Dear Media: You totally misread Denny Hastert's letter to the Justice Dept.

As Josh Marshall's "Talking Points Memo" notes, Hastert's letter is written in such a way as to exempt Hastert and the GOP leadership from the Justice Dept. investigation he's requesting. Instead, the investigation is intended to focus on outside parties - outside of Congress - be they non-profit groups like CREW, journalists, bloggers, and even potential victims and their relatives who knew of the communications but didn't contact the authorities. I.e., Hastert wants Justice to investigate the very people who broke the story and thus got the GOP in trouble.

Read Josh's analysis, he's right. Then re-read Hastert's letter carefully, or better yet, have one of your lawyers read it. You got duped. And even better, this way Hastert can say, a la PlameGate, "gosh, we just can't answer any more questions since there's an ongoing Justice Dept. investigation." Hastert and the GOP need to come clean now. Read the rest of this post...

Republicans happy to accept Foley's campaign money for other GOP candidates

Further proof that the GOP cares more about politics than the safety of children. The RNCC wants Foley's money for their other candidates:

Mr. Foley, who served on the House Ways and Means Committee, was a prolific fund-raiser. His campaign account had a balance of $2.7 million at the end of August, according to reports filed with the Federal Election Commission.

Carl Forti, the communications director for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said Sunday that the committee would gladly accept Mr. Foley’s money or a portion of it to devote to House races. Mr. Foley already gave $100,000 to the committee in July, campaign records show, as part of the party’s Battleground Program, to which members are asked to contribute.

“The money is in the control of Mr. Foley,” Mr. Forti said. “Whatever he decides to do with it is up to him.”

Says all you need to know about the GOP. Read the rest of this post...

GOP Rep. John Shimkus (R-IL) let Foley spend "a lot of time" with pages, including private dinner with one, after GOP knew Foley was a problem

Shimkus is toast. There's even video of Shimkus letting Foley talk to the pages AFTER the GOP knew Foley had page-issues.

You'll recall that he is the Republican member of Congress who runs the Page Board, the group in charge of the pages. You'll also recall that tonight we learned on ABC News that GOP House staff warned the page class of 2001-2002 to stay away from ex-Rep. Mark Foley.

Then why is it that on June 6, 2002, well after the kids were warned to stay away from Foley, Shimkus notes approvingly that Foley has spent a lot of time with the Page Class of 2001-2002? This is Shimkus speaking at the page's goodbye ceremony,

MR. SHIMKUS: I thank my colleague. Now someone who spends a lot of time with you also, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Foley), would like to say a thank you.

(Note: We've confirmed in the Congressional Record that this is the exact transcript of the proceedings that day.)

The GOP staff knew Foley was a problem the year before, they warned the pages in 2001. Yet Shimkus, the next year is acknowledging that Foley was still permitted to spend "a lot of time" with the pages. In the name of God, why?

Oh, but it gets worse.

Foley then gets up in front of Shimkus and tells a special little story of how he took one male page to a private dinner in downtown Washington, DC. Put the page in his BMW and "cruised" - Foley's word - to dinner.

And now for the kicker.

Foley told the kid he had to get permission from his mom and he had to notify the Clerk of the House, Jeff Trandahl, the Republican staffer who works for Republican Speaker of the House Denny Hastert (R-IL). You'll also recall that Trandahl is the Clerk who joined Shimkus in 2005 to talk to Foley about the creepy email exchange with the first child who got this scandal started.

Why did Shimkus let Foley spend so much time with the pages after GOP staff already knew Foley had a "page problem"? Did the Clerk of the House approve of this dinner? Did Shimkus? Clearly Foley had no fear in the kid going to Clerk and asking for permission - so Foley seemed to think the Clerk wouldn't mind. And clearly Foley had no fear in telling the story in front of Shimkus, so he obviously didn't think Shimkus would mind either.

Shimkus then introduces Foley. Read what Foley has to say to the pages of the 2001-2002 class in his speech wishing them goodbye.

