The circular firing squad continues

Yesterday, Kirk Fordham, the former Foley aide (chief of staff to Rep. Tom Reynolds of NY, and Foley’s bar babysitter), who was the first predator-enabler sacrificed for the cause, said Scott Palmer, Hastert’s chief of staff, and “senior staff at the highest level of the House of Representatives” were told more than three years ago about Foley’s email “problem.”

It didn’t take long for the denials on that one. (AP):

Palmer said through a spokesman, “What Kirk Fordham said did not happen.”

Hastert is still claiming that he first learned about Foley’s sick, torrid, predatory IMs to male congressional pages when the story broke last Friday. It looks, however, like insiders are eyeing a step-down plan for Hastert, and a few more lower-level heads to roll in order to stop the bleeding.

“Looks like right now he will keep his job for a maximum of one and one-half months,” said a top party aide, adding that in the meantime Hastert may fire some staffers. Other aides said it remained unclear how long he would stay.

Please. Trying to hold on to power through the election is going to make this story stay alive as the investigations, clearly, are going to go on all the way up until election day. As more information comes out in the media, Hastert, Boehner and the rest of these stooges are going to have to respond to each salacious development.

I hate to break it to them, but that is going to be the death of a thousand cuts unless the entire leadership involved step aside.

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Republican was the source of the emails

So much for blaming that on the Democrats. These folks are so desperate, and each time they search for a way out, it keeps blowing back on them. (The Hill):

The source who in July gave news media Rep. Mark Foley’s (R-Fla.) suspect e-mails to a former House page says the documents came to him from a House GOP aide. That aide has been a registered Republican since becoming eligible to vote, said the source, who showed The Hill public records supporting his claim.

The same source, who acted as an intermediary between the aide-turned-whistleblower and several news outlets, says the person who shared the documents is no longer employed in the House. But the whistleblower was a paid GOP staffer when the documents were first given to the media.

…These revelations mean that Republicans who are calling for probes to discover what Democratic leaders and staff knew about Foley’s improper exchanges with under-age pages will likely be unable to show that the opposition party orchestrated the scandal now roiling the GOP just a month away from the midterm elections.

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GOP — unfit to govern if they cannot even handle the administration of the page program.

That’s the only conclusion one can draw if what Republican Ray LaHood means what he says. (PJ Star):

U.S. Rep. Ray LaHood on Monday called for the termination of the House page program at the end of this semester until it can be reviewed in the wake of the scandal over a House member’s inappropriate Internet chats with teenagers who were in the program.

The Peoria Republican said he e-mailed his recommendation to House Speaker Dennis Hastert’s staff Sunday, but hasn’t received a response.

…”We should terminate the program until it can be re-evaluated so we don’t subject these young men and women to someone like Foley who obviously lost his moral compass and preyed on these kids,” LaHood said. “This program is flawed and it should be terminated until we can figure out how to fix it.”

What a nice theme he’s delivered for Democrats running commercials around the country — “The Republicans had to shut down the page program…because they didn’t know how to protect your children. Is this who you want running the country?“

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And what can only be described as a surreal downward spiral of hypocrisy, some of the filthy slime in Freeperland have come to the conclusion that Mark Foley’s actions really aren’t that bad after all. Jeebus H. Christ. These are the folks who obsess about the Clenis and floats in Pride parades — but a Republican sexual predator, who cruises teenagers who come to the Hill to learn about Congress is A-OK?

Even some of the fellow knuckledraggers in the swamp can’t believe this. This link should be preserved for whenever the next Dem sex scandal emerges (and we know, with politicians of any political stripe, it will occur).

Actual Freeper Quotes™

From what I have read so far, I have yet to see any crime, he was just exercising his free-speech and if the 16 year old boy didn’t like it all he had to do was hit the “block” button on AOL, takes less than 2 seconds.

My how far we’ve come. Now ephebophilia is ok and salacious talk with minors is fine and dandy as long as it doesn’t proceed to actual contact.

Are we having Internet sex yet?

They weren’t minors.

It was after they left D.C., so they would have been at least 17.

The victim of Foley’s electronic overfriendliness was not a pre-adolescent, but a 16-year-old; above the age of consent in D.C., and an age at which the average American moves from explicit IM exchanges to the real deal. A 16-year-old is neither a defenseless child nor an adult

Hmm.. I think I would still have a problem if a 54 year old man was going after my 16 year-old son or daughter. But, maybe that’s because I’m just out in flyover country and not in swinging DC.

A sexless homosexual sex scandal. This type of scandal would bore Rep. Barney Frank whose used to homosexual sex scandals with plenty of sex !!!

Exercising his free speech? LOL That’s one way to put it.

D.C. can have whatever laws they want on the books but Americans don’t think 16 year olds are adults. They barely think 18 year olds are adults. This was immoral. It was sick. And, frankly, I’m not interested in seeing anyone trying to contend otherwise.

