When is a joke not a joke?

Interesting reading over on Drudge.

Amidst all of the debate floating around about the Mark Foley incident, up comes a report that this was a bad prank gone bad. Apparently a former page goaded Foley into playing a prank on a current page, by sending the IM messages. Then the transcripts of the IM sessions got into the hand of some political operatives, and voila a scandal is born!

Well, this issue has been in my mind since it came out in the news. No matter what side of the issue you come down on, the bottom line is that this page, (and other pages), and his family now have to live through this nightmare.

I don’t want to get into the Democrat/Republican thing because BOTH sides have done this, and they are BOTH WRONG!!!

It’s just a sad statement on the political landscape in this country. Everyone is focused like a laser on what this means to the Republicans and Democrats 5 weeks in front of the election.

I don’t hear anything about the devastation to this young man and his family. I guess it’s also a sad statement on our society as a whole.

If this was in fact a prank gone bad, it’s even worse than we can imagine. Imagine a country where people’s lives can be ruined because of a “prank gone bad”. The article on Drudge mentions that the guy that says it was a prank has hired an attorney, and that he’s afraid that his career will be in jeopardy. Well, duh!!!!! That’s all we can think of in a time like this!!!! Oh my precious career might be damaged!!! What about the lives that have been destroyed because of this “prank”?????

I always thought that a joke’s a joke until someone’s not laughing. Well, I guess these guys aren’t laughing anymore, are they?