On sex scandals, Democrats are now the Puritans and it could cost them Democrats haven't always occupied the moral high ground. Republicans may end up benefiting from the opposition's newly discovered virtue.

Ross K. Baker | Opinion columnist

Show Caption Hide Caption Ryan says sexual harassment won't be tolerated House Speaker Paul Ryan says sexual harassment shouldn't exist anywhere, "let alone in the United States Congress" - and he says it won't be tolerated. (Nov. 29)

Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore may be a skeevy mall-creeper and President Trump a boastful Lothario, but somehow their transgressions seem less out of character than the same offenses committed by men who have earned a reputation as advocates of gender equality. Such practitioners of “do as I say not as I do” are tarnished by what Abraham Lincoln called “the base alloy of hypocrisy”.

Republicans don’t get a pass because they are less identified with issues of gender equality. Their tepid support for such things as pay equity, as seen in their resistance to “equal pay for equal work” bills, may simply be concern for their impact on businesses. But the result has been that Republicans are tagged as soft on workplace discrimination.

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The revelation that Sen. Al Franken had made invasive passes at a fellow entertainer on a USO tour drew a fierce reaction among Democrats, including some of his most liberal Senate colleagues. It wasn’t shock so much as a sense of betrayal of principles he had previously professed: He was one of ours and he went over to the dark side.

It does appear today as if liberals are less forgiving of those in public life whose actions make a mockery of their principles, than conservatives whose politicians commit moral turpitude even as they spout family and Christian values. Moore is only the latest example of this dispensation.

Rep. Scott DesJarlais, a physician who represents a Bible Belt district in Tennessee, was revealed in 2012 to have counseled his mistress, also his patient, to have an abortion. And yet DesJarlais went on to win reelection in 2012, 2014 and 2016.

Perhaps conservatives are more disposed then liberals to think in terms of sin and forgiveness. Certainly the people of Louisiana were more lenient toward Sen. David Vitter, whose name appeared in the address book of a Washington, D.C. madam in 2007, than New Yorkers were the following year with Gov. Eliot Spitzer. When the news broke that he was involved with a high-priced prostitute, Spitzer was forced to step down. Vitter was re-elected in 2010.

It’s true that 2010 was a good year for Republicans, but one is tempted to wonder about the emergence of a more unyielding moral standard in blue states. Clearly it wasn’t always the case that liberals rushed to condemn prominent Democrats who behaved badly.

No public figure was so celebrated for expressing moral indignation than Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy, whose private life was cluttered with casual liaisons, roaring binges and, tragically, involvement in the July 1969 death of Mary Jo Kopechne. Kennedy received token legal punishment but few calls from fellow Democrats to step down. Why Democrats continued to revere him can be explained simply by the fact that he was a Kennedy.

Equally problematic for liberals was their silence about Bill Clinton’s behavior, both before and during his presidency. Class bias might account for their rejection of the women who came forward with accusations of unwanted sexual advances and worse. As Clinton ally James Carville put it, in a comment that may have backfired, "If you drag a hundred dollar bill through a trailer park, you never know what you'll find."

Clinton’s defenders were also disdainful of Monica Lewinsky, who was 22 years old at the time of her involvement with the married 49-year-old president. While not a minor, she was hardly an age-appropriate sex partner.

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Perhaps the most painful recent example of the misanthropic liberal is Rep. John Conyers, the Michigan Democrat first elected in 1964. A founder of the Congressional Black Caucus, House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi just last weekend proclaimed him a civil rights “icon” who “has done a great deal to protect women.”

But several female former employees had accused Conyers of sexually harassing them, including one who received a settlement, and Pelosi predicted he would do “the right thing.” So far that has meant stepping down as senior member of the House Judiciary Committee, but some in Congress are pressing him to resign.

Among the electoral advantages enjoyed by conservative politicians, in addition to occupying House districts gerrymandered for them by GOP-dominated state legislatures, is a disposition on the part of Republicans to shrug when they hear stories about their politicians mistreating women. Perhaps it is Democrats, with their newly- discovered virtue, who have become the more puritanical party. Occupying the moral high ground, however, may come at a high political price.

Ross K. Baker is a distinguished professor of political science at Rutgers University and a member of USA TODAY's Board of Contributors. Follow him on Twitter: @Rosbake1