David Norris, candidate for the Irish presidency, and remarks on paedophilia

David Norris, who has been an Irish Senator since 1987, is standing for president in the election due October of this year. He was the first openly gay member of either of the houses of parliament here and was the key force behind the decriminalization of homosexuality in Ireland in 1993 after he took the state to the European Court of Human Rights in 1988 (on a side note, his counsel in that case was Mary Robinson, President 1990-97, and the first legal aide to the Campaign for Homosexual Law Reform was Mary McAleese, our president since 1997).

To secure nomination, he needs the support of four of the 33 city or county councils (he has one so far), or the support of 20 of the 226 members of the Oireachtas (houses of parliament; he's standing as an Independent, and has got eight of the 26 Independents so far). Our president has no executive powers, but can refer questionable bills to the supreme court to check on constitutionality and refuse to call an election if an alternate government can be formed. Anyway, enough technical background, for more see Irish presidential election, 2011 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This past week, controversy arose over remarks he made in an interview in 2002 in which he said, among other things,

This article has fuller details, Norris labels resurfacing of Magill article as
and you can read the original interview from these links http://cdn.thejournal.ie/media/2011/05/DNmagill1.jpg http://cdn.thejournal.ie/media/2011/05/DNmagill2.jpg
http://cdn.thejournal.ie/media/2011/05/DNmagill3.jpg

Personally I find it completely politically naive that a political figure who might ever consider standing for president might say such things, and then get shocked when it's brought up again later. What do you think? I'd be interested in outsiders' opinions.