The Movement You Need…

Count me as being very disappointed in Mark Foley. And count me as feeling extrememly squeamish about how a decision I made 16 years ago might just be responsible for making Nancy Pelosi the next Speaker of the House. I can’t get past the thought that a decision I made in the parking lot of Mark Foley’s real estate office in 1990 might have been the catalyst that sent him on a trajectory from political nobody to the Florida House, the Florida Senate and the United States House of Representatives with astounding speed.

Only his fall from grace was faster.

If I had to choose between having a pederast in the House and Nancy Pelosi as Speaker, I can’t honestly say which choice gives me the creeps more. I’m afraid that the details of my involvement long ago in what has become a crisis today is going to haunt me for a very long time. The mere thought of my having had a hand in setting in motion a series of events that, come next January, may result in the words “Speaker Pelosi” being spoken and printed for at least two years is ipecac for my brain.

Between 1988 and 1992, I was South Florida Regional Director for the Florida Medical Association. I handled legislative, grassroots, politics, public relations and acted as a liaison between the FMA and the four county medical associations in Dade, Broward, Palm Beach and Monroe Counties.

In the position, I also represented the FMA’s political action committee, FLAMPAC. During every election cycle, on behalf of FLAMPAC, it was my job to do in-depth, written analyses of every race for the Florida Legislature in my region. I was charged with finding ways to help re-elect incumbents considered friends of the medical-community and to help defeat incumbents who had poor voting records on issues the FMA deemed important.

FLAMPAC had a particular interest in finding new potential leaders who would, if elected, become “friends of medicine.” At the time, FLAMPAC was the largest PAC in the state, had the most money and had the ability to make or break candidates just about any time it chose to do so.

In those days, it was a big deal having your race “targeted” by FLAMPAC because it meant almost instant viability; in exchage for FLAMPAC’s endorsement, money and the assistance of a group of well-coordinated FMA members and FMA wives, there was a quid-pro-quo expectation for an increase in both access and leverage for Florida’s physicians and their paid lobbyists, like me, when the legislature was in session.

The quest for filling open seats with friendly legislators was the most important part of my mission on behalf of FLAMPAC. When those opportunities arose, I spent a lot of extra time doing statistical analyses of past voting trends, studying demographics at the precinct level of the open district and, usually, having face-to-face meetings with every single candidate who filed papers to fill the vacancy. I had a standard set of questions I’d ask candidates to see whether or not they new what they were doing, whether they came across as electable and whether or not they would be friendly, or could be persuaded to be friendly, to the issues important to organized medicine.

One day during either the late spring or early summer of 1990, I paid my first visit to Mark Foley in his real estate office. I really wasn’t expecting much. My research had uncovered either two or three previous failed attempts to get elected; as a rule of thumb, a one-time loser isn’t a bad thing because the first experience can make a candidate ready to serve. Losses in multiple tries usually indicates the candidate is either a gadfly, has no clue about how to get elected, or just flat-out isn’t electable.

From what I had read and heard about him, I expected that Foley fit into the “unelectable” category. But a couple of influential physicians had called asking me to take a particularly close look at this Foley guy, so I did my homework and headed to Palm Beach County for our meeting. I had so many of these meetings in my years with the FMA that I can’t possibly remember them all. Most of them were pointless…kind of like panning for gold near a tapped-out mine. It was really rare to find someone really stood out not only as electable to the Florida Legislature, but also as a rising star.

I expected to sleep-walk through the Foley inteview, but I came out almost convinced I’d just met the next representative for that district…if he could raise the money. Mark was not only presentable and articulate, he also exhibited knowledge of the district and the issues that would serve him well in the campaign. He knew the issues, knew how to communicate them, had a good plan, and he certainly convinced me he had the energy necessary to pound the pavement looking for votes. I suspected that his biggest problem, which plagues many of even the most seasoned politicians, was his inability to raise money. Asking someone to give you money for “vapor” is a tough task. I consider myself a good fundraiser, but I hate doing it. I only know a few people who truly like doing what amounts to organized begging.

I must say right here that something always struck me as strange about Mark. It wasn’t until later that I heard the first “he’s gay” rumors. But there was something odd I just could not reconcile, nothing that threw up any red flags, mind you, but just “something.” It wasn’t enough to change my analysis of the situation for sure; there are a lot of real weirdos who get elected and serve the public interest quite well. Meeting another potential oddball in the legsilature didn’t phase my course of action one iota. When it comes to politicians I’ve met and befriended through the years that there just aren’t enough closets for the skeletons. I’m not doing this stuff for a living any more, so I’m very choosy. If someone set’s my gut askew, I’m just not going to be involved in doing consulting work for that campaign.

After that first meeting with Foley, I remember sitting in my car in the parking lot of the office building looking over my notes and the spreadsheets I had prepared. I remember right then an there making the decision to recommend to the Palm Beach Medical Political Action Committee (MEDPAC) that they both target the race themselves and urge FLAMPAC to jump into the race.

And it came to pass.

Would Mark Foley have been elected to the Florida House of Representatives in 1990 had my recommendation to MEDPAC and FLAMPAC been negative? Maybe, but if I’m going to be completely honest about it, probably not. You know the rest of the story and I’m not going to link or publish the gory details. This is all just so disgusting and disappointing I have nothing more to say about it, for now at least.