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Ok, I get your point about the secrecy and abuse of power topics. I
agree that this administration has kept us too much in the dark and
that abuse of power is not a good thing.<br>
<br>
I see the hypocrisy of trying for the moral high ground and losing it,
but I don't like to blame the whole party for the failings of one
individual, even if that party claims to be better. I wish that the
citizens of this country would vote on the issues and not on how
wholesome they think a candidate is. If more comes out about either
party sitting on the information, then maybe I'll get more upset. From
what I've heard, though, the information that was had early on was more
vague than damning. I haven't been following it that closely though.
I have heard that the information that one of the papers had that they
sat on was not of sufficient interest to warrant a story (at least
until they had more info).<br>
<br>
I guess the issue is trivial to me because I don't expect that our
government officials are not humans with common (and uncommon) human
failings. That might not be true for others, especially the religious
right, so I understand why it's important to you to show the truth.
I'm just tired of our country trying to hold our government officials
up to be saints. The real saints are the people you work with on a
daily basis who do good even when it doesn't particularly benefit them.<br>
<br>
Paul<br>
<br>
Ted Moffett wrote:
<blockquote
cite="midd03f69e0610082215n506ebb9dxe5cb7c91f482e3e8@mail.gmail.com"
type="cite">
<div>Paul et. al.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>I think the Foley case is a focal point that illuminates why
many of the issues you raise that are so important have not been
addressed sufficiently in the halls of Congress.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Before making the following points, I would like to repeat the
political truism that the cover up is often worse than the crime. And
the implications of the cover up in the Foley case goes far beyond any
attempts by Foley to hide his behavior, or moral and legal issues of
the specifics of Foley's behavior. </div>
<div> </div>
<div>The evidence is mounting that Hastert, or his office, knew of
Foley's objectionable conduct as far back as 2003. Either Hastert is
woefully out of touch, or he knew what Foley was doing and chose to
keep silent. Other Republicans also knew of Foley's conduct, and also
kept quiet. </div>
<div> </div>
<div>If the Republican party takes advantage of being the party of
"moral values," meaning in part they support the fundamentalist
religious view of the immorality of gay behavior, which is an approach
they certainly have exploited in their courting of the powerful voting
block of the religious right, I don't think it is trivial or misguided
to fully examine a case of these moral positions being violated
substantively by a member of their party, while other party
members hide this fact. If they are hypocrites, hiding behavior that
might result in the loss of support of the religious right, this
deception requires full examination, if for no other reason than to
inform voters of the truth, to encourage truth in governance.
</div>
<div> </div>
<div>This case strikes at the heart of one of the primary propaganda
tools of the Republican party, a tool that has been used to deflect
attention from the critical issues you insisted are more worth
discussion. If we cannot dismantle these effective propaganda tools
used as "weapons of mass distraction," how can government focus on the
critical issues? Instead we have the US Congress wasting time
discussing a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, or
intervening in the Terri Schiavo case... The party of "moral values"
indeed!
</div>
<div> </div>
<div>The Foley case is another example of the pattern of secrecy that
the Bush administration has exhibited on many other issues (need I list
them?), that are more important, as you point out in your laundry list,
then one congressman's sexual approaches to minor pages. It is
the damage of conducting the affairs of government in secrecy that is
critical here, a pattern in the Bush administration, central to the
fundamental health of democratic governance. </div>
<div> </div>
<div>We are also discussing abuse of power, the
arrogance of approaching governance as though above
accountability, that can spill over into many areas of government,
which is another concern of many regarding how the Bush administration
has conducted itself, such as in the abuse of executive signing
statements by Bush. etc. Perhaps the Republican party became a bit too
overconfident in their dominant position, and thus arrogant to the
point of carelessness.
</div>
<div> </div>
<div>These three fundamental issues, a political party's hypocrisy,
secrecy and abuse of power in government, far transcend the moral and
legal issues about sexual approaches or contact between a 16 year old
and a 52 year old (I don't care whether hetero or homosexual), if this
was the conduct of an individual leading a totally private life. </div>
<div> </div>
<div>However, when politically damaging information is covered up in
the attempts to deceive voters, during an election, about behavior of a
member of a political party that would contradict that
party's message of being the high minded party of "moral values,"
exploited to win political office, such as in the Bush v. Kerry
election 2004, we are talking about deception of the whole nation to
win the presidency.
