Hastert Lies Again, Gets Caught Again

My meat? Sorry pal, I never EVER listen to that fat pant load.

But hey...please chirp on.

woiyo,
I still bet Shock&Awe was your woody. Am I wrong or were you in favor of invading Iraq?

I am for the initial invasion and against the current occupation.

We should have left the minute we accomplished our mission which was determine where the WMD are (none found), remove Saddam.

Now what, you wanna debate your ignorance to reality?

Denny says that the young buck stops here. Hastert is an incompetent sleaze who should be forced out. Hopefully, he will be voted out next month. Just think, he is second in line for the president.

Not long ago, he inserted an item in a pork bill that resulted in his receipt of millions in appreciation of real estate that he purchased only about five years ago. The item involves the construction of a federal highway that will be located near his remote real estate.

What was acomplished by initial invasion? We created anarchy, destroyed the infrastrcture of the nation, created widespread famine, eliminated the free schools and free health care they once enjoyed and destroyed their pristine roads and buildings. Granted, Saddam was a dictator but that did not give us the right to invade the country. As has been said so many times before, even by Bush himself, Saddam had NOTHING to do with 9/11. Wioyo are you suggesting that we should have gone in, destroyed the country, then left? We never should have been there in the first place!

Hastert Not Wanted: GOP Candidates Across US Canceling, Postponing Appearances...
NY Times | JEFF ZELENY | October 6, 2006 at 09:52 AM

Mr. Hastert, who had a busy October of campaign travel penciled into his calendar, is suddenly seen as a liability for the first time since being elected speaker. Republican candidates across the nation were canceling, postponing or reconsidering appearances with him, fund-raisers said, wary of campaigning with Mr. Hastert, even though pollsters say he carries no more than a 40 percent name recognition.

For nearly a week, Republicans said they saw the need for Mr. Hastert publicly to concede that mistakes had been made on his watch. While he stopped short of issuing a direct apology Thursday, saying he still was not aware of the extent of Mr. Foley's inappropriate behavior toward pages, Mr. Hastert did declare, "The buck stops here."

You must be a Sunni then?

Republicans on Panel Have Ties to Hastert
By David Jackson and Matt Kelley
USA Today

Thursday 05 October 2006

Washington - Both Republicans on the House ethics subcommittee investigating the Mark Foley scandal have financial ties to Speaker Dennis Hastert, whose handling of the former congressman's lurid Internet messages to House pages is under scrutiny.

Ethics Chairman Doc Hastings received $2,500 during the 2000 campaign from Hastert's political action committee, Keep Our Majority, according to PoliticalMoneyLine, which tracks money in politics. The six-term Washington Republican, who became ethics chairman last year, will lead the Foley investigation.

Rep. Judy Biggert of Illinois, received $6,000 from Hastert's PAC and $2,000 from Hastert's own re-election fund during the 2002 campaign, according to PoliticalMoneyLine.

Biggert, whose district neighbors Hastert's, said personal relationships and financial ties will not affect the investigation: "I think that all of us on this committee were chosen because we are thought to be fair."

Fred Wertheimer, president of the watchdog group Democracy 21, said the Hastert contributions undermine the subcommittee's credibility. "They should have brought in an outside counsel," he said.

Two Democrats, Howard Berman of California and Stephanie Tubbs Jones of Ohio, round out the Foley investigative panel.

Berman, who is in his 12th term, is the top Democrat on the full ethics committee. Berman recently replaced Rep. Alan Mollohan, D-W.Va., on the ethics panel. Mollohan stepped down amid charges that he funneled federal money to home-state foundations and increased his own wealth. He has denied wrongdoing.

Tubbs Jones is a former municipal and county judge in Cleveland and served as the elected Cuyahoga County prosecutor.

Ethics members have a job to do "regardless of relationships," she said. "My reputation is too important to put it aside for purposes of some friendship."

The panel will be aided by William O'Reilly, the committee's staff director and counsel.

Staffer Cites Earlier Role by Hastert's Office
Confrontation With Foley Detailed

By Jonathan Weisman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 7, 2006; A01

House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert's chief of staff confronted then-Rep. Mark Foley about his inappropriate social contact with male pages well before the speaker said aides in his office took any action, a current congressional staff member with personal knowledge of Foley and his behavior with pages said yesterday.

