The Republicans are spinning things so fast about the Foely sleaze scandal that it's a wonder they don't fall down from dizziness. Republican Congressman Foley solicited sex from a minor...period. And the Republican leadership knew about it well before the story broke and they did nothing except try to cover it up. THAT is the scandal.

All the Republican posturing about gays and liberals is all just a smoke screen to try and hide the clear fact that the Republicans ALLOWED A SEXUAL PREDATOR TO REMAIN IN CONGRESS.

But the Republicans want to blame the gays. This is the response from the Human Rights Campaign:

Congressman Mark Foley’s sexually-charged communications with young congressional pages was reprehensible and we have strongly condemned it. We have also been equally quick to condemn some in the GOP for their attempts to blame this scandal on the GLBT community.

Just hours ago, following Speaker Hastert's press conference, I sent a letter to him expressing outrage at the efforts of some in his party to scapegoat gay people for this unfortunate situation. You can read the full letter here.

At the beginning of the week, I issued the following statement to the press:

“Gay or straight, Democrat or Republican, it is completely inexcusable for an adult to have this kind of communication with a minor. Congressman Foley brought shame on himself and this Congress by his horrible behavior and complete lack of judgment. We strongly condemn his behavior.”

On Tuesday, we issued a press release condemning the Republican leadership for avoiding responsibility and for trying to blame our community. You can read the press release here.

On Wednesday, HRC Vice President, David Smith, appeared on MSNBC to combat Charmaine Yoest of the Family Research Council. Her group has been saying that the House Republican leaders were afraid to investigate the Foley matter because they were afraid of being labeled “homophobic.” That’s right! - the same members of Congress who have been trying to write our community out of the Constitution were supposedly unwilling to stop Foley because they were worried about their image as gay bashers. This is some of the most convoluted nonsense out there. David did an excellent job of going after FRC’s illogical and inflammatory statements...

Yesterday, I also submitted an editorial to Huffington Post, the popular online website run by Arianna Huffington. We need to get the focus of this debate back on topic. It has nothing to do with Mark Foley’s sexual orientation and everything to do with the fact that the pages were teenagers entrusted to the care of Foley and the entire House of Representatives...

Last night, I continued HRC’s full-on offense against the scapegoating and half-truths permeating this debate, when I appeared on CNBC’s “The Big Idea with Donny Deutsch.” Donny had an excellent show looking at how the media continues to perpetuate and exacerbate the more outlandish excuses for the scandal. (Foley was molested as a child; he was in the closet; and, so on. All of these issues are beside the point.)...

Keep up-to-date on developments and HRC’s aggressive response to the smearing and vilifying of our community by visiting www.hrc.org and please feel free to forward this message.

That about sums it up. The Foley sleaze scandal has nothing at all to do with the fact he is gay or about sex per se. It has to do with the fact that Foley used his position of power to solicit sex FROM A MINOR with full knowledge that that person was a minor, the Republican leadership were INFORMED ABOUT IT and they DID NOTHING. What part of "no sex with minors" do the Republicans not understand?