Did Foley's Resignation Reveal Hypocrisy in Congress?

[Rach3]

Just another politician at work...

WASHINGTON - Rep. Mark Foley (news, bio, voting record), R-Fla., resigned from Congress on Friday, effective immediately, in the wake of questions about e-mails he wrote a former teenage male page.
...
ABC News reported Friday that Foley also engaged in a series of sexually explicit instant messages with current and former teenage male pages...

Foley, as chairman of the Missing and Exploited Children's Caucus, had introduced legislation in July to protect children from exploitation by adults over the Internet. He also sponsored other legislation designed to protect minors from abuse and neglect.

"We track library books better than we do sexual predators," Foley has said.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060929/ap_on_go_co/congressman_e_mails

 

[Ivan Seeking]

He must be guilty as sin considering how quickly he resigned.

 

[Astronuc]

BobG posted a link - http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15063977/ - in What will happen in the 2006 mid-term elections?

Foley, as chairman of the Missing and Exploited Children's Caucus,. . .

Talk about the Fox guarding the Chicken coop.

Whatever happened to family values?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

What? He was exploiting children; like the job title says...

 

[Rach3]

October surprise?

And now it seems that Republican leadership knew about this all long, and didn't act! Hastert was complicit in this! This could be a major campaigning point for the DNC...

Rep.: Hastert told of Foley months ago

WASHINGTON - Rep. Thomas Reynolds (news, bio, voting record), head of the House Republican election effort, said he told Speaker Dennis Hastert after learning a fellow GOP lawmaker sent inappropriate messages to a teenage boy.
...
"Congressman Reynolds' inaction in the face of such a serious situation is very troubling, and raises important questions about whether there was an attempt to cover up criminal activity involving a minor to keep it from coming to light before election day," said
Democratic National Committee spokeswoman Karen Finney.

New York Democrats hoping to unseat Reynolds blasted the congressman, saying they call into question the Republican's values.

"Mr. Reynolds knew about these allegedly inappropriate emails from a fellow congressman to a minor for months and didn't lift a finger," said Blake Zeff, a spokesman for the state Democrats.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060930/ap_on_go_co/foley_reynolds

 

[Ivan Seeking]

It looks like we have another gate - Foleygate.

 

[edward]

Apparently a lot of people knew about Foleys actions and did not inform authorities.
According to the ABC video below High school kids were warned about Foley when they Came to D.C. as interns.

http://www.wonkette.com/politics/abc/

 

[Cyrus]

Ewwwwwwwwwww. I've seen those offices, and there are TONS of HOT female secretaries. Why molest underage boys when you can have hot legal women.

I guess that's why he's a crazy nut-job.

 

[Rach3]

Congress has sprung into action. There is now a toll-free hotline for boys solicited by members of Congress.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061001/ap_on_go_co/foley_reynolds

 

[Astronuc]

Congress has sprung into action. There is now a toll-free hotline for boys solicited by members of Congress.

After the fact - after the bull left the pen, they close the gate. Or maybe the open a new gate as Ivan mentioned.

 

[Skyhunter]

Congress has sprung into action. There is now a toll-free hotline for boys solicited by members of Congress.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061001/ap_on_go_co/foley_reynolds

But, with Rep. Foley gone, who will they put in charge of the hot-line?

 

[Rach3]

The implication being, that there are so many Congressionally-solicited pages that they need their own toll-free hot line.

 

[Astronuc]

The implication being, that there are so many Congressionally-solicited pages that they need their own toll-free hot line.

No - I think the comment about the hotline (as in Runaway/Missing hotline, which many states and localities have) is a sarcastic remark concerning the fact that Foley was chairman of the Missing and Exploited Children's Caucus.

It's very sad to see this, but a psychologist reminded me that pedophiles usually endear themselves to children, e.g. Boy Scout leaders, Youth conselors in camps or religious institutions, and so on. In fact, when I was about 15, I had an interaction with a Boy Scout leader who was seemingly too friendly with the boys. When he invited me on a hike and then suggested I remove my clothes - in an area away from the other scouts - I pretty much concluded that he was a pedophile (although at the time I didn't know the term). I think others caught on too. He left scouting shortly after that, and another man took over the troop. I became less active in the scouts after that, and subsequently moved.

He took pains to befriend the 16- and 17-year-old aides, several former pages said in interviews on Sunday. He chatted with them on the House floor, they said, sent handwritten notes and urged them to keep in touch when they left Washington for their hometowns.
. . .
“You didn’t have a lot of interaction with the members because most of them treated you like a kid, but he was pretty friendly,” said Ms. Gallo, who served as a page in 2001. “He would talk to people,” she said.

