Kirk Fordham: An American Hero?

Now Foley's long-time chief of staff tells the AP's Devlin Barrett, who has been embarrassing the Washington bureaus of the big three local newspapers, that he didn't protect Mark Foley -- he turned him two years ago.

To Dennis Hastert no less.

From the story:

"Kirk Fordham told The Associated Press that when he was told about Foley's inappropriate behavior toward pages, he had 'more than one conversation with senior staff at the highest level of the House of Representatives asking them to intervene.'"

Officially, it really shouldn't be able to get any weirder than this. And I really don't know what to make of it. When I wrote the story about Foley being gay in 2003, Fordham called me on more than

one occasion, trying like hell to talk me out of writing the story. I can't even remember all his arguments (damn I wish I would have kept those notes) but I do recall that he was particularly forceful. I also recall having the sensation that this guy cared about the truth about as much as Foley cared about the Penthouse magazine.

In other words, I could see Fordham trying to block an investigation on his old boss (which ABC News has been inferring) a lot easier than I could see him crusading for one. But any way you cut it, this is more bad news for Hastert. Fordham most likely had some communication with the Speaker in 2004 -- and now they can fight it out -- and lie it out -- about what was said.