Whoever you may deem as the creator, you have to admit that whether the creator was an actual person or entity or spirit, it was a clever and insightful creator. He (and I will use He for the sake of simplicity, no offense intended for individuals who may believe otherwise) gave us all the tools to do what needs to get done. He provided us a brain that can do miraculous things when life tests you. The only little mistake He made was not giving us the wisdom we all have when we can solve all problems with an effective tool called hindsight.
If we had the power to know what we know when hindsight enters the equation, all of us would be brilliant. Mistakes, sins, errors in judgment, miscalculations, shortcomings, jealousy, bad love affairs, adultery, and a whole list of other emotions and actions, would be no longer happen in our day to day lives. Hindsight clears things up. Hindsight makes us just a little bit smarter than the average bear. The only problem with hindsight is that it never comes along when you need it. You have to place your invoice in to the hindsight office, not in writing, but by your deeds. That creator is clever. You have to admire that type of cunning.
As I’m writing this column, the Mark Foley scandal is like a roaring freight train on all the news channels, talk radio and in print. All of the parties are dealing with their dose of hindsight. How bitter that dose is depends on what your particular hindsight is.
If you’re Mark Foley, his hindsight is a 70 ft man eating squid with razor blades attached to the suction cups. What can this guy be thinking when he looks in the mirror? What was he thinking all of the years that he communicated with young pages in the Congress? Doesn’t matter if he’s gay or straight, he had to know in his gut that what he was doing was wrong? What motivated him to do it in the first place? How could he betray a public trust like that? It doesn’t matter if particular Democrats in the past have gone down that road, or even acted, took it to a physical level with a child, what Mark Foley did was incredibly stupid and immoral and he did the right thing by resigning. The bottom line is, he was in a position of authority and he abused it badly. In hindsight, he would’ve done things much differently.
If you’re the Republican Party, you’re going to be faced with the endless stream of “what did you know and when did you know it” line if questions for the next few weeks. If any Republican knew of the true extent of what Mark Foley was doing, they have to resign. If any Democrat knew the true extent of what Foley was doing, they need to step down.
If the Republican leadership knew about the true extent of this and covered it up just so Republicans could stay in the majority, they have to go. Life goes on, whether it’s a Republican controlled senate and house or if it’s controlled by Democrats.
An argument could be made that if any Democrat knew what President Clinton was doing with Monica Lewinsky, the same rules should apply. The same principles have to apply for both sides. When you’re in a position of authority, you don’t have sex with your interns. There’s another phrase for this type of activity, but it’s a little gross. You know what it is.
Is what Mark Foley did an indictment on the entire Republican Party? No. Is what President Clinton did an indictment on the entire Democratic Party? No. Is power an addictive drug that both sides wait in line for every minute of the day? You bet they do. When you taste that power, your power of reason is threatened. This isn’t the city council meeting of a city the size of New Hope. This is the US House of Representatives and the US Senate and the Presidency. That kind of power has many perks. It also has severe drawbacks that can destroy lives. In hindsight, would any of the parties involved gone through this series of events? No way.
This is a very juicy story. It has all the elements that we salivate over. The way it’s being presented now is that Mark Foley was a gay predator of young children. That’s a risky road to go down for the obvious reasons. If the press continues this line of accusations, they could be accused of gay-bashing Mark Foley. That is not a route that any network or newspaper company wants to go down. It doesn’t matter if Mark Foley was hitting on young men or women, the principle of it is what’s important. That’s what should be presented, not whether he was gay or not. It’s a non-factor in the grand scheme of things.
The only explanation I can think of is that there is a reason that Mark Foley is going through this now. It may be a final slap down for all of his discretions. Or, it may be the kick in the ass he needed to snap out of it. Because in the end, he can’t blame the Catholic priests for allegedly (and oh so conveniently timed announced as well) abusing him as a teenager. He can’t blame the invention of the internet for the instant messages he sent. He can’t blame his lust for younger boys as a disease, he has to come to grips with what his actions have done to his family, his party and the government itself. That’s a lot to ask of someone who just thought he was flirting with a government page. Regardless of that, he has to come to grips with it, in his own way.
Hindsight is the only true friend that Mark Foley, both parties and the press have. It’s a friend they can choose to ignore, or embrace. It’s a friend that may not be telling them what they want to hear, but the right words are at the tip of it’s tongue, just waiting for them to let hindsight speak.
Without hindsight, none of us learn anything. Without hindsight, we keep repeating mistakes. Without hindsight, nothing gets resolved or improved. Mark Foley is not a monster. He hasn’t killed anybody. He’s a sexually frustrated, apparently, lonely man with some major shortcomings who made a lot of stupid and tragic mistakes. But, he has an opportunity to improve. We all do. I’m glad for that. You should be too.
