Almost as soon as the Foley scandal broke, we learned that the GOP leadership in the House had known about Foley's "overly-friendly" emails for nearly a year. The question that immediately came to mind was "Why did they not immediately remove him from all contact with the pages?" With almost a full year to go before the elections, they had plenty of time to recover from any incidental political fallout-- that is, as long as the fallout was within a normal range.
Over at HuffPo, Earl Ofari Hutchinson offers a startling (to me, at least) hypothesis: Foley knows where the bodies are buried re the infamous stolen 2000 election in Florida.
Bush was anything but indignant six years ago at Foley, and for good reason. Foley played a pivotal role in sealing Bush's much-disputed snatch of the White House. He helped shove thousands of dubious votes into the Bush column in his home district of Palm Beach County, Florida.
Recall that Pat Buchanan, the noted bigot, surprisingly received his highest rate of support in Foley's district, which is heavily populated with Jewish transplants from the north-east. Doesn't pass the smell test.
Hutchinson again:
A week after the election, with the air thick with lawsuits, court challenges, and accusations by Democrats of voter fraud, Foley took to the airwaves and delivered the Republicans weekly radio address. He flatly demanded that wrangling over the vote count should end.
[snip]
Foley launched a one-man spin crusade against the Democrats. He blamed outside agitators and "political operatives" for interfering in Florida's vote. He claimed that any suggestion that the vote was unfair insulted his constituents. He downplayed the significance of the vote for Buchanan, and at the same time defended it by implying that there was a stealth core of Reform Party backers in the County.
He demanded an end to the lawsuits, and appeals, and implored the Secretary of State to officially certify the vote. The rest of course is history.
Foley, the good soldier, found himself at ground zero of the election scandal, and delivered big time for Bush and the GOP. It is hard to think that a man in his position did not know the inside story of how the Bush-Rove cabal engineered the theft of the election.
Hutchinson concludes:
Foley was amply rewarded for his tireless service to Bush's dubious Florida win. He got a plum spot on the House Ways and Means Committee, and worked as right hand man to the equally disgraced former House majority leader Tom DeLay.
[snip]
GOP leaders showed their gratitude for his singular service to Bush's election by showering favors on him, up to and including their see-no-evil; hear no evil denial of his sexual hijinks..
To me, this story line has considerable persuasiveness. Could be fertile ground for further investigation.