Hastert Blames Media, Soros, Clinton

Hastert Blames Media, Soros, Clinton

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/...&entry_id=9525

10/6/2006

House Speaker Dennis Hastert, fighting for his political survival, is lashing out at the news media, George Soros and even associates of former President Clinton.

Prior to his more restrained afternoon news conference, Hastert suggested there may be a backlash when Republicans learn how the Foley story came to dominate the news cycle.

"When the base finds out who's feeding this monster, they're not going to be happy,'' Hastert told the Chicago Tribune of the firestorm over Mark Foley's contacts with House pages.

"The people who want to see this thing blow up are ABC News and a lot of Demoratic operatives, people funded by George Soros,'' Hastert says in the interview published this morning.

It was ABC news who confronted Foley with e-mails last Friday which led to his immediate resigation. Soros has contributed money to Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), which turned over some Foley e-mails to the FBI this summer.

As for Clinton, the Tribune writes that Hastert suggested that "operatives aligned with former President Bill Clinton knew about the allegations and were perhaps behind the disclosures in the closing weeks before the Nov. 7 midterm elections, but he offered no hard proof.''

"All I know is what I hear and what I see,'' Hastert told the Tribune. "I saw Bill Clinton's adviser Richard Morris, was saying these guys knew about this all along. If somebody had this info, when they had it, we could have dealt with it then.''

However The Hill, a Capitol Hill newspaper, reported today that ABC's original source for the Foley story was a Republican House aide, who has been a registered Republican since he was able to vote.

Hastert was more diplomatic in his afternoon news conference from his Illinois district, expressing how "deeply sorry'' he is that the scandal occured in the first place, and declaring that as speaker, "the buck stops here.''

Hastert went on to say he has no intention of resigning his post, and expects to stand for election and win the speakership when the new Congress convenes next year.

Ah ha ha ha, when all else fails, blame Clinton. It was a Republican that blew the whistle on Foley.

http://www.waynemadsenreport.com/

(Beltman713: Possibility that Hastert and others may be involved in trips to Southeast Asia to partake in the child sex trade?)

October 9, 2006 -- On October 2, WMR was the first media outlet to report on the involvement of Arizona Republican Rep. Jim Kolbe, the only openly gay GOP congressmen, in the Pagegate matter. We reported that Kolbe was a member and chairman of the House Page Board at the time reports of ex-Florida GOP Rep. Mark Foley's inappropriate sexual conduct with underage male pages was known to the Republican House leadership. WMR reported:

"From 2000 to 2001, the Page Board Chair was Rep. Sue Kelly (R-NY) and members included Rep. Jim Kolbe (R-AZ) (inexplicably replaced as chairman by Kelly), Kildee, Trandahl, and Livingood. Crews was the program coordinator. From 1999 to 2000, the Chairman was Kolbe and members included Rep. Jo Ann Emerson (R-MO), Kildee, Transdahl, and Livingood. The coordinator was Crews. From 1998 (when the allegations first reportedly surfaced about Foley), the Chair was Tillie Fowler (R-FL) and members were Kildee, Kolbe, House Clerk Robin Carle, and Livingood. The page coordinator was Hugh Addington. Foley became a congressman in 1995."

The Washington Post is reporting today, rather belatedly, that Kolbe was aware of Foley's salacious e-mails with an underage page in 2000. One of Foley's Instant Messages sent in January 2002 to a page stated that Kolbe once invited four pages to use his Washington home while Kolbe was in Arizona.

There is also much focus on the relationship between House Speaker Dennis Hastert and his chief of staff, 56-year old Scott Palmer. Hastert and Palmer, Hastert's longtime unmarried adviser, live together in a DC townhouse along with Hastert's Deputy Chief of Staff, Mike Stokke, while Hastert's wife Jean lives in Yorkville, Illinois and stays at a hotel when she visits Washington.

WMR has also learned of additional Senate links to the Pagegate scandal. There is much focus on GOP Sen. George Allen's predominantly white male staff. There is also interest in the activities of a senior GOP Senator from a Rocky Mountain state.

WMR's State Department sources have also reported that the visits of Hastert and other congressional leaders and staff members to certain Southeast Asian nations and the Northern Marianas should come under the scrutiny of the House Ethics Committee, now officially investigating "Pagegate." The Northern Marianas became infamous in the scandals involving Tom DeLay and Jack Abramoff because of the presence in the US slave labor territory of Asian children being used as prostitutes. Conveniently, Foley co-chaired the House Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children, which would have had authority to investigate charges of child prostitution in the Northern Marianas.

http://www.waynemadsenreport.com/SEAsiamap.jpghttp://www.waynemadsenreport.com/hastert1.jpg
Were Hastert and other congressional visits visits to Thailand and Vietnam on the up-and-up?

Our State Department sources report that it is no secret that a number of U.S. Foreign Service officers working out of the U.S. embassies in Bangkok, Phnom Penh, Hanoi, and Manila have been involved with underage nationals of the host countries where they are assigned. In fact, many have rotated their assignments between countries that look sideways at child prostitution and sex between adults and minors. In fact, John Mark Karr, as previously reported by WMR, was quickly whisked out of Bangkok after his arrest on pedophilia charges. The U.S. Embassy in Bangkok, working with the CIA and Department of Homeland Security, arranged for Karr's quick departure from Bangkok on a business class flight to the United States, where all charges, including those stemming from Karr's "admission" that he killed JonBenet Ramsey and child porn charges, were later dropped. WMR has learned that Karr may have been aware of the identities of top U.S. officials in the child sex trade in Thailand and that he was sprung from Thai authorities to prevent him from testifying in a Thai courtroom.

Hastert visited Vietnam, along with Palmer, in April of this year and spent three days in the country. Hastert, along with Illinois GOP Rep. Ray LaHood, canceled a visit to Thailand and Vietnam in January 2006. Hastert was also in Thailand in January 2002.