Hastert's aide(s) are going down-he'll be next

[samclem]

A source with firsthand knowledge of events says that this coming Thursday, Kirk Fordham— former chief of staff to both Foley and more recently Rep. Tom Reynolds, R-NY—will testify that a few years ago he was alerted by then-House Clerk Jeff Trandahl that Foley had been stopped while trying to enter the page dorm in an apparently intoxicated state . The source says Fordham will testify that he recalls this being the event that convinced both him and Trandahl to warn Hastert’s office , with Fordham designated to have the conversation with Hastert’s chief of staff, Scott Palmer. The source says that both aides had been watching Foley’s behavior with pages and Fordham had counseled Foley to watch his behavior.

from Foley's Reputed Visit to the Page Dormitory - ABC News

Palmer has denied that he was ever told of this or anything about Foley. Guess what, Scotty. You’re going down. Of course, perhaps he didn’t tell Hastert.

Also from the article

… Rep. Ginny Brown-Waite, R-Fl., also learned about the dormitory incident, which she says she was told about from first hand sources.

before the scandal broke. Sure were a lot of people who knew about Rep. scumbag.

[Tuckerfan]

First of all, sam, do you really think that given the subject matter “going down” is an appropriate phrase to put in the title of the thread? Next, have you seen the various Republicans trying to claim that this is an “October Surprise” launched by the Dems? (One of them tried to claim that this was a “tactical and strategic move” by the Dems, which, as Jon Stewart on TDS pointed out, are not terms one would use to describe the Dems.) Hopefully, these guys will get booted out, but I’m not holding my breath.

[Long_Time_First_Time]

@Tuckerfan

Next, have you seen the various Republicans trying to claim that this is an “October Surprise” launched by the Dems? (One of them tried to claim that this was a “tactical and strategic move” by the Dems, which, as Jon Stewart on TDS pointed out, are not terms one would use to describe the Dems.) Hopefully, these guys will get booted out, but I’m not holding my breath.

Instead of whining that this stuff came out at a time that hurts your chances for retaining your job, perhaps one should refrain from scummy behavior in the first place.

The longer Hasert stays in office, the worse it gets from a PR standpoint, IMHO. But he seems determined to stay the course. It seems very odd that the best and brightest of the Rebuplican party decided to was better to keep him around till after the election that to have him step down.
When the story first broke it struck me as politics as usual. Powerful men get away with all manner of stuff all the time, and this was just an instance when it happened to come to light. But every time I see a Republican or one of their apologists in the media blame everyone else instead of just growing a pair and admitting some …even a tiny, teeny bit…of responsibility, I get more pissed at them.
Yesterday there was a editorial in my local paper in which the “conservative” columnist said that the reason more conservative republicans haven’t rushed to defend Foley et al was because they were unhappy with the current congress’ fiscal policies. Well, they probably aren’t too happy with current fiscal policy (unless you owned an oil company or Haliburton you would be crazy to like it), but the columnist should have given those conservatives a little credit for being able to see that being a sexual preditor isn’t a good thing and is pretty indefensible no matter were you stand on other issues.