The Page Who Took Down the GOP

[MADem]

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/11/the-page-who-took-down-the-gop-mark-foley-dennis-hastert-213378?o=0


[center]The Page Who Took Down the GOP
Why I leaked the scandalous Mark Foley messages—and what I regret about it.
By Zack Stanton
November 20, 2015[/center]


Photo courtesy of Zack Stanton | The author is second from left.

In the middle of October I was sitting on my couch in Washington and heard a familiar name come up on CNN: Dennis Hastert. “Prosecutors have charged Hastert with lying to the FBI about $3.5 million he agreed to pay to… a former student to keep quiet about allegations of sexual abuse dating back to Hastert's time as a high school teacher.” On October 28, after striking a deal with prosecutors, the former speaker of the House pleaded guilty.


This was nine years after the FBI had barged into my parents’ house, more than a decade after the unsettling things I’d seen on Capitol Hill. It was the final thud of a decline that had reshaped Congress—and in which I’d played a pivotal role that almost nobody except those FBI agents knew.

Hastert’s speakership had ended in both defeat and scandal. In November 2006, after Democrats retook the house, Hastert announced he'd step down from leadership in the next Congress. He didn’t have much choice in the matter. That fall, a story exploded that likely cost Republicans their House and Senate majority: Florida Republican Rep. Mark Foley, it was revealed, had repeatedly made sexual advances to several congressional pages. Hastert, the speaker at the time, had allegedly been told by House colleagues about Foley’s history of messaging teens, and did nothing.

I was a congressional page in 2001 and 2002. During that year, Foley sent sexual instant messages to at least three of my classmates. The messages weren’t flirtatious—though some started that way—but out and out lewd. Two of those recipients continued to receive them well after their time in the page program had elapsed, extending into our college years. Many of us who were pages at the time knew that the conversations had taken place. Some of us even shared copies of the message logs among ourselves. But how the conversations went public, and who gave them to reporters and started the avalanche that ended Foley’s career and dealt a blow to the Republican congressional majority, has never come out.

It was me. .......


Read more: http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/11/the-page-who-took-down-the-gop-mark-foley-dennis-hastert-213378#ixzz3s6KcLkzp

Much, much, MUCH more at link.

[Doc_Technical]

1. Another blast from the past:

http://www.actuarialoutpost.com/actuarial_discussion_forum/showthread.php?p=1851460

[PatrickforO]

2. That was a really good read.

Of course, since you posted in the 'good reads' forum I guess we could expect that...

The thing that struck me was how the House found that since it couldn't trust itself around teenage pages, instead of reforming itself, it chose to just get rid of the page program - to blame the victim as the author says.

Congress really sucks. It clearly has the political courage of a thumb tack. If they can't even police a member's pedophilia, how the HELL can they perform their function of governing the nation???

[longship]

3. MADem, this is a damned good read.

This is an exemplar of what DU does best, to bring historic context to our political wranglings here.

This article is one of those which puts events into context.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.


Oh, and before I forget...
R&