US: A congressional ethics committee will question senior Republican officials this week about how they dealt with former congressman Mark Foley's contacts with teenage boys, amid fresh polling evidence that the scandal could doom the party in next month's mid-term elections, writes Denis Staunton in Washington
A Newsweek poll found that more than half of Americans believe the Republican leadership knew about Mr Foley's lewd internet exchanges with teenagers who worked as congressional pages, or messengers, and tried to cover them up. The poll gives Democrats a 12-point lead over Republicans in the congressional elections, with Democrats leading on every single issue, including national security, the war in Iraq and moral values.
If the election were held today, the Democrats would almost certainly take control of the House of Representatives and with the party ahead or tied in eight closely fought Senate races, Democrats could win the six seats they need to control the Senate too.
Mr Foley has admitted sending salacious e-mails and instant messages to pages but insists that he did not have sex with any of them. A former page told the Los Angeles Times yesterday, however, that he had sex with Mr Foley some years after he left the page programme, when he was 21.
The young man, who was not identified, said the former Florida congressman started sending him instant messages soon after he left Washington and that they had sex when the former page returned to the city to work as an intern.
The young man said that Mr Foley's overly friendly behaviour was the subject of gossip among pages, who nicknamed him "Triple F" for "Florida Fag Foley".
This week's hearings before the House ethics committee could bring further embarrassment to Republican leaders, who have given conflicting accounts of their role in the scandal. Mr Foley's former chief of staff, Kirk Fordham, is expected to testify under oath that, as early as 2003, he told House speaker Dennis Hastert's chief of staff, Scott Palmer, about Mr Foley's inappropriate contacts with pages.
Mr Palmer has denied having such a conversation and Mr Hastert insists he knew nothing of concerns about Mr Foley until the congressman resigned on September 29th.
Republican strategists fear that the scandal could persuade conservative Christians, many of whom are disappointed that their political agenda has not made more progress under President Bush, to stay at home on election day.
The party is also concerned about the scandal's impact on women voters, who appear to be more outraged by it than men.
This week's hearings come as the election's biggest issue, the war in Iraq, brings more bad news for Republicans with new data showing that injuries among US soldiers in Iraq have soared in recent weeks.
John Warner, the Republican chairman of the Senate armed services committee, said on his return from a visit to Iraq last week that the US would have to change course there if the situation did not improve within the next three months.
"If these movements now being taken by the Iraqi leadership and their government do not bring about a reduction in the killings and all of the other disruption and do not point to a clear direction that Iraq's going to move out of this situation that is existing today, then I think we've got to make some bold decisions here in our country," he said.
The Iraq Study Group, a bipartisan committee considering options for Iraq, is due to report after the elections and is expected to recommend a change in US policy towards the country but to stop short of calling for a complete withdrawal of US forces.