I feel myself moving into a slow burn. It astounds me how some are trying to trivialize the entire matter. They want to make it into a backroom joke. They are for the most part those who see this merely as a political dispute. I realize they just don’t get it. On the other hand some like yourself understand this is not about politics. It is about ethics and morality. Both sides will pay a terrible price if they attempt to exploit this matter politically.

Amen. I find the whole counter-attack counter-intuitive and counter-productive. This is a time for soul-searching and house-cleaning. Republican leadership in Washington has failed miserably. They will pay and the talk about fearing the democrats will fall on deaf ears. Four republicans have had to resign this year. FOUR. It isn’t the fault of democrats, liberals, the clintons, daily kos or sixteen year old adolescent males.

“I think I would still have a problem if a 54 year old man was going after my 16 year-old son or daughter”

Read what this child, ( as the Democrats call him) wrote back-often and happily to Foley and see if you agree with me- if this little perverted page had written the same stuff to my 16 yr old daughter-I’d have his head. And his parents. A pox on Foley, the page and the parents.

Well you voice a controversal opinion there lol. I actually think it has some merit. At the end of the day I am more upset at the abuse of trust and authority than the im thing in and of itself. But I agree. There is some kinda of silly that Foley could have verbally asked a 16 year old male for sex and that is ok but if he text messaged it its illegal. It doesnt make much sense if you ask me and if indeed that is the law its pretty stupid. I know there is also a issue of State lines that make it all the more complicated.

We need to fight back hard on this. DISTANCE the Repub Party from Foley, and put this whole thing BACK onto the GAY AGENDA.

Part of me says that I don’t care if Foley had sex or didn’t. He sounds like a problem we don’t want to keep. Another part of me says that he deserves due process and he either broke the law or didn’t; had sex or didn’t. In that case, the evidence will tell the story, and he’s innocent until proven guilty.

I guess all of the dirty old men who liked Britney Spears back in 1999 are going to jail.

So, I take it you’re PRO THE HOMO AGENDA.

It is no more appropriate for Foley to ask a 16 year old page to have sex than it is for a teacher to ask the same of a student. You know it really does appear that we may not be getting it. This is a really a significant matter, a big deal. It appears conservatives are becoming a little impatient with the lack of maturity being shown by Republicans. Especially those who are trying to make this merely a political dirty trick that can be easily blown away.

I think it’s a big distinction - being attracted to post-pubescent youths is probably a fairly normal physiologic reaction*; however being attracted to pre-sexual, pre-pubescent children is a whole different thing.

*Not that it makes it right, ethical or healthy. I agree it is and should be illegal.

I think hastert had to know. Boehner is now throwqing Hsaty under the bus and distancung huimself from them.I also think we will learn more about Foley’s activities. I suspect the IM’s are not the worst of his actions with adolescent males

Actually the IM I saw showed he was bumped off and choose to click back on and continue the sex talk. I think what happened was disgusting but the boy certainly shares a part in this imo.

His resignation says he is not innocent. And the attempt to claim the democrats are worse are,to me, irrational. I don’t vote for democrats.

“But as it turns out, the Mark Foley pedophilia sex scandal lacks two things: pedophilia and sex.”

Makes you wonder why he resigned if he didn’t have any physical relationship with any Pages. Perhaps we haven’t yet got to “the rest of the story” as Paul Harvey would say.

“The same cannot be said for Democrat deviants”

I am not responsible for them. I am responsible for myself and what I believe in and what I choose to be associated with. This is my problem and I and other conservatives are responsible to fix it. If you waste your time blaming Democrats you are not doing your share.

“The Democrats have been playing politics about this matter from Day 1, without waiting for the facts to come out.”

If they are they will pay a price. It is time for us to fix what is ours. This is about morality and ethics. Repair the wound and conservatives will be so much stronger because of it.

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Also:
* Hastert: I’ll resign if it will help the GOP
* Gingrich: Dems’ sex scandals are worse / Drunk Foley showed up at page dorm
* The List
* Kirk Fordham’s the first to go
* dKos Cheers & Jeers on Foleygate
* Qs of the day - who’s going down/career advice for Foley
* Glenn’s on Foley fire…
* Wednesday AM Foley update
* How low can you go — Tom Reynolds hides behind children
* Foley’s attorney: he was molested by a priest as a child
* OK, enough. Hastert has to go NOW.
* Dear Leader speaks…
* Foley interrupted floor vote to have cybersex with page
* Page threatened, Foley still using AOL screen name
* Eating their own - Boehner drop kicks Hastert
* Tuesday AM Foley roundup
* More GOP family values: Foley aide tried to cut a deal with ABC’s Ross
* More info on Foley’s well-known predator rep among pages
* They knew about Foley in 2001
* There should not be silence
* GOP leadership: spinning for the election home stretch, but nowhere to run on Foley
* More Foleygate
* Foley blasted ‘vile’ Clinton in 1998 for his ’sad sexual addiction’
* Resolution for ethics probe over Foley passes 410-0
* Denny Hastert must resign for doing nothing about Foley
* Foley drops out of re-election campaign
* What the heck was Mark Foley thinking?