At Least One of Dennis Hastert Sex Abuse Victims Named by Family

Hastert and victim

The gay sex scandal swirling around former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert continues to grow as the family of one now deceased victim of abuse has come forward.  The actual individual - who many assume to be yet another Hastert victim - remains unidentified.   In grasping the full hypocrisy of Hastert it is important to remember that Hastert consistently voted against gay rights measures just like former Virginia 2nd District congressman Ed Schrock whom I helped to "out."  In Schrock's defense, at least he wasn't insidiously preying on minors like Hastert.  Schrock was a total hypocrite, but he wasn't a sexual predator. Again, it is noteworthy that it is almost always the "conservative," "family values" Republicans who are the ones that become embroiled in gay sex scandals.  ABC News has details on this development.  Here are highlights:

In Steve Reinboldt’s 1970 high school yearbook, wrestling coach Dennis Hastert wrote that Steve was his “great, right hand man” as the student equipment manager of the Yorkville, Illinois wrestling team. 

But Steve was also a victim of sexual abuse at the hands of Hastert, Steve’s sister said Friday in an interview with ABC News. It is the first time an alleged Hastert victim has been identified by name since his indictment for lying to the FBI and violating federal banking laws to cover-up past misconduct. Hastert, due in court next week, has not responded to the allegations. 

In an emotional interview, Steve Reinboldt’s sister Jolene said she first learned of her late brother’s purported years-long sexual abuse at the hands of the future Speaker of the House back in 1979 when her brother revealed to her that he was gay and had been out of high school for eight years. 

Jolene said she asked her brother why he never told anyone. “And he just turned around and kind of looked at me and said, ‘Who is ever going to believe me?’”  

Jolene said that Steve told her the abuse lasted throughout Steve’s four years of high school as he served as team student manager. “Mr. Hastert had plenty of opportunities to be alone with Steve, because he was there before the meets,” she said. “He was there after everything because he did the laundry, the uniforms. So he was there by himself with him,” she added. 

Her brother also spent time with Hastert as a member of an Explorers troop, which Hastert ran. Photos taken by her brother show Hastert with a group of boys on a diving trip to the Bahamas.

Reinboldt’s sister says she has no doubts about the veracity of what her brother told her 36 years ago. 

Jolene said she believes the abuse ended when Steve moved away after his high school graduation in 1971. Reinboldt died of AIDS in 1995. She believes Hastert’s alleged actions irrevocably changed Steve's life for the worse. 

“He took his belief in himself and his kind of right to be a normal person,” Jolene said. “Here was the mentor, the man who was, you know, basically his friend and stepped into that parental role, who was the one who was abusing him… He damaged Steve I think more than any of us will ever know.”

Her anger boiled over when she said Hastert was so “brash” as to show up at Steve’s funeral viewing.

“I was just there just trying to bite my tongue thinking that blood was coming out because I was just… So after he had gone through the line I followed him out into the parking lot of the funeral home,” Jolene said. “I said, ‘I want to know why you did what you did to my brother.’ And he just stood there and stared at me. He didn’t say, ‘What are you talking about?’ you know, [or], ‘What? I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ He just stood there and stared at me. 

“Then I just continued to say, ‘I want you to know your secret didn’t die in there with my brother. And I want you to remember that I’m out here and that I know.’ And again, he just stood there and he did not say a word.”  Hastert got in his car and drove away. Jolene said Hastert’s non-response “said everything.”

[F]or years, Jolene watched helplessly as Hastert basked in fame and power, seated to the left of the president for years in the early 2000s for the nationally-televised State of the Union address.

“I would just watch for a while and then I would just have to get up and leave the room and just, you know, either cry or scream,” Jolene said. “I can’t believe the audacity of that man and how he thinks he will get away with it.”

PHOTO: Dennis Hastert, right, plays cards with members of the Explorer's Club in the Bahamas.

Hastert at State of the Union

It's a sad and disturbing story much like that of priest who abused minors for years - often with the aiding and abetting of the Church hierarchy.   The ultimate irony is that the far right accuses gays of preying on or "recruiting" children and youths.  Gays who are out and open in their lives do not need to prey on youth and those we can intimidate like the Hasterts and predator priests of this world.  It is they, not gays, who are a threat to children and youths.  And, if the "godly Christians" would cease their war on gays, people like Hastert would hopefully not feel compelled to live hypocritcal double lives and there would be far fewer Steve Reinboldts.  Meanwhile, I wonder how many other victims Hastert preyed upon.

