Many observers have explained Foleygate as Republican hypocrisy, others as hubris. Apologists on The Right claim Foley's is purely an
individual defect, anomlous within the Republican Party.
The reality is far more insidious. Foley exemplifies the Right-Wing Conservative Lifestyle: perpetrating an elaborate fraud of moral superiority in which you aggressively attack the morality of others to conceal your own immoral, unethical and criminal behavior.
The Right-Wing Conservative Lifestyle is the lifestyle of the Morality Scam, the confidence game, the family values flim-flam --practiced by the worst kind of sociopath. And not only is it the chosen lifestyle of individual so-called "conservatives," it is the central organizaing principle and defining ethos of today's Republican Party.
Exploding on the political scene after scores of Republican corruption & sex scandals, Foleygate --in all it's lurid detail-- has forced opinion leaders to explain how such depravity could be the work of longstanding "family values" Republicans. They have sought analogies amid old-school poltical corruption --from Boss Tweed to the House Banking Scandal-- proffered anti-semitic conspiracy theories involving George Soros, and otherwise characterized Foley as an infiltrater who only thrived because
other Republican gays helped him and conservative Republicans feared a politically correct backlash from the gay lobby.
These rationalizations are all just part of the scamming that is typical of the Right-Wing Conservative Lifestyle.
Accurate analogies for Rep. Mark Foley and all the other right-wing Republican Party sleaze are:
Rev. Jimmy Swaggert -- this hyper-moralizing pioneer of televangelism made a career of fulminating against sexual immorality --including sex scandals by fellow TV preachers-- to panhandle for millions of dollars in donations while purchasing the service of prostitutes.
Cardinal Bernard Law -- hiding in the Catholic bureaucracy, this politically powerful, outspoken critic of permissive "liberal" morals, knowingly transferred pedophile priests between parishes for years while concealing the incidents from police. His priests went on to commit multiple sexual assaults against children, even as his diocese lobbied for immunity form state mandatory reporting laws. When exposed by the local media, Cardinal Law denied any wrongdoing and sued unsuccessfuly to keep priests' personnel records from public scrutiny.
Dennis Rader -- this sadistic rapist-murderer concealed his predation behind the persona of a quiet Boy Scout leader and president of his church council.
Dr. W. David Hager -- this deviant misogynist adopted the guise of a Bible-centered OB-GYN, making money through books and lectures on sexual morality, the proper role of women, and medical ethics. All the while he was forcibly sodomizing his wife and coercing her to accept cash for various sex acts, some of which he videotaped.
What is the common characteristic of these sociopaths? They adopted a lifestyle centered around maintaining a phony exterior of morality in order to commit extreme misdeeds without arousing suspicion.
Every day they maintained a false front and, with the exception of Rader, publicly vilified in the starkest of terms so-called "liberals" for their supposed excess. In the case of Law, an entire institution was employed to maintain and extend a disguise of conservative moral superiority. It required enormous effort on a daily basis for these miscreants to maintain such double lives, but in time the truth came out.
This same fraudulant Right-Wing Conservative Lifestyle is the central organinzing principle of today's Republican Party. It is now axiomatic that the louder and more aggressively a conservative Republican attacks so-called "liberals" for their immorality, the more likely it is that said Republican is engaging in the exact same behavior or worse, to wit:
Rep. Tom DeLay -- led the crusade against Michael Schiavo's attempt to allow his wife the dignified death she wanted, even though DeLay had removed his own father from life support years earlier.
Sen. Strom Thurmond -- the outspoken segregationist and conservative "family values" proponent was posthumously exposed for fathering an out-of-wedlock daughter with an underage black housekeeper. He kept her existence secret for 50 years, including while he campaigned against the "n*gger race" as a pro-lynching Dixiecrat.
Rep.'s Henry Hyde, Bob Livingston and Helen Chenoweth -- while fulminating against President Clinton's immorality, they each were exposed for previously having an affairs. Livingston resigned, but Hyde dismissed his as a "youthful indescretion" even though it destroyed the woman's marriage and he was 41 at the time. Chenoweth simply claimed that she spoke with God and he forgave her.