The staff member said Hastert's chief of staff, Scott Palmer, met with the Florida Republican at the Capitol to discuss complaints about Foley's behavior toward pages. The alleged meeting occurred long before Hastert says aides in his office dispatched Rep. John M. Shimkus (R-Ill.) and the clerk of the House in November 2005 to confront Foley about troubling e-mails he had sent to a Louisiana boy.

The staff member's account buttresses the position of Foley's onetime chief of staff, Kirk Fordham, who said earlier this week that he had appealed to Palmer in 2003 or earlier to intervene, after Fordham's own efforts to stop Foley's behavior had failed. Fordham said Foley and Palmer, one of the most powerful figures in the House of Representatives, met within days to discuss the allegations.

Palmer said this week that the meeting Fordham described "did not happen." Timothy J. Heaphy, Fordham's attorney, said yesterday that Fordham is prepared to testify under oath that he had arranged the meeting and that both Foley and Palmer told him the meeting had taken place. Fordham spent more than three hours with the FBI on Thursday, and Heaphy said that on Friday he contacted the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct to offer his client's cooperation.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/06/AR2006100601888_pf.html

here are the emails:

http://www.citizensforethics.org/filelibrary/FoleyEmailExchangeUpdated1.pdf

I have a problem with this argument, as it has been advanced in a number of places here by conservatives/Republicans. I've seen it being pointed out that if there hadn't been any evidence available to the House leadership that Foley had done anything illegal, then why could they have been expected to do anything about it or look into the matter?

Isnt that awfully little to expect from the House leadership? To only expect it to act on possible misbehaviour of House Representatives if there is proof available that what they did was criminal? What about just unethical? A Congressman preying on teenage pages, who were entrusted to the care of the House - does the suspicion of something like that (and reason for some suspicion was obviously there, as you indicate yourself with the raising of eyebrows) not alone warrant some looking into the matter, some following up? Even if there is no sign yet that there was something outright illegal going on?

What I mean is: since when is the 'if he wasnt doing anything illegal / criminal' - or rather, even: 'if no proof had been supplied yet that he was doing anything illegal / criminal' - we could not have been expected to act on it, the Republican line on ethical responsibility? Isnt that an awfully narrow definition of responsibility for a party that otherwise claims the 'moral values' tag?

And, if we are bringing Clinton into this here - what was the whole point about Monicagate then? If as long as there's no proof of illegal activity, there's no reason for an investigation, then why was Clinton ever investigated, to the point of being brought to court, where he was to promptly try committing perjury? I mean, why was he even taken there then, if something as wholly legal as extramarital but consensual sex then surely is no reason for investigation?

Foley's Antics Were Tip Of The Iceberg
Nation: What Hits From Below The Surface Could Sink Republicans




http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/10/04/opinion/main2060999.shtml

Closeted Gay Republicans and a Party in Political Free-Fall
Closeted Gay Republicans and a Party in Political Free-Fall
by Lawrence O'Donnell
10.05.2006

The LA Times has outed Kirk Fordham today. He will not be the last closeted gay Republican outed by this scandal.

Today's NY Times has a chart that outlines the "key communications" in the House of Representatives about Mark Foley's inappropriate contact with pages. More than one of the names in the chart, which includes Kirk Fordham, are rumored to be closeted gay Republicans who have been working at the highest levels of the Republican leadership.

They have been looking at their names in print for the last couple of days and no doubt fearing for their futures in a Party that is in political free-fall.

Are ambitious closeted gay Republican officials, the most reliable people Speaker Hastert could have delegated the Foley problem to last year? Obviously not. Heat on a closeted gay Republican in the House is heat on all closeted gay Republicans in the House. The most innocent Foley emails were enough to worry the parents of the recipient. They were enough to worry the closeted gay Republicans too. But the closeted gay Republicans were perfectly positioned in the House to make the problem disappear.

