The WaPo has an op ed posted this morning demanding Speaker Hasterts resignation.
Sister Toldjah asks: Should he?
I will take it a step farther and challenge the premise on its foundation. I see nothing the Speaker has done or has not done to justify this, unless it is just for the partisan advantage of the Democrats.
Why? Because at this point and according to the information at hand, the Speaker only knew about the emails, not the Instant messages.
The emails are important because unless they are validated at a server level then remain the only proof of this incident aside from Foley’s public acknowledgment, and at their foundation they are harmless.
According to this sidebar at MSNBC:
Federal officials familiar with the very early assessment of the Mark Foley e-mails say that at this point, there's no clear indication that federal laws were violated.
The law that might be involved is the prohibition on "enticement," which makes it a crime to use any interstate means of communication to entice minors to engage in any sexual act. But it as a relatively high threshold for prosecution -- the communication must explicitly propose a sexual act. The initial assessment, and it's a very early read, is that none of the e-mails that have been made public meet that test.
The emails prove nothing. They are harmless, if borderline overly friendly.
Hastert had knowledge of them and took appropriate action based on their content:
Hastert, who did not take questions from reporters, called on any person who was aware of the 2003 instant messages to speak to law enforcement authorities. He said no Republican leader in Congress was aware of those exchanges until Friday, when ABC News reported it had questioned Foley about them.
Leadership officials had been aware since last year of the 2005 e-mail exchange, which they described as "overly friendly" but did not include overtly sexual references. They said they did not follow up on them other than to instruct Foley to not communicate with the Louisiana page.
Hastert was aware of the emails. Not the IMs.
The Instant messages, which conveniently can not be validated to any acceptable degree of evidence, and are easily faked, are the only "proofs’ of misconduct, and as yet no one has shown any proof that Hastert had knowledge of them. (The emails can also be faked, I must again remind everyone, and already show signs of tampering.)
If and when that proof emerges, then I will join the WaPo is blogging for his oust.
But said proof must include either clear knowledge of the IMs or previous information about other misconduct by Foley that when viewed with the emails shows a pattern of abusive behavior.
That proof may exist. But as of now it is baseless allegations, and Hastert is being targetted unfairly.
Posted by guitarplayr at October 02, 2006 11:26 PM | Email ThisThe Neo-cons are shooting the Republican party in the foot again with Mehlman misspeaking and causing independents to wonder..
Posted by: KS on October 3, 2006 12:24 PMWell said. No credible evidence yet on Foley. Hopefully ERNurse reads this post.
Yes, Foley was once a Democrat, in fact, here's a wild theory, what if he is complicit? What if he's been harboring a long standing hatred of anti-gay perceptions voiced by some conservatives? That would really be taking one for the team, but we've seen some pretty unbelievable and frankly criminal behavior on the part of Dems to try and bring down this President. So a willing volunteer in Foley would be warmly embraced.
Whatever, I'm sure that more evidence will emerge implicating Democrats in this scandal. Afte rall, this is the party of Dan Rather and Mary Mapes.
Wouldn't it be just wild to see the Republicans use their majority for a change and censure the House minority leader for false charges and improper conduct of a House member?
I know, Republicans don't know how to go on the offensive!
Posted by: MJC on October 3, 2006 03:27 PMWho is?
So far I have heard universal condemnation form republicans about this guy.
But you cannot expect condemnation before there was any knowledge. Judging the information trail so far, Hastert did nothing wrong.
I would also point out that a few naughty IMs and a couple personal emails are not a direct indication of molestation.
If and when a page steps forward with that claim I will immediately condemn him for that act as well.
But I do not believe in making premature allegations.
Posted by: guitarplayr on October 4, 2006 01:40 PM"I would also point out that a few naughty IMs and a couple personal emails are not a direct indication of molestation."
No, they're a very direct indication that a Member of Congress who sponsored legislation criminalizing certain adult contact with minors has, to put it mildly, no sense at all when contacting minors. They're also a very obvious signal of a matter which needs investigation. Speaker Hastert was a high-school wrestling coach; Rep. Boehner was a prosecutor. Between them, they made the conscious decision not to investigate a very suspicious matter involving possible adult crimes against children.
