Soapbox

Boy, I guess they are just out of ammunition in the Republican party. Seems like the bullets are gone, so they’ve resorted to throwing shoes.

In the wake of this whole sordid mess with Rep. Mark Foley and his illicit contacts with teenaged pages at the capitol, the GOP has done everything but try to find out what was really going on.

After first blaming it on Bill Clinton, Republicans then insisted that the whole story is just a ploy by the democrats to win seats in November. (Democrats made a Republican sexually solicit boys? Who knew they were so powerful!) Apparently, that dog woudn’t hunt. Desperate to divert attention from the party officials who knew Foley was contacting these boys but did nothing to stop him, their latest lob is that several years ago, (I am not making this up) Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D- California) was seen near a guy from NAMBLA in a Gay Pride parade. So you see, the Democrats have no business asking questions about Mark Foley, because clearly they are in favor of adults molesting children.

?? Wha–?

As I recall, a few years ago Don Rumsfeld sold light-water nuclear reactors to Kin Jong Il of North Korea! He also sold chemical weapons and shook hands with Sadaam Hussein. By their own logic, this would mean that Republicans are in favor of brutal dictators, terrorists and WMD’s!

Bear in mind, these outraged Republicans are the same bunch who fired their own Ethics Committee chairman a few years ago after his committee had the audacity to recognize ethical violations by Tom DeLay, and tried to change the rules so DeLay could keep his positions of power even after being indicted for crimes. They also booed Nancy Pelosi a week ago when she asked for a full investigation of the affair!
But what a difference a week makes. Having seen which way the political wind blows, the Republicans are clucking in moral outrage over how democrats are in favor of man-boy love and are demanding an investigation, apparently having decide to throw speaker Dennis Hastert under the bus if necessary.

From the first Hastert has maintained that the only e-mails he knew about were “merely inappropriate”- as if such e-mail contact between a 52 year old man and 16 year old boys is a normal part of life! Bay Buchannan, to her credit, angrily told her own party leadership, “Those messages had “predator” stamped all over them!”

Then the Republican talking head (without a brain) Matt Drudge said that teenagers are “beasts” and these kids clearly manipulated and abused Mark Foley. Good God- what is he smoking? Speaking of God, the Rev, James Dobson of “Focus on the Family”, self-appointed guardian of the nation’s morals who is on a first-name basis with Jesus Christ said that what happend was “just a “prank.”

A PRANK? if that is his idea of a prank, keep him the hell away from MY children! This is the man who maintains that it is appropriate for his followers to deny women emergency contraception and even birth control pills because their use does not conform to God’s law. Wonder what part of the Bible says “thou shalt protect sexual predators if they are in your own party.”
No one with any sense would accuse congressional Republicans of actually thinking that it is OK that Mark Foley was verbally molesting children. But every minute they spend trying to blame Bill Clinton, or Nancy Pelosi, or the pages themselves instead of just cleaning their own house reinforces the notion that they do care more about keeping their majority than about finding out what exactly what was going on between one of their own and the children in their care.

We just have to try to stay strong and sane until the November elections.