Did Someone Say Cover-up?

A new poll from Scott Rasmussen conducted Tuesday and Wednesday night reports that 61 percent of American adults believe that Republican leaders have been “protecting Mark Foley for several years.” Only 21 percent believe that the leadership “just learned about Foley’s problems last week.”

The word “protecting” is a very nice, polite term pollsters use for cover-up.

The House GOP 2006 contract at online betting parlor TradeSports dropped 5 points today to less than 43 percent.

Let me emphasize from my earlier posts that a party without ethical principles is no party at all. Bad principles lead to bad politics—whether on national security, taxes, or ethics and morality. Saving Mr. Hastert may be doing enormous damage to the Republicans in next month’s elections.

There are also reports that Republican pollsters in the field are finding a catastrophic impact from Hastert.

And as far as his press conference today goes, the Speaker raised more questions than he answered. And he didn’t take responsibility for the timeline that clearly points to either his knowing about the Foley problem, or his staff knowing, which is all the same thing in my view.

In addition, this morning’s Washington Post reports that Hastert crony John Shimkus (R-IL), along with Jeff Trandahl, former House clerk and a member of the Page Board, were provided the text of the emails a year ago (including Foley’s request for the boy’s photo on a standard sized sheet of paper.) Trandahl, now director of the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, will not respond to press inquiries.

A Shimkus spokesman put this information out yesterday according to Jonathan Wiseman and Charles Babington, the Washington Post staff reporters.

Of course, this email information was not shared with the Dems on the Page Board.

Did someone say cover-up?