FOLEY: John [one of the pages] was the highest bidder on lunch with Mark Foley. Maybe you all do not know this story, but John had paid considerable sums to dine with me. I had offered to take the winning bidder to lunch in the Members' dining room. Then I heard how much John Eunice paid. And I said, ``John, there is no way in the world after you committed so much money to have lunch with me that I would dare take you downstairs to eat in the Members' dining room.'' I said, ``Where do you want to go?'' He says, without reservation, ``Morton's.'' I said, ``Morton's? Like in Morton's Steakhouse?'' He said, ``Oh, would that be too much?'' I said, ``Oh, no, we'll go.'' I said, ``Call your mother, get permission, make sure she notifies the Clerk and we will go to Morton's.'' And so we proceeded to cruise down in my BMW to Morton's.

Putting aside the creepy notion of children bidding on dinner with an already-suspected child sex predator, what in God's name were Shimkus and the Clerk doing approving of Foley taking a kid in his BMW to a private dinner in downtown Washington? The GOP staff already knew that Foley was trouble. They had already warned the kids. Yet Shimkus let Foley spend lots of time with the kids, by Shimkus' own admission. And then they let Foley cruise the kid to dinner in his beamer.

Shimkus is toast.

Oh, and if anyone would like to see video of Shimkus praising a suspected child predator for spending lots of time with underage 16 year old pages, you can order the video from this specific date from C-Span for $270. As C-Span notes, the video includes appearances by Mr. Foley and Mr. Shimkus.

(Hat tip to MyDD for discovering the transcript.) Read the rest of this post...

GOP Staff Warned Pages About Foley in 2001; Hastert calls on Attorney General to investigate his own party; More kids come forward

Watch this broadcast of tonight's ABC News report on the Foley scandal. Denny Hastert is done as House speaker.



Hastert is through. ABC is reporting that not only did GOP staff know about Foley in 2001-2002, but some people in that class got predatory emails from Foley. And don't forget, the instant message chat from 2003 and the emails from 2005 would never have happened had they dealt with Foley in 2001 when they knew about it.

Take this instant message exchange between Foley and yet another child, AFTER the GOP already knew he was trouble, AFTER the GOP had already warned children to stay away from him.



According to ABC, Foley was talking about the boy's penis.

Denny Hastert and John Boehner, and Alexander and Reynolds and Shimkus all must have known about Foley's behavior long behavior the last kid complained in 2005 - the kid they ignored because Foley told them it was nothing. It is simply not credible that the House leadership knew nothing about Foley's past.

From ABC News (note: this is NOT the transcript from tonight's ABC News report, watch the video above, it's FAR WORSE:

A Republican staff member warned Congressional pages five years ago to watch out for Congressman Mark Foley, according to a former page.

Matthew Loraditch, a page in the 2001-2002 class, told ABC News he and other pages were warned about Foley by a supervisor.

Loraditch, the president of the Page Alumni Association, said the pages were told "don't get too wrapped up in him being too nice to you and all that kind of stuff."

Read the rest of this post...

ABC's "This Week" on GOP child sex predator scandal and cover-up

Read the rest of this post...

More Reynolds/Foley connections

Think Progress reports on the NY Daily News blog post about an "unusually large" $100,000 contribution from Foley to the GOP House campaign fund controlled by Congressman Reynolds. Foley transferred the money in July of this year. Reynolds had already contributed $5k to Foley in May of 2006. Remember, from his perch as chair of the NRCC, Reynolds is the top House Republican political operative this cycle. As TP reminds us, Reynolds was one of the House leaders who knew early on about Foley's email problems -- well before this money changed hands.

And check out this pic of Reynolds and Foley on the NY Daily News blog....write your own caption. Read the rest of this post...

Mr. Reynolds, why is your chief of staff advising a child sex predator?

Congressman Tom Reynold (R-NY) has some explaining to do.