Now two Republican staffers are locked in a credibility contest: it's Kirk Fordham v. Scott Palmer, Hastert's chief of staff. Palmer flatly denies that Fordham warned him about Foley. Hastert's political life depends entirely on Scott Palmer's credibility. I can't find anyone in Washington who knows Palmer who thinks his credibility can survive this test.

It's no accident that the first call for Hastert's resignation came from Tony Blankley, Newt Gingrich's former press secretary. Tony knows that the scandal cannot die as long as Hastert and his staff are still in the building.

The Republican base--the Evangelical get-out-the-vote troops--are going to be devastated when they discover how many closeted gay Republicans were involved in policing Mark Foley in the House of Representatives. Republican House members know this. That's why momentum is building for a very quick House cleaning and a new Speaker by next week.

Re: Closeted Gay Republicans and a Party in Political Free-F

That was from the Huffington Post. And included a bit too much eager gay-baiting for my taste.

BBB
I]NY Times time line: [/I]http://www.nytimes.com/ref/washington/FOLEYTIMELINE_GRAPHIC.html?currentcasetype=coscommunication

Re: Closeted Gay Republicans and a Party in Political Free-F


There is entirely too much gay bashing going on, including trying to falsely infer that being gay means being a pedophile. Same thing happened during the priest scandal.

Staffer Cites Earlier Role by Hastert's Office
Staffer Cites Earlier Role by Hastert's Office
Confrontation With Foley Detailed
By Jonathan Weisman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 7, 2006; A01

House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert's chief of staff confronted then-Rep. Mark Foley about his inappropriate social contact with male pages well before the speaker said aides in his office took any action, a current congressional staff member with personal knowledge of Foley and his behavior with pages said yesterday.

The staff member said Hastert's chief of staff, Scott Palmer, met with the Florida Republican at the Capitol to discuss complaints about Foley's behavior toward pages. The alleged meeting occurred long before Hastert says aides in his office dispatched Rep. John M. Shimkus (R-Ill.) and the clerk of the House in November 2005 to confront Foley about troubling e-mails he had sent to a Louisiana boy.

The staff member's account buttresses the position of Foley's onetime chief of staff, Kirk Fordham, who said earlier this week that he had appealed to Palmer in 2003 or earlier to intervene, after Fordham's own efforts to stop Foley's behavior had failed. Fordham said Foley and Palmer, one of the most powerful figures in the House of Representatives, met within days to discuss the allegations.

Palmer said this week that the meeting Fordham described "did not happen." Timothy J. Heaphy, Fordham's attorney, said yesterday that Fordham is prepared to testify under oath that he had arranged the meeting and that both Foley and Palmer told him the meeting had taken place. Fordham spent more than three hours with the FBI on Thursday, and Heaphy said that on Friday he contacted the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct to offer his client's cooperation.

"We are not preparing to cooperate. We are affirmatively seeking to," Heaphy said.

Hastert spokesman Ron Bonjean declined to directly comment on the second House staff member's assertion, saying that it is a matter for a House ethics committee investigation. "The Standards Committee has asked that no one discuss this matter because of its ongoing investigation," Bonjean said.

The emergence of a second congressional staffer describing such a meeting came on a day that Hastert (R-Ill.) was working to solidify his hold on the speakership. Prominent Republicans, including President Bush, have defended Hastert, saying he should not step down, but the criticism continues to flow.

New Jersey's Thomas H. Kean Jr., whose candidacy offers the GOP its most promising hope to take a Senate seat from a Democrat in November, called for Hastert's resignation yesterday, as did the editorial page of the Los Angeles Times. Democratic House candidate Patty Wetterling of Minnesota, a child-safety advocate and the first to air a television commercial about the Foley scandal, will deliver the national Democratic response to Bush's weekly radio address today.

Hastert maintains that he knew nothing of Foley's actions until last week, when the story first broke and Foley resigned. His stance contradicts that of House Majority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) and National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Thomas M. Reynolds (R-N.Y.), both of whom said they had informed Hastert this spring.

Palmer has resolutely said he had no earlier meeting with Foley, and other leadership aides have questioned the truthfulness of Fordham. Fordham quit his job as Reynolds's chief of staff last week after acknowledging that he had tried to persuade ABC News not to publish the salacious instant-message exchanges between Foley and two former pages.

