So someone switched on the light in the secret back rooms of the Good Old Boys Club (GOBC) and caught a lot of big slimy sleazy asshats with their pants down, figuratively and literally.
Now they’re scrambling for cover like a bunch of cockroaches, each trying to save himself first, even if it means breaking the cardinal rule of always protecting each other.
The big one who got caught in the spotlight scurried off to a nice cozy treatment center, where he immediately felt it necessary to tell us he is the victim of the disease of alcoholism, and a victim of clergy abuser himself . Why?
Because it’s “part of his recovery process.” his attorney tells us.
Please hand me my hip boots. On the very first day of an inpatient treatment process, you need to do this “for your recovery?” You better try to sell crap to someone who hasn’t been through inpatient treatment three times, like I have, Foley.
You damned well needed to do that to try to save your own sorry ass form the consequences of your own destructive behaviors, as well as try to cover sorry assesof your equally sleazy brothers in the Good Ol Boys Club.
So you were abused as a kid? Well, so was I. So were millions of people who somehow managed to NOT exploit their adult power over youngsters for our own sexual pleasure. I do hope that if it’s true you were exploited by clergyman, that you DO throw HIS sorry ass under the bus ASAP too, so even more GOBC night crawlers are blinded by the light.
And to top it all off, NOW you finally decide to come out publically as a gay man?! Another part of the “rigorous honesty” of your one day old your twelve hour old “recovery program”, no doubt. How fortunate for the GOBC gay bashing, holier-than- thou-faction who will swoop downs on this juicy morsel and use the hell out of it to paint all gay men as potential sexual predators and happily fan the flames of rampant homophobia they hope will keep them in their gravy positions.
Well, maybe you actually are a genuinely suffering active alcoholic, an unrecovered sexual abuse victim, and an oppressed, closeted gay man. I was all of these things too, once. (except for being a woman). It is a hard, hard place to come back from, I know, and I’d wish you all the best in your long healing process to come.
But I will never trust you, Mr. Foley, or any of the other Good Ol Boys who are running this country. Your fraternity is too strong, your ethics and morals are too long dead, your greed for more and more power over others too vast, and your belief in your right to exploit others for your own gain seems to be imbedded in your very genes.
None of you will ever willingly change. Why would you? Your tactics have been working quite well for you for a very long time, haven’t they? I’m just glad I won’t be one of you when what goes around, comes around.
I would, however, greatly enjoy watching it.
I am not going to belittle the fact that this man has problems and ethically I am trying to believe that after this catastrophe to his victims and himself that this was his bottoming out moment and that he is sincere.
Nevertheless, it is only my personal experience with the recovery process, that when someone goes to rehab, the denial is done or they wouldn’t be there in the first place, they’d still be drinking and drugging.
It struck me, therefore, that he stated “I strongly believe that I am an alcoholic” and not “I am an alcoholic”. Doesn’t sound to me, anyway, that the denial is truly gone.
It would not surprise me that this man has those problems….
But the best person to call bullshit on an alcoholic is another alcoholic, I see it happen all the time at meetings.
He no doubt is parroting back whatever the political operatives and lawyers are telling him to say at this point.
Which means that if this man is genuinely suffering from serious untreated alcoholism,the rest of them are all exploiting him too, just to cover thier own butts.
FWIW, JD, in my experience going into rehab doesn’t necessarily signify anything at all in itself, in terms of personal transformation.
I’d guess there’s even less chance that it does if rehab is politically mandated.
That was just my experience, I went last summer, and I knew, no question about it. Everyone I was in with knew about themselves too.
But you are right, if it is court mandated or as you say in this case politically mandated, and not personally mandated, then you are absolutely right.
It’s unfortunate, really, that it’s possible to talk a good game in the interest of ‘making it’ in recovery –ergo the revolving door syndrome.
The real test of transformation, I think, takes place when one returns to a less rarified environment.
Of course, those who walk the walk in honest effort deserve our blessings & support.
Hello. I see you still use a University of Virginia email account, but you’ve said often that you’re in Germany. I want to college and to law school at UVA. Someday I’d be curious to know about your times in C-ville.
I went to my first AA meetings in downtown, south C-ville, with mine workers and factory workers, not a single university type in the room. Charlottesville, I often observed, is a strange town. There is an Upper Crust of rich people (including some VERY rich people) and university types, and there is The Other Side of the Tracks (literally) where the poor folks live. And there is not much of a middle class at all. I graduated from the college at UVA in 1976, so I’m sure things have changed. It’s almost an exurb of D.C. by now. I wonder if that sharp contrast still exists.
I don’t agree with you that people are done with denial when they go to rehab. We all know 1000 counterexamples.
I agree with your suspicion about Foley. I don’t think alcoholism is the root of this scandal at all.
You know you’ve sunk about as far as one can sink when you try to be excused by horrible crimes by claiming to be an alcoholic.