Both of these "leaders" participated in the long attempt to drive a sitting President from office for his consensual affair with another adult. They then refused even to investigate possible crimes against the children around them. We don't need such "leaders" running our government. Their judgements fail tests of both practicality and morality.
Posted by: Paddy Mac on October 4, 2006 07:18 PMI wasn't referring merely to impeachment, but to their long, sick obsession with his sex life, which ended publicly with his acquittal by the Senate. Had they spent one-tenth as much time (on our payroll) or energy on stopping al-Qa'eda (who attacked during the run-up to impeachment, btw) we might not have had a 9/11. Instead, they refused to rally around our President against the terrorists, and continued trying to destroy his presidency. I'm sure bin Laden took careful note of their non-actions against him.
Posted by: Paddy Mac on October 5, 2006 07:38 PMTheir preoccupatoin with his sex life was fundamentally because it involved sexual harassment and rape allegations, and Monica was a refection of a patter of misbehavior.
They had a legitimate reason to inquire what he was doing.
And they do against Foley for essentially the same reasons.
Posted by: guitarplayr on October 6, 2006 09:11 AMThere was some negligance on his part for not taking notice of Foley earlier on, that he admits that he is responsible for. The perception of this incident doesn't look good. it was sneaky for it not to come out until last week, but that's the nature of politics today. I don't think he was hiding anything, but he is still a political liability at this time.
Posted by: KS on October 6, 2006 09:44 PMThey investigated Foley? This is news!
For the sake of argument only, let's assume that their sick obsession with Pres. Clinton's pants had some legitimate excuse. They spent how much time and (our) money on it? They refused to relent even after terrorists killed Americans.
When it came to a suspected child predator loose amongst the children for whom the House Page Program cared 'in loco parentis', they did NOTHING. No multi-million dollar investigation, nor moralizing lectures, nor shouted condemnations. They impeached Clinton; they could have expelled Foley, but instead they did NOTHING. They let him keep looking for child victims, long after they knew he might be doing so, and years after the pages were warning each other that Rep. Foley was a creepy pervert.
Hastert and Boehner lectured Clinton for being no worse than Gingrich; they voted to stop gays from marrying; but when given a chance actually to so some good with their self-proclaimed superior morality, they carefully did NOTHING. Hastert can resign now, or he can have Democrats take the gavel from his hand in a few months; it makes no difference.
Posted by: Paddy Mac on October 8, 2006 02:51 PMAnd they do against Foley for essentially the same reasons."
Are you implying that Speaker Hastert, or other Republicans in the House, investigated Rep. Foley's alleged solicitations of children? Because there's no evidence that they did. In fact, they seem to have kept any whisper of this from reaching the lone Democrat on the House Board which oversees the page program.
Meanwhile, they had impeached Clinton for his irrelevant testimony in a dismissed lawsuit. No court in this country would have tried him for prejury, but they did-- and saw his swift acquittal. If they'd put 1% of that effort into investigating the Foley issue-- which directly concerned the House's legal responsibility for the children in its employ-- they might have caught him grooming children for his sexual gratification.
Posted by: Paddy Mac on October 8, 2006 06:02 PMAnd consider that that was just in a case of emails that were hair too personal, but showed absolutely no indications of any other misbehavior.
Meanwhile, they had impeached Clinton for his irrelevant testimony in a dismissed lawsuit. No court in this country would have tried him for prejury, but they did-- and saw his swift acquittal.
His lying testimony before a grand jury. Its called Perjury and he was sentanced and disbarred for it. it was an ethical violation.
And lest you forget he tried to use the power of his office to avoid the lawsuit, even as he used the power of his many offices over the years to feed his misbehavior and sexual appitites.
It never ceases to amaze me the lengths that liberals will go to excuse him.
As for Foley, no one on the right has done anything to defend him, yet that is not enough.