Mark Foley/Republican catastrophe: the spinning is nearing desparation as more (and more graphic) emails and IM's come to light... Drudge is seeking to shift the blame to the young pages involved; Tony Snow tries to minimize the IM's as "naughty"; Limbaugh tries to frame the whole trainwreck as a Dem set-up; and most amusing, the claim by Newt Gingrich that the right's reticence to expose this ugliness is due to the fear on the part of Republican leadership of offending gay people. That one surely takes the cake.

Coincidently, the BBC's Panorama airing tonight in the UK will examine the RC Church's cover-up of their own child abuse mess, and highlight the role in said cover-up of the former Cardinal Ratzinger, now known as Pope Benedict. I'm not sure if this report will air in the USA tonight, though. If it does, the unhappy similarities will be all the more obvious.