Democrat Eric Massa Retires From House

The official reason is cancer.  The unofficial reason:  nasty allegations he sexually harrassed a male staffer.

Rep. Eric Massa, D-New York, announced Wednesday that he will not seek re-election and denied a report that he harassed Capitol Hill staffers.


Massa, a cancer survivor, told reporters in a conference call that he was briefly hospitalized last December.
“I kept it private between myself and my immediate family,” Massa said. “It was a very intense and personal experience especially in light of having gone through this before.”

Massa said he keeps up a brisk pace "and my doctors have made it clear that I can no longer do that."

Kind of a weird case here, and Massa was one of the better progressives in the House.  Equally weird is CNN's report:

Massa is the 10th House Democrat to announce that he will not seek another term in the House nor run for a higher office in 2010. Seven House Republicans have also said they will outright retire at the close of the 111th Congress.

So if you go by this, you'd totally believe the Dems were bailing from the House in greater numbers than the Republicans.  It's just not true.   20 Republicans are retiring, the Dems are up to 14 now.

Funny how that works.