Balta1701

Abe, one question though...if Hastert does wind up taking the fall, which is how it certainly appears...what happens to his natural successor, John Boehner, the current Majority leader in the House, who also seems to have known about it and taken roughly as many actions as Hastert?

CNN is reporting that 2 more pages are coming forwards with allegations against Foley.

Will anyone else not be surprised at all if Radke somehow makes this series go 4?

QUOTE(Rex Kicka** @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 11:02 AM) Reynolds' Chief of Staff first victim of Foley Fallout. http://blogs.abcnews.com/theblotter/2006/1...op_staffer.html So...this guy, Fordham, doesn't seem to be too happy about being the next scapegoat. He sure sounds like he's going to try to take others down with him.

QUOTE(Gene Honda Civic @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 02:23 PM) Figgins is a bad defender at 3B, a brutal defender at SS(17 starts in 3+ years), passable at 2B, good at CF, and figures to be excellent in LF (he hasn't gotten much PT there). He's a more useful player than Pods, but he really should only be used in the OF. Do you have anything other than playing time to back up him being brutal at SS? Because playing time just can't really be used as a good argument when the Angels have had good starting players at those positions. THe 4 errors he's made at SS in 18 games are a better argument, but it's also worth wondering what he'd do if he were locked in to that position and not just playing it sparingly.

QUOTE(kapkomet @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 02:11 PM) I said this somewhere else, but talk to me when the S & P breaks records. Until then, this doesn't matter. It does matter to some extent...mainly in terms of it being a psychological barrier. As we saw last week, sometimes people just don't want to push the market beyond that. In terms of saying anything about the economy as a whole, its impact is, as you say, rather little.

QUOTE(RockRaines @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 11:02 AM) I respect your opinion and all. But IMO, that rotation is good for another 3rd place finish in the AL Central. We need to improve our lineup, not inject several unproven younger players hoping that they can carry us. Jeremy Bonderman, Mike Maroth, Justin Verlander, Zach Miner, Andrew Miller, Francisco Liriano, Matt Garza, and Boof Bonser say hi. QUOTE(CWSGuy406 @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 02:02 PM) Then again, I'm not that much of a fan of Figgins, period. He's another player in the mold of Podsednik, a no power slap hitter who is better suited towards the bench. Figgins does have a little bit of power...5, 8, and 9 home runs in the last 3 years respectively.

QUOTE(jackie hayes @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 02:11 PM) But he's on the weakest team, so he seems to be the least likely to actually be made available. Alou can become a free Agent this November, and sure sounds like he's headed out of S.F. ""I'm glad I was here," he told the San Jose Mercury News on Sunday. "I'm thankful for the opportunity.""

QUOTE(Steff @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 01:53 PM) Hanson is in Arizona filming a new series of kiddie porn Dateline specials. The irony.. I can't have been the only one who imagined Dateline having a sitting Congressman show up on one of their "to catch a predator" shows when I heard about this, can I? QUOTE(kapkomet @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 02:03 PM) It's not the same on a lot of levels, but it is on others. The double standard is the raising hell, when the other is a personal matter, and it's both sleaze. To say it another way, consent vs. minors, yes, I agree that's pretty bad and should NOT be compared. I'm talking about how it was/is being handled. That's more my point. So, if I thought Bill Clinton should have resigned in 98, does that make me asking if Hastert and Boehner and Reynolds should resign now more credible?

QUOTE(Rex Kicka** @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 10:55 AM) Bob Novak is reporting today that the head of the NRCC (National Republican Congressional Committee) knew of all the emails last year - and rather than demand an investigation, or even encourage him to retire (as he was considering) - he encouraged Foley to run again. That person? Congressman Tom Reynolds. http://www.nypost.com/seven/10042006/news/...rrespondent.htm Reportedly, Reynolds' chief of staff, the guy who tried to convince ABC not to run the nasty stuff, has now resigned. QUOTE(Texsox @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 10:56 AM) I actually do believe it was a mistake. Call me crazy. I don't believe it was intentional either...in the way that most Freudian slips aren't intentional.

QUOTE(Texsox @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 10:00 AM) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Wait, that's real??? OMG. If that was CNN and they labeled a Dem a Rep, we'd never hear the end of it. Yup. That's real. Ran on O'Reilly last night I'm told. here is a different screenshot from the same little clip. It's also up on Drudge now. Supposedly the AP also ran this today. Oopsie Daisie.

QUOTE(Texsox @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 09:55 AM) Obviously the conservative press and their bias kept them for printing this story. You can bet if it was a liberal congressman, they'd have rushed it into print immediatly. If this isn't a clear confirmation of the conservative bias of the media in this country, I don't know what is. Come on all you media bashers, if Foley was a DEM, y'all would be screaming liberal bias for holding the story.

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 09:48 AM) So, just curious... what do you think it would take from the Sox to get Figgins? Straight up? I'm not sure the Sox have anything that would make that deal work. The Halos have a ton of young talent already, so they're probably not going to be in the market to trade Figgins to get younger. But at the same time, the guys the White Sox have who the Halos might want on their big league team are way too valuable to be traded for Figgins straight up. They need a bat desperately, so the likely options would be Crede, Thome, Dye...all of whom are worth significantly more than Chone Figgins. The only guys who I think we could do straight up for Figgings talent-wise would be Iguchi or Uribe, and I don't see that happening, because Anaheim's infield is freaking loaded. They might take Anderson for him, but having seen BA for a season, I wouldn't make that deal. The only way that a Figgins deal works is if Figgins is a throw-in alongside some of their big talent youth.

