Drunk-driving, red-light-running senator is 'grateful to have this matter resolved'

Sen. Mike Crapo (R-drunk) It sure is nice to be a senator, isn't it? Boozing it up in D.C., joyriding around Virginia in the middle of the night, running red lights, blowing a field sobriety test when you get pulled over'and then pretty much just walking away with a slap on the wrist:

Sen. Mike Crapo pleaded guilty to a drunken driving charge in Virginia on Friday, agreeing to have his license suspended for one year, take alcohol awareness classes and pay a $250 fine.

A 180-day jail sentence for the Idaho Republican has been suspended on the condition of good behavior. [...]

A second charge, for running a red light, was dropped.

Sure, you might think that Sen. Crapo is getting off easy because he's a senator. But, see, he had a really good reason for getting hammered:

'It was a poor choice to use alcohol to relieve stress, and was at odds with my personally held and religious beliefs, ' Crapo said outside the Alexandria General District Court.

See? Most people use alcohol for bad reasons. Or because using alcohol is consistent with their personally held and religious beliefs. And that's certainly no excuse for drunk driving. But the good senator? He was stressed, see, because being a Republican obstructionist is damned hard work and sometimes, even if you claim to be a devout Mormon who does not drink, well, you've got to find some way to relieve your stress, and what better way than to knock back a few vodka tonics'which apparently, even though Crapo is not a drinker, he just happened to have laying around in his D.C. apartment, where he was drinking alone before he decided to "to go out for a drive and get out of my apartment and try to wind down."

Uh huh.

But whatever. That's all tonic water under the bridge now because Crapo said he's "profoundly sorry" and "grateful to have this matter resolved and will follow through on the sentence imposed by the court." Big of him to promise to fulfill the court sentence, isn't it?

Despite Crapo's insistence that this is all over now, the question still remains: Why was Crapo in Virginia on the Sunday before Christmas instead of Idaho, with his wife and five children, after all his fellow members of Congress had gone home for the holiday?