Mark Foley Scandal-The Midterm Election's Pivotal Point

Nancy Pelosi should be awarded a Medal of Freedom for inventing the phrase "culture of corruption." I think it drove thousands of evangelicals to the Democratic column as Republican scandal after scandal kept coming.

There is no doubt that Iraq was the issue for most voters in throwing the Republicans out of the House and Senate on Tuesday. However, "corruption" was high on the list of concerns for many voters.

The Republicans were just getting ready to "swiftboat" Pelosi when the Foley page scandal exploded. You can imagine the commercials attacking Pelosi that had to stay in the can. Pelosi's face in grainy black and white, gays parading half-dressed down Castro Street, with a claim that she would surrender Washington to Bin Laden.

Thanks to Foley's wandering eye and compulsive IM's to pages, rather than smear Pelosi, whom most Americans didn't even know, the Republicans had to divert valuable advertising time and money trying to keep their own candidates from being defeated.

The "culture of corruption." The Republicans were finally out-sloganeered by the Democrats. ("Stay the course" was already crumbling.) Mark Foley crystallized and defined the corruption issue like no other scandal could. To me, it was the decisive moment of the election.