Re: Family values

["Petem" <petem001@xxxxxxxxx>]

Robert why don't you post this type of thing is Comp.home .automation?

aren't you tired of being a jerk in this NG?

"Robert L Bass" <robertbass1@xxxxxxxxxxx> a écrit dans le message de news:
cq2dnejNH6YEiK7YnZ2dnUVZ_oednZ2d@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
> But now the Republican rowboat is leaking, and the longest-serving GOP
> speaker in history is at the center of the storm.
>
> As investigators probe whether Hastert ignored warnings about former
> representative Mark Foley (R-Fla.), Democrats across the country are
> portraying him as a symbol of a see-no-evil Republican House. They say
> Hastert's intense partisanship repeatedly blinded him to GOP misconduct --
> not only Foley's inappropriate electronic messages with teenage pages but
> the corruption of lawmakers such as Rep. Robert W. Ney (R-Ohio), as well
> as Bush's missteps in Iraq and New Orleans. Even Hastert's defenders
> acknowledge that his top priority as speaker has been protecting the GOP
> majority, not investigating the president or his own caucus.
>
> Hastert doesn't seem capable of intense anything; he has a conservative
> voting record but a moderate temperament. He looks like a cross between
> actor Wilford Brimley and Jabba the Hutt, and his unassuming Midwestern
> public demeanor makes for dull television. He has shown none of the
> restless intellectual energy of Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.), the frenetic
> revolutionary who preceded him as speaker; and he has often been dismissed
> as a frontman for former majority leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.), the
> conservative firebrand who anointed him.
>
> Hastert does not deliver the polished speeches and Sunday-show ripostes
> that typify leadership in Washington. But he sees himself as a coach, and
> his overriding goal is to help his team -- the Republican caucus, not the
> House. That team has enjoyed quite a winning streak over the past seven
> years. Republicans agree that if good-cop Hastert couldn't have done it
> without bad-cop DeLay, DeLay couldn't have done it without Hastert,
> either.
>
> "Denny really smooths out the rough edges in the caucus," said former
> representative Rob Portman (R-Ohio), who is now Bush's budget director.
> "He's a kinder, gentler guy, but when he puts that big arm around you and
> says he needs you, it's hard to say no."
>
> Coach Hastert is still beloved by his players, which is why he's survived
> the Foley mess so far. They appreciate how he listens to their concerns,
> shares credit and works overtime to keep the team together. He schlepped
> to 42 districts in August to try to maintain the GOP majority; it's no
> coincidence that his political arm is called the Keep Our Majority PAC.
>
> "No one ever thinks he's put himself ahead of the team," said Rep. Adam
> Putnam (Fla.), a 32-year-old Hastert protégé who chairs the Republican
> Policy Committee.
>
> Taint his legacy?
> The question is whether Hastert's quiet commitment to winning at almost
> any cost will taint his legacy. He has always been loyal to team players
> like Foley, who defied his longtime supporters in the sugar industry last
> year to help Hastert pass a Central American trade bill. He eviscerated
> the House ethics committee after it admonished DeLay, and tried to change
> the House ethics rules to help DeLay stay in power. He didn't pay for a
> fundraiser he held at disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff's restaurant until
> reporters asked about it two years later; the same month of the
> fundraiser, he wrote a letter opposing an Indian casino that Abramoff was
> trying to kill, and received $27,500 from Abramoff and five Indian tribes.
>
> Now Hastert finds himself disputing his leadership team over what he knew
> about Foley, insisting he did not know about Foley's inappropriate
> behavior until recently, while others say they warned him last spring. He
> is also under fire for a multimillion-dollar windfall he earned by buying
> land and then promoting a federal highway nearby.
>
> Suddenly, Republicans such as Reps. Don Sherwood (Pa.) and Ron Lewis (Ky.)
> are canceling fundraisers with him, and Democrats are running ads
> attacking Rep. Michael E. Sodrel (Ind.) and Iowa candidate Mike Whalen for
> ties to the speaker. Even Hastert's lead over John Laesch, an unknown and
> under-funded challenger, in his heavily Republican district has shrunk to
> 10 points, according to a poll last week.
>
> Rep. Rahm Emanuel (Ill.), head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign
> Committee, says Hastert is a perfect symbol of a hypocritical party that
> always claimed to distrust government power until it discovered it liked
> the taste.
>
>
>
> "When it's come to a choice between the integrity of the House or the
> Republican majority, he's always put his thumb on the scale to protect the
> majority," Emanuel said.
>
> Hastert is 64 and diabetic, and many Republican insiders think he'll step
> down no matter what happens in November. But he's confounded expectations
> all his life.
>
> Denny Hastert was an unlikely politician, a mild-mannered country boy
