Simply amazing.
Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert, on Rush Limbaugh's show, says it's all the Democrats' and the kids' fault:
SPEAKER HASTERT: There were two pieces of paper out there, one that we knew about and we acted on; one that happened in 2003 we didn't know about, but somebody had it, and, you know, they're trying -- and they drop it the last day of the session, you know, before we adjourn on an election year. Now, we took care of Mr. Foley. We found out about it, asked him to resign. He did resign. He's gone. We asked for an investigation. We've done that. We're trying to build better protections for these page programs.
But, you know, this is a political issue in itself, too, and what we've tried to do as the Republican Party is make a better economy, protect this country against terrorism -- and we've worked at it ever since 9/11, worked with the president on it -- and there are some people that try to tear us down. We are the insulation to protect this country, and if they get to me it looks like they could affect our election as well.
In two thin, mean paragraphs, Hastert manages to say that it's all a conspiracy by Democrats and/or by Foley's victims, and he says the kids who dared report the child sex predator the GOP had been shielding in their ranks are trying to "tear down" efforts to protect this country against terrorism. He says he's the "insulation" to protect this country -- when all the press reports out there say America would be stupid to trust Dennis Hastert to protect a Boy Scout troop.
This guy is just sick.
He doesn't get it, even today -- he thinks having a sex predator in Congress, knowing about it for at least a year and doing flatly nothing to even investigate how bad it was, not after Alexander knew about it, not after Shimkus knew about it, not after Reynolds knew about it, not after Boehner knew about it, not after Hastert himself was told about it, not even informing the Republican or Democratic members of the Page Board itself, is just another political thing to be "handled" on the Rush Limbaugh Show. And so now he's attacking the victims who finally did come forward, after nothing else worked, and saying that exposing the predator is all a plot against him and Republicans.
Hastert needs to go. It's done. He has no compass for leadership -- or even for remaining in Washington.