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The Foley Coverup Timeline

By ThinkProgress on Sep 30, 2006 at 11:47 pm

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On Friday, Sept. 29, 2006, Rep. Mark Foley (R-FL) resigned from Congress after ABC News published inappropriate emails and sexually explicit instant messages that Foley sent to underage boys.

Subsequently, it’s become clear that Congressional leadership “knew for months about e-mail traffic between Representative Mark Foley and a former teenage page, but kept the matter secret and allowed Mr. Foley to remain head of a Congressional caucus on children’s issues.” Here is a timeline of the coverup, based on published reports:

2000 — Rep. Jim Kolbe (R-AZ) informed of improper Foley Internet messages that made a page feel uncomfortable with the direction Foley was taking their email relationship. Kolbe claims he never personally confronted Foley, but rather recommended that the complaint be passed along to his office. [Washington Post, 10/9/06; Arizona Republic, 10/11/06]

2001 — A Republican staff member warns pages “to watch out for Congressman Mark Foley.” A former page says that they were told “don’t get too wrapped up in him being too nice to you and all that kind of stuff.” [ABC, 10/1/06]

2003 — Rep. Mark Foley (R-FL) has sexually explicit IM exchanges with an underage boy who worked as a Congressional page. [ABC News, 9/29/06]

2003 — Foley’s former aide Kirk Fordham told The Associated Press that “when he learned about Foley’s inappropriate behavior toward pages, he had ‘more than one conversation with senior staff at the highest level of the House of Representatives asking them to intervene,’ alluding to House Speaker Dennis Hastert. Hastert’s office denied the explosive allegations.” [CBS News, 10/5/06]

APRIL 2003 — Rep. Mark Foley (R-FL) interrupts a House vote on the 2003 Iraq supplemental to “engage in Internet sex with a high school student who had served as a congressional page.” [ABC, 10/3/06]

SUMMER 2005 — Rep. Mark Foley (R-FL) sends inappropriate emails to another former Congressional page. [CREW]

SEPTEMBER 2005 — Rep. Rodney Alexander (R-LA), who sponsored the page, learns “of the e-mails from a reporter.” [AP, 9/29/06; CQ, 9/30/06]

FALL 2005 — “Tim Kennedy, a staff assistant in the [Speaker J. Denis Hastert's] Office, received a telephone call from Congressman Rodney Alexander’s Chief of Staff who indicated that he had an email exchange between Congressman Foley and a former House page…[Mike] Stokke [Deputy Chief of Staff for Speaker Hastert] called the Clerk and asked him to come to the Speaker’s Office so that he could put him together with Congressman Alexander’s Chief of Staff.” [Hastert Statement, 9/30/06]

LATE 2005 — Rep. John Shimkus (R-IL), Chairman of the House Page Board, “was notified by the then Clerk of the House, who manages the Page Program, that he had been told by Congressman Rodney Alexander (R-LA) about an email exchange between Congressman Foley and a former House Page.” Shimkus interviewed Foley and told him “to cease all contact with this former house page.” He did not inform Rep. Dale Kildee (D-MI), the only Democrat on the House page Board. [Roll Call, 9/29/06]

EARLY 2006 — Rep. Tom Reynolds (R-NY) talks Foley into running for another term. Bob Novak reported, “A member of the House leadership told me that Foley, under continuous political pressure because of his sexual orientation, was considering not seeking a seventh term this year but that Rep. Tom Reynolds, chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), talked him into running.” [New York Post, 10/4/06]

FEBRUARY/MARCH 2006 — Rep. Rodney Alexander (R-La.), whose office first received the complaint from the page, told Boehner about Foley’s inappropriate e-mails, and Boehner sent him to Tom Reynolds. Alexander tells Reynolds about “the existence of e-mails between Mark Foley and a former page of Mr. Alexander’s.” Reynolds tells Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-IL) about the emails and his conversation with Alexander. [Reynolds Statement, 9/30/06; Roll Call, 9/30/06; Hastert Statement, 9/30/06; Chicago Tribune, 10/3/06]

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Politics

President Bush fired Colin Powell.

By ThinkProgress on Sep 30, 2006 at 8:51 pm

“On Wednesday, November 10, 2004, eight days after the president he served was elected to a second term, Secretary of State Colin Powell received a telephone call from the White House at his State Department office. The caller was not President Bush but Chief of Staff Andrew Card, and he got right to the point. ‘The president would like to make a change,’ Card said, using a time-honored formulation that avoided the words ‘resign’ or ‘fire.’ … Bush wanted Powell’s resignation letter dated two days hence, on Friday, November 12, Card said, although the White House expected him to stay at the State Department until his successor was confirmed by the Senate.”

Security

Bush Officials May Have Covered Up Rice-Tenet Meeting From 9/11 Commission

By Guest Blogger on Sep 30, 2006 at 6:17 pm

ricehand.jpg [Our guest blogger, Peter Rundlet, was a Counsel to the 9/11 Commission.]

