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October 01, 2006

Foley was rightfully forced to resign -- Updated

He was an adult in a position of power, no matter that his emails (non-sexual) or recently revealed IM's from 2003 (sexually explicit) appear to be legal as the age of consent in the District of Columbia is 16.

You see, my objection to the consensual affair of Billy Jeff and Monica was the power differential. Just as it is in this case.

I'm being ethically consistent. It's why I support parental consent laws no matter how many times I'm told that I should "just get over" the fact that teens will have sex.

So count me as among the crowd that, while applauding Foley's being run out of DC on a rail, I'm finding the manufactured rage from the "it was just about a bj, you prudes, it was just sex" crew emanating more than just a whiff or two of rank hypocrisy.

Washington D.C. attorney Clarice Feldman offers up an eyeopening timeline of the sordid affair

Sometime last year a former page contacted the St. Petersburg Times with an exchange of emails between himself and Congressman Foley. In the words of the editor, they never ran the story.
Why?
There was nothing overtly sexual in the emails, but we assigned two reporters to find out more. We found the Louisiana page and talked with him.He told us Foley’s request for a photo made him uncomfortable so he never responded, but both he and his parents made clear we could not use his name if we wrote a story. We also found another page who was willing to go on the record, but his experience with Foley was different. He said Foley did send a few emails but never said anything in them that he found inappropriate. We tried to find other pages but had no luck. We spoke with Rep. Alexander, who said the boy’s family didn’t want it pursued, and Foley, who insisted he was merely trying to be friendly and never wanted to make the page uncomfortable.

So, what we had was a set of emails between Foley and a teenager, who wouldn’t go on the record about how those emails made him feel. As we said in today’s paper, our policy is that we don’t make accusations against people using unnamed sources. And given the seriousness of what would be implied in a story, it was critical that we have complete confidence in our sourcing. After much discussion among top editors at the paper, we concluded that the information we had on Foley last November didn’t meet our standard for publication. Evidently, other news organizations felt the same way.

Understand that the emails were separate and distinct from the unconscionable and disgusting anonymous transcript of IMs. Conflating the two distinct episodes is either done out of confusion or deliberately in support of another agenda.

Foley acted immorally and unethically. He has rightfully lost the trust of his family and constituents. He deserves to be shunned by anyone with any concern over obnoxious behavior between adults and teens, regardless of genders involved.

But if the first innocuous emails had "triggered" an investigation by Hastert, as disengenuous Leftists are asserting in their newly found dedication to sexual propriety, how long before such an investigation premised on "Gay men can't be trusted emailing young male pages" were leaked to the press that the NY Times would be running the story on page 1 of their website and denouncing on their editorial pages the "homophobic" GOP and its "witch hunts" distracting the nation from "failures"?

Oh... I'd measure it in minutes.

See, this is no longer about the disgusting, and thank-God-gone Foley for the Left. That's why they can't write honestly about the subject.

*UPDATED* Now it just gets weird. Commenters blaming Republicans (natch) for "forcing Foley into the closet"

my guess is that Rep. Foley’s inappropriate actions might not have occurred were his sexual needs satisfied with a mature, committed and open relationship that actually lined up with his orientation. It appears the GOP would rather have a closeted, frustrated predator in Congress than a well-adjusted openly gay representative.
I guess than that Hillary wasn't satisfying Billy Jeff in a mature, committed way, so that why he indulged in an inappropriate, including sexual conduct, manner with a female subordinate his daughter's age. Blame it on Republicans for creating the oppressive monogamous atmosphere. They'd rather have a frustrated, closeted satyr in the oval office than a well-adjusted openly polygamous President.

Makes sense, eh?

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Posted by Darleen at October 1, 2006 11:25 AM

Comments

I remember someone close to me saying that Clinton just had a "silly sexual addiction" - totally dismissing Clinton's mis-use of power with an intern. And the left seems to idolize Clinton now. It's crazy.

Posted by: Carol at October 1, 2006 01:48 PM

Hmmmm.......consenting adults versus......pedophilia.

One is illegal and causes psychological damage forever, and the other is something that is resorted to instead of breaking up a family when the love in the romance department is dead. There are always way more shades of grey than we may realize. Of course, if the case of just wanting as many women to f*** as possible is the "plan of the man", what many men are about, quite degrading to the man, but...is it a national issue? No. Certainly not something to spend millions of taxpayer money on. Pedophilia is a crime worthy of imprisonment.

Is this bringing up Clinton thing kind of like saying nah-nah......nah-nah-nah? It does not even fit the topic. Pedophilia versus an affair?

Darleen, sorry I posted the link a few months ago, that turned out to be a white supremecist site. As I said, I should have read it further than I did. The first part of the article was making my point. The latter.....*scream*.

Posted by: blubonnet at October 1, 2006 06:13 PM

blu

I know what pedophilia is. Did you not see what I wrote in the opening paragraph, that the age of consent in DC is 16?

Ephebophilia, but not pedophilia.

Foley engaged in egregious, disgusting, unethical behavior. But it there is no charge of sexual contact nor does it qualify as pedophilia.

In the context of a consensual relationship between people in different positions of power, the comparison to Clinton/Monica is apt.

If you condemned that relationship as well as Foley's, like I have, then you're holding an ethically consistent position regardless that each relationship was not criminally proscribed.

Illegal, no. Immoral, yes.

Get it?

Posted by: Darleen at October 1, 2006 06:25 PM

It is hypocrisy you are so right! I was angry about what Bill Clinton did and I am angry about this with Foley. It has nothing to do with who is what politically, wrong is wrong and sick is sick.

Great post about this Darleen.

Posted by: Wild Thing at October 1, 2006 09:07 PM

This post doesn't make any sense. There's a difference between being of the age of consent and actually giving consent which appears to escape you. And parental consent laws don't have anything at all to do with this.

Posted by: Josh at October 2, 2006 12:59 PM

See, this is no longer about the disgusting, and thank-God-gone Foley for the Left. That's why they can't write honestly about the subject.

Let's write honestly about this then. This isn't just about a sexual predator who happens to be a Republican Congressman.

This is about a likely cover-up by Republican leaders (including, possible, the Speaker of the House) who knew about some of Foley's inappropriate behvaior and chose to keep it under wraps because of the impact it would have on the mid term elections.

Instead of making this about Foley versus Clinton, why don't you comment on that?

Posted by: Brad at October 2, 2006 02:33 PM

Actually Mz Darleen, you don't make much sense on this one.

Presidents can have sex with adults anytime they want. Aint' nobody's business if they do.

Foley on the other hand, is quite a different matter. His case involved minors.

Posted by: Carl W. Goss at October 3, 2006 07:53 AM