Mark Foley: American.
So one of the strongest fighters in the House for laws to take on internet sex-predators looks like he wrote from experience: Methinks the Congressman doth protest too much.
Sure it would be easy to make a lot of cheap jokes here, and on my budget that’s about all you’re going to get, gentle reader. But I think there are two interesting elements that go beyond the actual behavior of the Representative.
First, Hastert and some GOP officials knew of some “inappropriate, but not sexual” emails Foley sent three years ago. They did the equivalent of slapping him on the wrist and telling him to knock it off. Hastert points out that the media had the same info at the time, but did nothing at all.
The issue is this: What responsibility did the Speaker have to follow through and make sure that this behavior did not continue? What responsibility did the Speaker and company have to investigate if there was more going on than just inappropriate email.
The second issue is an angle I have not seen addressed at all, and honestly I don’t know if or how it affects my reaction: namely gender.
How does the fact that it was teen boys affect the seriousness of his actions and the intensity of our reactions?
posted by The sane one @ 2:17 PM
6 Comments:
I absolutely agree that Hastert and the GOP leadership messed up and need to be held accountable. The Speaker has an obligation to protect the vulnerable pages from the creeps on the Hill that seek to take advantage of their power and position.
For cripes sakes, if you had as much evidence as Hastert and his team had (the creepy emails), a full investigation should have been conducted.
This Sgt. Schultz response of "I know nothing" isn't going to cut it.
an editorial in the christian science monitor says it all--
THE MONITOR'S VIEW
Congress, police thyself...
House Republicans handled the Mark Foley case quietly and incompletely. Big mistake.
In my opinion, gender is immaterial to the issue of sexual predation. This is no different than what some catholic priests did to their altar boys.
foley's lawyer today was emphatic that he was never accused of "touching" inappropriately and therefore was NOT a predator!
Oh,I see, he didn't touch the pages. but let's go after those internet porn guys!!!
foley is a predator, thru and thru. no spin is ever gonna convince me otherwise. when are we going to demand that our leaders be more accountable?
it was never the press's job to investigate. hastert should take the responsibilty for his
(in)action and resign, with full apologies to the kid(s) he could have protected!
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gender shouldn't be of consequence, but i think that in society it is. i think if these were teenaged girls the shit would have hit the fan a long time ago... or at least worse than it has now.
maybe it's odd how i associate things, but your question reminded me of the movie enemy of the state. they asked the question (essentially) that if you have a regulation and you have regulars of the regualtion, who's going to regulate the regulators. follow me? who's going to govern the legislators? obviously there is a serious gap here.
I think my question about the role of gender in this is my reaction to the nearly deafening silence out there in the media on that issue.
I agree that the issue is predatory behavior, but lets face it, there are a whole lot of people out there that believe AIDS is proof that God hates gays. And yet, none of the usual loudmouths are mentioning this angle.
And to Blaine, have you considered the fact that Hastert could look like Sgt. Schultz if he grew a mustache? Maybe that will help him this strategy.
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