A Prank and ABC
10/05 05:13 PM
As best I can tell, ABC News has yet to report on or address Drudge’s revelation, i.e., that former congressional page Jordan Edmund “goaded an unwitting Foley to type embarrassing comments that were then shared with a small group of young Hill politicos. The prank went awry when the saved IM sessions got into the hands of political operatives.”
Of course, this doesn’t expunge Foley’s conduct. But it does put at least this page’s conduct into a completely different light. He wasn’t the innocent victim portrayed by some who have sought to exploit this situation.
Although ABC hasn’t reported on Drudge’s revelation at this writing, it has apparently communicated its position to rawstory.com.
Among other things, ABC claims that this couldn’t be a prank because there are other pages and other communications. That may well be true. And nobody would argue, I think, that Foley shouldn't have resigned over his communications with Edmund. But it certainly does raise other questions. For example, Speaker Hastert is under political attack because he is accused of not doing enough in response to the Edmund’s e-mails. As I understand the Drudge revelation, these e-mails, among other communications, were intentional attempts by Edmund to get the kind of reaction from Foley that, in fact, he got. So, not only hadn’t Hastert seen these e-mails, if he had seen them any subsequent decisions Hastert might have made would have based on Edmund’s prank. Perhaps that might have resulted in the discovery of additional communications between Foley and other pages, but that’s not a basis for concluding that Hastert was negligent or should resign.
Moreover, the reason ABC News looks foolish is because the story it originally broke was apparently based on Edmund’s prank. Again, Foley’s comments in the communications are indefensible. We all know that. But wouldn’t it also have been useful to know that the page in question (who was almost 18 years old, if not 18 years old at the time) was knowingly provoking a rather ill member of Congress for kicks. But the reporter, Brian Ross, was so committed to promoting the “Republican scandal” aspect of this, including focusing attention on Hastert, that he took the Edmund e-mails and ran with them without much, if any, curiosity about their author and his motivations.
Sure, ABC News will release more reprehensible electronic communications, but to what end? It doesn’t excuse its failure to get the full story, and get it right, at the outset. And we already know that Foley was a very sick man who has now resigned. It is difficult to see how the daily release of more communications is anything but an effort to continue to feed the Democrat party’s frenzied demand for Hastert’s resignation, put Republicans on defense, and influence the November elections.
http://levin.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NWU1NzZmNmQ3MDMzMDQ0YWVkODlmOTFhNjczNzM5YjU=
Spot on!