Ellen Goodman, like me, was initially reluctant to comment on Mark Foley’s foibles and the inevitable political fallout from the disturbing and sordid "chicken hawk" saga.
Just as I had hoped that the upcoming elections would be a stinging rejection of Bush and the Republican Party’s failed policies of peace and prosperity at home and abroad, Goodman too wanted the disaster in Iraq to be the deciding factor for voters. However, as she explains and I concur, moral issues that relate to areas "above our necks" are not as sexy (pun intended) as those that are "below our belts." If Foley’s pathetic obsession with fair faced adolescent boys and the Republican leadership’s equally obsessive attempts at sweeping that inconvenient fact into the "closet" are what will undo the arrogant, corrupt and dangerous GOP control of Congress, so be it, says Goodman. As is usually the case with Goodman, one of my favorite columnists, her commentary echoes my own thoughts on this matter almost word for word.
Ellen Goodman: A Lousy Way to Win Back Congress
If I had my druthers, this election would have turned on the war in Iraq. I hoped that when the voters finally got it, “it’’ would have been the disaster that’s turned this war zone into a recruiting ground for terrorists.
Instead we have the self-described party of family values caught enabling or at least ignoring a sick puppy of a congressman, Mark Foley, who was sex-talking electronically to teenage pages. Instead we have Speaker Dennis Hastert dismissing such an exchange as merely “over-friendly’’ and White House press secretary Tony Snow describing the messages as “naughty.’’ We even have right-wing webmaster Matt Drudge blaming the teenagers themselves as “16- and 17-year-old beasts.’’
This scandal is what has registered on the political Richter scale. This is what voters are asking their representatives about. Well, I wouldn’t have chosen to play on this field, but I will take it.
Rest of the article here.
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