The story of Republican representative Mark Foley of Florida and the emails he sent to a congressional page is growing and changing faster than a Sea Monkey in water, or one of those dinosaurs in a capsule my son loved when he was little, probably for the same reason. Contents under pressure, dying to come out (so to speak). (I’ll leave others to handle the closeted-Washington angle, though I think it’s fair to say that the gays I have met in DC are more flamboyant after hours, as it were, than their NY counterparts because they have to save it up. You can do Dorothy all day in the West Village and no one bats a lacquered eyelash.)

Now we’re on to the what-did-they-know-and-when-did-they-know-it part of the cycle, with the GOP sweating on getting their story straight on the question of whether or not they looked the other way when presented with evidence that one of theirs assigned to the job of protecting exploited children might have been the wrong man for the job. Did Hastert et al do a Sgt. Schultz when confronted with Foley’s overly friendly email to the 16-year-old because they were worried about losing another seat in the House?

If so, they may wish to revist the cover-up strategy in the future. True, Foley asking the kid what he wants for his birthday and requesting a recent pic smacks of Peter Graves in the cockpit of Airplane! (“Joey, do you like movies about gladiators?”), but I guarantee that what is to follow is worse. Rumors of more explicit IM’s beg the question: what was Foley thinking? Just as Jeanine Pirro might have imagined Bernie Kerik was under surveilance when she asked him for help bugging her husband’s love boat (see below), I think everyone should assume that not only is no email or even instant message private (ask the folks at Enron, the live ones anyway), it will live forever. Imagine not just that anything you write will be read by others but that it will be broadcast from the jumbo screens in Times Square, just like Madama Butterfly.

So what fun is email if you can’t say something suggestive? None whatsoever. What I suggest is that you adapt a disclaimer, similar to your signature line, on everything you write. “Any reference in the above material to floggings, nipple-clamps or patent leather is intended to be purely ironic.” If you work in academia you may want to try the “queer theory” approach: “Sexual deviance is a social and political statement and the reader should not assume that the writer engages in any of the practices mentioned in this email but stands in solidarity with those who do.” Or there is always the Pete Townshend defense: “In an effort to better understand the sexual tendencies of others the writer of this email may express an interest in certain activities purely for research purposes.” Just assume there is no privacy. Alberto Gonzalez does.