Absolved: The alcohol made me do it...

[NellieBly]

That's the point -- you and ippy do the same thing (cut and paste). Pervs don't care about who you vote for.

[sgrizzle]

Wasn't the house page leadership notified? sounds like an internal matter with the board as well.

[iplaw]

quote:
The Republican House leadership buried this information and did nothing to protect the pages. They tried to protect Foley, his seat, and the GOP, but they did not try to protect the children.

No one has any proof of a concerted coverup.  Just stating it exists doesn't make it so.  If there was, people will get smashed as they should.  At this point it's just party political well-wishing.

quote:
...can you simply admit that this behavior is unacceptable?

Sure.  As long as you are willing to do the same and lambast Gerry Studds the same as you do Foley.  Or is it okay or excusable when a Dem does it?  As if child sex crimes are somehow a political issue...  

[Chicken Little]

quote:Originally posted by Conan71

How is it that no one has said a word about how the "Democratic member of the Page Board" was sleeping on the job to not know of a complaint by a page?

Kildee himself spoke up, "...I was outraged to learn that the House Republican leadership kept to itself the knowledge of Mr. Foley's despicable behavior toward the House Pages."

Its called a coverup, Conan.

[MichaelC]

From MSNBC

quote:The speaker did not mention e-mail exchanges between Foley, a Florida Republican, and another page, from Louisiana, in 2005. Other House Republicans said they told Hastert about those exchanges months ago. Hastert has not disputed those accounts.

On a side note, counter to the title of this topic, Foley isn't "absolved" of anything.  If the evidence is good, he'll face charges.

[iplaw]

I believe that MSNBC also ran several "news" stories confirming that Rove was the Plame leak.  How about we let the justice department figure this one out?  He will be subject to charges once he leaves "rehab."

[Conan71]

Since you guys seem to pull info out of questionable sources, here's one for you Dems:

http://members.aol.com/mpwright9/boren1.html

http://members.aol.com/mpwright9/boren.html

Comments? Questions?

[iplaw]

Nothing new under the sun:

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/story?id=2509889

How do these people get elected...

[Chicken Little]

quote:Originally posted by iplaw

...is it okay or excusable when a Dem does it?

H*ll no.  It wasn't in '83 when a Dem or Republican Dan Crane were caught...still isn't today.

No proof of a coverup?  You are kidding, right?  The Republican members of the Page Committee and the Republican House Leadership failed to tell the Democratic member of the Page committee, or anyone else, about this.  Is this an oversight?

[MichaelC]

From Fox News

quote:Rep. Thomas Reynolds of New York, head of the House Republican election effort, said he told Hastert months ago about the allegations involving a 16-year-old boy from Louisiana.

Hastert acknowledged that his staff had been made aware of concerns about what they termed "over-friendly" e-mails Foley had sent to the teenager — including one requesting his picture — in the fall of 2005, and that they referred the matter to the House clerk.

But Hastert said those e-mails were not viewed as "sexual in nature" and that he was not aware of "a different set of communications which were sexually explicit ... which Mr. Foley reportedly sent another former page or pages."

[si_uk_lon_ok]

quote:Originally posted by Conan71

Okay Si Uk,

Nice cut and paste, either that or you have way too much time on your hands.  Why don't you find and cut and paste a big list of all the perv's on the Democrat side now?  I am sure there are just as many, or do you just care to be partisan?

I'm not partisan, I was evening it up. Iplaw created a list of democrats who had misbehaved I merely did the same for republicans. I was showing how meaningless pulling stuff off line is, for one side there is always another side especially on the net.

[Chicken Little]

Hey, ip, I can wait on an investigation, too.  Meantime, Tradesports has the GOP below 50%.[]

[aoxamaxoa]

quote:Originally posted by Chicken Little

Hey, ip, I can wait on an investigation, too.  Meantime, Tradesports has the GOP below 50%.[]

Yes, people are tired of evil do gooder hypocrites.  Regime change is in order. Kissinger must go.....again. The rest the country knows what's going on.

[Conan71]

Consider the timing of this "outing".  With just over four weeks before the mid-terms this suddenly broke.

Democrats on The Hill can say all they want there was a Republican cover-up and they knew nothing about this behavior, but I will remain suspect that this was known to both parties for some time, it finally became "convenient" to leak it to the media when ballots were already printed and Foley's name cannot be taken off.  You can be assured that it wasn't a Republican operative that leaked this.

If, during the investigation into this, it is found that any Democratic member of Congress knew about this for any length of time prior to the leak, then they are just as much a part of a cover-up.

The U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate both have become "elitist" institutions.  Just about any time other than election season, members protect each other and their personal behavior, regardless of party affiliation.  It's the way things work in Washington.  Our Congress is corrupt, for sale, and filled with people who are intoxicated with power, money, privilege, and all it implies.  

