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September 30, 2006

Throw the Bums Out

You know, I try very hard to be even-handed. It is easy to let partisanship and preconceived notions shape how we view events. Over at Obsidian Wings I am frequently criticized for false equivalence, because I tend to believe that the Republicans mostly appear worse than the Democrats right now because the Republicans are in power. But what can you say about the fact Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert was told months ago about Representative Mark Foley's improper emails to Congressional pages, and did nothing, or at best asked Foley to resign?

Maybe Hastert didn't know that the issue was as serious as it is, some are already arguing. Maybe this is a dirty trick. Sorry, but I'm not buying that. The pages are underage. As soon as the leadership received word anything remotely inappropriate was going on between Foley and the pages, they should have investigated fully. Yes, it might have been embarrassing. Yes, it might even have cost the Republicans some votes. So instead, and I hope that it was only because they didn't investigate the less damning issue for fear of embarrassment, they moved slowly and cautiously, leaving a man who has at the least demonstrated a propensity for making inappropriate requests of underage boys in position to continue his antics.

The Republican Party would have us believe that they are the only one of the two major parties capable of dealing with the threat of Islamic extremism. Yet we now have some pretty damning evidence they can't even be trusted to deal properly with a very simple call: I don't think you need a PhD, or even a GED, to realize that when an adult in a position of power asking explicitly sexual questions of minors, you get him out of that position of power and you make sure that he has no opportunity to commit such acts again. Maybe I'm old-fashioned that way. But it is exceedingly difficult for me to believe the Republican Congressional leadership has any call to suggest it is prepared to make any decisions at all, let alone questions of life and death. It is time for a change.