Informed Speculation

Is there more to the Mark Foley story than meets the eye? Well, if the Republican leadership has something to hide, they sure are inviting a lot of scrutiny:

Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid of Nevada called the Foley case “repugnant, but equally as bad is the possibility that Republican leaders in the House of Representatives knew there was a problem and ignored it to preserve a congressional seat this election year.”

Reid said the case should be handled outside Congress.

“Under laws that Congressman Foley helped write, soliciting sex from a minor online is a federal crime,” Reid said. “The alleged crimes here are far outside the scope of any congressional committee, and the attorney general should open a full-scale investigation immediately.”

In his letter to Gonzales on Sunday, Hastert asked the Justice Department to investigate “who had specific knowledge of the content of any sexually explicit communications between Mr. Foley and any former or current House pages and what actions such individuals took, if any, to provide them to law enforcement.”

The scope of the investigation, Hastert wrote, should include “any and all individuals who may have been aware of this matter — be they members of Congress, employees of the House of Representatives or anyone outside the Congress.”

Note how Harry Reid’s words are nearly verbatim those used by Glenn Greenwald, though, of course, the Democrats never coordinate their political attacks, as we’ve been assured countless times what ‘freethinker’ individualists they are.

Speaking of uncoordinated political attacks by Democrats, the MinuteMan is smelling a rat:

Apparently the Mark Foley story first broke on this new blog, StopSexPredators.blogspot.com, which started in July and brought down the Congressional leadership with its sixth, seventh and eighth posts.

Color me skeptical.  Maybe the blog author was an unwitting catspaw, but I would want some assurance that this was not simply a successful attempt to promote a story that wasn’t quite ready for the Mainstream Media by laundering it through some blogs (and wasn’t that Matt Drudge’s ecological niche, back in the day?).  And part of my suspicion arises because the blog posted emails about gay Congressmen in repsonse to a post about “skinterns“, scantily clad young women.  Where were the emails about Dirty Old Men and Sweet Young Things of the female persuasion?

The River City Mud Bugle has even more backstory:

Two hours later [following the first posting of the former page's emails], someone writing under the name “WHInternNow” published a diary on Daily Kos linking to Stop Sex Predators. The diary was met with skepticism from Daily Kos users, and received only a few largely critical comments. “This diary makes an accusation,” one commenter wrote, “a serious accusation, but provides no evidence to back it up.”

In a previous Daily Kos diary about Foley, “WHInternNow” made an early attempt to draw attention to Foley’s peccadilloes.

The Real Problem With Foley (0 / 0)

It’s not that he’s gay. It’s that he constantly hits on underage interns on The Hill. You guys talk about an “open secret” well Foley’s eye for the young boys in the White House and around the Capitol is what has the Republican bosses scared to death. It’s just wrong that this guy can hit on young boys and still be in the leadership.

by WHInternNow on Tue Sep 05, 2006 at 07:48:09 PM CDT

The story was evidently not quite good enough for the D Kos, but ABC found enough to run with it.

Does any of this excuse Foley? Of course not.  Nor does it absolve Hastert and company if it is determined that they failed to act with diligence on a potentially criminal matter.

However, it is far from certain that that is the case.  All we know at the moment is that they were presented with some fairly tame e-mails and a complaint from a page’s parents, a complaint that was investigated with an admonishment to knock it off.

Should they have done more? I don’t know, because I don’t have all the facts.  Neither do you, and I don’t care who you are.  Is the call for an investigation a CYA manuever? Sure, it is…but it’s also a sign he believes he has little to fear from such an investigation.

I hope to spend very little time on this story, because as sad as it may be (or disgusting, or maddening, or…) it’s small potatoes next to the very real, very huge problems we currently face, particularly in our foreign affairs.  Nevertheless, I know a railroad job when I see one, and I don’t think Republicans need to stand idly by and take it when prominent Democrats and liberal bloggers use this tragedy as a partisan weapon, particularly one with such unsavory implications.

If the investigation shows any illegalities or improper behavior, I’ll join in calling for Hastert’s head…but we’re a long way from that at this point…