The supposed “procedural safeguards” that SHOULD have shielded Dennis Hastert to some degree have been pretty much eroded, and while what happened long in the past was reprehensible, that was not the snare that was used to entrap him. Something suitably vague, like “lying to the FBI”, a cover that is conveniently overlooked when dealing with mischief by a political figure of the “protected class” (i.e., someone of liberal Democrat connections), and which is only capriciously applied, if and when an “unperson” has to be removed from the scene.
One could apply the same standard to Herself, Madame Benghazi, the Cold & Joyless, but nobody has the testicular fortitude to even attempt that degree of even-handed application of the statutes.
Dennis Hastert is a former high school teacher who spent a couple of decades in Washington, earned something on the order of $125,000 per year in one of the nation's most expensive metropolitan areas, and was a multi-millionaire when he retired from Congress ... to the point where he was apparently willing to pay $3.5 million to cover up an old crime that was no legal threat to him at all.
Good riddance to a Beltway scumbag by way of Illinois.