</div>
<div> </div>
<div>A trivial issue?</div>
<div> </div>
<div>We shall see what develops in the Foley case regarding the
evidence.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Ted Moffett<br>
<br>
</div>
<div><span class="gmail_quote">On 10/8/06, <b
class="gmail_sendername">Paul Rumelhart</b> <<a
href="mailto:godshatter@yahoo.com">godshatter@yahoo.com</a>> wrote:</span>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote"
style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
<div bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000">Ted,<br>
<br>
I don't mean to belittle the issues of a congressman using the page
system as Foley did for his own personal gratification, or of coverups
by either party. I guess I'm just getting sick of these kinds of power
plays.
<br>
<br>
I know this is not what others believe, but I could for the most part
care less what sexuality, or level of sexual promiscuity, or whatever a
congressman has. I put the "for the most part" in there because of
cases such as this one where a law was broken. I didn't care about
what Clinton did with Monica Lewinsky or cigars. If the page was 18 or
older, I wouldn't care much about how Foley IMs them either. I'd
rather judge them on the job they are doing as a government official.
<br>
<br>
I'd rather we focus on the actual real damage that (I feel) is being
done to this country. Such as the warrant-less wiretapping, Patriot
Acts I and II, the new bill that McCain caved on that actually states
that someone who disagrees with the administration can be considered an
enemy combatant, the debate over torture and our needs as a country to
employ it wantonly, the secret prisons, the handing off of prisoners to
countries we know will torture them, the willingness of our telcoms to
have the NSA sniff every packet on the Internet, the disregarding of
intelligence before 9/11, the no-bid contracts to make those connected
in power wealthier, and the complete ignoring of the FISA rules even
when they are so broad as to be almost meaningless. Did I forget
anything? Oh yes, the war with Iraq when we knew it had no WMDs.
Anyway, you get the point.
<br>
<span class="sg"><br>
Paul</span>
<div><span class="e" id="q_10e2ae1c193d7c60_2"><br>
<br>
<br>
Ted Moffett wrote:
<blockquote
cite="http://midd03f69e0610071526q2c13f0cav4d8ad4f1e767f14a@mail.gmail.com"
type="cite">
<div>All:</div>
<div> </div>
<div>The case of former Republican Representative Foley's use of
the page system to sexually communicate with minor pages, using his
official tax payer supported influence, has implications that
are critical to basic democratic principles regarding the conduct of
government. </div>
<div> </div>
<div>As it's been said, the cover up is often worse than the
crime, and in this case the Republican cover up, with solid evidence it
extends back before the 2004 presidential elections, is a gravely
serious violation of the public right to know about the conduct of
public officials in government, not only because it allowed Foley to
continue this behavior in his official capacity in government, but
because the cover up was possibly aimed at deceiving voters in the 2004
election. </div>
<div> </div>
<div>Foley's misconduct is central to illuminating the truth
behind one of the main propaganda tools utilized in the Republican rise
to power. The Republican party has made political gains opposing gay
rights, with grandstanding measures wasting the time of the US
Congress, and the tax payers dollars, with the proposed constitutional
amendment (and numerous state measures) to ban gay marriage. It is
political and poetic justice that we discover they hid the
inappropriate sexually oriented conduct of a gay member of their party
in the US Congress, allowing the misconduct to continue, exposing the
hypocrisy of their claim to the the party of "moral values," a dominant
propaganda tool they have used to exploit public unease with gay rights
issues for political advantage. </div>
<div> </div>
<div>Secrecy and deception have been prominent tactics of the
Bush administration on many levels on many issues, violating a central
principle of how a democracy must function with transparency in
government. This pattern is exposed again in the Foley cover up, and
US House Speaker Hastert should be held accountable for complicity in
allowing Foley to continue in his powerful taxpayer and voter supported
role, without voters being immediately informed of critical ethics
violations involving Foley's official duties in government. </div>
<div> </div>
