It's Hitting the Fan

Update: A brief portrait of Mark Foley at Faithful Democrats, a site by people who are Democrats and Christians : "Foley made get-tough laws on sexually exploited children -- particularly exploitation over the Internet -- one of his primary crusades in Congress." He also was outspoken about his Christian (specifically Catholic) faith. The combination got his an 84% positive rating from the Christian coalition in 2004.

The site then says: Foley rails against the depraved; he is the depraved. Foley attacks the predators; he is a predator. Our question: where are the denunciations from the religious right? Where is Focus on the Family? Where is the Family Research Council? Do they only care about sexual misconduct when it's committed by a Democrat? The hypocrisy doesn't belong to Foley alone. The hypocrisy belongs to everyone who rails against sexual sin for political purposes then delivers a sermon of silence when the sinner happens to advance a right-wing, Republican agenda.


When a story this big (the sudden resignation of a Republican Member of Congress over sexually suggestive emails) grows by the minute, a lot of people get caught saying things they wish they hadn't, about five minutes after they've said it. This can vary from just getting beat on the story (like CNN did Chris Matthews: while Matthews guests were trying to figure out why Congressman Foley resigned over the relatively tame emails first released, CNN had the new and more explicit ones, and suddenly there was no mystery) to charges you're likely to regret real soon.

Like these from Republican loyalists in Florida: Ganter said she questions the timing of the reports, given the election is 39 days away. Ganter said it's suspicious that the e-mails have popped up shortly after Republican Virginia Sen. George Allen was painted as a racist."It's a big coincidence that all these things are happening to our fine conservative party," Ganter said. "It does make one wonder."

By Friday night it was becoming clear that the timing was months and perhaps a year late--that at least some of the Republican leadership knew about Foley's sexually explicit emails to under-age pages (or former pages), and Speaker of the House Dennis Hassert may have known for at least six weeks.

Or at least according to one high ranking Republican, who had second thoughts of a different kind about what he said. The Washington Post reported: " House Majority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) told The Washington Post last night that he had learned this spring of inappropriate "contact" between Foley and a 16-year-old page. Boehner said he then told House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.). Boehner later contacted The Post and said he could not remember whether he talked to Hastert." Apparently their fine conservative party was going to help re-elect Foley anyway.