It's the Lying CYA Cover-up GOP Hypocrisy Again

I love Christy Hardin Smith's subject line so much that I stole it for my own.

Glenn Greenwald shares her outrage. He focuses on those defending the indefensible, in this case the loathsome John Hindraker who claims the e-mails were so innocuous and Hastert was such a busy man that it's only reasonable that he wouldn't remember, So... it's no biggie.

In fact, Hindraker claims that the only reason this is an issue at all is because "Foley is a Republican, and there is an election in five weeks". In response to the "you're only doing this to me because I'm a Republican" whine, Glenn provides a "Yeah, right" response with: "As the Lewinksy scandal proved, the media will just outright ignore and bury a sex scandal unless it involves a Republican".

Glenn then puts the lie to this defense by first pointing out that the content of the e-mail messages was in fact inappropriate enough to warrant investigation and then...

Second, Hastert and company knew not only about the e-mails, but also about the fact that the page in question complained bitterly, labelled the conduct "sick sick sick," and his parents called Rep. Alexander to demand that this harassment stop. Those are hardly casual events that one just fails to notice or forgets about. Regardless of the parents' wishes, that by itself gives rise to the obligation to investigate. Third, there were numerous steps that could have been taken to find out how serious this problem was (if they didn't know already) -- e.g., talking to other pages past and present, talking to Foley's own pages, finding out if this was a pattern of behavior. Not only did they fail to take any of those steps, they actively worked to block such an investigation by excluding the Democrat on the Page Board from these deliberations (while including their own political operatives such as Rep. Reynolds).

They knew there was a serious problem here but they did not want to know more. It's clear what their objectives were -- to ensure that Foley's conduct was not disclosed in order to keep his seat safely in GOP hands and to avoid political damage to Republicans, and to accomplish that, they purposely allowed Foley to continue his predatory behavior. That conduct reveals an institutional corruption and rotted character so severe that I think even most Republicans (outside of the Reynolds/Hinderaker cultist types) are having real trouble defending it, even to themselves.

Here's what Christy had to say:

Let's talk for a moment about what a person honestly concerned about the well-being of the teenagers involved would have done: (1) talked with the page in question; (2) talked with the parents of that page; (3) talked to other pages; (4) an actual, thorough and real investigation; (5) contacted outside authorities with no political axe to grind to conduct an independent investigation to assure that nothing untoward was happening; (6) pretty much anything but a cover-up and an admonishment to treat the teenagers with whom this grown elected official was flirting with "respect." (Hello GOP Leadership, in the corporate world, this sort of brush-off of a sexual harassment problem with one of your partners would get you slapped silly with a civil lawsuit. Do you think the rules do not apply in Congress or that the children who serve there are less worthy of protection than adults in the workplace? RollCall has more.)

What did the Republican leadership actually do? No one has any clear picture of that at the moment, because they are all running around in circles pointing the finger at each other, with no one standing up and taking any responsibility whatsoever for their failure of leadership or concern for the kids who were placed at risk by pervy Uncle Foley's masturbation and grooming advances. Josh Marshall has a sort of chronology going on this — it really needs a vast flow chart at this point with all the finger pointing and backtracking — and it doesn't look good for most of the GOP leadership. Pathetic.

But when you pan out a bit and look at the broader context of the Republicans and their consistent CYA behavior versus choosing actual honesty with the public, it is not a pretty picture

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Aren't you asking yourself this question: What else do we not know that the GOP is hiding from the public? And aren't you tired of all the hypocrisy, the lies, the cover-ups and the CYA? It's time for some accountability…America simply cannot afford to be shoved in the back seat by the GOP any longer, while they put themselves and their party's hold on power front and center in every decision.