The Attack of the Wiley Pages

I have not commented here about the trials and tribulations of former Rep. Mark Foley (R-FL), because it has seemed to me to be more a titillating distraction than a serious story. Of course, CongCritters are gonna be venal; of course, they're gonna lie. That's how the game is played.

Lately the GOPukes, intent on damage control, have begun to try to 'blame the victims,' alleging the pages in question weren't entirely blameless in the matter. Some, like Drudge, accuse the pages of truly nefarious plots, involving tricks to lure the CongCrit into lapses.

I am totally sure that at least some of the pages were using what they knew about CongCrit Foley to their own advantage.

The pages were, after all, off-spring of politically connected families, and were all volunteers for this indoctrination into the mysteries of USer politics.

Foley's stupid and deserves to be thrown out of Congress, if for no other reason than for allowing himself to be used that way. It's exemplary of why, in the old days, gays were considered security risks: they had to hide their appetites, and it made 'em ripe for the picking by agents who'd exploit their weaknesses.

When I went in service in '64, the USAF spent a couple hundred thousand dollars to prove me a good security risk. I was to be working with highly classified material, but mainly processing it, not necessarily internalizing it.

You'd think that, given the sensitivity of much of the info to which CongCritters are exposed, they'd spend a couple grand to dig into the backgrounds of candidates, if only to forestall exactly the kinds of exploitation that the Flying Monkeys are now projecting onto Foley and his victims...