The Foley business

It may not surprise you that I believe that the person responsible for the Foley mess is none other than Mark Foley himself. Not Speaker Hastert. Not the Republican leadership in the House. Not Nancy Pelosi. Not even the many Congressmen - Republican and Democrat - who were almost certainly aware of Foley's wandering eyes.

Not Foley's childhood priest. Not his parents. Not the free love generation or the Sexual Revolution. Not the Log Cabin Republicans. Nope...I blame the dirty old man himself...Mark Foley. In hindsight, it seems that Foley's fellow House members could have been a little more attentive to his odd behavior, but then again, what could they have done about it other than tell him to cut that crap out? Members of Congress have no "boss" other than their own constitutents. There are plenty of obnoxious rogues on Capitol Hill, but being obnoxious is not a crime. Given what is now known about Foley's string of e-mails and instant messages - when they were sent, to whom, and who was aware of their contents - the efforts by the media and others to shift the blame for Foley's behavior to the House leadership and to the Republican Party in general is unwarranted.

Rep. Foley should be punished for what he did. In fact, that punishment has already begun. Once the details of his conduct were reported, he promptly resigned his office, and properly so; if he had not, he would have been forced out. It's safe to say that Foley will never be entrusted with a position of public trust again. His reputation is thoroughly trashed, and he has lost the friendship and goodwill of former colleagues and constituents. He could possibly face legal action and even jail time. All of that is exactly as it should be.

This is a shameful episode, but not surprising. Human beings, weakened as they are by original sin, are capable of horrible misdeeds. Man's actions, when they are unrestrained by conscience and the virtues, are limited only by his imagination and will, coupled with the capacities of his body and intellect to fulfill what is demanded of them.

We are right to expect our public officials to adhere to a higher standard of conduct, but as we've been reminded this week, they too are capable of acting badly from time to time. To make excuses for them or to blame others for their misconduct is to reject the idea that grown men and women must be held accountable for their own decisions. People need to calm down and ponder that for awhile.