Teddy Roosevelt would be ashamed of his party today

[DaveSZ]

"If I could only be
President and Congress
too for just ten minutes."

Public rights come first...
private interest second."


http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/tr/


Actually he'd also probably be ashamed of the corporate democrats as well.

[Sandpiper]

1. Yes and No

Teddy would be ashamed of the Republicans who are in the pockets of corporations. But Teddy was also a warmonger and would have supported the invasion of Iraq whole heartedly.

[AP]

8. Yeah. He'd be proud of the imperialism part. But probably not so proud of

the lack of patriotism, and not so proud of replacing loyalty to country with loyalty to corporations. He'd hate that part.

[phillybri]

2. Why today more than any other day?

:shrug:

[lanparty]

3. A GREAT president!!!!

He definitely would NOT be a Republican if alive today. Teddy was the LAST of the good Republicans before the party flipped and became the party of the affluent.

Taft was the FIRST asshole Republican President. He was SO bad, that Roosevelt ran against.

[oscar111]

4. FDR or Teddy more progressive?

Also, was teddy's 25% vote total in about 1912 the highwater mark of progressive sentiment for all our history?

If now , when? Also, other hiwater marks of the LW?

PS newbies, teddy and FDR were distant cousins. Also, waste no time on the official FDR foundation site.. it is bland, with few answers to obvious questions, and unresponsive. Boring accountants must run it.

[UrbScotty]

5. He's also an environmentalist, too

...which in itself sets him apart from Bush.

[progdonkey]

6. he was ashamed then, too

He even went to the extent of forming the Bull Moose Party to unseat the Republican Taft.

[Wednesdays]

7. Teddy was ostracized by the rank-and-file GOP in his day, too

Without Teddy, can you think of any Republican president since Lincoln that didn't represent corporate greed? Maybe Ike, but I'm at a loss to name any others.

TR was always a maverick, and most Republican politicians hated him. They tried to neutralize him by putting him in the vice-presidency in 1900.

[denverbill]

10. I think you're wrong. Republicans were the liberal party before 1910.

From ending slavery, to busting trusts, to conservation, to worker's rights, the Republicans were clearly the progressive party back then. Democrats were the conservatives, the old South, the gentry.

It wasn't til FDR that Democrats adopted a clear liberal bias. And the upper crust called FDR a 'traitor to his class'.

[Mechatanketra]

9. One of the mountains of irony today

The Republicans like to call themselves "the party of Lincoln and Roosevelt".

Roosevelt gave us national parks and busted up Big Oil.

The Republicans want to bust up the national parks and give them to Big Oil.

[MurrayDelph]

11. His (great?) grandson got booed

four years ago at the Republican national convention when he
tried to point out that one can be both a Republican and
pro-ecology.

Apparently, he is the only one who thinks so.

[denverbill]

12. I wish the Onion hadn't gone to premium priced archives.

Their article 'Bush Vows to Remove Toxic Petroleum From National Parks' was too funny.

[Sandpiper]

13. That's not true

He wants to give them too Big Timber too.

Republicans never saw a national forrest that they didn't want logged.