Virginia GOP Goes Further Off the Rails - Supports Cuccinelli By Large Majority

If there is anyone in Virginia who is the Christian equivalent of ayatollahs governing Iran its Ken "Kookinelli" Cuccinelli who in some ways makes Rick "Frothy Mix" Santorum look fairly rational.  Kooch thinks that he and Virginia are above the U.S. Constitution and he never hesitates to inflict his extremist religious views into the civil laws.  The very thought of him as governor must send the Christofascists at The Family Foundation into near orgasm.  For those not clinically insane or favoring a Christian Taliban like theocracy, Cuccinelli ought to make one's blood run cold.  The man is a menace and would destroy what's left of Virginia's reputation on both the national and international scene.  Yet the ever more extreme and backward thinking Virginia GOP seems to think Kooch is their man for 2013.  One can only hope that something arises to derail the insanity - perhaps one of the unconfirmed claims I receive from time to time that that Kooch likes cock will be verified (he certainly seems to fit the profile of the self-loathing closet case revealed in the University of Rochester study of homophobes).    Here are highlights from a Virginian Pilot article on the Virginia GOP's growing insanity:

Six months after jumping into the race, Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli holds an overwhelming lead over Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling in the contest for the 2013 Republican nomination for governor, according to a poll released Wednesday.

Among 549 Republican and Republican-leaning voters surveyed May 30 through Monday, Cuccinelli has more than a 3-1 edge, 51 percent to 15 percent, in the Quinnipiac University poll.

Cuccinelli's huge advantage extends across all GOP demographic groups. He leads among Republican men 55-20 percent, women 46-9 percent, conservatives 54-15 percent, moderates 45-15 percent, white evangelical Christians 51-15 percent, and tea-party supporters 67-8 percent.

His lead over Bolling in the new survey is much wider than in previous polls, said Larry Sabato, a political scientist at the University of Virginia. But Sabato cautioned against taking any poll too seriously a year before the nomination.

"You can argue about whether he is a substantial favorite or a heavy favorite, but it's one or the other," Sabato said. "That doesn't mean that he'll win. Lots of things change once you actually get into the election campaign."

For one thing, he said, McDonnell is expected to campaign extensively for Bolling. For another, if Republican Mitt Romney manages to defeat President Barack Obama this fall, he would be likely to lend Bolling a hand as well.

Let's hope Sabato is correct and Cuccinelli is tossed onto the trash heap of history where he belongs - or admitted to a mental institution.

Republican Senator caught posting nude pics... on Grindr

Yes, a hurricane is bearing down on the area and the boyfriend and I have been working like dogs all afternoon and into the evening, but some instances of hypocrisy are just too sweet to pass up. Like a Republican state senator posting nude photos on Grindr. You know, that gay hook up application. The hypocrisy of far too many in the Republican Party is simply beyond belief. Here are highlights of how "Andrés Duque" of Blabbeando describes the latest expose of a Republican politicians obviously on the make to do the gay sex nasty:

Another day, another politician caught posting lewd pictures of himself online. So who fucked up this time? None other than Puerto Rican senator Roberto Arango.

Last Friday Puerto Rican TV show *Dando Candela* aired the picture you see to the left which they supposedly downloaded from the popular gay cruisingapp *Grindr*. The picture, they said, is one of Roberto Arango, senator and president of the *Partido Popular Democratico* [Popular Democratic Party].

When asked about the picture, Roberto Arango didn't confirm or deny taking the photograph: Roberto says he's been documenting his weight loss and this may very well be a part of that: You know I've been losing weight. As I shed that weight, I've been taking pictures. I don't remember taking this particular picture but I'm not gonna say I didn't take it. I'd tell you if I remembered taking the picture but I
don't."

Oh, OK. We'll humor you and give you the befit of the doubt. Just as soon as you explain this picture, supposedly taken off the same *Grindr* account: [REMOVED: Click on link above to see it] What exactly are you documenting here? Your anal weight loss?!

I don't mean to seem cruel, but WTF is this "weight loss" excuse? Until such time as members of the GOP and their Christianist puppeteers admit that sexual orientation is innate and unchangeable, we can expect to see more of these exposes - and more lame excuses by the closeted politicians.

