“I have long considered that one of the primary qualifications for being “accepted” into the major parties as a serious candidate (for anything) is that you’re able to be blackmailed. There has to be something in your past that they know about and can use to “keep you in line.” There is an utterly-ridiculous over-representation of people in the US Congress and other “high positions” that have been accused (or even proved) to have had interest in “little girls”, as an example, which has led to the (not very funny) anecdote that the only way to “get” this politician or that is to find them with a dead girl — or live boy.
As just one example I give you Dennis Hastert, who was Speaker of the House. Long after he left office (but sadly for him, before he died) he was accused of structuring transactions illegally to pay off a kid he allegedly did inappropriate things with before he was in the House at all, say much less before he was Speaker. It beggars belief that nobody knew of this alleged indiscretion before Hastert ascended to the House itself, say much less Speaker of the House.
Therefore this is a perfectly reasonable question: Who blackmailed him and what did they get? I remind you that the Speaker of the House has near-absolute control over what is and isn’t heard on the floor and thus what bills can and cannot be voted on.”
Advanced Mediterranean Diet 