Washington- In his first public comments since word of Larry Craig’s arrest broke yesterday, Mitt Romney unloaded on his former backer, calling reports that the Idaho senator allegedly solicited an undercover cop in an airport bathroom “disgusting.”

“Once again, we’ve found people in Washington have not lived up to the level of respect and dignity that we would expect for somebody that gets elected to a position of high influence,” Romney told CNBC’s Larry Kudlow in a broadcast to be aired later. “Very disappointing. He’s no longer associated with my campaign, as you can imagine. … I’m sorry to see that he has fallen short.”

Craig was one of Romney’s top two backers in the Senate and had worked to round up support there for the former governor. After Craig’s bathroom encounter was reported, the Romney campaign moved to distance itself from the Idahoan, issuing a terse statement last night that it was no longer associated with Craig and that it didn’t want the senator to be a distraction.

But the candidate himself went much further today, seeking to tie Craig’s alleged search for a gay liasion to the broader pattern of corruption permeating Washington in recent years.

“I think it reminds us of Mark Foley and Bill Clinton,” Romney told Kudlow, in remarks reported on the network’s First Read blog. “I think it reminds us of the fact that people who are elected to public office continue to disappoint, and they somehow think that if they vote the right way on issues of significance or they can speak a good game, that we’ll just forgive and forget.”

“And the truth of the matter is, the most important thing we expect from… an elected official is a level of dignity and character that we can point to for our kids and our grandkids, and say, `Hey, someday I hope you grow up and you’re someone like that person.’ And we’ve seen disappointment in the White House, we’ve seen it in the Senate, we’ve seen it in Congress. And frankly, it’s disgusting.”

Romney’s quick move to not even give an early supporter the benefit of the doubt reflects two apparent calculations. First, the lurid details of this story and past whisperings about Craig make him politically radioactive right now. Locked in a wide open battle for president, a candidate who has so emphasized his traditional family and broader family values the way Romney has can’t afford any connection whatsoever to such a tawdry tale.

But there is also in Romney’s remarks a clear hint of trying to make lemonade out of lemons. Besides spotlighting his longtime wife — “my sweetheart,” he calls her — and five sons, Romney has gone to great lengths during his run to make plain that he’s not a career politician nor a creature of Washington. By tut-tutting Craig and construing his actions as yet another in a litany of Beltway transgression, Romney hopes to remind Republicans of the need for an outsider.