<div>If it is true that Hastert or other Republicans denied
voters critical information regarding Foley's conduct with
pages before the 2004 election, this is potentially a case of a cover
up to swing the presidency to the Republicans. Exposing Foley's
misconduct before the 2004 elections could have inflicted damage to the
aforementioned propaganda message of the party of "moral values." </div>
<div> </div>
<div>The documentation that Hastert, or his office, was informed
of Foley's questionable conduct with pages after 2004 is solid, though
Hastert says, "he does not remember."</div>
<div> </div>
<div>I quote a few excerpts below from the news article at this
link:</div>
<div> </div>
<div><a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)"
href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15063977/" target="_blank">http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15063977/</a></div>
<div>
<p><span></span><b><strong>Speaker doesn't remember discussion</strong></b></p>
<p>Hastert said he does not remember talking to Reynolds about
the Foley e-mails, but did not dispute Reynolds' account.</p>
<p><span></span>"While the speaker does not explicitly recall
this conversation, he has no reason to dispute Congressman Reynolds'
recollection that he reported to him on the problem and its
resolution," Hastert's aides said in a preliminary report on the matter
issued Saturday. </p>
<p><span></span>ABC News reported Friday that Foley also engaged
in a series of sexually explicit instant messages with current and
former teenage male pages. In one message, ABC said, Foley wrote to one
page: "Do I make you a little horny?" </p>
<p>-------------</p>
<p>There is documentation that Hastert, and/or his office, and/or
other Republicans, were informed of Foley's sexual advances to underage
pages before the 2004 election. This evidence supports the assertion
of a possible cover up to influence the 2004 elections favorably for
Republicans. </p>
<p>I have pasted in a few excerpts of this news article offering
information that Republicans knew of Foley's misconduct before the 2004
elections below this link:</p>
<p><a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)"
href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/04/AR2006100400616.html"
target="_blank">http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/04/AR2006100400616.html
</a></p>
<p><strong>Ex-Aide to Foley Cites '03 Warnings<br>
</strong> By Jonathan Weisman and Charles Babington<br>
The Washington Post </p>
</div>
<div>
<p> Thursday 05 October 2006</p>
<blockquote><b><i>Former staffer says he alerted Hastert's office.</i></b></blockquote>
<p> A longtime chief of staff to disgraced former
representative Mark Foley (R-Fla.) approached House Speaker J. Dennis
Hastert's office three years ago, repeatedly imploring senior
Republicans to help stop Foley's advances toward teenage male pages,
the staff member said yesterday. </p>
<p> The account by Kirk Fordham, who resigned yesterday from
his job with another senior lawmaker, pushed back to 2003 or earlier
the time when Hastert's staff reportedly became aware of Foley's
questionable behavior concerning teenagers working on Capitol Hill. </p>
<p> It raised new questions about Hastert's assertions that
senior GOP leaders were aware only of "over-friendly" e-mails from 2005
that they say did not raise alarm bells when they came to light this
year.</p>
<p> Fordham says his warnings to Hastert's office dealt
with a different matter: reports of Foley's troubling interest in male
pages working in the Capitol Hill complex. He says he implored the
highest ranks of the GOP leadership to intervene to thwart behavior
that he had been unable to stop after multiple confrontations with his
boss. Sources close to the matter say a meeting took place between a
senior Hastert aide and Foley before Fordham's January 2004 departure,
probably in 2003, in a small conference room on the third floor of the
Capitol. </p>
<p>-------------------------</p>
<p>If the Democrats had solid information about Foley's sexual
approaches to pages prior to the 2004 elections, this raises the
question why they would not have made it public then to attempt to
bring Foley and the Republicans down? The fact the democrats did not
expose Foley before the 2004 elections, arguably more critical than the
upcoming 2006 elections, suggests they did not know of Foley's ethics
violating conduct, or did not have enough documentation to make it
stick. </p>
</div>
<div>Blaming Democrats, or the media, for sitting on the
