I read Thomas Lifson’s thoughts on Hastert, yesterday.  Here are some links to stories about his land deals while he was in office. Note the crucial pre 2006 election dates of these stories.  The Democrats made Hastert the face of why the Republicans needed to lose control of Congress in the 2006 election in their culture of corruption meme. http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2006-06-15/news/0606150161_1_speaker-hastert-land-trust-land-deal http://www.aei.org/publication/worse-than-foleygate/print/ http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2006/06/15/5792/hastert-pictures-of-corruption/ http://sunlightfoundation.com/press/releases/2006/06/15/dennis-hasterts-highway-to-financial-heaven/ Later on in the summer of 2006, the media was keeping homosexual Congressman Mark Foley's flirtations with a male page front and center. But long before that, much of the political base of the Republican Party had had it.  Under Speaker Hastert almost every bill...(Read Full Post)