http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15120451/site/newsweek/
Shifting the Spotlight
The Foley sex scandal has become a leadership crisis for the
Republicans. Can House Speaker Hastert survive?
By Eleanor Clift
Newsweek
Updated: 6:32 p.m. ET Oct. 3, 2006
Oct. 3, 2006 - A friendly looking bear of a man, Dennis Hastert provided
a much needed image makeover for the Republicans when he took over as
House speaker in January 1999. The Democrats had gained seats in the
midterm election, repudiating the GOP’s zealous pursuit of President
Clinton, and the Republicans were at sea over the leadership of their
fractured party.
With Newt Gingrich discredited and his designated successor, Louisiana
Rep. Bob Livingston, taking himself out of contention after confessing
he had been unfaithful to his wife, the party turned to the
grandfatherly Hastert, a former high-school teacher and wrestling coach
with an impeccable personal life.
Never a strong leader but a good public face, Hastert was the congenial
front man for a party whose real power was Tom DeLay. Love him or loath
him, DeLay ran the House with a steely precision, punishing anybody who
crossed him and serving up Republican majorities for whatever the White
House wanted. After DeLay left earlier this year, the Republicans
drifted, unable to fasten on an agenda and vulnerable to the charge they
were a “do-nothing Congress.”
With the Democrats needing only 15 seats to take control of the House,
it’s not surprising that the sex scandal involving Florida Republican
Mark Foley morphed with stunning speed into a leadership crisis for the
Republicans. Hastert’s lackadaisical handling of Foley’s “overly
friendly” e-mails to a teenage boy serving as a congressional page
exposed the speaker’s weakness as a leader. Hastert took the easy way
out, apparently hoping any impropriety could be contained. Either he
didn’t recognize the potential seriousness of the problem, or worse, he
knew what lay ahead and chose to protect his Republican majority until
after the election. Whatever the reason, it could mean he’s finished as
speaker.
Republicans and Democrats alike privately put the odds at 50-50 that
Hastert keeps his position. With the House in recess for the election
campaign, a beleaguered Hastert returned to Capitol Hill for a cameo
appearance, issuing a terse statement and refusing to take questions.
Religious right leaders are hammering him, a rebellion that could cost
him his job. The Washington Times, a conservative newspaper, reflecting
the uproar on the right, called upon Hastert to resign. “Either he was
grossly negligent for not taking the red flags fully into account and
ordering a swift investigation … or he deliberately looked the other way
in hopes that a brewing scandal would simply blow away.”
A former Republican staffer who handled damage control during an earlier
sex scandal involving a member of Congress said there’s a pattern in
Washington. Once a scandal gets going, then it really gets going, and
with Foley hidden away undergoing treatment for substance abuse, the
clamor is for somebody to pay the price—and Hastert is the likely
figure. Like so many before him in the clubby world of Capitol Hill,
Hastert’s first inclination was to protect one of his own. That changed
with the public revelation of the e-mails. “The minute anybody shines a
light into the club, the rats go scurrying into the corners; it’s pretty
disgusting behavior.” says the former GOP staffer. Republicans are
furious at Hastert for letting the Foley scandal erupt the way it has.
They feel he has not protected them, that he expects them to take the
bullet for him, not the other way around. They’re still angry that he
made them vote for DeLay as majority leader after he had been indicted.
DeLay then turned around and announced he was relinquishing the post and
wouldn’t run for election, handing the opposition a club to use against
Republicans.
Thrust into a leadership job he never sought, Hastert is an accidental
leader. “He’s what Truman could have become if he hadn’t risen to the
challenge,” says a Republican lobbyist, reflecting widespread
dissatisfaction—if not disgust—with the way Hastert has settled into his
job as Speaker. “He’s not a leader. He’s gotten fatter and more
comfortable in that job. He’s gotten rich, and he’s running around the
country attending fundraisers for people who couldn’t lose their
election if they tried.” Last year, Hastert and two business partners
sold a parcel of land west of Chicago for at least $1.5 million in
profit—only months after he had "earmarked" hundreds of millions in
federal funding for a controversial highway project just a few miles
away.
If Hastert were to step down, there is no obvious interim successor. The
Washington Times suggests the venerable Henry Hyde, who at 82 is not
running for re-election, as somebody to guide the party through the next
few months. Others would like a fresh face and a new generation like
Louisiana’s Joel McCreary, 57, or even Virginia’s Eric Cantor, 43.
Republicans are in enough trouble to take a chance on a radical shakeup,
but the House is such an insular place, nobody is betting on it.
© 2006 Newsweek
--
Fundies and trolls are cordially invited to
shove a wooden cross up their arses and rotate
at a high rate of speed. I trust you'll
be 'blessed' with a plethora of splinters.
.
|
