THE REST OF THE STORY?

MARK FOLEY


As I'm sure most of you are already aware, Florida Congressman Mark Foley has resigned effectively immediately from Congress and will not seek reelection this November because of the controversy and probable illegal activity involving Foley sexually explicit email and instant messaging exchanges involving an underage boy. The left blogosphere has been all over this and some of the better stuff out right now can be found at Talking Points Memo and Americablog, among other fine sites.

Where the story takes a turn for the surreal is the fact that apparently GOP House leadership was aware of this going back to the beginning of this year and possibly earlier. The fact that members of the GOP knew that a member of their caucus was involved in what amounts to illegal activity and said and did absolutely nothing about it for all this time is what is really going to hurt the party. It is an extreme example of the culture of corruption within the GOP-controlled Congress. Someone in the party does something wrong? Let's just brush it under the rug. In this instance, it appears that the GOP leadership was complicit in covering up a crime. Based on my admittedly limited study of law, I've always understood that a person who helps cover up a murder is just as guilty as the person who commits the murder. Let's hope that the voters finally hold the GOP accountable for their part in this.

UPDATE: Just read this from a commentor over at Think Progress. I think it sums up the state of the GOP nicely: "I always believed that the worst thing you could do was put party before country, but party before all semblance of human decency? Bravo, Mr. Hastert. "