Two of the United States' most prominent newspapers called on House Republican leaders to answer for their handling of the congressional page scandal, just five weeks before the 7 November midterm elections.
The Washington Post urged the House to appoint an outside investigator to examine whether party leaders acted appropriately after learning of former Representative Mark Foley's inappropriate electronic messages to teenage congressional pages. Foley resigned the previous Friday after the messages became public.
The New York Times argued that Republican leaders had failed to grasp the gravity of the situation, warning that voters deserved full information about how each official responded before heading to the polls.
Both papers stopped short of demanding Speaker Dennis Hastert's resignation, a step the smaller Washington Times had taken a day earlier. The Post cautioned against forcing a resignation primarily to provide a scapegoat, while still insisting that senior House figures owed the public a more thorough account of their actions.
The scandal deepened as reports emerged that several Republican lawmakers may have been aware of Foley's conduct months before his abrupt departure from Congress.
Historical summary. TurkishPress restated this wire report, first published in October 2006, in its own words.