Hastert requests a free pass for House members -- and prosecution of the media

A good point has been raised at Talking Points Memo regarding Dennis Hastert's request for an investigation into the Foley matter. It seems that in true Republican fashion, while Hastert is now willing to throw Foley under the bus, he's handling the rest of the scandal -- the fact that just about everyone in the House leadership knew what Foley was doing and did nothing -- in true Republican fashion: Blame the Media.

The letter is here. Here's the relevant excerpt:

“As I am sure you are aware, there are two different and distinct communications at issue here. First, Mr. Foley sent an email to a former page of Representative Alexander in the fall of 2005. This email was determined to be "over friendly" by Representative Alexander's office but was not sexual in nature. Second, based on media reports, there is a different set of communications which were sexually explicit instant messages which Mr. Foley reportedly sent another former page or pages. These communications, of which no one in the House Leadership was aware to my knowledge, reportedly were sent sometime in 2003.

“According to an Editor's Note that appeared on the St. Petersburg Times' website yesterday, the Times was given a set of emails from Mr. Foley to Representative Alexander's former page in November of 2005. (See "A Note From the Editors" located at http://blogs.tampabay.com/buzz /, visited on September 30, 2006). The editors state that they viewed this exchange as "friendly chit chat" and decided not to publish it after hearing an explanation from Representative Foley. Acting on this same communication, the Chairman of the House Page Board and the then Clerk of the House confronted Mr. Foley, demanded he cease all contact with the former page as his parents had requested, and believed they had privately resolved the situation as the parents had requested.

“Unlike the first communication, the second communication was a set of instant messages that contained sexually explicit statements and were reportedly generated three years ago. Last week, ABC News first reported these sexually explicit instant messages which led to Representative Foley's resignation. These sexually explicit communications warrant a criminal referral in two respects. Initially, since the communications involve interstate communications, there should be a complete investigation and prosecution of any federal laws that have been violated. In addition, since the communications appear to have existed for three years, there should be an investigation into the extent there are persons who knew or had possession of these messages but did not report them to the appropriate authorities. It is important to know who may have had the communications and why they were not given to prosecutors before now.

“Therefore, I also request that the Department undertake an investigation into who had specific knowledge of the content of any sexually explicit communications between Mr. Foley and any former or current House pages and what actions such individuals took, if any, to provide them to law enforcement. I request that the scope of your investigation include any and all individuals who may have been aware of this matter-be they Members of Congress, employees of the House of Representatives, or anyone outside the Congress.

This seems to be a request to limit the investigation to those who specifically had access to the Instant Messages, which are where the sexually explicit communications took place. Presumably House members, while they had the e-mails, in all likelihood did not have these, because these were provided to ABC News by the former page who had received them. Therefore, Hastert's request is less a request for a full investigation than a request to limit the investigation to just Foley and ABC News, and perhaps even one to prosecute ABC News for not forwarding the messages to authorities the minute they received them.

It's appalling that for the Republicans, once again it's not about doing the right thing, it's about doing whatever is necessary to retain power. While at first glance, it LOOKS as if Hastert is trying to "do the right thing", in reality this letter is about spin and damage control. He's taking a page from the Bush Administration "blame the leakers" book -- and hoping it works. And given the leanings of the Bush Justice Department, it probably will.

Meanwhile, John and Glenn have more, Pam shows us a Wing Nut Daily poll proving just HOW much wingnuts adhere to the IOKIYAR rule, ShakesSis asks "What would Karl Rove Do with This?", and Digby reminds us not to forget about how Cheney pushed Rumsfeld as Secretary Defense way back in 2000, even when others had their doubts about him.

Because the Foley mess may be big, and it may even bring down the House leadership (though somehow I doubt it), but the fact still remains that the Bush Administration botched the handling of the terrorist threat back in 2001, they've botched it ever since, and they will continue to botch it for as long as they're in power.