He claims that when he was informed about the Foley page scandal he did his due diligence. But did he really? We now learn from the Palm Beach Post that Reynolds' chief of staff, Kirk Fordham (former chief of staff and campaign manager to Mark Foley for ten years) "returned to Foley's side to advise him during the past couple of days."

Really?

Tom Reynolds' chief of staff has been advising a child sex predator? A sex predator who Reynolds would like us to believe he dealt with in an appropriate and impartial and objective manner?

A few questions for Mr. Reynolds, assuming the Palm Beach story is accurate:

1. Did Reynolds approve of his chief of staff returning to the side of a child sex predator to, not comfort him, but ADVISE him?

2. Did his staffer assist this child sex predator on the government dime? During government work hours?

3. Did Mr. Reynolds know at all that his chief of staff was advising the sex predator?

4. If so, did Mr. Reynolds try to dissuade his chief of staff from assisting the sex predator, or in any other way did Reynolds let his concern be known?

5. Did Mr. Reynolds' chief of staff influence Reynolds' handling of the Foley scandal this spring when Reynolds became aware of the scandal?

6. Reynolds would have us believe that he only found out about the scandal this spring. Are we to believe that Reynolds' chief of staff, who was Foley's top aide for ten years, didn't get wind of this scandal last fall when it became known in Senate leadership circles? That Foley himself didn't tell the former chief of staff? And if the staffer knew, are we to believe he didn't tell his bos, Mr. Reynolds - and if not, why not?

7. Is your chief of staff's close connection to Mr. Foley the reason you, this morning, in an interview with the local Buffalo press tried to downplay the suffering of the victim in this case?

You suggest that Mr. Alexander told you the victim only had "some discomfort" over the emails from Foley. In fact, the victim said he was "freaked out," that the emails were "sick" (he repeated the word 13 times), and the child victim asked that the congressman be informed. That hardly constitutes "some discomfort."

Did Mr. Alexander downplay the victim's suffering, or did you?

8. And now that you know your chief of staff has been advising a child sex predator, what do you plan on doing about it? Read the rest of this post...

More deception and cover-up from GOP leadership

More GOP deception documented by Josh Marshall. This one is Rep. Shimkus vs. his own staffer and Hastert's office. Shimkus tells reporters he actually saw the Foley emails. Yet, both his own spokesman and Hastert's office said Shimkus didn't see the emails. How odd.

This passage from Josh underlies the current situation:

But if Foley already had a "reputation" among congressional pages, you can bet his reputation extended to staffers and probably to congressmen themselves. One thing that seems to be missing from the GOP reaction is shock or surprise. Maybe I've simply overlooked them, but I haven't seen any quotes along the lines of what you usually expect when something like this breaks: the befuddled reactions of those who knew the alleged perpetrator but had no idea he was even capable of what he is being accused of. I'm thinking of those standard quotes from serial killers' neighbors: he was quiet, kept to himself, seemed completely normal.

It's a small world up there on the Hill, and you just don't get the sense that this is a bolt from the blue. I'd be surprised if some reporters didn't already have the low-down on Foley's "over-friendly" ways.

It is a small world on the Hill. If the House pages were warned about Foley, many more people up there had to know there was a problem. Who warned the pages about him?

By all their efforts to cover their tracks, it is increasingly obvioius that GOP leadership knew about the Foley problem, but didn't do anything. That would cause political problems for them. Instead, they ignored the situation. Now, they're all running for cover. A friend who watches the GOP leadership very, very closely wrote this to me last night, "I've never, ever, ever, seen them throw each other under the bus like this." The bus is running them all over. Read the rest of this post...

Me on CNN yesterday talking about the Foley scandal

Read the rest of this post...

Sunday Talk Shows Open Thread

Iraq, via the continuing quagmire, the NIE and "State of Denial," is the dominant subject. Bartlett's spewing the White House lies today. Russert is doing the Ohio Senate debate. And, have to think the explosive Foley/GOP leadership scandal will come up on the talk shows:

FOX NEWS SUNDAY...: Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.); former House speaker Newt Gingrich ; Michael Scheuer , former head of the CIA's bin Laden unit; Daniel Benjamin , former Clinton administration counterterrorism official; author Lawrence Wright .