information regarding Foley's misconduct, till weeks before the 2006
mid-terms, smacks of the same tactics the Republicans mocked when
Hilary Clinton talked of the "vast right wing conspiracy" during the
Clinton years. Now we have a vast Democratic/media conspiracy to
damage the Republicans. Note that the facts that Foley for years has
been using the page system for his sexual advances on minors is so well
documented that many Republicans are agreeing this conduct occurred. </div>
<div> </div>
<div>Shouldn't the Republicans pay a price for covering up
Foley's misconduct in this matter, even if the public release of this
information was planned to occur by political advantage seeking
Democrats, or the media, in the weeks before the 2006 mid-terms? Of
course many Republican party supporters would rather have more time to
distance themselves from this issue before the mid-terms. But given a
cover up by Republicans, this is not a case of Democrats or the media
taking the Republicans totally by surprise, even if the public release
of the information was opportunistically timed. Republicans were
hiding this information, no doubt hoping it would not come out before
the mid-terms. </div>
<div> </div>
<div>If Democrats (or the media) sat on solid documentation
regarding Foley's misconduct with pages, waiting for when the
information would receive the most exposure, and do the most damage,
then it is morally questionable It allowed Foley to continue in his
misconduct, with the voters who supported him continuing to have the
wool pulled over their eyes. </div>
<div> </div>
<div>Where is the documentation that the media or any Democrats
had solid evidence regarding Foley's misconduct, and hid this
information from the public, deliberately waiting to release it before
the mid-terms? Is it not possible some of this information was kept
hidden, hoping to keep it a "secret" till at least after the 2006
mid-terms, thus rendering it difficult for those looking for
politically damaging information to put it all together with enough
documentation to go public? </div>
<div> </div>
<div>This case is more deserving of an independent counsel
investigation into Republican complicity in covering up Foley's sexual
approaches to pages, than there was in an independent investigation
into the Monica Lewinsky case involving Clinton, given the evidence
Republicans hid this information, from prior to the 2004 presidential
elections up until the information broke publicly recently. Clinton
paid a heavy price for his misconduct, but there was no cover up in the
Monika Lewinsky case by Democrats that influenced the outcome of a
presidential election in their favor. The Monica Lewinsky case was a
burden that Al Gore had to overcome in his 2000 contest with Bush, as
the Republicans campaigned in part on their claim to the the party of
"moral values," compared to the sexual scandal plagued Democratic party
represented by Al Gore. </div>
<div> </div>
<div>Ted Moffett</div>
<div> </div>
<div><span class="gmail_quote">On 10/7/06, <b
class="gmail_sendername">Paul Rumelhart</b> <<a
onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)"
href="mailto:godshatter@yahoo.com" target="_blank">godshatter@yahoo.com
</a>> wrote:</span>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote"
style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">I'd
actually classify myself as an independent right now. The Dem/Rep<br>
lines are too close in certain areas and differ too much in some areas
I <br>
could care less about.<br>
<br>
It seems to me that the sides are even, if what this article said is<br>
true. Dems play their card that they have been sitting on for a while.<br>
Reps cut their losses. Why take it any farther? <br>
<br>
Just to be clear, I condemn the behavior of sitting on something like<br>
this because of political motivations. Whether it was democrats waiting<br>
for the right time to strike or republicans that were trying to avoid a
<br>
scandal, I condemn it. Obviously, I also condemn the behavior of trying<br>
to come on to underage pages. I just think pushing it farther in the<br>
political arena is a waste of resources.<br>
<br>
Funny that we're talking about trust here when discussing an article <br>
that claims to have information on a subject but doesn't actually<br>
present it as fact. Trusting innuendo and gossip isn't much better than<br>
whatever trusting you are accusing me of. I have a naive wish to go<br>
along with my naive ability to trust, though: I wish the people we<br>
elected into office would spend 1/10th the amount of time they spend on<br>
