Did the NRCC chairman's chief of staff try to suppress publication of IMs?

It sure looks like it. Glenn Greenwald, responding to a dispatch by Howard Kurtz which reports that a strategist for Mark Foley tried to cut a deal with ABC's Brian Ross in which he was promised the exclusive on Foley's resignation if he withheld publication of the sexually explicit IM messages:

It has been reported, by Michael Crowley among others, that Mark Foley's former Chief of Staff, Kirk Fordham, is currently the Chief of Staff for [National Republican Congressional Committee] Chairman Tom Reynolds...

John Aravosis says that he has now "confirmed" ... that it was indeed Rep. Reynolds' Chief of Staff, Kirk Fordham, who tried on behalf of Mark Foley to convince ABC to suppress the IMs. ... I think this is a huge revelation. It means that the Chief of Staff for the current NRCC Chair, a key GOP House leadership position, tried on behalf of Foley -- after he knew of the IMs -- to block the public from learning about the IMs by offering ABC an exclusive interview with Foley in exchange for ABC's agreement to conceal those messages.

That means that the top aide to one of the Republican House leaders, as recently as last Friday, tried to suppress the most incriminating and important facts regarding this scandal.

The GOP managed to withhold the relevant information about Foley's predilections from the Democrats and the public for years, and then tried to hide the full scope of it by bartering with the media (who wouldn't bite). The party is corrupt to its very core.

(Crossposted at AlterNet PEEK.)