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Hugh Hewitt, Superpartisan

Hastert did not know that Foley was a predator, only that Foley had sent a too-friendly e-mail to one teenage page, the sort of e-mail that would have been completely unremarkable if it hadn’t come from a gay Congressman. ~Hugh Hewitt But it did come from a gay Congressman, which one might think would make all […]

Hastert did not know that Foley was a predator, only that Foley had sent a too-friendly e-mail to one teenage page, the sort of e-mail that would have been completely unremarkable if it hadn’t come from a gay Congressman. ~Hugh Hewitt

But it did come from a gay Congressman, which one might think would make all the difference in the world.  But Hewitt will not be stopped.  He is in a full-court press against the enemies of Hastert:

There was no story because there was no scandal in the e-mails…

Unless you find it decidedly unsettling to have a gay man asking teenage boys for pictures, which almost everyone who has seen the emails in question do.  Moreover, it is very different whether those emails in themselves were newsworthy and whether they merited more serious action by the leadership, when the rumours about Foley’s, er, preferences for pages had been circulating for years.  This is not a credible defense, and each time a flack makes this defense he reduces the credibility of the GOP and conservatives generally in the eyes of the public.  Laughably, Hewitt thinks that it will be The Washington Times, which called for Haster’s resignation as Speaker, that will be the one to lose credibility! 

Whether or not this is the sort of thing that ought to drive Speakers from power, and whether or not there are more important issues in this election cycle, the tone deafness of people like Hewitt on this scandal is amazing.  Republicans cannot win a fight over the details of this scandal–they do not have a winning argument.  Right now their best defense is ignorance, which is to say that they were oblivious to outrageous conduct right under their noses.  After the disgrace of DeLay, Ney and Cunningham, it probably became easier for the GOP leadership to just look past misconduct and pretend that things would sort themselves out.  Either they were negligent or complicit or both, and that is what people are going to take away from this.

Update: While Hewitt is playing the role of the good, unthinking soldier, ABC reports this attack on Hastert coming from…John Boehner!:

In a radio interview with 700 WLW radio in Cincinnati, House Majority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) placed responsibility for the Foley matter not being handled properly on House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL).

“I believe I talked to the Speaker and he told me it had been taken care of,” said Boehner. “And, and, and my position is it’s in his corner, it’s his responsibility. The Clerk of the House who runs the page program, the Page Board—all report to the Speaker. And I believe it had been dealt with.”

Boehner’s buck-passing isn’t terribly dignified, but he, like Reynolds, is not going to take the bullet for Hastert.  Now, if the Majority Leader thinks the Speaker is responsible, how oblivious does Hewitt have to be to the gravity of the scandal to continue to argue for Hastert’s innocence while berating the evil media conspiracy that is out to destroy the GOP?  Of course the media are in a feeding frenzy: the scandal has all of the National Enquirer-style trashiness and high political drama rolled into one that any journalist could want, and the massive coverage is typical of the news media that has routinely gone into hyperdrive whenever there are crimes or scandals involving the potential sexual abuse of children.  Sleaze, power and “protecting the children”–the modern media can only respond to such a story with excessive zeal, just as it will hyperventilate about missing child X for three weeks straight and just as it quite properly went after Gary Condit, ending his career in the process.  As for the Democrats, they might want to keep a low profile, but when the majority puts its foot in it this deep the opposition is almost expected to pile on.  From the party that gave you Impeachment ’98, cries of over-politicising a sex scandal ring particularly hollow.  This is the adversarial political system in all its ugliness.  It used to be all fun and games when it was high times for the GOP and appeaser-baiting and spitting on the military records of veterans who oppose the Iraq war were all the rage, and now suddenly we hear this whiny lament that the other party is being mean and going overboard.   

Second Update: So much for the great Democratic conspiracy.  Brian Ross, the ABC reporter handling the Foley story, suggests that his sources were Republicans.

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