Republican Pedophile Scandal: They Knew

1:21 am EST September 30th, 2006 | Republicans | 54 Comments

Apparently several members of the Republican leadership knew there was a man interested sexually in boys in their midst and they kept quiet about it.

The resignation rocked the Capitol, and especially Foley’s GOP colleagues, as lawmakers were rushing to adjourn for at least six weeks. House Majority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) told The Washington Post last night that he had learned this spring of some "contact" between Foley and a 16-year-old page. Boehner said he told House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.), and that Hastert assured him "we’re taking care of it."

Here is the question I want answered: is the Republican leadership so focused on holding on to power, to keeping their majority in the congress, that they were willing to keep quiet probable pedophilia?

UPDATE: Boehner is now claiming he didn’t know and didn’t tell Hastert. So why did he tell that to the Post?

John Aravosis has more on the timeline of Republican knowledge.

The Palm Beach Post:

Congressional staff members who asked not to be identified said it was widely known among Hill staffers and some House leaders that Foley had been engaging in inappropriate conduct and language with young aides.

One highly placed staff member said Foley’s abrupt resignation may have been demanded by Republican leaders who have been aware for some time about allegations of inappropriate behavior.

Foley’s campaign staff had said Foley routinely asked for pictures of former interns and others who might be seeking a recommendation.

Rep Pelosi has passed a resolution requiring an immediate investigation.

“For nearly a year, Republican leaders have known of the egregious behavior of Congressman Mark Foley, yet were prepared to adjourn tonight without an Ethics Committee investigation. But because Democrats forced a vote on a privileged resolution, the House has now acted unanimously to have the Ethics Committee conduct a bipartisan investigation.

“The investigation must determine when Mr. Foley sent the inappropriate emails, who knew of them, whether there was a pattern of inappropriate activity by Mr. Foley with pages or former pages, when the Republican leadership was notified, and what corrective action was taken once officials learned of any improper activity.

“For more than 150 years, children from across the nation have come to Washington to serve as pages in the U.S. Capitol. The Page School is a national treasure, and the children who attend it and work in the Congress are our special trust. Members of Congress have a responsibility to protect their employees, especially young pages who serve this institution.”

One or more Republican Reps had the information on Foley’s predatory behavior last year yet chose (conveniently) not to tell the Democrats.

For probably the first time in history I agree – in part – with a Free Republic poster:

If anyone else knew about Foley and what he was doing, then I would think they’ll also be expected to resign. How could they, if they knew there were suspicions about him, put him charge of the house caucus on missing exploited children. What the hell were they thinking. I can just see Pelosi have a field day with this one, sheesh, I can’t take that woman.

It’s the resigning part I agree with. I like Rep. Pelosi.

Did Republican Leadership Know About Foley’s Emails?

9:10 pm EST September 29th, 2006 | Politics | 2 Comments

From the AP’s coverage.

The page worked for Rep. Rodney Alexander, R-La., who said Friday that when he learned of the e-mail exchanges 10 to 11 months ago, he called the teen’s parents. Alexander told the Ruston Daily Leader, “We also notified the House leadership that there might be a potential problem,” a reference to the House’s Republican leaders.

If this is correct, the GOP house leadership knew of these charges at least 10 months ago and nothing was done until ABC investigated.

Americablog has more.

Michelle Malkin Bikini Shots?

7:59 pm EST September 29th, 2006 | Uncategorized | 15 Comments

Possibly real?
Possibly fake?
Does Malkin eat puppies?
Is Michelle Malkin a serial liar?
Michelle Malkin: Threat To Freedom?
Michelle Malkin: An Al Qaeda Operative?

We’ve got questions?
Questions swirl.

Topic: Humor

Mark Foley Is Out Over Salacious Emails

3:09 pm EST September 29th, 2006 | Republicans | 19 Comments

Yesterday when I wrote about this, Jay Caruso said I hit a new low. I now recommend a drink for him.

AP: Foley submits resignation to Congress

Rep. Foley considering resigning

Foley resigned because of his Republican family values:

Hours earlier, ABC News had read excerpts of instant messages provided by former male pages who said the congressman, under the AOL Instant Messenger screen name Maf54, made repeated references to sexual organs and acts.

Yes, Republican Mark Foley is a pedophile.

And of course, the reaction from the wingnut idiots at Redstate:

I will refrain from pointing out that Barney Frank is still in Congress and I will refrain from daring to suggest that this is just another example of why the policy against gay scoutmasters in the Boy Scouts is a good one.

When confronted with a Republican pedophile, the Republican reaction is to smear a gay Democrat and all gay Americans. Nice.

UPDATE: He’s removed them now. Good thing some of us notice these things.

AN IDEA: Tell Mark Foley to donate his considerable campaign war chest to a charity for abused kids.

HOLY COW: ABC has posted the full IM transcripts. They are very explicit, and very very wrong.

Twilight Of The Truly Dumb

2:35 pm EST September 29th, 2006 | News | 11 Comments

Writing at The Moderate Voice, Jack Grant says that this so-called mea culpa from a con blogger is worthy of praise. Bull.

The right has supported the Iraq war through thick and thin, ignoring all the bad news and consistently wagging their finger at the left and slamming the media for not covering the latest happy Iraqi story about some school that opened while car bombs go off every 15 minutes.

This was a Republican war enabled by a whipped congress. It is a Republican war continued by a Republican administration so tied up in domestic success it refuses to change strategy or tactics that could lead to greater safety for Americans and Iraqis. The blood of our troops and Iraqi innocents is on the hands of the enablers of this war.

