The end of the Mark Foley scandal?

The end appears to be near for the Mark Foley scandal.  Well, not really the end, but rather the end of the mainstream media's interest in the story.  Why?  Gay rights group Human Rights Campaign quietly announced the dismissal of one of its staff members this week on the grounds that HRC resources had been "inappropriately used."  It turns out that the alleged "inappropriate use" was in fact the creation of the now-infamous blog "Stop Sex Predators Now," which orchestrated the leak of the Foley instant messages.

In case you haven't been following the story, the evidence suggests that the Mark Foley scandal was orchestrated according to the following scenario:

• Congressional pages, knowing Foley is a closet gay, prank him into joining sexually explicit instant message sessions with them.  They save the messages and share them with friends as a joke.

• The messages fall into the hands of Democrat operatives, who devise a scheme to get rid of Foley and damage the Republican party during the fall 2006 elections.  Democrats had these instant messages for months, perhaps over a year.

• Working with at least one member of the Human Rights Campaign, Democrat operatives start the "Stop Sex Predators Now" blog.  They shop the instant messages around to various news organizations and finally ABC News' Brian Ross bites.

• The story is simultaneously released at SSPN blog, Daily Kos, and ABC News.

• Foley immediately resigns in disgrace; Democrats immediately call for the resignation of Speaker Hastert and a full investigation into the entire Republican party leadership in the House of Representatives -- "what did they know and when did they know it."

Ironically, Democrats seem, well, rather reluctant to answer those questions themselves.  And in the process of smearing Foley they also dredged up the ugly "all gay men are pedophiles and sexual predators" stereotype that gay rights groups have been fighting to eradicate for decades.  Nice going, guys.

And have you read what Camille Paglia had to say about all of this?

I was especially repulsed by the manipulative use of a gay issue for political purposes by my own party. I think it was not only poor judgment but positively evil. Whatever short-term political gain there is, it can only have a negative impact on gay men. When a moralistic, buttoned-up Republican like Foley is revealed to have a secret, seamy gay life, it simply casts all gay men under a shadow and makes people distrust them. Why don't the Democratic strategists see this? These tactics are extremely foolish. Gay men through history have always been more vulnerable to public hysteria than are lesbians, who -- unless they're out there parading around in all-leather bull-dyke drag -- simply fit more easily into the cultural landscape than do gay men, who generally lead a more adventurous, pickup-oriented sex life.

Not only has the public image of gay men been tarnished by the over-promotion of the Foley scandal, but they have actually been put into physical danger. It's already starting with news items about teenage boys using online sites to lure gay men on dates to attack and rob them. What in the world are the Democrats thinking? We saw the beginning of this in that grotesque moment in the last presidential debates when John Kerry came out with that clearly prefab line identifying Mary Cheney as a lesbian. Since when does the Democratic Party use any gay issue in this coldblooded way as a token on the chessboard? You'd expect this stuff from right-wing ideologues, not progressives.

Whether or not this issue results in the Democrats picking up a few seats in the House of Representatives, the truth is that the Foley scandal will bite Democrats hard in the near future.  Again -- just so no one misunderstands -- Foley's pederast's fantasies were despicable.  Despite the fact that he never actually touched a teenage D. C. page, Foley is not the type of man who should hold public office as a representative of the people.  I am glad he resigned.  But as I see things, a lot of goodwill between the gay community and the Democrats was lost because of the eagerness with which Democrats pursued the outing and public humiliation of a gay man.

Whatever is left of this scandal can only be bad news for Democrats, so for them and their allies in the mainstream press this scandal is over.

UPATE:The fake blogger has been named.  He is Lane Hudson, a former staffer for Sen. Fritz Hollings (D-SC) and former South Carolina Gov. Jim Hodges, also a Democrat.  Ace of Spades has a lot more.

Comments

[George Bush]

He's a gay pedophile! Sometimes even Republicans do wrong things! Like suspending Habeus Corpus and invading foreign nations without just cause! It's why we're losing both houses in two weeks.