> whose father owned a feed-supply store. He inherited a stolid Midwestern
> conservatism from his parents, and accepted Jesus as his savior in high
> school. His autobiography overflows with 1950s nostalgia, with Denny
> waking up at 3 a.m. to drive a milk truck, and operating on his own
> infected shoulder.
>
> Story continues below ?
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> advertisement
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> "I learned from experience that when bad things happen, don't complain,"
> Hastert wrote. "You play the cards you're dealt and remember there is a
> way to win."
>
> He became a teacher and coach, then led a charmed life in politics,
> winning a race for state representative in 1980 after a GOP incumbent got
> sick, then jumping to Congress in 1986 after another GOP incumbent got
> sick. (The designer of his first yard sign, Scott Palmer, is still his top
> aide; and is embroiled in the Foley case.) He was a popular backbencher,
> and DeLay made him chief deputy whip after the Republicans seized Congress
> in 1994.
>
> The Livingston affair
> In 1998, Gingrich was ousted and Rep. Bob Livingston (La.) chosen to
> replace him. Hastert didn't know Livingston well, so he made a date to see
> a private-sector headhunter. But the day before the appointment,
> Livingston suddenly stepped down because of an extramarital affair, and
> DeLay within hours orchestrated Hastert's ascension to speaker.
>
> In his first speech as speaker, Hastert vowed to reach out to Democrats,
> declaring that "solutions to problems cannot be found in a pool of
> bitterness." But Hastert soon concluded there was no point working with
> Democrats. In his autobiography, he suggests he started to feel this way
> when he visited the office of House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt
> (D-Mo.) and saw a "Gephardt for Speaker" sign. The relationship fell apart
> after a controversy over the House chaplain, when a few Democrats accused
> Hastert of anti-Catholic bias. "I have never seen a more cynical and more
> destructive political campaign," Hastert declared.
>
> Hastert's team has shut House Democrats out of the governing process,
> refusing to allow their bills on the floor, limiting debate, calling
> midnight votes on complex bills that few have read. The Hastert Rule
> decrees that the House will consider only bills approved by the GOP
> caucus -- "a majority of the majority" -- and the speaker has enforced it
> with few exceptions.
>
> "After the chaplain, he focused on winning," said lobbyist John Feehery,
> another former Hastert aide. "And with such a small majority, winning
> meant keeping the caucus together."
>
> It was DeLay who spearheaded the K Street Project that made corporate
> lobbyists and rank-and-file Republicans so dependent on party leaders. And
> early in Hastert's tenure, DeLay whipped Republicans to defeat a
> resolution that Hastert supported on the Kosovo war, fueling perceptions
> that "the Hammer" was the real power in the House. But Hastert and DeLay
> agreed about almost everything else. And Hastert's influence gradually
> increased, especially as DeLay became distracted by scandal.
>
> For example, Hastert encouraged an effort to oust Rep. Christopher H.
> Smith (R-N.J.) as a committee chairman after Smith bucked party leaders on
> veterans benefits. He angrily chewed out then-Sen. Robert C. Smith
> (R-N.H.) for holding up a bill full of pork-barrel projects for vulnerable
> House members before the 2000 election. He held open a 3 a.m. vote in 2003
> on the prescription drug bill for three hours until he could round up a
> majority, and persuaded Rep. Robin Hayes (R-N.C.) to switch his vote to
> pass the Central American trade bill.
>
> Republicans say Hastert wins by appealing to party loyalty and taking care
> of members with earmarks, campaign cash and other goodies. Conservatives
> aren't happy that earmarks have quadrupled under the GOP Congress, but
> they recognize that the House has passed almost everything Bush has
> requested, including his efforts to expand executive power.
>
> "He doesn't beat people over the head, but he's kept them in line," said
> conservative activist Grover Norquist. "Do I wish he made spending
> restraint a priority? Of course. But everyone knows he represents the
> caucus agenda, not his own agenda."
>
> Disparate directions
> It is only recently that GOP oars have started rowing in disparate
> directions -- not only over Foley, but policy issues such as Social
> Security and immigration. Some insiders think the loss of DeLay has
> created a breakdown in discipline. "Everybody in the caucus loves Denny.
> The problem is that nobody really fears him," said one GOP lobbyist who
> spoke only on condition of anonymity. "I think he's done."
>
> Hastert aides say he intends to fight to protect his job, and he intends
> to win. After all, his legacy is at stake on Nov. 7. He'll either be the
> unbeaten coach, or the coach who lost the big one. Either way, he'll be
> the speaker who presided over an era of unprecedented partisanship, an era
> when winning seemed to be the only thing that mattered.
>
> © 2006 The Washington Post Company
>
>
>
>