House approves page program reforms

[techs]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070119/ap_on_go_co/house_pages

The House voted Friday to overhaul the board that supervises its congressional page program, seeking to close the book on a sordid e-mail and sex scandal that sullied its reputation and became a Campaign 2006 issue.

Specifically, lawmakers voted 416-0 to provide that both parties have equal say in overseeing the program, as old as the institution itself.

The purpose of the resolution the members approved Friday was to ensure that teen-age pages no longer are vulnerable to the kinds of electronic-message come-ons associated with now-resigned Rep. Mark Foley, R-Fla.

The bipartisan resolution resulted from the failure of the House Page Board's past Republican chairman, Illinois Republican John Shimkus, to notify other board members that Foley had sent questionable e-mails to a former page.

Pages are high school students who learn about Congress while running errands and attending a congressionally-run school

The new, eight-member board will include an equal number of lawmakers from each party and include a former page and the parent of a current or former page. The board also would have to meet regularly.


Gee, what a concept. Including the other party. Something the Republicans know nothing about. Seems the Democrats are real democrats.

 

[Fern]

Typical superficial feel-good legislative crappola, accomplishing nothing of any practical significance, about a media-sensationaized psuedo-scandel fabricated for an election time hit job on a sad man.

#1 The email and text messages were sent to people AFTER they had left the page program.

#2 The only emails known of by anybody were merely "overly friendly". When has that been a fvcking crime? At best, it may have been an indication of a possible deeper problem. I say "problem" because I have not seen anybody determine yet whether the text messages ultimately revealed where any type of crime. Have you?

And if they (the text messages) are a crime, are we to prosecute people now because we see "indications" (i.e., emails) of a crime? (remember, and this is important, up until the scandel burst people had only seen the overly friendly emails, not the naughty text messages). If so, lets go ahead and arresting any Muslim attending a sermon by a radical violence-promoting Imam - that's an "indication" you may end up committting terrorist activities.

"Dirty" text messages from one older gay guy to a younger, yet seemingly legal age, gay guy. Maybe I find gross, or humerous or whatever, but I'm not a moral policeman. I wonder how differently this would have been percieved had Foley been "out" for all these years?

Any confidence that this tweaking of the page oversight system is going to be effective at preventing similar "naughty gay stuff" in the future is sorely misplaced.

NOTE: To understand my comments requires an understanding of the differences between the email, and the text messages.

Fern