A Republican congressman from New York state has resigned amid media reports he had flirted online with a woman to whom he sent a shirtless photograph.

Chris Lee, a married 46-year-old with one son, was first elected in 2008.

In a statement on his website, he said he regretted harming his family, staff and constituents, adding: "I deeply and sincerely apologise to them all."

Republicans gained control of the House of Representatives in the November mid-term elections.

"The challenges we face in western New York and across the country are too serious for me to allow this distraction to continue, and so I am announcing that I have resigned my seat in Congress effective immediately," Mr Lee said.

Mr Lee resigned his seat hours after news and gossip website Gawker.com posted e-mail correspondence it said had been sent between the congressman and a 34-year-old single woman he met on the classifieds site Craigslist.
Muscle flexed

The woman, who has not been identified, had posted a note in the "women seeking men" section saying she was looking for an attractive and "financially and emotionally secure" man aged 30 to 40, Gawker reported.

In the e-mails, Mr Lee - who used his real name and e-mail address - described himself inaccurately as a 39-year-old divorced lobbyist, Gawker said.

He said he was a "fit fun classy guy", and sent a photograph of himself posing shirtless in dark slacks in front of a mirror, flexing a bicep.

Mr Lee, who was elected to his second two-year term in November, has been a relatively low-profile, backbench member of the Republican House caucus.

Last year, a congressional ethics panel launched an inquiry after Mr Lee held a fundraising event within 48 hours of a House vote on a financial services regulation reform bill, which he voted against.

The panel dropped the matter in January.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-12413047

It seems nothing more than our MP's have got up to. Though maybe infidelity is regarded much more severely in the US. Maybe I am jaded by all our scandals?

We haven't had an infidelity scandal for quite some time though have we? Beyond Wacky Jaqui's husband charging 'gentleman's cinema' to the state. Financial scandal is much juicier for the press because it can in theory lead to MPs going to gaol, which makes for several stories (accusation, arrest, various trials, appeal, final sentence) whereas infidelity is at most two stories (adultery, divorce). I suspect when the financial stories slow down (i.e. when they start being a bit smarter about it) we'll get back to the 'MP shagging secretary' stories again.

Infidelity I think is more of thing over there because their financial scandals aren't as a scandalous - their arrangements are different, there's much less chance to defraud the state and taking large donations from wealthy benefactors is pretty much accepted as the way things are done.

Jon

I would accept that they are a more moralist bunch. The options for corruption are far greater than here. Lots of US politicians end up in jail or out of office for financial irregularities.

It was the incredibly stupid way he went about it that made me laugh

Oh, and you'd have to go a long way to beat Iris Robinson - sexual and financial

Bear in mind that the Republican party is the political wing of the conservative right-wing Christian population, and they tend to take a dim view of infidelity, much more so than over here. A Democrat would certainly have had more chance of getting away with it.

Maybe so but the Republicans always target Democratic candidate sexual history.

Speaking of dimwit Republicans, did anyone see the Today show with Jon Stewart? They said that some Republicans were trying to stop Federal funding for abortions in cases of rape, only allowing funding for "forcible rape" instead. Anyone care to figure that one out?

Yes the new definition of rape rape rather than rape-ish.

All rape is forced whether you use drugs or alcohol to make it easier. In the US I have heard of a case where a husband raped his wife then locked her up for days till the injuries disappeared. It was a simple case of one persons word against another.

Now there's a contradiction in terms.


It's risible isn't it?

"Didn't deserve it" rape gets money whereas "Asking for it" rape doesn't.

Twunts.

Agreed, I do like that line about 'the problem with the Christian Right is that they are invariably neither'.

Ooooo

Who was that then?

It was something my brother posted on Facebook a while back, not sure of the origin.

I have a suspicion I heard it on radio 4's News Quiz, although I dare say that is not where it originated.

NSFW


Yay, the Guardian have kindly supplied the picture in question: