Mark Foley, the disgraced Florida Congressman who resigned after sexually explicit instant messages came to light, is now saying that he was molested by a clergyman between the ages of 13-15.Attorney David Roth said Foley had never had sexual contact

Given the obvious trend of kids being immature and impressionable to much older ages, I would think the age of consent laws need to be raised instead of dropped. Although kids are made aware of things a lot earlier because of tv and the internet, it seems to me they are much less capable of dealing with said stuff until later than when I was a kid. I think I’ve got a new issue to deal with.

2) The protection of pages shouldn’t be limited to Members of Congress. It is the duty of every human being. Those children are there to have some fun, to work and to learn about government. They shouldn’t wind up with the impression that government is full of perverts or be permanently scarred for life. If someone knew about this and said nothing, I don’t care whether they are a member of Congress or not - they should not have remained silent. God help them if they did remain silent.

3) Foley says he’s a Roman Catholic, but doesn’t adhere to many teachings of the church, such as on abortion, and obviously not on the dignity of the human person. He’s as good a Roman Catholic as is John Kerry or Ted Kennedy. Which obviously isn’t saying much.

4) No, it’s not about Clinton, but there are some parallels. The worst parallel, in my view, is Clinton’s pardon of Mel Reynolds - not that Clinton sexually harrassed/got a blow job from a teenage intern. Mel Reynolds, lest we forget, was convicted of 12 counts of sexual assault, obstruction of justice, solicitation of child pornography, 15 counts of bank fraud, and lying to the SEC. What’s he doing now? Working for Jesse Jackson’s Rainbow Coalition as a youth group leader. I kid you not.

5) Laws setting the age of consent have been lowered all over the nation. In CA, for example, the age of consent is now 14 years old. Frankly, I think this is not just misguided, but horribly wrong. Setting the bar this low allows children to be taken advantage of by predators, while allowing the predators to get off scott free. It’s sick.

I prefer to look at things as they are right now. William Jefferson abused the trust of the people and got a free pass from the Democrats other than some lip service ( he’s still on his caucuses and committees ), Foley resigns as soon as it’s made public and the very exact same Democrats are calling it a conspiracy.

Just seems a little hypocritical to me.

As far as Foley’s marital status, I thought I saw where he had a wife and son. Could be wrong there. Given the circumstances, I certainly wouldn’t rule it out.

2) Members have a “sacred trust” to protect pages, yes?

3) There is a difference between Clinton (”no” sex with an adult) and Foley (virtual sex, we think, with a minor).

And yes, the Republican Party jettisoned Foley faster than a “monkey on a cupcake.” The real issue IMO though, is not going to be Clinton’s zipper, or Barney Frank’s/Greg Stubb’s indiscretions, or maybe even not Foley himself, but the cover-up if there was one.