“He would say, ‘Here’s my e-mail address if you want to keep in touch.’ I don’t think anyone thought anything of it. They saw him as a mentor or a reference.”
. . .
But despite Mr. Foley’s warm demeanor, Mr. McDonald and another former page said they later became aware that the lawmaker might have a darker side. Mr. McDonald said he learned that Mr. Foley had sexually explicit Internet conversations with several pages who had left the program. “I was disgusted, but I was not surprised when these revelations started circulating,” he said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/02/washington/02pages.html

Mentoring is a great privelege, but Foley abused it. It is a great shame, and also that the House leadership seemingly dismissed the early alarms. That speaks volumes for the leadership of this country - not the kind of leadership the country needs or deserves.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

... "I strongly believe that I am an alcoholic and have accepted the need for immediate treatment for alcoholism and other behavioral problems," Foley, a Republican, said in a statement, Roth told the AP. [continued]

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/2003285252_webfoley02.html

Okay, he may also have an alcohol problem, but that's not THE problem.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

..."Congressman Reynolds' inaction in the face of such a serious situation is very troubling, and raises important questions about whether there was an attempt to cover up criminal activity involving a minor to keep it from coming to light before election day," said Democratic National Committee spokeswoman Karen Finney. [continued]

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?id=2512011

Who knew what and when did they know it?

 

[Skyhunter]

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/2003285252_webfoley02.html

Okay, he may also have an alcohol problem, but that's not THE problem.

It seems that guys like Foley who advocate prison over treatment for drug addicts are the first to blame their problems on alcohol abuse and seek treatment.

Or is this just the mid-term damage control for the Republicans, first Bob Ney, now Foley. I can't remember, did DeLay claim alcoholism?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

There is talk of criminal charges.

 

[turbo]

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?id=2512011

Who knew what and when did they know it?

This is critical. Apparently, the House GOP leadership was aware of this in 2005 and the people in the page program were aware of it, but did nothing apart from talking to Foley. Hastert first claimed that he knew nothing of Foley's contacts with the pages, and when evidence to the contrary arose, he changed his story to admit that he only knew of contacts that were "overly friendly". What is the problem here, boys and girls? When a Congressman is "overly friendly" to minor boys, isn't that a synonym for pedophilia? And nobody thought to look into things a bit? Everyone who knew of his activities and failed to act or to follow up appropriately should resign immediately, including Reynolds and Hastert, and anybody else who covered for this slime-ball. Their silence makes them complicit in pedophilia and they should be charged, as well.

The people at the top (like Hastert) are grasping for "plausible deniability" to save their butts. I predict that the next step will be a "thorough" and very brief Congressional investigation that exonerates all the enablers at the top of the party, in the hope that the public will not demand a real investigation.

 

[Skyhunter]

The people at the top (like Hastert) are grasping for "plausible deniability" to save their butts. I predict that the next step will be a "thorough" and very brief Congressional investigation that exonerates all the enablers at the top of the party, in the hope that the public will not demand a real investigation.

At the very least this demonstrates a huge failure of leadership. This should be a wake up call to Republicans that the leadership of their party is corrupt and incompetent.

 

[McGyver]

This is critical. Apparently, the House GOP leadership was aware of this in 2005 and the people in the page program were aware of it, but did nothing apart from talking to Foley. Hastert first claimed that he knew nothing of Foley's contacts with the pages, and when evidence to the contrary arose, he changed his story to admit that he only knew of contacts that were "overly friendly".

The people at the top (like Hastert) are grasping for "plausible deniability" to save their butts.

Apparently, hypocracy on the conservative Christian right, has no bounds!

 

[Rach3]

Why were there complaints filed to a Republican congressman in 2005, and nowhere else? Wouldn't a criminal complaint be the first step?

 

[turbo]

Why were there complaints filed to a Republican congressman in 2005, and nowhere else? Wouldn't a criminal complaint be the first step?

Apparently, when children are being abused by someone with wealth and power, the Republican leadership in Congress will look away and later claim that they didn't know the whole story. You can bet if Barney Frank had shown any attention to a minor, the story would have been blasted all over the news (FOX, anyone?). This stinks!

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I had to laugh at a guy who was on CNN today. He was the head of the center for family values or something similar, and his position was that the Republicans were probably hesitant to pursue the matter because Foley is a homosexual. He thinks they were afraid of looking politically incorrect.

In other words, if I understood his point correctly, if we didn't have homosexuals in congress [and the Republican party] then we wouldn't have these problems!