I also believe there was a certain "tit-for-tat".  Last Friday, The American Spectator released John Murtha's Abscam tape in which he tells the FBI agents posing as Saudi businessmen that he might accept $50K down the road if they play ball with some businesses in his district first.

http://youdontknowjack.org/abscam/

For the record, Murtha ostensibly did not break any laws during the probe since he wasn't charged, and did not accept a bribe.  He wound up testifying against two other members of Congress.  To me, this video is not a smoking gun, though there are people on the right who seem to think it is.  Personally, I think it was a very weak cheap shot.

No, I'm not comparing Murtha's actions to Foley's.  What I'm pointing out is I believe there is shameful electioneering going on with both parties and we haven't heard the end of it.  You can bet the Republicans will be working around the clock to "out" the behavior of Democrats in retribution.

Foley's actions are reprehensible and disgusting.  He's not just an insult to the Republican party, but to Congress.

[snopes]

Lest I be accused of plagiarism for not posting a link again (lol). Here is the link:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ibd/20061002/bs_ibd_ibd/2006102issues01

Scandal: Right after Mark Foley was revealed to have had inappropriate e-mail conversations with a 16-year-old page, he resigned and checked into rehab. Now, what did Democrats know, and when did they know it?
Yes, you read that right: the Democrats. It's of course clear that Foley, a Republican representative from Florida, resigned for good cause. We don't defend him or his inexcusable behavior -- good riddance.
But it didn't take long at all after Foley's resignation for the Democrats to call for an investigation of the entire Republican leadership in the House, charging that GOP stalwarts knew early on that Foley, as they like to say in the rehab business, had a "problem."
Democrats have begun losing their once-significant lead in the polls, and a mere five weeks remain until the midterm elections. Is this scandal the Democrats' own "October Surprise," meant to throw the GOP into a tailspin shortly before the vote?
Recent polls show Democrats aren't doing very well on several key issues. What better way than a good, old-fashioned sex scandal to get people's minds off such things as the importance of winning the war in
Iraq, our ongoing vulnerability to terrorist attack and the necessity of keeping the Bush economic boom going?
As it is, Republicans deny knowing about the explicit text messages that Foley sent to a 16-year-old congressional page back in 2003. In repudiating Foley, House Speaker
Dennis Hastert called the messages "vile and repulsive."

Despite this, the immediate take by Democrats and much of the mainstream media was that this was a classic example of Republican hypocrisy -- talking "morals" and "values" while all the time shielding a child predator. But it was nothing of the kind.

If anything, the episode reveals the Democrats' hypocrisy about their own behavior. The fact that Foley resigned virtually within minutes of being told that ABC News had copies of his salacious e-mails and text messages indicates he at least felt shame for his actions. Can the same be said for Democrats?

Sadly, it doesn't seem so. How else can you explain the following?

In 1983, then-Democratic Rep. Gerry Studds of Massachusetts was caught in a similar situation. In his case, Studds had sex with a male teenage page -- something Foley hasn't been charged with. Did Studds express contrition? Resign? Quite the contrary. He rejected Congress' censure of him and continued to represent his district until his retirement in 1996.

In 1989, Rep. Barney Frank (news, bio, voting record), also of Massachusetts, admitted he'd lived with Steve Gobie, a male prostitute who ran a gay sex-for-hire ring out of Frank's apartment. Frank, it was later discovered, used his position to fix 33 parking tickets for Gobie.

What happened to Frank? The House voted 408-18 to reprimand him -- a slap on the wrist. Today he's an honored Democratic member of Congress, much in demand as a speaker and "conscience of the party."

In 2001, President Clinton who had his own intern problem, commuted the prison sentence of Illinois Rep. Mel Reynolds, who had sex with a 16-year-old campaign volunteer and pressured her to lie about it. (Reynolds also was convicted of campaign spending violations.)

You get the idea. Democrats not only seem OK with the kind of behavior for which Foley is charged, but also they protect and excuse it. Only when it's a Republican do they proclaim themselves shocked -- shocked! -- when it comes to light.

We have a lot more questions about this whole affair. The timing of the revelations, as we noted, couldn't be more propitious for the Democrats. Turns out both the Democrats and several newspapers seem to have known about Foley's problem as far back as November, according to research by several enterprising blogs.

Why didn't they come forward then? Who dredged up these e-mails -- and why did they hold them until now? This reeks of political trickery.

We're glad Foley's gone. He betrayed Congress, his party and the trust of the 33 pages who serve in Congress, and their parents. He behaved immorally, and we won't be surprised at new revelations.

That said, if this scandal is the Democrats' answer to their problems at the polls, it's pretty pathetic. It shows a base contempt for the voters.