As others here have commented, I’ve been drunk many times, but I damn sure never had a desire to hit on a teenager, much less a teenage boy, much less a teenager under my control at work.
From what we’ve heard so far, I think Foley needs five years in federal prison.
Hey Arminius,
I’m enrolled in a grad program at UVA but I do my research here as well as some catching up since things slowed down for me academically since I got ill, been here for the last couple of years and taught two semesters on a grad exchange. German Lit is my field and I will have to fly back to defend.
I think Charlottesville is better, but there still is a definate divide. You still here “if you want you kids to go to good schools, live in the County (Albermarle, for those who don’t know), not the City (of Charlotteville). But I really don’t know enough to compare. The “old money” is still there though.
I think I was lucky to be over here when I had my breakdown. I realize now that I had been a very functioning alcoholic for a long time but everything started to fall apart and spin out of control about the time of the start of Iraq war. One Sunday morning in May of 05, it was around 9AM because I remember hearing the church bells and it was still during the semester here, I read a diary over at Orange about a poster (who posts here as well) who reached his 90th day of sobriety and had some temptations. I was on my third beer (they come in liters here) and broke down and cried because he was describing me. Literally wept. I tried going to meetings but that lasted a week. I know that I admitted it to myself and it lasted about a week. For some reason I accepted it with a sense of fatality and didn’t care. It took one late July evening (had been blogging here too, drunk) to get really shit-faced, black out, and wake up in the morning on my balcony with a noose tied around my neck and the other end to the railing with numerous beer bottles scattered. I said to myself “Jesus, I need help”. I realize now that I had been a functioning alcoholic for years going back until probably when I first joined the military though I didn’t drink as a teenager.
I checked into rehab. I say I was lucky that I was overhere because the clinic was incredible, I knew that I would never be able to afford that type of treatment in the US. I’ve been hooked on semi-socialized medicine ever since. I don’t know about rehab in the US, but this was 100% voluntary, you could leave if you wanted too. So everyone there was there because they wanted to be and no one there ever said that I am a kinda-sorta alcoholic. It didn’t seem, to me at least but I was very new to this, that anyone was in denial. I remember one revolving door and how everyone was sad but really supported him.
I stayed sober until around late October when the nightmares started to return and I couldn’t sleep, as the booze was always my “good medicine”. As we know, it starts out with a drink here or there but quickly spirals to the prior level if not more. That point came for me on New Years. Not only drunk but my first visual flashback. The incident embarassingly involved the Polizei and I woke up back in the clinic strapped to a gurney “oben” or upstairs, which is the lock down. A judge put in the clinic. After I narrated what had happened to the staff, they moved me to a different clinik on the same grounds as the rehab but for psychiatric patients. I was in until late March and treated for PTSD, Major Depression and Alcoholism. Unfortunately I peaked in my therapy and my therapist said that I was not able to go further until I dealt with all of the alcohol problems and was able to go deeper. She told me I needed a year to work through that and that is what I am doing now with meetings.
Nevertheless, things are going very well and I have a very happy feeling that I don’t need to go back but can do it outpatient after the New Year. There has been enormous support online here too from tribbers as well as some kossack (thanks Alohaleezy and others). So that is kinda where I am at.
This was meant as an illustration and not a hijack but I wanted to answer the question and explain what I’ve seen with my own experience with this self-generated crap.
For me it was a very dangerous suicide attempt, I think I passed out before I could jump, and I think I was serious because I left no note nor did I try and call anyone, it’s still all kinda hazy but I do remember feeling very suicidal.
This is why I am still trying to give Foley the benefit of the doubt. I have to be careful here because I have no intention of providing excuses for what he did nor minimizing the damage he did to his victims, not at all and if it comes across that way it is solely due to my poor writing skills. In speculating, I am trying to put myself in his shoes.
It may very well be that everything came to a head when he got that call from ABC and that his life crashed around him in an instant as well as his wall of denial. I would not be surprised if he had this disease, which compounds other things that he already had. That feeling of realization that came to me, that it was so bad that there was no way to deny it anymore. But his statement of “I strongly believe…”, I never heard anyone in Rehab say that, we always said “I am”; very definative and no wriggle room. My first week of meetings that May, I said something along those lines and got hammered, rightly so, for it as I was still trying to come to terms with myself, it was so goddamn hard just to admit the truth.
I will say this though. If I had ever gotten behind the wheel shit-faced and ran somebody over, the alcohol excuse as we all know would never fly but make it worse. Yes I would be an alcoholic, and a murderer as well. Though I want to support his therapy, he still needs to account for his crime. Sexual predation is a crime, alcohol or no.
