His Staff Ate His Homework?

While just about every Republican in DC at one time of another "informed the Speaker's office" about what a creep Rep. Foley was, somehow none of these reports actually made it to Speaker Hastert himself. Wow, how strange! So what's a boss to do?

House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) pledged today to fire anyone on his staff who covered up information on former congressman Mark Foley's improper contacts with teenaged male pages, but he said he did not think anyone in his office did anything wrong.

I guess you have to really like your job to be stay on after your boss takes the biggest political fiasco in the past few years off of his plate and puts it onto yours. I'm sure the expression "What a dick!" was used a lot in the Speaker's office today.

But let's break it down. If Hastert didn't know about Foley, then he failed to protect the pages and his caucus. If he did know, he failed to protect the pages and his caucus, and is a big liar to boot. Incompetence or mendacity — given the situation, the difference between those two options isn't very great. Either way, he needs to resign.