Another "Family Values" GOP Sex Pervert

The news coverage of sexual misadventures by politicians has been slower that usual given the high focus on the ongoing political campaigns. But never fear, a Republican from New York State has been arrested in a hotel sting for child-pornography and soliciting charges. True, a Florida Congressman has been recently exposed for improprieties with a woman, but unlike the family values GOP members he at least was not looking for sex with a minor. Not surprisingly, Ortloff was known for "being tough on crime and increasing increase the criminal penalties for all kinds of sex crimes." I feel sorry for Ortloff's family. Here are some highlights from the New York Post:

*

Chris Ortloff, 61, was arrested in a Plattsburgh-area motel room in a State Police sting at about 5 p.m. Ortloff, who allegedly had arranged a date on the Internet with an underage victim he thought would provide sex, had child porn and what was described as "sex paraphernalia" in his possession, according to the officials.

8
They said Ortloff, a Republican who represented Plattsburgh, would likely face felony sex charges under state law, and could also be charged with violating federal anti-child pornography statutes. Ortloff, married with two sons, could not be reached for comment.

*
"He was always the tough-on-crime guy in the Assembly who wanted to increase the criminal penalties for all kinds of sex crimes," said a former associate.

Update on Washington State GOP Hypocrite

I posted early this morning about the possibility of yet another GOP gay sex scandal at the state legislature level. Now, more details are coming out and it is getting wilder and wilder. These GOP "family values" types seem to like it really, really kinky! I swear, it'd be hard to make this stuff up if you tried. Here are some highlights from Spokesman Review.com (http://www.spokesmanreview.com/breaking/story.asp?ID=12164):

Newly released police investigative reports allege a state representative dressed up as a woman and engaged in an oral sex act at a Spokane Valley adult bookstore before later rendezvousing at a downtown hotel for another sexual encounter with a man now under investigation for extortion. The suspect in the investigation, identified in police and court documents as 26-year-old Cody Michael Castagna, of Medical Lake, told detectives he was offered $1,000 to have unprotected sex with State Rep. Richard Curtis, a Republican from La Center, which is near Vancouver.

Castagna, a part-time porn model, has been featured in explicit photo shoots posted on some members-only gay Web sites. He declined interview requests from The Spokesman-Review today, saying only that he’s not an "escort," in response to e-mail messages sent to his MySpace page. A short time later, he restricted access to his MySpace page.

Curtis and Castagna met shortly before 1 a.m. last Friday at Hollywood Erotic Boutique in Spokane Valley where Castagna was watching porn videos, police investigative reports say. An employee at the porn store told detectives Curtis has been in the business three times in the last month and is called “the cross-dresser” by employees. The same employee said she was told by Curtis he is gay and likes to dress in women’s underwear.

During questioning by Spokane Police detectives, Castagna said he saw a man later identified as Curtis in Hollywood Boutique early last Friday “wearing long red women’s stockings and black sequined lingerie.” Castagna later told detectives he saw a 40-year-old man with a cane performing oral sex on the legislator, according to the police reports. Later, the legislator gave his phone number to Castagna before leaving the adult bookstore at 9611 E. Sprague, the reports say.

Once the two arrived in the legislator’s hotel room, “Curtis gave the male $100,’’ before the two engaged in sex acts, the police reports say. Detectives seized pillowcases and bed sheets from the room and surveillance video from the hotel’s lobby, the documents say. After Curtis fell asleep, Castagna is alleged to have left the hotel room with the legislator’s wallet. Later that day, he called Curtis, demanding the $1,000 Castagna claimed he was owed for being a partner in the unprotected sex act, the reports say.

“Curtis woke up alone a little before 7 a.m. and received a phone call from the male,’’ the reports say. “This male told Curtis had had Curtis’ wallet and knew he was a state legislator and married.” “The male claimed to have taken explicit photos of Curtis” while the legislator was asleep, Curtis told detectives. Castagna, however, told police that wasn’t true, that he didn’t have a camera or take pictures of Curtis.

Of course, when not cross-dressing and indulging in gay sex, Curtis is the typical GOP hypocrite. In fact, Curtis was meeting with his GOP colleagues at the Red Lion in Spokane prior to the legislative session and other GOP lawmakers quoted assumed Curtis was staying at that hotel with them. It appears, however, that Curtis was staying across town at the swankier Davenport—closer to Spokane’s trendier nightspots (such as they are) and far from the prying eyes of his buddies in the gay-bashing GOP.

As for Curtis’ record… well, it’s just what you would expect, given the news: Elected to the state House of Representatives in 2004, Curtis has voted like a fiscal and social conservative. This spring, he voted against domestic partnerships for gay and lesbian couples. Last year, he opposed a gay rights bill that banned discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation….