The Sudden Demise of a Congressman

Jerry Pournelle over at The View from Chaos Manor offers a brief, but insightful, comment on the sudden crash of Rep. Tom Foley's (R-Fla.) political career. I'll copy one paragraph, but you can read it all here.

Whatever one's views on homosexuality -- in Washington DC the age of consent is 16 so there doesn't appear to be anything illegal here -- it's certainly not part of the mainstream culture for grown men to have conversations with teen age boys about masturbation. Of course there is a segment of the population and the intellectual community who think it ought to be part of our culture, and they seem to be taking delight in exposing Foley for doing something that they don't usually oppose. Had Foley's follies been exposed prior to the primary election, he would have withdrawn and a different Republican would have been nominated for what is, absent this kind of scandal, a safe Republican district. This looks to have been rather carefully arranged.