Fox News Coverage of the Foley Scandal

Congressman Mark Foley of Florida has recently resigned in disgrace in light of revelations that he has been using the Internet to send sexually explicit messages to underage congressional pages. There is no question about the nature of the emails and instant messages. They were not, as Press Secretary Tony Snow said, merely "naughty emails."

Mr. Foley asked sixteen year-olds to measure their penises for him, and whether or not he made them "horny." He tried to set up night time rendezvous with the boys. He invited boys to his house for alcohol. He had cybersex and reached orgasm with underage boys while the House was voting.

And yet, Fox News' Special Report, Fortune magazine Washington bureau chief Nina Easton characterized all the conversations, not just the email, as "overly friendly but not sexually suggestive."

While in Congress, Mr. Foley introduced legislation to protect children from exploitation over the Internet by adults. (Irony abounds.) And there is no question that he was the Co-chairman of the Missing and Exploited Children Caucus. You can only be a Chairman of anything in Congress if your party is the majority. Which means that Mark Foley is unquestionably a Republican. So why has Fox not once, but three times shown graphics telling their audience that Foley is a Democrat?

Is it an accident? You decide.

Bill O'Reilly, whose advocacy on children's issues would almost demand the strongest response possible from him, declined to explore the possibility that the GOP might have been covering up the matter. He says that if any of them knew, they should resign. But he declined to report breaking developments such as the fact that GOP leaders actually warned pages about Foley in 2001. So, be clear about this: Republicans worried enough about Foley's conduct to warn children away from him, but let him continue on in his role as a Congressman and as a leader in their party on children's issues. That's the "fact trail" as Bill O'Reilly might say.

And really, I thought we'd about seen the limit of things that people can blame on Bill Clinton. But, grasping for moral equivalence like a drowning rat scrambles on the deck of a sinking ship, Sean Hannity launched into a discussion of the Lewinsky matter. (He told his audience that Monica had been 19 years-old when she took up with Bill Clinton. She was 22. If you doubt it, do the math. She was born in 1973. The Government Shut Down during which their affair commenced was in 1995.)

Contrary to Fox News' implication, this is not a story about an affair. It's not a story about being gay. No matter how much Congressman Foley would like it to be, it's not a story about alcoholism either. It's a story about pederasty.

But in a move that should finally settle the question over whether or not Fox is a legitimate news network, anchor Brit Hume accused Congressman Barney Frank of having had inappropriate relationships with subordinates. Other commentators tried to correct Hume, explaining that Congressman Barney Frank has had no inappropriate relationships with subordinates, adult or otherwise. Barney Frank's scandal all those years ago was that he was gay.

Hume did not reply when corrected.

Perhaps the reason that Fox News is flacking for the GOP is because they engaged in a little 'turning-a-blind-eye' themselves. As it turns out, Fox News was leaked copies of the inappropriate email exchange last year, but apparently did not run the story or investigate further.

It would be ABC that finally confronted the congressman, and broke the story.