• Dennis Hastert,  Election 2006,  Mark Foley,  Politics

    Mark Foley Sex Scandal Watch: Foley Was “A Ticking Time Bomb”

    AP: Foley panel: GOP left pages vulnerable

    Republican lawmakers and aides left male pages vulnerable to Rep. Mark Foley (news, bio, voting record)’s improper sexual advances even though the first concerns surfaced more than a decade ago, the ethics committee said Friday in its report into an election-year scandal that convulsed the House.

    The committee said one witness testified he warned the head of the page board, Illinois Rep. John Shimkus (news, bio, voting record), a year ago that Foley was a “ticking time bomb” who had been confronted repeatedly.

    The GOP Leaders knew and they did nothing to protect the male pages.

    The Democrats knew and they played politics with the knowledge:

    If Republicans were criticized for failing to confront Foley more aggressively, Democrats also figured in the investigation.

    The committee said that one aide, Matt Miller, had possession of suggestive computer messages written by Foley, and passed them along to reporters as well as a communications aide at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

    House Speaker Dennis Hastert should have RESIGNED and he may have saved GOP sets in the November election.

    But, as the report acknowledges – POLITICS AS USUAL

    And the GOP paid the price…..

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    Chairman of the House Ethics Committee Doc Hastings (R-WA) (R) and ranking committee member Howard Berman (D-CA) speak about their committee’s report into the Mark Foley scandal on Capitol Hill in Washington December 8, 2006.

    Previous:

    Mark Foley Sex Scandal Watch: Three More Pages Accuse Foley

    Mark Foley Sex Scandal Watch: AOL Instant Message Exchanges of Jordan Edmund Are a
    PRANK

    Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert Watch: Hastert on the Laura Ingraham Show

    Mark Foley Sex Scandal Watch: Identity of Page Who Accused Mark Foley Exposed

    Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert Watch: Congressional Aide Kirk Fordham – Alerted Hastert’s Office Three Years Ago About Mark Foley

    Michael Ramirez on the Congressman Mark Foley Sex FLAP

    Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert Watch: President Bush – DON”T RESIGN, Mr. Speaker

    Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert Watch: RESIGN, Mr. Speaker


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  • Michael Ramirez,  Vladimir Putin

    Michael Ramirez on Russia’s Vladimir Putin

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    BBC: Russia poisoning inquiry widens

    Russia is investigating the attempted murder of a contact of the former KGB agent, Alexander Litvinenko, who died in London last month.

    Dmitry Kovtun met Mr Litvinenko hours before he fell ill from the radioactive poison that eventually killed him.

    Reports that Mr Kovtun is in a critical condition have sparked speculation he too may have been poisoned. A lawyer linked to him denies he is unwell.

    The Russian investigation is being run parallel to a British murder inquiry.

    The UK’s minister for communities and local government, Ruth Kelly, said on the BBC’s Question Time programme on Thursday that she expects Russia “to co-operate fully” with the British investigation.

    A funeral service for Mr Litvinenko was held at a central London mosque on Thursday.

    The former spy, a vocal critic of the Kremlin, had issued a statement on his deathbed accusing Russian President Vladimir Putin of ordering his poisoning.

    Charles Krauthammer: That Murder in London

    The poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko, renegade Russian spy and fierce critic of Vladimir Putin’s government, is everywhere being called a mystery. There is dark speculation about unnamed “rogue elements” either in the Russian secret services or among ultranationalists acting independently of the government. There are whispers about the indeterminacy of things in the shadowy netherworld of Russian exile politics, crime and espionage.

    Well, you can believe in indeterminacy. Or you can believe the testimony delivered on the only reliable lie detector ever invented — the deathbed — by the victim himself. Litvinenko directly accused Putin of killing him.

    Putin and his agents did it.

    Old Cold Warriors NEVER die……..

    Linked to OTB. 


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  • John McCain,  Mitt Romney,  President 2008

    Mitt Romney Watch: Another HYPOCRITICAL Moment? This Time Gay Marriage

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    Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney speaks to opponents of gay marriage at a rally at the Massachusetts State House in Boston, November 19, 2006. Romney, a devout Mormon and former bishop of Massachusetts’ temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, is expected to announce in January he will join what is expected to be a crowded field of Republican White House contenders for the presidency.

    Boston Globe: Romney’s ’94 remarks on same-sex marriage could haunt him

    Comments Governor Mitt Romney made during his 1994 Senate bid, in which he said the gay and lesbian community “needs more support from the Republican Party,” resurfaced yesterday, posing a potential hurdle as he appeals to conservatives for a probable presidential campaign.

    Bay Windows, the Boston-based gay and lesbian newspaper, republished excerpts from an August 1994 interview the paper did with Romney during his campaign against Senator Edward M. Kennedy. In the interview, Romney said it should be up to states to decide whether to allow same-sex marriage and he criticized Republican “extremists” who imposed their positions on the party.

    “People of integrity don’t force their beliefs on others, they make sure that others can live by different beliefs they may have,” Romney is quoted as saying.

    More recently, Romney’s words and deeds have sent a very different message.

    In 2005, Romney came under fire for saying dismissively to a South Carolina Republican audience that some gay and lesbian couples “are actually having children born to them.”

    Mitt Romney changes his political opinions like “FLIPPER” John Kerry.

    First, it was ABORTION. Mitt Romney: My Abortion Views Have ‘Evolved’

    So, Governor are you pro-life or pro-choice or a hypocrite pandering one message in the South and another in New England?

    Second, there is Mitt Romney’s illegal immigration flap.

    As Governor Mitt Romney explores a presidential bid, he has grown outspoken in his criticism of illegal immigration. But, for a decade, the governor has used a landscaping company that relies heavily on workers like these, illegal Guatemalan immigrants, to maintain the grounds surrounding his pink Colonial house on Marsh Street in Belmont.

    Now, there is the Gay Marriage Flap.

    Romney has been an outspoken proponent of a federal constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. Last spring, he wrote a letter to Senate majority leader Bill Frist urging its passage.

    “In order to protect the institution of marriage, we must prevent it from being redefined by judges like those here in Massachusetts,” Romney wrote of the amendment, which has not passed. Same-sex marriage became legal in Massachusetts after a 2003 decision by the Supreme Judicial Court.

    One of several Republicans to oppose the federal amendment was Arizona Senator John McCain, who is likely to be one of Romney’s chief rivals in 2008. Romney, in an interview last month with the DC Examiner, accused McCain of being “disingenuous” on same-sex marriage, because McCain says he’s against it but believes states should decide the issue.

    And Mitt Romney is NOT disingenuous like John McCain? Or is Romney HYPOCRITICAL to campaign and pander for votes from anti-Gay marriage proponents in South Carolina yet holding a different opinion in Massachusetts?

    What is your position Governor?

    Mitt Romney’s soon to be announced presidential campaign is already a disaster.

    Why?

    Ask the candidate.

    Linked to Stop The ACLU 

    Previous:

    Mitt Romney Watch: Romney’s Response to LAWNGATE FLAP as Investigations Continue

    Mitt Romney Watch: Presidential Campaign Implodes on Illegal Alien FLAP


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