Most of the world has now seen the infamous picture of President Bush tending to his ranch on August 6, 2001, the day he received the ultra-classified Presidential Daily Brief (PDB) that included a report entitled “Bin Laden Determined To Strike in US.” And most Americans have also heard of the so-called “Phoenix Memo” that an FBI agent in Phoenix sent to FBI headquarters on July 10, 2001, which advised of the “possibility of a coordinated effort” by bin Laden to send students to the United States to attend civil aviation schools.

As a Counsel to the 9/11 Commission, I became very familiar with both the PDB and the Phoenix Memo, as well as the tragic consequences of the failure to detect and stop the plot. A mixture of shock, anger, and sadness overcame me when I read about revelations in Bob Woodward’s new book about a special surprise visit that George Tenet and his counterterrorism chief Cofer Black made to Condi Rice, also on July 10, 2001:

They went over top-secret intelligence pointing to an impending attack and “sounded the loudest warning” to the White House of a likely attack on the U.S. by Bin Laden.

Woodward writes that Rice was polite, but, “They felt the brushoff.”

If true, it is shocking that the administration failed to heed such an overwhelming alert from the two officials in the best position to know. Many, many questions need to be asked and answered about this revelation — questions that the 9/11 Commission would have asked, had the Commission been told about this significant meeting. Suspiciously, the Commissioners and the staff investigating the administration’s actions prior to 9/11 were never informed of the meeting. As Commissioner Jamie Gorelick pointed out, “We didn’t know about the meeting itself. I can assure you it would have been in our report if we had known to ask about it.”

The Commission interviewed Condoleezza Rice privately and during public testimony; it interviewed George Tenet three times privately and during public testimony; and Cofer Black was also interviewed privately and publicly. All of them were obligated to tell the truth. Apparently, none of them described this meeting, the purpose of which clearly was central to the Commission’s investigation. Moreover, document requests to both the White House and to the CIA should have revealed the fact that this meeting took place. Now, more than two years after the release of the Commission’s report, we learn of this meeting from Bob Woodward.

Was it covered up? It is hard to come to a different conclusion. If one could suspend disbelief to accept that all three officials forgot about the meeting when they were interviewed, then one possibility is that the memory of one of them was later jogged by notes or documents that describe the meeting. If such documents exist, the 9/11 Commission should have seen them. According to Woodward’s book, Cofer Black exonerates them all this way: “Though the investigators had access to all the paperwork about the meeting, Black felt there were things the commissions wanted to know about and things they didn’t want to know about.” The notion that both the 9/11 Commission and the Congressional Joint Inquiry that investigated the intelligence prior to 9/11 did not want to know about such essential information is simply absurd. At a minimum, the withholding of information about this meeting is an outrage. Very possibly, someone committed a crime. And worst of all, they failed to stop the plot.

– Peter Rundlet

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Politics

Rep. Reynolds confirms: Hastert knew.

By ThinkProgress on Sep 30, 2006 at 5:36 pm

Roll Call reports that Rep. Tom Reynolds (R-NY) issued a statement today in which he said that he informed Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) in early 2006 of allegations of improper contacts between then-Rep. Mark Foley (R-FL) and at least one former male page. “Hastert’s response to Reynolds’ warning remains unclear. Hastert’s staff insisted Friday night that he was not told of the Foley allegations and are scrambling to respond to Reynolds’ statement.”

Yglesias

What’s The Deal With…

By Matthew Yglesias on Sep 30, 2006 at 11:51 am

… Bob Woodward? His new book:

In Bob Woodward’s highly anticipated new book, “State of Denial,” President Bush emerges as a passive, impatient, sophomoric and intellectually incurious leader, presiding over a grossly dysfunctional war cabinet and given to an almost religious certainty that makes him disinclined to rethink or re-evaluate decisions he has made about the war. It’s a portrait that stands in stark contrast to the laudatory one Mr. Woodward drew in “Bush at War,” his 2002 book, which depicted the president — in terms that the White House press office itself has purveyed — as a judicious, resolute leader, blessed with the “vision thing” his father was accused of lacking and firmly in control of the ship of state.

Why were the earlier books so different? Did he somehow not notice this stuff before? It’s a serious problem for the most prominent people in the journalism world to be merely lagging indicators, praising leaders when they’re popular and then pointing out that, in fact, they suck only after a whole series of disasters discredit them.

Politics

ThinkFast: September 30, 2006 — ‘State of Denial’ Edition

By ThinkProgress on Sep 30, 2006 at 11:15 am

Woodward quotes Iraq war commander Gen. John Abizaid telling two retired generals in 2005, “We’ve got to get the [expletive] out.” In March 2006, Abizaid visited Rep. John Murtha (D-PA) and “indicated he wanted to speak frankly. According to Murtha, Abizaid raised his hand for emphasis, held his thumb and forefinger a quarter of an inch from each other and said, ‘We’re that far apart.’”

In February 2005, two weeks after Condi Rice became secretary of state, her top aide Phillip Zelikow “presented her with a 15-page, single-spaced secret memo” summing up his fact-finding trip to Iraq. “At this point Iraq remains a failed state shadowed by constant violence and undergoing revolutionary political change,” Zelikow wrote.