George W. Bush -- promoted himself as a opponent of "big government" who would "restore dignity to the White House," but as president he set record deficits authorizing more discetionary spending than LBJ and lied repeatedly to the American people about pre-9/11 intelligence and Iraq.
Oliver North -- presented himself as a patriotic soldier and defender of freedom while providing weapons to America's enemies in Iran and funding the Contra terrorists in Nicaragua.
Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney -- claimed to be outraged over Saddam Hussein's killings and use of WMDs, even though they helped provide him weapons and defended his actions in the 1980's --when he was committing his worst mass-killings and war crimes.
Jack Abramoff -- he hid behind the guise of religious conservatism while operating an organized criminal enterprise on behalf of the Republican Party; was sentenced to 5 years and $21 million restitution.
Andrew Sullivan -- this openly gay, HIV-positive journalist published vitriolic attacks against gay promiscuity and President Clinton's affair with Monica Lewinsky, but was caught soliciting men and women online for unprotected sex.
Rep. Newt Gingrich -- though he rode to power by viciously attacking Democrats and so-called "liberalism" as the cause of all moral decline in America, the twice-divorced Republican Speaker was forced from office in disgrace after ethics scandals and an extra-marital affair with a staffer 23 years his junior.
Rush Limbagh -- made millions attacking so-called "liberals" for their immorality, military weakness, and unwillingness to jail drug abusers --though he himself dodged the draft, was twice divorced and convicted of doctor shopping to support his drug habit.
"Republican Marty" Glickman -- was a vocal Florida activist who organized anti-Gore protests during the 2000 recount and published a newsletter vilifying the Clinton's for corruption and sleaze. He committed suicide while awaiting trial for providing drugs to underage girls in exchange for sex.
Sen. Dan Burton -- a former seminarian and hard-core conservative moralist, Burton led several high-profile investigations of the Clinton administration and once publicly called Clinton "a scumbag." Vanity Fair busted him for concealing a child he'd fathered outside of his marriage.
George Roche III -- the president of the right-wing conservative Hillsdale College was preaching family values and anti-liberalism while sleeping with his daughter-in-law who subsequently committed suicide.
Kossacks are familiar with this rogues gallery of fraudsters, and more --from Randall Terry and Armstrong Williams to Duke Cunningham and Pat Robertson. They all live of the Right-Wing Conservative Lifstyle, attacking others for alleged immorality in order to conceal their own misdeeds.
But after Foleygate, Right-Wing Republicans are frightened more than ever that the public has figured out their con. Thus, apologists like Byron York are saying:
It's no secret that conservatives are unhappy with the performance of many GOP officeholders in Washington, from President Bush on down. In particular, they don't like the party's abandonment of fiscal discipline and its failure to restrain the growth of government.
Sorry, Byron! Bush and the Republicans didn't "abandon fiscal discipline," they never believed in it, not Ronald "Deficits" Reagan nor George W. "Cut-Estate-Taxes-During-Wartime" Bush.
Republican cries for "fiscal discipine" were part of the scam, promoted to gain sufficient public trust until they could get the keys to the treasury and pillage it. Ditto for fulminations against "big government," as they proved when they sued in Bush v. Gore and called the entire government into session so they could force their right-wing ideology on the Schiavo family.
Just as the Catholic priesthood devolved into a popular hiding place for pedophiles, the Republican Party with its permissive, morally relativistic Right-Wing Conservative Lifestyle is the preferred choice of sociopaths.
It is a lifestyle from which you can safely engage in all manner of sleaze --while being protected by the National Republican Party, President Bush and Congress, a wide network of activist groups like Focus on the Family and Eagle Forum, wealthy elites like Richard Mellon Scaife, and Corporate Media shills who will tell Americans you stand for morality and Family Values even after you've been convicted of raping their children.
It is insufficient for us to challenge Republicans for "hypocrisy" and "corruption." We must expose their modus operandi for what it is --a lifestyle of fakery and exploitation-- and finally end their grand deception for the good of America.