It gets even more interesting.  Rep. Foley appears to be one of the few members of Congress who ever gave the congressional pages any attention, or treated them with any respect—the sincerity of which is supported by many interviews detailed in today's New York Times.  The most interesting section of the piece dealt with Foley's farewell speech to the departing Page class of 2002:

In 2002, he even stood up on the floor of the House, his eyes welling with tears, and commended the young men and women for their year of service.  In his speech, Mr. Foley mentioned several of the high school students by name, describing a handwritten note to celebrate one young man's graduation and a lunch with another at Morton's steak house.

The genial lawmaker stood on the floor of the House and noted that several pages were weeping as he spoke.  "You all have proven without a doubt that you are not only courageous Americans but wonderful young people," Mr. Foley said on June 6, 2002.  "I salute you and I thank you, and I hope you will join me, too, in saluting everyone in the page program that has made this year a resounding, phenomenal learning experience and success for you.  God bless you all."


And you know what?  I don't doubt the sincerity of his speech.  A man who can spend his entire congressional career fighting online predators of children, only to throw it all away behaving like an online predator of children, can also genuinely care and wish the best for people he wants to take terrible advantage of.  People are that complicated.  Especially people who spend their life having to hide the fact that they are gay. 

One part of this story I take exception to is the labeling of Rep. Foley as a "pedophile".  An adult male who makes sexual advances on a 16 year-old is, clinically, not a pedophile.  A pedophile is strictly attracted to pubescent or prepubescent children.  They would, frankly, be turned off by a physically developed 16 year-old.  There are enough bad things to say about Mark Foley without tossing in "child molester". 

Which brings up the fact that he apparently never "molested" anyone either—child, teenager, or adult.  Even if he had engaged in a sexual act with a 16 year-old boy, guess what?  It would have been quite legal.  Yep, the age of sexual consent in Washington, D.C. is 16. 

The staggering irony, however, is that by by restricting his advances to Internet communication only, Foley likely did break a law he was instrumental in getting passed just last year: the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006.  This law makes it a crime for an adult to discuss or solicit sexual acts with anyone under the age of 18.  So it appears Foley could have legally had sex with a 16 year-old boy.  He just couldn't have talked it over with him, first. 

The real reason, of course, why this story is important is its potential impact on the November midterm elections.  Can the Democrats win Foley's once-safe Republican district?  John Fund, conservative political analyst for the Wall Street Journal, certainly thinks so:

Republican leaders in former Rep. Mark Foley's Florida district will meet today to pick a replacement candidate for next month's election.  The leading candidate is State Rep. Joe Negron, who has $1 million left over in his campaign account from an aborted race for state attorney general.

But the odds against Mr. Negron or another candidate prevailing against Democratic businessman Tim Mahoney are long.  The name of any replacement candidate would not appear on the ballot.  To elect another Republican, voters would have to vote for the disgraced Mr. Foley and Mr. Foley's votes would then be transferred to the new GOP nominee.  A more cumbersome and difficult-to-explain procedure is hard to imagine.

Complicating the plight GOP leaders face is the fact that Mr. Mahoney is an attractive Democratic candidate for a district that gave George W. Bush 54% of its votes in 2004.  Indeed, Mr. Mahoney was a Republican until just two years ago and describes himself as a devout Christian.  He made his mark as CEO of a financial services company that has recently had several years of sub-standard returns but he was nonetheless featured in a recent business book called "If At First You Don't Succeed" by Wall Street Journal reporter Brent Bowers.  The book chronicles the stories of small business owners who overcame adversity.  When it comes to politics, Mr. Mahoney may not have to endure any adversity at all.  He may waltz into a seat in Congress without even breaking a sweat. 


The second part of the equation is whether the Democrats can enlarge the story to paint the Republican House leadership as "protective" of Foley long after they knew of his proclivities.  That is certainly what they are trying to do.  At first, I was skeptical of the effectiveness or provability of this approach.  Then I saw this from today:


It turns out Foley's obsession with 16- and 17-year-old male pages has been known to Republicans on Capitol Hill for at least five years.

But other than issue a warning, little else seems to have been done about the congressman.

A former page has come forward to tell ABC News warnings were issued about Foley to the pages in 2001.

Matthew Loraditch says pages were told to watch out for Foley.

"It was a slight cautionary statement, you know, 'Don't get too wrapped up in him being too nice to you and all that kind of stuff.'  You know, 'He's a nice guy, but he's a little bid odd,' and that sort of thing," Loraditch said.

ABC News has obtained Internet messages sent by Foley to three different pages after that warning.

Two of them were sent to pages in the 2001-2002 class, with sexually explicit messages, most too graphic to be broadcast. 


It is almost completely opportunistic for the Democratic Party to behave as though the Republican leadership knowingly condoned the predatory behavior of Mark Foley for almost 5 years, just to protect a single Republican seat.  It is also entirely the correct thing to do.

For an interesting—and rather underreported—peek at how the story got legs in the first place, check this link out: