Actually, Hastert didn’t become wealthy until he left office and became a lobbyist which is so often the case with former members of Congress and that is why most of the money was paid after he left office. If you want to fix that problem, we need to stop the revolving door that exists in Washington and often in state government.
The payments started long before the current election cycle, namely 2010 and his “deed” took place years and years ago. How do you know he isn’t a pedophile? Please don’t give me the ridiculous argument that he is married and has kids.
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There is another possibility and I noted it earlier. Think Progress has details here:
http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2006/06/15/5792/hastert-pictures-of-corruption/
Hastert had steered a federal highway contract for Illinois through Congress and it just HAPPENED to follow a route that transected a big parcel of land he had invested in. I believe he wound up selling that for a nice bundle (TP says at least $1.5 million)…and stuff like that (which might not have been the only such scheme he was involved with - lots of folks would love to win favors from the Congressman and once you’ve done one, why not more) plus all of the money he likely made in the lobbying business, gave him the means to pay for what looks like blackmail. Sex, money laundering, kickbacks, political favors. There are many many possibilities Mr. Hastert might have been involved in, and as Speaker of the House, he obviously was in the right position to take advantage if he so chose.
And why would the indictment mention “he was a teacher and high school wrestling coach”? The indictment didn’t mention fraud or racketeering or political issues. Indictments generally only mention things relevant to the case. Please also take into consideration the unfortunate way in which he handled the Mark Foley sex scandal with House pages.
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Whatever the transgression was, it didn’t have to do with his political career as it happened before the timeframe in which he was in office.
I think he was involved in a lot of land acquisitions, buying up farm land then selling it off to developers. There was a tremendous building boom in that county several years ago.
Yes, but is the timing right ? I agree: When he was a political insider he would know a lot of profitable stuff, but this appears to have happende before that, when he was a snotty-nosed school kid cum wrestling coach.
I doubt it. A baby would just suggest he was an ordinary young guy making mistakes, something he could ‘manfully’ admit at this date (and be slightly proud of) . It must be worse than that.
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I’m thinking you are on correct on the child molestation angle. This is why I think so:
Press Release: August 16, 2013
This afternoon, Governor Quinn signed a bill into law that eliminates the criminal statute of limitations for sex offenses that occurred when the victim was under 18 years old. The legislation is a significant victory for victims and survivors of child sexual abuse, many of whom take years to disclose the abuse.
If the statue of limitations never run out, that would be an incentive to pay so much. A regular affair or dalliance with someone of age is very unlikely.
Agreed. Remember that years ago he admitted to an affair, so he wouldn’t pay millions to cover up another one, even if it resulted in a baby. This has to be much more damaging to his reputation, and since corruption is par for the course in political circles, I’m going with some sort of underage relations.
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I was responding to the question of where his money came from. Sorry, I wasn’t clear about what I was referring to. Yes, I think too that the crime has something to do with a relationship long ago during his early years of teaching.
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Note also that the indictment made a point of saying ‘accounts he controlled’. It never actually said that Hassert was paying the person with his own money. There may be some fiscal hanky panky going on here too.
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Exactly right.
Government for hire.
Maybe the guy that has something on Hastert is mistaking him with Drew Carey, those guys look like twin brothers and you just know that Carey is a shady fellow, taking advantage or people cross dressing.
I don’t know about all of them, just a couple I dealt with who literally used the time in our class for teaching to read magazines.
You should read the comments sections on AOL, or The Washington Post! It’s all, “Obummer”, and Hillary and Benghazi, just as your e-mail jokes about! It’s unbelievable! The total inability to stay on-topic, and discuss ANY issue that doesn’t circle back to their tiny laundry list of usual bullet points and hackneyed complaints is scary.
I’m not so sure that criminal charges would be Hastert’s primary worry, but the huge damage to his reputation. And it would have to be big, I’m guessing something of the type/scale of Sandusky. He never “felt” right to me, despite his squeaky clean, warm-fuzzy image; I’m quite interested in the outcome of this.
Extortion + Indictment + teacher/politician = Live boy of set (Live boy:dead girl)
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Get a grip. Hastert was the one who was paying money.
We do not know the exact actions that Hastert was trying to cover up and speculation is running immediately to the idea of pedophilia, but perhaps that is just the prurient nature we have developed these days about GOP/Tea Party/Christian Conservative values. But, I have a different scenario that would create a great deal more havoc in Mr. Hastert’s life that he might want to have hushed up.
Consider that Mr. Hastert came to power when two other candidates for House Speaker were shown to be involved in extra-marital affairs either during their time in office or while running for office, after Newt Gingrich’s affair came to light at the time of impeachment hearings on Clinton. Hastert was chosen and touted as being squeaky clean and above reproach, i.e. not hypocritical on calling out Clinton’s affair. What if Individual A was Hastert’s mistress, and there are now grown children involved pushing this person to go public, after her own political career has ended.
Republicans are well known for not paying child support and when Hastert hit the post-Congressional gravy train, chances are paying off a mistress was not something on his agenda. Once out of Congress, he returned to Illinois, and the DC mistress and possible children were left high and dry, or without the political backing that was requested to move forward with her career.
His payments at first were $50K, then dropped to $10K about every 6 weeks after the banks got involved. This sounds more like hush money in lieu of child support, and was being paid quietly to keep someone from going public at a time when the GOP already has problems with their family values image. She gave him two choices: she writes a good tell-all (and that includes pillow talk disclosures that could be detrimental to the GOP and the Bush Administration) or start paying up on the child support. It was only when the bank got nosy that the Feds were brought in, and she is probably going the state’s witness route to protect herself and the children from extortion charges across state lines.
While I would not put it past the old cout to have other preferences or skeletons in his closet, this sounds a whole lot more like a woman scorned than an adult going after a pervert. The timing of the payments is more in line with living expense/child support than hush money for illegal dealings. Only time and trials will tell us all, but the media will always have plenty of fodder for speculation.