Foley, fast forgotten?
MayorBob.
Posted to Politics on Tue Dec 12, 2006 at 06:00:06 AM EST (promoted by Acefantastik). RSS.
It was the scandal which cost one long-time incumbent his Congressional seat. It was also the scandal which, when stirred in with the other stuff rankling the public, ended up costing Republicans control of Congress and spelled the end of Dennis Hastert's Republican leadership role. It was the Mark Foley congressional page scandal and the House Ethics Committee just completed its investigation into the matter.
In their 91 page report on the scandal (pdf doc) the House panel found that ex-Representative Foley did indeed send "salacious" messages to pages. Many Republican lawmakers and staffers were aware of what was happening and, while some tried to "elevate the matter" they tended to be ignored by the leadership. The actions of many of these senior Republican officials were characterized as trying to "to remain willfully ignorant of the potential consequences of former Represenative Foley's conduct." According to the executive summary of the report:
"The failure to exhaust all reasonable efforts to call attention to potential misconduct involving a member and House page is not merely the exercise of poor judgment; it is a present danger to House pages and to the integrity of the institution of the House."As much of a danger to House pages or integrity as the incident was, nobody is going to be punished for it. Because that was the bottom line on the report - no rules broken, no time out for anyone. Representative Doc Hastings (Rep - Washington), the committee head, said the report should remind House members of an "affirmative obligation" to take action when behavior like Foley's is encountered in the future.
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