"I was disgusted by the revelations and disappointed that he [Foley] would violate the trust of the citizens who placed him in office," Bush said at an elementary school during a campaign swing in California.
President Partisan Douchebag will never be accused of "feeling anybody's pain." Read that statement carefully. Foley only betrayed the Republican voters of his district, Mr. President? Or, how about, he violated the trust of parents and citizens everywhere regardless of political affiliation. He abused and betrayed the trust of children entrusted to work in his office. He violated the trust of society
Like everything else in this disgusting scandal, these shitheads cannot see beyond their own party and interest. Ever. Even after the fact, in supposedly thoughtful and conciliatory statements. They cannot help themselves. Throw. Them. All. Out.
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Here's another interesting and disturbing wrinkle inspired by a comment in the thread at The Carpetbagger Report...
We all know Foley's lawyer announced yesterday that 1. Foley is gay. 2. Foley was molested as a child by a priest.
Of course that information struck me initially as crap. Impossible to prove or disprove, and a poor attempt to garner sympathy for Foley and excuse his behavior..." He was drunk!...er, and molested as a child!"
Now, I am aware that molestation as a child often has far-reaching effects and does make one more likely to repeat the abuse. But is that really what Foley, his lawyer (and Republican handlers) are getting at? OR are they trying to conflate Foley's childhood molestation with his being gay?!?
In other words, Being molested by a priest isn't an excuse for Foley later molesting others, rather, it's the reason he is gay. And once that happened, the next thing you know, he molests boys...'cause those gays can't help themselves...
I suspect the information was released/framed that way, because they are only too happy to let some jump to that conclusion.
Of course, in the final analysis thinking about this too hard only makes the cover-up look worse. Molestation and sexual abuse does have a profound effect on children for the rest of their lives, and can lead to continuing the cycle of abuse. And if you follow their warped logic, even if it meant "turning some pages gay." Which, of course, if followed to their illogical conclusion, guarantees Foley's victims go on to molest children themselves. And so on.
Yet they were willing to look the other way. All to protect one House seat. Now that is a violation of trust, Mr. President.
Corrupted absolutely, indeed.
[Cross-posted as two posts at Kakistocrats.com]
UPDATE: Welcome Daou Report readers, and thanks for the vine, Steve.
11 comments:
Bush should pardon Foley. He'd be following in the footsteps of your esteemed President Clinton, who PARDONED Mel Reynolds. You remember Mel Reynolds, the guy who was convicted of having sex with a 16 year-old intern.
The Democrats have as much sleeze in their party as the Republicans. Of course, they also have no shame either...
The Democrats should be on this morning, noon, and night, in all 435 districts. Rahm, let's get out a commercial ASAP and get it on the air in all 50 states...something like:
52 year old Republican Congressman Mark Foley has admiited he has been making sexual advances FOR YEARS towards the teenage boys serving as House Pages. House Speaker Denny Hastert, House Majority Whip John Boehner, and the rest of the republican leadership in the House covered it up FOR YEARS, and protected an alleged pedophile from justice. Call your represntative and ask them where they stand on pedophiles serving in the US Congress.
and then put the local phone number of any republicans on the screen. When the media goes apeshit over it, not only pointedly refuse to apologize, also state that you are proud to expose the true colors of the republican congress. Run the ad over and over and over and over right up to election day, then watch as the Democrats pick up about 60 seats in the House and 8-10 in the Senate. This is a gift from God, who wants the republicans out. Let's use it.
You have taken this damaging situation for the republicans and somehow found a way to attack them for the wrong thing.
Clearly, Bush's comments were referring to Foley's abusing his position as a congressman - to abusing the public trust of asking to represent those people and then betraying that trust.
Bush doesn't make speeches about every person in America who commits the acts Foley committed; clearly, Bush's comments were in the context of Foley as an elected representative.
The criticism is nit-picking over nothing, and I think that's a pretty bad idea when the democrats need to be having a simple, clear message about the main things Bush does wrong to convince his supporters, not dilute the message with trivialities, which implies that the other stuff isn't so bad.
Bush should be attacked for corruption, for unnecessary for, for incopetent government, for fiscal irresponsibility, for attacking democracy itself in many ways, for supporting torture, etc.
The Democrats have as much sleeze in their party as the Republicans.
So...consensual sex between adults or a sloppy blow job from a chubby intern (who was 22) equates to child molestation? Awesome. Great defense.
To anony 1 Mr Clinton pardoned Mel Reynolds after he spent 8 years in prison and had completed the 5 years he was sentanced to on the sex charges, the pardon was for SEC violations, or did that fact escape you?
Be careful how you mince words;
Mel Reynolds was convicted and server all of his term for sex with a 16 year old intern. He was convicted again for bank fraud and lying to the SEC. He served ALL of his term for the sex with a minor issue and served 42 out of the 78 months for the bank fraud. Clinton pardoned him on that count, not the sex conviction.
The key difference here is whether Hastert and the Republican party knew about Foley and ignored it. The Democratic party didn't "ignore" what was going on with Mel Reynolds.
Way to handle that first anonymous commenter's bullshit, guys. I did not know the intricacies of the Mel Reynolds either way.
Attempt to deflect from your own problems by bringing up complete crap from years ago is par for the course.
Craig-
I hear what you're saying. the nitpick on Bush is actually more of a sidebar to me in this post, and I probably should not have led with it.
I went to the WaPo article because I wanted to read the exact context of the "Foley's gay/Foley was molested" statement. I wanted to expand upon the theory put forth by the Carpetbagger commenter that the molestation was Foley's excuse for being gay, not an excuse for the molestation.
The piece wraps up with the Bush statement, and that's when I started writing. It's just the order I wrote the piece, and now with the link fromn TDR, I won't reformat it. I do however stand by what I said, nitpicky as it is. These guys are supposed to be in damage control mode and every time they open their mouths, they dig themselves in deeper. Tony Snow. Boehner, Tom Reynolds' preposterous daycare center press conference, "Political correctness/homophobia" — they just keep making it worse.
They are fumbling it so badly because they are STILL thinking of it solely in political terms. I really think the regret is for getting caught, not for what happened.
And for all the other "Democrats have their own skeletons" wingnuts... If I had a blog to write on after I got home from Middle School, I would have called out Gerry Studds for the same thing.
It's ancient history now, though.
Interestingly, when that scandal broke in 1983, Studds admitted to having an affair with a 17-year old male page, including a trip to Morocco. He held a press conference with his paramour (by that time in his twenties) at his side, and said that, although it reflected an error of judgement on his part due to age, their relationship was completely consensual and none of anyone else's business. Not only did he refuse to resign, he turned his back on the Speaker of the House when his censure was read. He then managed to be re-elected by his constituents until his retirement in 1996.
Quite a bit different from propositioning and harassing multiple teenage boys in emails and IMs, then digging the hole deeper with lies and excuses when the story comes out.
As an interesting side note: the other congressman nailed for having sex with an underaged intern alongside Studds attempted a different strategy. He issued a tearful apology and hung his head in shame at his censure. He was not re-elected.
Yep, Jack. That second guy was a Republican. Lately these two examples have been trotted out to show that Dems kept electing there perv while Repugs rejected theirs...
Whatever. Neither of those instances involved coverups with the House leadership and repeat offenses.
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