A mea culpa three years after the fact from such vehement war supporters is kinda bull.

Michael Steele Is Tapped Out

2:30 am EST September 29th, 2006 | News | 6 Comments

The national scenario for the GOP is pretty bad, so they’re putting their resources in the races that really need it – meaning the ones they can win. Michael Steele’s race is a longshot at best for a Republican, and now Steele has gone public panhandling the national GOP so it doesn’t abandon him.

Maryland Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele has been reaching out to key Republican leaders in recent days, urging them to continue directing resources to his U.S. Senate bid.

In an interview yesterday, Steele confirmed what some people close to his campaign have said privately — that tightening races in other key states have taken priority in the year since high-ranking Republicans persuaded Steele to run, in part by promising the party’s lasting financial support.

Essentially the National RNC is telling Steele he’s on his own, which is bad news because the amount of GOP donors he’ll be able to whip up in MD isn’t exactly on par with what the national party could do – no wonder he’s been using the GOP prostitute’s old boss to scrape up cash…

Two sources close to Steele said that the campaign team began to sense
that the party’s financial commitments had essentially dried up as the
senatorial committee has seen more pressing needs arise in states where
sitting senators are under fire from Democratic challengers. Both
sources spoke on the condition that they not be named, because they
were discussing the internal workings of the campaign. The party has
paid for ads in three states: Missouri, Ohio and Tennessee.

It’s getting so bad for Steele that Ken Mehlman isn’t returning his phone calls!

One of the sources said concern heightened when Steele tried to reach
RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman this week and was unable to get a response. A
spokesman for Mehlman said the chairman received a call from Steele
yesterday and returned it.

And of course, one of the most popular pols in America, Barack Obama just came in to town to rally for Rep. Cardin while his primary opponent, Kweisi Mfume, gave Cardin a strong endorsement ("You gotta put this guy in the Senate")…

But hey, he does love puppies.

Topic: 2006 Election, Maryland, Michael Steele

Senator Obama Clear Frontrunner In OW.Com Primary

1:19 am EST September 29th, 2006 | News | 5 Comments

Superman connection vaults Illinois senator to top of the heap

(Takoma Park, MD) — Senator Barack Obama of Illinois became a clear frontrunner in the valuable OliverWillis.com presidential primary today with the discovery of a previously unknown picture of Sen. Obama and Superman. “We thought the senator was super before, but with this picture his star has now hit heroic levels.”, said Oliver Willis, the president of OliverWillis.com. As part of his job, Senator Obama represents the town of Metropolis, Illinois, the “home” of Superman so his connection to the Man of Steel has often been rumored but never confirmed with photographic evidence until now.

###

Topic: President Obama

Now That I Got That Out Of My System…

12:46 am EST September 29th, 2006 | Politics | 2 Comments

we’re going to try something different to see if we can’t kickstart a solution to the problem. And I mean “we” as in OliverWillis.com the virtual war room (I know I’m not the only damn Democrat to see this movie) of the Democratic party.

CK, man the guns.

Buying The White House

12:24 am EST September 29th, 2006 | Republicans | 1 Comment

The Republican culture of corruption refuses to die.

A bipartisan Congressional report documents hundreds of contacts between White House officials and the corrupt lobbyist Jack Abramoff and his partners, including at least 10 direct contacts between Mr. Abramoff and Karl Rove, the president’s chief political strategist.

The House Government Reform Committee report, based on e-mail messages and other records subpoenaed from Mr. Abramoff’s lobbying firm, found 485 contacts between Mr. Abramoff’s lobbying team and White House officials from 2001 to 2004, including 82 with Mr. Rove’s office.

You know, whenever stuff even remotely embarrasing comes out about a Democrat, the Republicans are screaming it from the rafters (and I’ve got to extend this to Gov. Dean – I strongly support the work he’s doing to fix the long term infrastructure of the party, but why is it barely a day goes by without Ken Mehlman on air talking up the GOP, but Gov. Dean’s appearances are few and far between?). Yet, the GOP continues to gift-wrap its corruption and mendacity and the sound from the Democrats is crickets chirping. They are so afraid to move ahead with something that hasn’t been poll tested to within an inch of its life, they end up just letting things pass by. And on the rare occasions that they do hit on something, they think just one press conference or just one press release is all it needs. I have communicated with one or two folks on the inside and it seems like they just don’t understand this. They think that just one presser, or just one email is doing the job while it’s just losing the game.

As I have noted before, the way the world works now – not the way we wish it would work, but the way it actually does – is that a political party must repeat, repeat, repeat its talking points to the point of exhaustion while hitting the press via press releases and activist contact until they begin covering it and the Republicans must respond.

But apart from the occasional campaign operation that gets it, Democrats refuse to do this. It seems irrational but the only conclusion I can keep coming to is that they actually want to lose. They’ve become so used to it, to being the whipped spouse that they think this is how things always have been and will remain.

Stop it. You make me sick. Fight. Stand up. Do Something.

The Media’s Double Standard For School Shootings

12:06 am EST September 29th, 2006 | Media | 2 Comments

What happened in Colorado was horrible, horrific, and devastating to a community. But I have to ask – why is it school shootings that are just as devastating that happen to occur in mostly black schools (and I’m not even saying urban black schools, I happen to have gone to a mostly black high school in suburban south Florida) don’t get this sort of high level treatment from the New York Times and the cable news channels?