 

[Skyhunter]

I had to laugh at a guy who was on CNN today. He was the head of the center for family values or something similar, and his position was that the Republicans were probably hesitant to pursue the matter because Foley is a homosexual. He thinks they were afraid of looking politically incorrect.

In other words, if I understood his point correctly, if we didn't have homosexuals in congress [and the Republican party] then we wouldn't have these problems!

That is rich, Republicans concerned about being PC.

Don't post a link if I watch it I might need stitches in my side.

 

[Skyhunter]

Here is a letter to the editor that was in my paper this morning.

Editor -- During the Clinton/Lewinsky scandal, the country was treated to a year of somber-looking Republicans trooping before television cameras, shaking their heads sadly and asking, "What will we tell our children when they ask us about the president's lying about having sex with another woman?"
The answer now seems abundantly clear. Tell them that Republicans will go to the ends of the Earth to persecute a Democrat who cheated on his wife and lied about it, but they will close ranks, cover-up for and enable a Republican pedophile, who preyed on the children under their protection. How comforting to know that our White House and Congress are being led by the party of family values.


CAROLE MILLS
San Rafael

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2006/10/03/EDG6PKDUFS1.DTL

Nothing like a little historical perspective.

 

[Skyhunter]

Just so there is no doubt that the Republican leadership tried to cover this up...

Here's the new part. As we noted earlier today, ABC's Brian Ross has told the Washington Post's Howard Kurtz that a strategist for Foley tried to cut a deal with him last week: Ross doesn't disclose the sexually explicit instant messages Foley sent to pages, and the strategist gets Ross an "exclusive" on Foley's resignation. Thanks to AMERICAblog's John Aravosis, we know now that that strategist was Kirk Fordham.

Who is Fordham? He's a former chief of staff for Foley who is currently the chief of staff for Reynolds. Reynolds, it seems, lent Fordham's services to Foley to help him navigate his way out of the page scandal. And what does that mean? It means, as Glenn Greenwald explains, that "the top aide to one of the Republican House leaders, as recently as last Friday, tried to suppress the most incriminating and important facts regarding this scandal. Isn't that the very definition of 'cover-up'?"

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/index.html?source=newsletter

 

[turbo]

Please go to Yahoo! news and click on the relevant ABC news clips on the Foley affair. This goes way back. Pages were being warned at least as far back as 5 years ago to keep their distance from Foley. In light of this, Hastert's protestations about how shocked he is about Foley's pedophilia are impossible to believe. As the most powerful member of the House, he would have been privy not only to information in official channels, but to gossip and allegations from and about other members wishing to advance their own agendas. Surely, some of the people aware of Foley's activities gave Hastert a heads-up on the potential for scandal and embarrasment, if they didn't outright call for Hastert to do something drastic to protect the children involved. His "surprise" is unconvincing.

 

[Skyhunter]

Please go to Yahoo! news and click on the relevant ABC news clips on the Foley affair. This goes way back. Pages were being warned at least as far back as 5 years ago to keep their distance from Foley. In light of this, Hastert's protestations about how shocked he is about Foley's pedophilia are impossible to believe. As the most powerful member of the House, he would have been privy not only to information in official channels, but to gossip and allegations from and about other members wishing to advance their own agendas. Surely, some of the people aware of Foley's activities gave Hastert a heads-up on the potential for scandal and embarrasment, if they didn't outright call for Hastert to do something drastic to protect the children involved. His "surprise" is unconvincing.

By his own admission, Hastert said he may have heard about it from Reynolds, when Reynolds was briefing him about it as something that might affect campaigns.

REPORTER: Congressman Reynolds put out a statement on Saturday saying that he told you in the spring. Do you think he’s lying?

HASTERT: No, I’m not saying. I just don’t recall him telling me that. If he would have told me that, he would have told me that in the context of maybe a half a dozen or a dozen other things. I don’t remember that.

REPORTER: Other allegations of improper e-mails?

HASTERT: No, just other things that might have affected campaigns.

Watch the http://thinkprogress.org/2006/10/02/hastert-foley-campaigns/

Hmmm, so this is telling about how the Republican leadership works.

Reynolds; Hey, one of our members might be a pedophile.

Hastert; Is he in trouble?

Reynolds; No, the family got what they wanted.

Hastert; Will it affect the campaign?

Reynolds; No. It has been dealt with.


And what about the way Foley supported the troops.

Florida Rep. Mark Foley once told a former House page that he's never too busy to masturbate, and he apparently meant what he said. In a new IM exchange just posted by http://blogs.abcnews.com/theblotter/2006/10/new_foley_insta.html, Foley appears to have taken time out for some long-distance sexual satisfaction with a former page in the midst of a House vote on emergency wartime supplemental appropriations in 2003.