Hastert's office contends that the first confrontation with Foley occurred in November 2005, when Shimkus, the head of the House Page Board, and then-House Clerk Jeff Trandahl took Foley aside to discuss what they termed "over-friendly" e-mails that Foley had sent to a Louisiana boy. Fordham's account not only pushed the matter back at least two years but also indicated that alarms over Foley's behavior had gone well beyond bland e-mails.

Sources close to Fordham say Trandahl repeatedly urged the longtime aide and close family friend to confront Foley about his inappropriate advances on pages. Each time, Foley pledged to no longer socialize with the teenagers, but, weeks later, Trandahl would again alert Fordham about more contacts. Out of frustration, the sources said, Fordham contacted Palmer, hoping that an intervention from such a powerful figure in the House would persuade Foley to stop.

Now, a second House aide familiar with Foley and his actions told The Washington Post yesterday that "Scott Palmer had spoken to Foley prior to November 2005." The aide spoke on the condition of anonymity because the matter is now the subject of a criminal investigation and the House ethics committee inquiry.

Two law enforcement officials said yesterday that the FBI had not yet determined whether a crime had occurred in the Foley case. Justice Department and FBI officials have cautioned that cases involving the enticement of minors are notoriously difficult to prosecute.

On Wednesday night, Palmer was described as highly emotional while aides sifted through e-mails and files to determine whether he had ever spoken to Fordham. Several people who spoke with Palmer said the chief of staff was emphatic in denying that he knew anything about Foley's questionable contacts with young male pages.

Palmer, who shares a townhouse with Hastert when they are in town, is more powerful than all but a few House members. Members know that he speaks for Hastert.

The divergent accounts have highlighted the holes in the public's understanding of Foley's undoing. And they are sure to ratchet up the pressure on Trandahl to come forward with his knowledge of events. As House clerk between January 1999 and November 2005, Trandahl had direct control over the page program.

Pages apparently saw Trandahl as a strict disciplinarian. In one instant-message exchange obtained by The Post, a former page, on his way to his first annual reunion in Washington, told Foley in January 2003 that "everyone is going to be pretty wasted a lot of the time in dc."

He then added, "well we dont have the [expletive] clerk to fire us anymore. . . . we didnt like trandahl that much . . . he isnt a nice guy . . . and he gets really scarey when he is mad."

Trandahl's departure came within days of his confrontation with Foley over e-mails that the congressman had sent a former page. House aides say the circumstances of Trandahl's exit were oddly quiet. The departure of a staff member of long standing, especially one as important as the House clerk, is usually marked with considerable fanfare, said Scott Lilly, a former Democratic staff director of the House Appropriations Committee. Debate is suspended in mid-afternoon to accommodate a stream of testimonials from lawmakers.

Trandahl's departure was marked by a one-minute salute from Shimkus and a brief insert into the Congressional Record.

"My one-hour Special Order changed to a five-minute Special Order, now to a one-minute," Shimkus said. "I just want to say thank you for the work you have done."

Lilly said: "He seemed to suddenly disappear in a puff of smoke."

Trandahl, now the executive director of the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, has not returned repeated phone calls and e-mails.

Congressional aides point to another factor that links Trandahl to the Foley matter. A member of the board of the national gay rights group Human Rights Campaign, Trandahl is openly homosexual and personally close to the now-disgraced former lawmaker, who announced through his lawyer this week that he is gay.
-----------------------------------------------

Staff writers Jim VandeHei, Charles Babington, Dan Eggen and Allan Lengel contributed to this report.

Here is a very interesting piece about Matt Drudge, an editor for the WSJ, and leaders of the Christian right are saying that the Foley matter is the result of a joke or prank by former pages. Rev. Dodson says that the explicit IMs by Foley were just a joke. Amazing!

http://mediamatters.org/items/200610060004?src=other

Who is Scott Palmer?
by Lawrence O'Donnell
He is Speaker Hastert's chief of staff, which makes him the key player in the what-did-Hastert-know-and-when-did-he-know-it drama. Scott Palmer has issued a statement flatly denying that Kirk Fordham, Mark Foley's former chief of staff, warned him that Foley was crossing the line with pages long before Foley's inappropriate email surfaced.