political maneuvering on actually trying to make this country a better<br>
place. <br>
<br>
Paul<br>
<br>
g. crabtree wrote:<br>
<br>
> Spoken like a trusting Democrat. I agree about the creepy &
stupid<br>
> part but, if the DNC or democrat operatives were aware of this<br>
> situation months or even years earlier and waited till six weeks
out <br>
> from the mid terms to spring the nasty news for the advantage it
would<br>
> bring then I think that that has its own stink of nastiness (if not<br>
> criminality) and deserves to be made public.<br>
><br>
> gc <br>
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Paul Rumelhart"<br>
> <<a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)"
href="mailto:godshatter@yahoo.com" target="_blank">godshatter@yahoo.com</a>><br>
> To: "vision2020" <<a
onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)"
href="mailto:vision2020@moscow.com" target="_blank">
vision2020@moscow.com</a>><br>
> Sent: Friday, October 06, 2006 11:37 PM
<br>
> Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Scandals<br>
><br>
><br>
>> So responding in sexually-explicit ways to an underage staffer
is<br>
>> somehow ok if it's really a joke that's being played on
you? How is <br>
>> this an improvement? Now he's both creepy and stupid at the
same time.<br>
>><br>
>> Anyway, he's resigned. That should be the end of it as far as
I'm<br>
>> concerned, at least from a political standpoint. This arguing
about who <br>
>> knew what should stop.<br>
>><br>
>> Paul<br>
>><br>
>> Pat Kraut wrote:<br>
>><br>
>>> On the front page of the local newspaper tonight there is
talk of<br>
>>> scandals...but what scandal? <br>
>>> This is from a blog and makes me question who started this
and what<br>
>>> and when<br>
>>> did they know??<br>
>>> Foleys a slime, no question but what is the rest of the
story?? <br>
>>> Dirty tricks<br>
>>> to change the election?? I think dems should be put under
oath also.<br>
>>><br>
>>> After the Frenzy<br>
>>> 10/05 03:13 PM<br>
>>> This is why it pays to wait and get more facts before
joining the <br>
>>> chorus of<br>
>>> pundits and operatives demanding resignations. I will
revisit this<br>
>>> later.<br>
>>> XXXXX DRUDGE REPORT XXXXX MON OCT 5 2006 2:53:48 ET XXXXX<br>
>>> <br>
>>> CLAIM: FILTHY FOLEY ONLINE MESSAGES WERE PAGE PRANK GONE
AWRY<br>
>>> **World Exclusive**<br>
>>> **Must Credit the DRUDGE REPORT**<br>
>>><br>
>>> According to two people close to former congressional page
Jordan <br>
>>> Edmund,<br>
>>> the now famous lurid AOL Instant Message exchanges that
led to the<br>
>>> resignation of Mark Foley were part of an online prank
that by<br>
>>> mistake got<br>
>>> into the hands of enemy political operatives, the DRUDGE
REPORT can <br>
>>> reveal.<br>
>>><br>
>>> According to one Oklahoma source who knows the former page
very well,<br>
>>> Edmund, a conservative Republican, goaded Foley to type
embarrassing<br>
>>> comments that were then shared with a small group of young
Hill <br>
>>> politicos.<br>
>>> The prank went awry when the saved IM sessions got into
the hands of<br>
>>> political operatives favorable to Democrats. This source,
an ally of<br>
>>> Edmund, <br>
>>> also adamantly proclaims that the former page is not a
homosexual.<br>
>>> The prank<br>
>>> scenario was confirmed by a second associate of Edmund.<br>
>>><br>
>>> The news come on the heels that former FBI Chief Louis
Freeh has <br>
>>> been named<br>
>>> to investigate the mess.<br>
>>><br>
>>> Developing...<br>
>>><br>
>>> =======================================================<br>
>>> List services made available by First Step Internet, <br>
>>> serving the communities of the Palouse since 1994.<br>
>>> <a
onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)"
href="http://www.fsr.net/" target="_blank">http://www.fsr.net</a>
<br>
>>> mailto:<a
onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)"
href="mailto:Vision2020@moscow.com" target="_blank">
Vision2020@moscow.com</a><br>
>>> =======================================================
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>>><br>
>>><br>
>>><br>
>><br>
>> ======================================================= <br>
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>> serving the communities of the Palouse since 1994.
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onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)"
href="mailto:Vision2020@moscow.com" target="_blank">
Vision2020@moscow.com</a><br>
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