PhotoDude.com

I happened to be in the car driving for a good part of today, and as the selection of radio stations in rural Alabama leaves something to be desired (you can hear anything you want, as long as you want Country and Western), I ended up listening to the hysteriamongers on AM radio beating this dead horse into a pasty smear.

Basically, this is just plain theatre. Anyone who thinks that you’ll elect 535+ folks at the highest levels of power in this country, and not manage to mix some downright nutballs in the pile is fooling themselves. Heck, just look at Cynthia McKinney, and ask yourself if that’s normal.

This guy is definitely not the kinda guy who needs to be in office, no question. He’s a freak, to everyone but the other freaks. Problem is, we’ve managed move the lines about what is a freak so often, that now it’s hard to tell the freaks from the disenfranchised.

As for the blame game, that’s just comedy. I listened to strident babble about how this just shows how the whole party is rotten to the core! Why, an elected official engaging in sexual activity of any kind with a subordinate is truly, completely dispicable!! He should be jailed!! OMG!! Why, consider the subordinates, they must have felt pressured to be involved in these situations! After all, the elected official is a person of power, and this is an abuse of it.

Yeah, I hear the point. Clinton should have been jailed. Oh wait, I forget- who was it was saying this? Was it a Democrat bitching about Foley, or a Republican bitching about Clinton? Eh, who cares. Any more it’s like they’re just scraping the same mud that hit them and throwing it back.

The timing of this is fun, tho- I’m waiting with almost tense anticipation for the first reports that some Democrat had this stuff for a year or more, and waited to drop it just a few weeks before the election.

We’d be fools to believe this won’t be suggested, and is it the measure of my growing political cynicism that I wouldn’t consider the possibility to be far-fetched?

“We’d be fools to believe this won’t be suggested�

It’s already been suggested. The question has been asked, what did the Democrats know and when did they know it. Problem is that the senior Democrat on the Page Committee was never told anything. It went from Reynolds to Hastert.

The same question has been asked of the media. Brian Ross of ABC knew about this in August. Why didn’t he speak up then?

The same question has been asked of the pages. If they knew Foley had shown excess interest in them since perhaps as early as 1995, why didn’t they blow the whistle on him? Because 16 year olds hoping to score career points as a page take on powerful Congressmen for sport every day, right?

And if you were limited to terrestial radio today, I’m surprised you didn’t hear Rush Limbaugh suggest that these pages actually set up Foley. Yep, he did. They’re just conniving little democratic stooges.

It would appear so many people completely let Mark Foley down, and did not look out for him in the manner they should have. Because how else would a powerful 52 year old man be done in by a few teenagers?

As for your point that elections of 535 Congresspeople will surely “manage to mix some downright nutballs in the pile� ... one cannot argue with that. But one can argue that the other members of that “pile� ought to be able to police themselves in this most basic matter.

As for the “blame game,� yes, I expect accountability. But it’s also clear it’s been so long since we’ve had any, many people have grown to think we dont get it because we don’t deserve it. Because we’re not owed it.

And that is sick. Because if they can’t gather the facts and make a clear stand on a case of an elected official hitting on a minor in their midst, then they are incapable of gathering the facts and making a clear stand on anything.

Think about it in terms of being done to one of your own kids. There’s simply nothing to argue about, is there? Yet there’s been a world of argument today…