Palmer's denial of Fordham's headline-grabbing claim is the thread Hastert's Speakership is now hanging by.

In Hastert's brief, evasive press conference on Thursday, sharp reporters immediately zeroed in on Palmer's role in the Foley information flow. Did Hastert leap to the defense of his chief of staff's honor in the crucial credibility contest with Kirk Fordham? Did he say I know Scott Palmer and I know he's telling the truth? No. He avoided every question with Palmer's name in it. Hastert obviously does not want to talk about Scott Palmer.

If Fordham did warn Palmer about Foley a long time ago, what are the odds that Palmer did not tell Hastert? As close to zero as you can get. Many chiefs of staff are close, very close, to their bosses on Capitol Hill. But none are closer than Scott Palmer is to Denny Hastert. They don't just work together all day, they live together.

There are plenty of odd couple Congressmen who have roomed together on Capitol Hill, but I have never heard of a chief of staff who rooms with his boss. It is beyond unusual. But it must have its advantages. Anything they forget to tell each other at the office, they have until bedtime to catch up on. And then there's breakfast for anything they forgot to tell each other before falling asleep. And then there's all day at the office. Hastert and Palmer are together more than any other co-workers in the Congress.

For now, Hastert is holding on to the Speaker's office because the Republicans don't have anyone in the leadership who is squeaky clean enough to take the job. Every one of them is tainted by the Foley scandal or the Abramoff scandal or the DeLay scandal or, like Henry Hyde, has some ancient sexual indiscretion in his background. But if the press cracks Scott Palmer's denial of Kirk Fordham's bombshell, then Denny Hastert is going to have to pass the gavel to some freshman we've never heard of.

Staffer Cites Earlier Role by Hastert's Office
Staffer Cites Earlier Role by Hastert's Office
Confrontation With Foley Detailed
By Jonathan Weisman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 7, 2006; A01

House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert's chief of staff confronted then-Rep. Mark Foley about his inappropriate social contact with male pages well before the speaker said aides in his office took any action, a current congressional staff member with personal knowledge of Foley and his behavior with pages said yesterday.

The staff member said Hastert's chief of staff, Scott Palmer, met with the Florida Republican at the Capitol to discuss complaints about Foley's behavior toward pages. The alleged meeting occurred long before Hastert says aides in his office dispatched Rep. John M. Shimkus (R-Ill.) and the clerk of the House in November 2005 to confront Foley about troubling e-mails he had sent to a Louisiana boy.

The staff member's account buttresses the position of Foley's onetime chief of staff, Kirk Fordham, who said earlier this week that he had appealed to Palmer in 2003 or earlier to intervene, after Fordham's own efforts to stop Foley's behavior had failed. Fordham said Foley and Palmer, one of the most powerful figures in the House of Representatives, met within days to discuss the allegations.

Palmer said this week that the meeting Fordham described "did not happen." Timothy J. Heaphy, Fordham's attorney, said yesterday that Fordham is prepared to testify under oath that he had arranged the meeting and that both Foley and Palmer told him the meeting had taken place. Fordham spent more than three hours with the FBI on Thursday, and Heaphy said that on Friday he contacted the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct to offer his client's cooperation.

"We are not preparing to cooperate. We are affirmatively seeking to," Heaphy said.

Hastert spokesman Ron Bonjean declined to directly comment on the second House staff member's assertion, saying that it is a matter for a House ethics committee investigation. "The Standards Committee has asked that no one discuss this matter because of its ongoing investigation," Bonjean said.

The emergence of a second congressional staffer describing such a meeting came on a day that Hastert (R-Ill.) was working to solidify his hold on the speakership. Prominent Republicans, including President Bush, have defended Hastert, saying he should not step down, but the criticism continues to flow.

New Jersey's Thomas H. Kean Jr., whose candidacy offers the GOP its most promising hope to take a Senate seat from a Democrat in November, called for Hastert's resignation yesterday, as did the editorial page of the Los Angeles Times. Democratic House candidate Patty Wetterling of Minnesota, a child-safety advocate and the first to air a television commercial about the Foley scandal, will deliver the national Democratic response to Bush's weekly radio address today.

