Tuesday, October 03, 2006

On Power and Justice

I am working on a background story for the GP scandal site, but the information is tumbling out at the moment and my aim, as usual, is to encapsulate the saga for the longer term.

Oddly, apart from the demonstrated willingness of the majority party to condone yet another "obscene breach of trust", and one other issue which I will come to, I find the whole affair minor, if relatively sordid.

These people have already shown their tendency to breach the trust of those they govern on behalf of. Lawmakers are steadily being exposed for a variety of "obscene' breaches of public trust. Perhaps this one strikes home to voters because the conservative lawmakers are being 'hoist on their own petard'.

But there is nothing new about conservative 'perverts'. Sexual deviance is a power trip; and it seems that it must be all the more exciting when it is the very ideal you champion which you can then go and pervert. That is power!

Which brings me to the other point, another take on hoist on your own petard. If Foley is prosecuted it is likely that it will be under laws established by a committee he heads up - as he was the co-chairman of the House caucus on Missing and Exploited Children.

Last week we had Australian conservative backed businessmen threatened with dubious anti-terror laws for supplying cash to Saddam, this week the champion of children facing his own pervert laws. That is justice!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Do you think this will have any effect on the november elections?

Cartledge said...

Rom, i'm not sure I'm the right person to answer that. But judging from the noise it is creating, the issue will surely dampen down Republican attacks, and no doubt create some suspicion toward them.
It looks like Foley's district might be lost which strengthens the Dems.
Perhaps others who know the thinking better will offer a view.

Praguetwin said...

Rom,

I think for starters, Foley's seat that was considered safe is now at least in danger.

Looking at the big picture, this will have a huge effect. Americans, especially Repbulican Americans, do not tolerate deviants. In Europe this might not be AS big of a deal, but for America, this is huge. Just look what they did to Clinton for an consentual heterosexual affair. Now exptrapolate.

The Republicans have been running on a "Family Values" platform for decades. This really takes some wind out of their sails.