If he came out and said “I am a perpetrator, I did these horrble things to these boys and I don’t know why but I am trying to figure it out with help. I am truly sorry that it took so long, caused so much damage and had to come to this before I seeked help. The leaking of the emails was the best thing that could have happened in this situation as it stopped me from preying further and I am thankful to whomever leaked them and I hope to make amends one day when I am sincerely able. I am an alcoholic as well, and so I am going into rehabilitation to try and deal with that first so that I can clear my head enough to deal with these atrocities that I committed and the root causes of my behaviour. In the meantime, I realize that I committed crimes against these young men and that I will have to take responsibility for those crime.” Then I would probably have no doubts as to his sincererity.
But he didn’t do that. So now I am on the fence as to whether he does have this problem with this disease and is gradually coming to terms with it, the knowing but not quite able to say it yet, or whether this is a cheap political stunt. Right now it is hard for me to say, but I am still not on the bandwagon to beat him up (over the alcohol claim, that is)… not yet.
Hey JD, I remember that May 05 diary at dkos and you taking the risk to talk about your situation. I just didn’t remember who it was. We were all so worried about you. Glad to hear you got what you needed and did what you needed to do. Hang in there!
JD, thanks for sharing your story: I can relate especially to having to deal not only with alcoholism but also severe depression and PTSD as well. I am so glad you were in a place where you could access the right kind of help in time, are doing well, and are so committed to taking it all the way. Dealing with the underlying issues at long last was the only way for me to finally find lasting sobriety and a whole new life I didn’t know existed. It’s worth every difficult moment of hard work it takes, too. 🙂
Somehow I missed your diary in May. I’m grateful for the chance to hear so much of the story here. There are numerous parallels to my own situation, including the near-suicide.
I keep thinking: maybe German lit is a little extra hard on your nerves. A switch to something like Bertrand Russell for a short while might help. (Forgive presumptious comment.)
but I would like to stress that this isn’t about me, it’s about Foley.
I wanted to only illustrate why I am very hard trying to give him the benefit of the doubt though I have doubts. Lot’s of us here have been through some shit and I really love how we hang together.
I am not making apologies for this man. What he did is despicable and he needs to be held accountable for his crimes, as well so that his victims can gain some closure. I am sure they will have symptoms of PTSD as it’s not just for vets anymore. They’ve had trauma and need help.
That said, I just wanted to express my uncertainty one way or the other of Foley’s rehab move. I don’t know. Is it his moment of truth or is it a political stunt. We may find out in the future.
I just wanted to say how I could envision this whole catastrophe, of his own making, could function as a moment of truth. Like my moment I described above.
Again, I don’t know. Thanks again for the kind words Tribbers, somehow it feels good just to say those things out load.
Yes it does feel good to get those things out. Kinda like purging the poison so to speak.
Always glad to hear from you JD, and I hope the road ahead gets a little easier for you.
Beautifully stated, scribe. Thank you.
What seems to redeem the sinners, for the omnipotent GOP base, is the abandonment of personal responsibility. This is the key to their forgiveness; ergo, the abuse/alcoholic crap is absolutely critical. All that remains for Foley’s full political redemption to be complete is rebirth in Christ, with concurrent sexual realignment. After all, he’s still on the ballot (as an R, not a D).
I know a bit about the recovery routine as well, unfortunately. It’s simply not that clean a process.
It’s a given, in my mind, that they will spin and manupulate all of this anyway they can to serve the ultimate purpose of saving themselves andretaining political power, no matter who of what needs to be sacrificed in the process. There are simply NO limits to how far the GOBC will go.
Absolutely right. Of course there are no limits — there’s no functional mechanism in place to impose them. Any adjustments to the style of ‘governance’ are just a matter of tweaking public perception. Big deal!
Great diary, scribe, as always.
wench, you have me laughing hysterically at the sudden visual of a White House Baptism and Wedding ceremony in the Rose Garden. Surely some loyal Republican woman could be found to sacrifice herself in a glorious 1950’s-style celebration of Foley’s new-found abstentious, Bible Believing, Christian Straightness.
Well, sure. Can’t be too hard to find a willing lesbian in similar ‘straights’.
😉
Well, one name does spring to mind…..
All the lesbians I know are hard left, but I can’t imagine even a Republican lesbian going for this. They’ll have to find a brainwashed Laura-clone to do it.
Thankfully, refusal to consummate is still a semi-private matter.
Not saying there is no such thing, but I’ve yet to run into a genuine “Stepford Lesbian”.
With full national coverage.
The only reason this man is coming out now as gay is a disgusting legal strategy that wants to play on that ever popular theme P Buchanan was spinning lst night on Chris Matthews’ show: that ‘homesexuals are more prone to predatory behaviour’ w/ CM doing his old schtick of semi-disapproval while giving the POV plenty of airtime. As a good republican Xtian, Foley’s no doubt redeemable for a sympathetic jury – thus ‘rehab.’
Abso-fucking-lutely despicable.
