Scandal in the House, right before the election
ABC News broke the story that resulted in Fla. Rep. Foley’s Resignation. Foley had, for years, been emailing and IM-ing underage boys in the congressional page program about sex in a really sick way. Most of these kids were 15 and 16, and there was more than one involved. The FBI is investigating.
Now, if that wasn’t bad enough, Foley was chairman of the House Caucus on missing and exploited children, and helped pass tough laws against Internet use for sexual exploitation of children. Can we say Weasel in charge of hen house security?
Even worse, the House leadership (also Republican) was told two years ago of Foley’s suspected activity and chose to cover it up and keep the House Seat Red rather than arrest the guy.
According to the ABC Blog, which has the full story, “according to several former congressional pages, the congressman used the Internet to engage in sexually explicit exchanges . . . They say he used the screen name Maf54 on these messages provided to ABC News.”
The story broke when ABC reported on an exchange of overly friendly emails with Foley that was reported by a former congressional page and made the young man very uncomfortable. These emails began when the young man requested a letter of recommendation from Foley. The story was reported, and Republicans, of course, lambasted ABC for election rigging for the Dems.
What followed, however, was anything but partisan politics. As a result of the story ABC was contacted by other Congressional Pages and former Pages, many of whom had saved email and IM exchanges with Foley and provided them to ABC. These exchanges were extremely explicit and much worse than the email exchange which brought this story to light.
Meanwhile Democrats have requested an investigation into the allegations and the cover up. According to CNN, “House Speaker Dennis Hastert on Sunday asked the Justice Department to investigate how lawmakers handled allegations that a former Florida congressman sent inappropriate e-mail messages to teenage congressional pages . . . The rare move followed calls by Democratic leaders in the House and Senate for a swift inquiry, questioning whether the GOP leadership in the House had improperly squelched concerns about former Rep. Mark Foley’s contacts with pages.”
If the allegations about Foley are true, which looks to be the case, then this man who was entrusted with writing the laws to protect children, is a pedophile and will be convicted in violation of the laws he helped to write. I hope they throw the book at him.
Meanwhile, the House leadership is under fire for possibly covering up the matter. If indeed they did so, it is despicable. When people put partisan politics ahead of the welfare of kids, they’re not fit to govern. A bitchslap is way too little for all of you.
Technorati Tags: Foley, Pedophile, chairman of the House caucus on missing and exploited children, Hastert, FBI