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/index.html?source=newsletter

 

[Yonoz]

Florida Rep. Mark Foley once told a former House page that he's never too busy to masturbate

What a great moto.

 

[Astronuc]

That dude is in serious need of help. A psychologist I know mentioned that someone in his shoes would likely check into an alcohol or some type of rehab program in order to avoid prosecution. The guy knows right from wrong, and he made a choice. He only has himself to blame.

I do think Hastert and Reynolds need to resign from Congress. We don't need leaders who behave in this manner.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Foley_scandal

Matthew Loraditch, the president of the Page Alumni Association stated that in 2001 he and other pages were warned by Republican staffers to "watch out for Congressman Mark Foley." Loraditch clarified by stating that he had been not been warned, but rather told informally by a supervisor that "Foley was a bit odd or flaky" but not that he should be avoided. Another former page stated "It was so well known around the House. Pages passed it along from class to class."

Foley's 2005 e-mail to a congressional page, sponsored by Rep. Rodney Alexander (R-La.), prompted Alexander to inform Rep. Thomas M. Reynolds (R-N.Y.), chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, apparently after a news reporter brought the matter to his Alexander's attention some months before the scandal broke. Reynolds said he spoke to the family of the page and in turn informed the Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert. The matter was also referred to the non-partisan clerk of the U.S. House of Representatives, and the House Page Committee chairperson, Rep. John Shimkus (R-IL), but the issue was not brought up before the entire House Page Committee (which included Democratic members of the House).

Talk about obstruction, especially if this was 'well-known' since 2001. Well afterall, Foley did help Bush in Florida.

sick, sick, sick, sick . . . .

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Have you all heard about this?

... Rush Limbaugh had Hastert on his show, with Hastert claiming that the Foley Scandal Is A Liberal Conspiracy To 'Get To Me' And 'Affect Our Election.' He promised Limbaugh "we are going on offense." The "offense" is an effort to portray the scandal as a conspiracy specifically timed by liberals. ...

http://www.alternet.org/blogs/themix/42538/

I haven't found another link but saw it reported on CNN.

 

[Astronuc]

Apparently

on July 21, 2006, two months before the scandal broke, the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) received copies of the emails. On that day, CREW turned over the emails to the FBI; however, the FBI found insufficient grounds to open a criminal investigation. After the scandal broke, CREW asked the Justice Department's Inspector General to investigate that decision.

Well, it may be that the particular emails were not explicit enough. Had Foley been notified not to contact the page, but continued to do so, that might have been a cause.

On the other hand - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Foley_scandal#Events

http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=newsOne&storyID=2006-10-04T015959Z_01_N01292632_RTRUKOC_0_US-FOLEY.xml&WTmodLoc=Home-C1-TopStories-newsOne-2

By John Whitesides, Political Correspondent

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - House of Representatives Republican leaders faced growing pressure over a congressional sex scandal on Tuesday, with Speaker Dennis Hastert rejecting calls to step down amid Republican fears about the potential fallout in November's fight for control of Congress.

The conservative Washington Times newspaper accused Hastert of barely pursuing warnings about Florida Rep. Mark Foley's sexual messages to teenage boys and said in an editorial he "must do the only right thing, and resign his speakership at once."

Hastert has denied any knowledge of Foley's overtly sexual Internet messages to male congressional pages until they were made public on Friday, and he rejected calls for his resignation.

 

[Skyhunter]

Did you check out the ad for http://www.pattywetterling.com/media/crimes.php

She is wasting no time taking advantage of it. I should check to see where she stands in the polls, but I need to go to bed.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Okay, it looks like this is the real quote. I can't find anything supporting what was reported earlier re Limbaugh and Hastert.

RUSH: Well, it's clear to me that what the Democrats are doing here in some sort of cooperation with some in the media is to suppress conservative turnout by making it look like you guys knew this all along but because you're so interested in holding the House rather than protecting children that you covered it up

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_100306/content/eib_interview.guest.html

 

[Astronuc]

Does one think the Washington Times sees it this way? Is the Washington Times going to manipulated by a Liberal/Democratic conspiracy?

These are the same guys who are giving extraordinary powers to the president, who have failed in their responsibilities to provides 'checks and balances', and who apparently did know that something was going on regarding Foley and some congressional pages (as is evident in their own words and actions - even including not bringing the matter before the entire House Page Committee (which included Democratic members of the House)).

Yes, there does appear to be a conspiracy - obstruction of justice on the part of Hastert, Reynolds, and perhaps some other republicans.