How nice to know that Dennis Hastert (allegedly) paid $3.5 million in hush money

This whole story seems mostly retro to me. Dennis Hastert hasn't been Speaker of the House since 2006, and he left the House that same year. I thought he was a terrible Speaker and I said so at the time. Is it that relevant in retrospect that he was harboring a secret - apparently about sexual misconduct with a (possibly) minor male student dating back to his days as a high school wrestling coach before he was elected to the House, and that he ultimately appears to have paid hush money in an effort to keep the whole thing secret? I think so, but first let's review where we are:

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The individual is a man who said he had sexual contact with Mr. Hastert decades ago, according to the people familiar with the matter. In 2010, according the indictment, Mr. Hastert agreed to pay the man $3.5 million over a period of years to keep him from disclosing the alleged misconduct. The identity of the individual and details of the alleged misconduct couldn’t immediately be determined. A series of large cash withdrawals by Mr. Hastert made bankers suspicious, so they questioned him, according to the indictment. After that, he began withdrawing money in increments of less than $10,000 each to avoid breaching a threshold above which banks must report transactions, the indictment said. That, the Justice Department said, violated a law against “structuring” cash transactions to avoid the reporting rule. Mr. Hastert is also charged with lying to the Federal Bureau of the Investigation about the purpose of the withdrawals. Each of the two counts of the indictment carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine. Legal experts said punishments for such crimes are typically less stiff, usually six months in prison or even probation. Mr. Hastert, 73 years old, has been married for more than 40 years and has two sons. He resigned on Thursday from Dickstein Shapiro LLP, the law firm where he worked as a lobbyist.

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Here's the thing you wonder about in retrospect: If Hastert was harboring this secret the entire time he was in Congress, and was invested enough in hiding it that he was willing to pay millions to keep it under wraps, how much might that have also influenced his actions (or lack thereof) as Speaker? When someone has power over you, you can only do what you think falls within that person's window of acceptability. Why didn't Hastert lead on any number of issues when Republicans had majorities in both houses of Congress and a more willing president than history seems to remember? Maybe he was a cowardly politician irrespective of his need to protect his secret, but how can we know for sure now? The price for Individual A's silence was at least $3.5 million, but was that all it was? Maybe he also let it be known he wasn't a fan of domestic energy exploration, or tax simplification, or Social Security privatization. I'm speculating, obviously, but the point is that you never know whether a politician's actions are his own once you realize that someone else has the ability to control him. A lot of people still argue that personal character doesn't matter when they choose candidates for office. As long as they espouse the correct issue positions, they can be as dirty as the day is long. You just want them to vote the way you like. Good luck with that. If the person is dirty, chances are he's got secrets and someone has the ability to expose those secrets - and that person controls your guy. By the way, if Dennis Hastert had any character at all, maybe he wouldn't have agreed to ascend to the position of Speaker knowing he was already compromised before he ever started the job. But then again, if he had any character, he wouldn't have been doing the things it now appears he did during his days as a wrestling coach. Say, America, if you're still not convinced it's a problem to elect dishonest, corrupt people to high office, I think you're probably going to get another chance coming up here pretty soon.

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