Re: [MLUG - DISCUSSION] [POLITICS] Dump House Leader for Protecting Foley

[Mike Miller <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

On Tue, 3 Oct 2006, Phillip Kelchen wrote:

> On Tuesday 03 October 2006 11:50, Mike Miller wrote:
>
> > I snipped out the URLs and email addresses from this message.  I guess 
> > it's no surprise they're going after Hastert.  --Mike
>
> Of course it's no surprise as that behavior is taken straight out of the 
> National Politics for Dummies textbook- find anybody with ANY link at 
> all (the more powerful the person the better!) no matter how tenuous, to 
> the problem and hammer them publicly about it and call for a 
> resignation. If you can get away with it, then you succeeded in causing 
> damage to your opposition. If you didn't get them ousted, then you have 
> political fodder for next election- "He was sooooo sleazy that he 
> refused to resign even after $EVENT..." It's a no-risk way to make the 
> other side look a lot worse than they really are and to score yourself 
> anywhere from little to a huge amount of credit and votes.


That's all true, but there are some interesting wrinkles on the current 
drama:

The Washington Times -- a very "conservative" (some would say insanely 
right-wing) newspaper is asking Hastert to step down:

http://washingtontimes.com/op-ed/20061002-102008-9058r.htm

House Majority Leader John Boehner, Republican, is blaming Hastert for 
problems:

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2006/10/boehner_points_.html

So it isn't just Democrats attacking Hastert because he's vulnerable right 
now.  Everyone is attacking him, partly in self-defense ("It isn't 
'Republicans' who screwed up, it's just Hastert!")

Mike

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