Republican Leadership Knew Something About Foley Scandal Months Ago

At this point, the claim is that House leadership only saw less-incriminiating emails, not enough to set off serious alarm bells.

Which makes some amount of sense; purely as a crass political calculation, if they knew the extent of this, it would have made more sense to force Foley out (threatening to expose him themselves) and put a new candidate up in Foley's fairly Republican-friendly district.

However, the Republicans are so stupid that I expect there's another shoe to drop.

Dean Wormer might have dropped the big one, guys. It may be all over.

Questioning the Timing: Of course this disclosure is perfectly timed to impact the upcoming elections.

The left, though, won't note this true question-the-timing situation. Not many on the right are even bothering to note it.

Which makes sense. The Democrats hardly had any obligation to time the disclosure in order to help the GOP, now did they?

I have a sick feeling this is going to get worse. Was this kid promised anything if he kept his mouth shut? I imagine someone, somewhere promised him something.

More... Allah has decent evidence at this point that Hastert only saw the more innocuous, worrying-but-not-damning emails, which only got as bad as asking the kid for a pic in a non-sexual context. (Which is, we all can agree, inappropriate and enough to raise a red flag, but not necessarily enough to make someone cry "Pederast!")

If true, then this is a defensible decision.

Of course, the media and the Democrats (but I repeat myself) aren't exactly going to advertise the fact that Hastert only saw the less-sinister emails.

Questioning The Timing II: Reading down in Allah's link, find this link to RightWing NutHouse. See Update II.

If we're talking cover-up-- what precisely did the Democrats know, and when did they know it? I wrote above they had no obligation to time the revelation of this to do anything except damage the Republicans -- at least in political terms.

But what about in law-enforcement/protect the children terms?

If Democratic operatives, and therefore, presumably, the DNC itself, had the full details of this months or even a year ago, did they allow a pederast to roam free for a year purely for partisan advantage?

Did the Democrats know more than the GOP did, and if so, didn't they have an obligation to share this evidence with the police, a year ago, and not just ABCNews a month out from an election?

"Parents Didn't Want Any Action Taken:" According to Newt Gingrich.

posted by Ace at 12:05 PM

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