This should be a new post...but whether or not it feeds into the last one I think it's important... Thus far, both ABC and now CBS have run statements suggesting that Foley won't be the last Congressman caught up in this. Somehow, I get the feeling that both parties are going to wind up searching for new leadership in the House before this all gets cleaned up.

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 09:18 AM) And then, the update on the House: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20061004/pl_nm/poll_house_dc_1 Dems lead in 11 of 15 in these particular key races. GOP has a 15-seat advantage. No word on any of the other races, and their projections. If things fall as they are polling here, Dems would need to pick up 5 more seats (net) in the other 400-some-odd races to gain control of the House. You'll also note that there are plenty of other races that are competitive that are not polled. Indiana's infamous "Bloody 8th", for example. And a lot of those Republicans who are leading are still significantly below 50%.

QUOTE(FlaSoxxJim @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 07:47 AM) I agree completely with this assessment. That goes for the governance boards of corporations and non-profits as well. Unless reasonable term limits are put in place ensuring a reasonable turnover you are left with either a do-nothing worthless board or an entrenched board full of cronies that loses site of what they are there for. In national politics today I think term limits remain important and necessary when you have an America that I so polarized. 51% or 52% of the vote isn't a mandate no matter which side wins an election. Allowing the political machinery of an incumbent to keep manufacturing 1% and 2% wins term aftter term would not in any way indicate we had the best person on the job, merely that they had the best re-election machinery. The one problem one can run into with Term Limits though is the problem California has run smack into. With term limits, you force out of office any and all of the actual experienced legislators every x number of years. Out here, this has had the effect of a much more partisan and divided state legislature, because the experienced legislators who work their way up by knowing how to deal with the other side or by actually making deals on legislation get pushed out of office. When that happens, you then wind up with them being replaced by whichever person wins the primary for that particular party in that district...and when you have the gerrymandered mess that this state and this country does...those "safe" districts wind up almost always giving you the most partisan candidate possible coming out of it. In other words, the term limits out here have wound up basically creating a do-nothing, fairly worthless legislature that has no interest in doing whats best for the state.

QUOTE(Texsox @ Oct 4, 2006 -> 05:20 AM) Are you suggesting that newspapers held the story for a concentrated effort were they all could release the story at the same time? A bunch of new sources had this story up to a year ago and held it. They didn't have the raciest stuff, but they had the same original "Creepy" email that Hastert saw, etc. Fox News even had it. None of them were going to break it at all until ABC got their hands on the really nasty stuff...for the same reason people have said, it's hard to go public with a story saying "Congressman hits on pages" unless you really can prove it. Update: the NYT looked into the breaking of the story. Couple key bits:

Bring me back a Dunite Xenolith.

I think they should go after Dusty Baker. After all, black managers are better in the heat and sun than white ones.

So, the one issue people are forgetting with regards to Frank's contract status last year is this one: had the White Sox not been able to sign Frank by about December 20th, the White Sox would have had no choice but to either let Frank go or sign him to whatever deal he wanted. Why? Because of the arbitration deadline. Frank made about $10 million in 05, IIRC. If the White Sox offered him arbitration, and Thomas had accepted, then Frank could have held the Sox over a barrel by not signing a contract and just going to arbitration; arbitrators rarely decrease a person's salary by much. Frank wound up not signing anywhere until late January...because until then no team wanted to take the risk on signing him because of his injury history, and because he wanted to wait to see if any offers would come along. So basically, we'd have these 2 options: offer Frank enough money to get him to sign before the arbitration deadline, which would likely have been significantly more than what Oakland offered, or offer Frank arbitration, and wind up being stuck having to pay Frank nearly $10 million this season. Oh, and probably losing Konerko too.

Padilla Panicks.

QUOTE(southsider2k5 @ Oct 3, 2006 -> 12:48 PM) What was the saying about the definition of insanity being you repeat the same action over and over and over again, while expecting a different result? "And my message today to those in Iraq is: We'll stay the course; we'll complete the job." Anyway...flipping subjects here a little bit. On Friday, a previously unnamed person called up ABC News and offered ABC an exclusive on Congressman Foley's resignation if ABC would hold off on publishing the nastiest of the emails/IM's. We've finally learned today who that was...Kirk Fordham, the Chief of Staff to Congressman Tom Reynolds, the head of the NRCC (who's name has come up a couple times in this already.) So...this of course begs the question...were the Republicans in Congress trying to keep this story under wraps as recently as Friday?

QUOTE(Allsox @ Oct 3, 2006 -> 12:32 PM) Any number Bora$$ gives would be laughable as well. Don't get me wrong, I love Joe Crede but he's not A-Rod and this was his first real yr at producing anything at the major league level. To expect to be paid 10 mil annually for one good yr is laughable. So, is he at least 40% as valuable as ARod?

It just keeps getting better and better for the Mets.