“Glory to Those Who Torture Us”
Completely — it’s a fake-out based on a distortion based in animal ignorance.
Dead on, Acturus, on all points.
“How fortunate for the GOBC gay bashing, holier-than- thou-faction who will swoop downs on this juicy morsel and use the hell out of it to paint all gay men as potential sexual predators and happily fan the flames of rampant homophobia they hope will keep them in their gravy positions. “
They already started last night. Did anyone here see Pat Buchanan going off on Hardball and Joe Camel last night. He started spewing how all pedaphiles are gay….blah blah blah. It was disgusting. Chris mathews actally cut him off once.
That “man” is so damned dead-end dumb he needs his voicebox removed.
I just got around to readng this today. Keep telling it!
One thing I am sure of is that Foley is NOT in recovery, nor close to it.
How so? Look at his confession. Bogus. On the face of it.
A real confession is not easy to make. But it also represents real change.
A bogus confession may not be easy to craft, but it represents raising the con to a new level. Now he is trying to con us, and extend his crimes.
It is the opposite of repentence.
May Nemesis take him.
You said it. For another viewpoint, I have been listening to Randi Rhodes on Air America Radio. . .She is from Florida, she knows Foley quite a bit more than just knowing who he is. She says almost everyone in his District knew he was Gay from the start, although there was no big “I am Gay” pronouncement. She also says that at the many political or other events that she interacted with him, she never even saw him take a drink. . .although that surely doesn’t preclude him from being an alcoholic if he is.
The slime in our government is just beyond the pale. I find it just amazing (I guess I am easily amazed) that the great concern everyone seems to have is who to blame, NOT concern for the victims and how we can further protect any potential victims in the future.
Disgusting! Every person (GOBC) of whatever political stripe that has this problem of needing, wanting, initiating, foisting sex on children needs to be directed towards the help they need and out of any such jobs that put them in contact with potential victims. Hmm, I guess that proves I have moved along in my own personal healing, I no longer think they should be killed in a slow, horrible and painful way.
Our society has a pervasive illness when it comes to sexuality and sexual abuse. . .we need to do something about it. Wish I knew what that is.
Thanks Scribe,
Hugs
Shirl
“Please hand me my hip boots. On the very first day of an inpatient treatment process, you need to do this “for your recovery?” You better try to sell crap to someone who hasn’t been through inpatient treatment three times, like I have, Foley.”
(How do I make Blockquotes in this format?”
I commented on this on Dailykos yesterday. I’m not in recovery myself, but I spent several years working on, producing, writing and directing some major longform documentaries on sexual abuse, its survivors and also its perpetrators. I spent a lot of time with its perpetrators. I spent a lot of time with children (yes, under “page age” of 16) who were victims. And After about 7 years I burned out and had to switch over to making history docs for a while. Because this stuff is soul-wrenching, soul-murdering stuff. I am not cut out to be a social worker, though I have the desire in me to change the world through fiction and non-fiction storytelling)
And Scribe (that’s part of my main screenname on my internet service btw!) – you are SO dead right about that – Mr. Foley coming out less that 24 hours after entering “rehab” and having the great “Eureka” moments of “being an alcoholic” (or, um, “Believing” he’s an alcoholic, which I guess leaves the door open for him to have that glass of champagne at the correspondents dinner in 2008)…and more importantly, suddenly realizing “I was molested by a ‘clergyman’ when I was 15.”
That is a crock of shit. If he were indeed at rock bottom as an alcoholic, he’d say it. AND, if he’s been methodically (and make no mistake about it, his predatorial behavior was well-planned out and premeditated!) abusing boys over whom he had power for between 5 and 11 years, he’s NOT going to come to the big revelation in the sky that he’s a scumbag, criminal, etc. in under 24 hours. His “admissions” just make him more guilty – and more of a manipulator – which is what an addict – drugs, alcohol, sex, abuse – is all about.
I have read elsewhere that he is in a Scientology rehab center – which if true, is simply a brainwashing/recruiting station for serious Scientologists. Being addicted is the perfect state for them to brainwash someone. If this is true, I fear for the man – because he’s going to go from worse to worse – er. The Scientologists will enable his molesting, help him cover it up, then use it to blackmail him to keep him in the fold.
Where is this guy’s family – he needs help and REAL help now – if he’s ever going to be safely let back into our community again.
ALSO – I do believe in forgiveness. But so far, this guy hasn’t thrown any of us a bone as to why he should be forgiven – or trusted – again.
Yep, absolutely. It’s complete manipulative bullshit.
I’m fascinated at your rumor that it is a scientologist rehab center. Does anybody else know anything on that?
That really adds yet more “frisson” to the scandal! (Considering that the scientologists are totally insane, antisocial fascist cult pervert madmen, among other things.)
We need to get Nancy Grace to interview Tom Cruise about this. It would be scorpions in a bottle.