Ex-page reported Foley to GOP lawmaker in ’00 | Chicago Tribune

A spokeswoman for Rep. Jim Kolbe (R-Ariz.) confirmed Sunday that a former page showed the congressman Internet messages that had made the youth feel uncomfortable.

Kolbe’s press secretary, Korenna Cline, said “corrective action” was taken. But Cline said she hadn’t yet determined whether that action went beyond Kolbe’s confrontation with Foley.

The revelation pushes back by at least five years the date when a member of Congress has acknowledged learning of Foley’s questionable behavior. A timeline issued by House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) suggested the first lawmakers to know, Rep. John Shimkus (R-Ill.), the chairman of the House Page Board, and Rep. Rodney Alexander (R-La.), became aware of “over-friendly” e-mails only last fall.

A former page himself, Kolbe is the only openly gay Republican in Congress. He is retiring at the end of the year.

Well, there’s the Republicans’ out: the witchhunt is ON, because they can claim that gay Republicans covered up for one of their own.

Even though similar reports were made to other, heterosexual Congresscritters. That won’t count, so long as this report stands as the oldest reported complaint.

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