"He's done the right thing," Hastert said. Asked if the chain of events was disturbing, he said, "None of us are very happy about it."

In other e-mails, Foley wrote, "I am back in Florida now . . .its nice here . .. been raining today . . . it sounds like you will have some fun over the next few weeks. . . how old are you now?" and "how are you weathering the hurricane . . . are you safe . . . send me an email pic of you as well."

Sorry, this sounds improper to me.

Debby, the recorded exchanges are worse than that. So much worse. ABC has the full transcripts.

WARNING: Reader discretion really is advised. This is disturbing, graphic stuff.

Jason,
This 52 year old man is a pedophile, and I hope he is prosecuted for this.

pedophile, gay, and def. a whacko. How the frack do these people get in office.

'hope he's prosecuted'... ???

The guy should be locked and the key thrown so far that nobody will ever find it!

The amazing factor is listening to some who state that 'he was a good congressman', like that's suppose to be some sort of excuse for this inexcusable behavior. Unreal!

House Majority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) told The Washington Post last night that he had learned this spring of inappropriate "contact" between Foley and a 16-year-old page. Boehner said he then told House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.). Boehner later contacted The Post and said he could not remember whether he talked to Hastert.

It was not immediately clear what actions Hastert took. His spokesman had said earlier that the speaker did not know of the sexually charged online exchanges between Foley and the boy.

Oh man.

(from the Washington Post, via Talking Points Memo)

I hope you are right Record Sage, but our justice system is more often than not for sale to the highest bidder.

They will. Considering he's a Republican, he'll have full wrath of the media on his back, including people like O'Reilly who aren't liberal, but who absolutely can't stand anyone abusing kids in any way and of course the Dems will milk this guy dies of dehydration. This jerk should be made an example and used as a deterrent for anyone in the future.

I predict that commentators and journalists will shift their attention away from Foley to the issue of what the House Republican leadership knew, when they knew it, and what they did or did not do.

It's a good story--House leaders covering up a Congressman who, as far as they knew, was sending suggestive e-mails to minors. I suspect they had an inkling that Foley was doing more than just writing suggestive and improper e-mails.

Considering your views, jklugman, it's not surprising that you 'suspect', although that hardly means anything in terms of facts. The witchhunt your describing is a total waste of time, and would be nothing but political BS. I hope that the attention does stay on the perpetrator of the crime and that he gets fully and totally punished for doing these deeds. This has nothing to do with politics and thus shouldn't be treated so. If someone was accepting bribes for political favors etc. - fine... but this is a different situation.

Haven't been paying attention I see. Boehner has already admitted that he knew about the Katrina e-mails. He told the Washington Post that he informed Hastert of them too, but then he retracted his statement.

They knew Foley had a problem with his relationships with underage minors who were House pages. They covered it up.

What I was speculating on was that Boehner & Hastert had some idea that Boehner's problems with minors went beyond improper e-mails asking for pictures. Of course that remains to be proven, but if it is, I will be able to say, "I told you so".

If that makes you feel better - you can tell me now
I simply meant that I hope that the political sideshow doesn't take the pressure (and the sentence) off the guy for what he did, that's all.