Woodward writes, in those moments “where Bush had someone from the field there in the chair beside him [in the Oval Office], he did not press, did not try to open the door himself and ask what the visitor had seen and thought. The whole atmosphere too often resembled a royal court, with Cheney and Rice in attendance, some upbeat stories, exaggerated good news and a good time had by all.”

In a seven-page memo in July 2004, a “longtime friend” of Donald Rumsfeld, Steve Herbits, described Rumsfeld’s “style of operation”: “Indecisive, contrary to popular image. Would not accept that some people in some areas were smarter than he. . . . Trusts very few people. Very, very cautious. Rubber glove syndrome — a tendency not to leave his fingerprints on decisions.”

“Woodward said he pushed repeatedly to interview Bush,” Howie Kurtz writes. “But White House counselor Dan Bartlett and national security adviser Stephen Hadley, after a period of cooperation, told him an interview was unlikely and then stopped returning his calls,” which Woodward attributes “to Bush’s declining popularity.”

Politics

White House Falsely Claimed Rove Only Had A ‘Casual Relationship’ With Abramoff

By Faiz Shakir on Sep 30, 2006 at 10:02 am

A House Government Reform Committee report documents at least 82 contacts between Karl Rove’s office and Jack Abramoff’s lobbying team. The Committee describes at least ten “direct contacts” between Abramoff and Rove, seven of which were instances of lobbying.

And yet, Karl Rove told Scott McClellan that his relationship with Abramoff was “more of a casual relationship” than a business one.

MCCLELLAN: Yes [Rove] knows Mr. Abramoff. They are both former heads of the College Republicans. That’s how they got to know each other way back — I think it was in the early ’80s. And my understanding is that Karl would describe it as more of a casual relationship than a business relationship. That’s what he has said. [White House Press Briefing, 1/17/06]

But excerpts from the House report indicate that there was an extensive business relationship between Rove and Abramoff:

On March 6, 2001, Abramoff wrote in an e-mail to Dennis Stephens that he had a “great meeting” with Karl Rove to discuss an appointment to the Department of Interior. (p. 33)

On April 5, 2002, Abramoff sent an e-mail to his assistant asking the assistant to add to his schedule “a Karl Rove/SagChip breakfast on the 16th at 8 am. Location tbd.” According to the documents, this was an event with Karl Rove and “tribal representatives and leaders” from the Saginaw Chippewa tribe. (p. 37)

In one e-mail to a client, Abramoff expressed the view that Rove did not want to be perceived publicly as taking actions that benefited Abramoff. … “It gives me a lot of cover, which is one of the things Karl was worried about. It does not benefit them to be doing stuff on this publicly for me, as you can imagine, and he was really worried that we would cause a NYT like piece.” (p. 38)

Yglesias

Liberty Under Law

By Matthew Yglesias on Sep 30, 2006 at 9:49 am

It’s long and ambitious, so I haven’t yet had time to develop and write up any really intelligent remarks, but late last week the Princeton Project on National Security released its final report Forging A World Of Liberty Under Law. Take a look.

Yglesias

Corporal Punishment

By Matthew Yglesias on Sep 30, 2006 at 7:57 am

The New York Times writes about corporal punishment in American schools, legal in a broad swathe of red America, but in practice overwhelmingly taking place in Texas, Arkansas, Mississippi, Tennessee, and Alabama. Obviously, as a good upscale liberal my instincts are overhwelmingly opposed to this. In addition, my ex ante skepticism that Texas, Arkansas, Mississippi, Tennessee, and Alabama have together hit upon a useful public policy experiment ignored by the rest of the nation is extremely high.

That said, on a subject I’ve given more thought to it seems to me that we actually ought to seriously consider adding a corporal punishment component to our criminal justice system. Sanctioning offenders works better when the punishment is swift and predictable, which means it helps a lot for the sanctions to be cheap, which prison is not. What’s more, though caning is cruel, the reality of the American prison system — as opposed to the hopes of reformers decades ago — is pretty damn cruel as well. So I think there really might be something to, well, beating people rather than imprisoning them for at least some offenses. Which, I guess, means it should be on the table as something to contemplate for the schools system as well. But my conscience really rebels against the idea of hitting kids and it’s not as if the rural southern counties are known world-round for their excellent schools.

Politics

Hastert knew.

By Judd Legum on Sep 30, 2006 at 1:14 am

From the the Washington Post:

The resignation rocked the Capitol, and especially Foley’s GOP colleagues, as lawmakers were rushing to adjourn for at least six weeks. House Majority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) told The Washington Post last night that he had learned this spring of some “contact” between Foley and a 16-year-old page. Boehner said he told House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.), and that Hastert assured him “we’re taking care of it.”

It was not immediately clear what actions Hastert took. His spokesman had said earlier that the speaker did not know of the sexually charged e-mails between Foley and the boy.

Josh Marshall has much more on this story.

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