THIS WEEK (ABC....: White House counselor Dan Bartlett ; Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.); U.S. poet laureate Donald Hall .

NEWSMAKERS (C-SPAN), 10 a.m.: Murtha.

FACE THE NATION (CBS....: Bartlett ; Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.).

MEET THE PRESS (NBC....: Sen. Mike DeWine (R-Ohio); Rep. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio); Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf .

LATE EDITION (CNN), 11 a.m.: Bartlett ; Sens. Richard G. Lugar (R-Ind.) and Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.); Zalmay Khalilzad, U.S. ambassador to Iraq; former national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski ; former secretary of state Henry A. Kissinger .

Watch and comment, please. Read the rest of this post...

Why does Hastert want to coddle sexual predators?

Dennis was so forceful in telling the country about the Democrats wanting to coddle terrorists - without any proof of that being the case because it's a political smear and a lie - yet now it is appearing to be very clear that Hastert knew about a sexual predator in his own ranks and failed to take every action possible to save the children of America. So a refresher from just days ago:

``Democrat minority leader Nancy Pelosi and 159 of her Democrat colleagues voted today in favor of more rights for terrorists," Hastert said . ``So the same terrorists who plan to harm innocent Americans and their freedom worldwide would be coddled, if we followed the Democrat plan."

Now let's think about this in the context of disgraced congressman Foley. It looks like Hastert wanted to coddle someone who may be a criminal, who was taking advantage of his position of power to prey on an American youth who wanted to participate in the American political system. Despite rumors about such behavior, Hastert and his colleagues in congress did their best to avoid the news spreading beyond their small circle.

While Hastert can't provide any proof whatsoever that Democrats want to coddle terrorists it is appears to be the case that Hastert and company were doing their best to cover-up a disgusting, if not illegal, scandal. Why does Hastert and the GOP hate America? Why do they want to coddle sexual predators? Read the rest of this post...

Open thread

Remember how I always tell you that hope springs eternal in politics? Read the rest of this post...

Hastert is in trouble

Hastert tried to pin the blame on Reynolds, and Reynolds is now snitching on Hastert. The Republican House leadership, so freaked out by the mess, has now apparently called for a criminal investigation of Foley. It's a total mess.

From Sunday's Washington Post, front page:

House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) was notified early this year of inappropriate e-mails from former representative Mark Foley (R-Fla.) to a 16-year-old page, a top GOP House member said yesterday -- contradicting the speaker's assertions that he learned of concerns about Foley only last week....

Yesterday's developments revealed a rift at the highest echelons of House Republican ranks a month before the Nov. 7 elections, and they threatened to expand the scandal to a full-blown party dilemma.

Only after Reynolds's definitive statement did Hastert concede yesterday that he may have been notified of some of the questionable activities of Foley....

Rep. Rahm Emanuel (Ill.), chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, questioned yesterday why Alexander had gone to the House Republicans' chief political operative, rather than to other party leaders. "That's to protect a member, not to protect a child," Emanuel said.

With his statement, Reynolds, who is locked in a difficult reelection campaign, signaled he was unwilling to take the fall alone amid partisan attacks that were becoming increasingly vituperative....

Republican insiders said Reynolds spoke out because he was angry that Hastert appeared willing to let him take the blame for the party leadership's silence.

A House GOP leadership aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of losing his job, said that Reynolds realizes he has taken a shot at his leader but that it is understandable.

"This is what happens when one member tries to throw another member under a bus," he aide said.

Last night, Hastert, Boehner and Majority Whip Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) said in a statement that Foley's communications with former pages are "unacceptable and abhorrent," and that his resignation "must now be followed by the full weight of the criminal justice system."

The House clerk's office "has taken possession of Congressman Foley's office, and Capitol police officers have been posted in front of his office around-the-clock" to preserve Foley's records and correspondence, said Hastert spokesman Ron Bonjean.

Read the rest of this post...