Hastert maintains that he knew nothing of Foley's actions until last week, when the story first broke and Foley resigned. His stance contradicts that of House Majority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) and National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Thomas M. Reynolds (R-N.Y.), both of whom said they had informed Hastert this spring.

Palmer has resolutely said he had no earlier meeting with Foley, and other leadership aides have questioned the truthfulness of Fordham. Fordham quit his job as Reynolds's chief of staff last week after acknowledging that he had tried to persuade ABC News not to publish the salacious instant-message exchanges between Foley and two former pages.

Hastert's office contends that the first confrontation with Foley occurred in November 2005, when Shimkus, the head of the House Page Board, and then-House Clerk Jeff Trandahl took Foley aside to discuss what they termed "over-friendly" e-mails that Foley had sent to a Louisiana boy. Fordham's account not only pushed the matter back at least two years but also indicated that alarms over Foley's behavior had gone well beyond bland e-mails.

Sources close to Fordham say Trandahl repeatedly urged the longtime aide and close family friend to confront Foley about his inappropriate advances on pages. Each time, Foley pledged to no longer socialize with the teenagers, but, weeks later, Trandahl would again alert Fordham about more contacts. Out of frustration, the sources said, Fordham contacted Palmer, hoping that an intervention from such a powerful figure in the House would persuade Foley to stop.

Now, a second House aide familiar with Foley and his actions told The Washington Post yesterday that "Scott Palmer had spoken to Foley prior to November 2005." The aide spoke on the condition of anonymity because the matter is now the subject of a criminal investigation and the House ethics committee inquiry.

Two law enforcement officials said yesterday that the FBI had not yet determined whether a crime had occurred in the Foley case. Justice Department and FBI officials have cautioned that cases involving the enticement of minors are notoriously difficult to prosecute.

On Wednesday night, Palmer was described as highly emotional while aides sifted through e-mails and files to determine whether he had ever spoken to Fordham. Several people who spoke with Palmer said the chief of staff was emphatic in denying that he knew anything about Foley's questionable contacts with young male pages.

Palmer, who shares a townhouse with Hastert when they are in town, is more powerful than all but a few House members. Members know that he speaks for Hastert.

The divergent accounts have highlighted the holes in the public's understanding of Foley's undoing. And they are sure to ratchet up the pressure on Trandahl to come forward with his knowledge of events. As House clerk between January 1999 and November 2005, Trandahl had direct control over the page program.

Pages apparently saw Trandahl as a strict disciplinarian. In one instant-message exchange obtained by The Post, a former page, on his way to his first annual reunion in Washington, told Foley in January 2003 that "everyone is going to be pretty wasted a lot of the time in dc."

He then added, "well we dont have the [expletive] clerk to fire us anymore. . . . we didnt like trandahl that much . . . he isnt a nice guy . . . and he gets really scarey when he is mad."

Trandahl's departure came within days of his confrontation with Foley over e-mails that the congressman had sent a former page. House aides say the circumstances of Trandahl's exit were oddly quiet. The departure of a staff member of long standing, especially one as important as the House clerk, is usually marked with considerable fanfare, said Scott Lilly, a former Democratic staff director of the House Appropriations Committee. Debate is suspended in mid-afternoon to accommodate a stream of testimonials from lawmakers.

Trandahl's departure was marked by a one-minute salute from Shimkus and a brief insert into the Congressional Record.

"My one-hour Special Order changed to a five-minute Special Order, now to a one-minute," Shimkus said. "I just want to say thank you for the work you have done."

Lilly said: "He seemed to suddenly disappear in a puff of smoke."

Trandahl, now the executive director of the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, has not returned repeated phone calls and e-mails.

Congressional aides point to another factor that links Trandahl to the Foley matter. A member of the board of the national gay rights group Human Rights Campaign, Trandahl is openly homosexual and personally close to the now-disgraced former lawmaker, who announced through his lawyer this week that he is gay.
--------------------------------------------------

Staff writers Jim VandeHei, Charles Babington, Dan Eggen and Allan Lengel contributed to this report.