When did the Republican Party become so corrupt?

[coloradodem2005]

THere are a very small minority of respectable Republican politicians, however the party is corrupt. THe Dems are too, but not nearly to the extent that the Repubs are. For me, my guess would be during the Carter years. Yes Nixon was corrupt, so were a lot of the people that were in his administration, but the major cover-ups that did work seemed to start around 1980 with the Iran hostage crisis and the belief that George Bush in particular used this to torpedo Carter's presidency.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

1. Um late 1800's?

[evil_orange_cat]

30. political parties are corrupt... that's why Washington didn't want them...

George Washington... smart man...

[Punkingal]

2. I agree....

and I think the resentment over Nixon being forced out of office (rightfully so) caused them to think they were entitled to do anything. Was Bush involved in the Iran hostage thing? I always heard it was William Casey, Raygun's CIA guy. (Not that I would be surprised if he was involved!)

[eileen from OH]

3. there's enough crap to spread around. . .

in both parties, and you read about stuff that happened in the 1800's. But from my lifetime, it goes back to Nixon. He was the first real example, that I remember, of absolutely every policy, ever piece of legislation, every utterance, ALL done purely in the name of politics and screw-whether-it-was-right-or-wrong. Others have carried on his questionable legacy, but when it comes to dirty politics, Nixon was the ultimate schemer.

eileen from OH

[maggrwaggr]

4. check out "The Origins of the Overclass"

here:

http://mirrors.korpios.org/resurgent/L-overclass.html

Makes a startling amount of sense.

[Myra]

5. Steve did make a lot of sense. Thanks for the refresh maggrwaggr

eom

[rman]

9. informative kick

-

[CrownPrinceBandar]

25. Holy Crap!

Whats this guy's background? Does he have any real credibility?

[MinnFats]

6. i really think their souls were blackened crisp during the Nixon years

I don't think Eisenhower was a bad man. many of his warnings ring true today.

Nixon's influence cannot be overstated. he had no real political philosophy until calif. repubs asked him to run.
then he found out that chasing phantom commies was worth big political hay. he smeared his opponent, a decent woman, as 'the pink lady' even though there was no evidence to back his claim up. he didn't care...people bought it.

he also found that using cheap, saccharine images were useful...the checkers speech and that little girl with the 'bring us together' sign (turned out she was a plant -- a campaign staffer's daughter. he and the whole republican apparatus saw the evidence that what matter was theimage, not the substance. nixon lost to kennedy, many said, because he came off poorly on television, and he vowed to create suitable images ever thereafter.

nixon came to love money. he realized that in politics, one can never have too much money. his campaign aides extorted huge sums from corporations with promises to drop litigation against them, or to start litigation if they didn't pay up.

he came from a poor background. he managed to get rich. unlike many poor people who become rich, he wanted nothing to do with those still where he had come from. he surrounded himself with rich people. he found the poor distasteful and many would argue hated them.

and he did not trust the american people. he believed that if he shared all relevant information with them, they would not reach the same conclusion -- witness the war in vietnam. he felt he had to mislead the people to make the war acceptable.

good thing he wasn't too good at it -- lying, i mean.


interestingly, i think bush also finds it very easy to lie from the podium, in order to make americans accept his policy decisions that they would never accept if told the whole truth.

the trouble is, bush learned from nixon's errors. he sugarcoats his lies and covers his tracks. he is cut from the same cloth as nixon, though and now, like nixon, he has blood on his hands.

[NewJeffCT]

15. Bush* also learned from Reagan

Reagan said his tax cuts for the rich would trickle down to the poor (in actuality, it greatly increased the rich/poor gap in the country)... now, Bush says that the large majority of his tax cuts (really for the rich) are for the poor & working class.

[Spider Jerusalem]

7. Try around the time of its founding.

And if not then, certainly during the Civil War, when the GOP became the party of the Northern industial interests. Try reading up on Grant's administration sometime. The Credit Mobilier scandal, for instance. The Republicans have been the party of choice for wealthy scum going on a century and a half now. (With one or two exceptions, among their leaders at least...Theodore Roosevelt and Dwight Eisenhower come to mind.)

[Lexingtonian]

8. Whaddya mean 'when'?

The original meaning of "pork barrel spending" goes back to the early Civil War days, when politically connected businessfolk were given contracts to supply the Union armed forces. They notoriously delivered a hugh amount of crappy material because the military inspectors were too few, incompetent or willing to be bribed, or themselves bunglers.

In short, as soon as a party gains a significant amount of power (Republicans won for the first time in 1860), particularly the spending of money for a complex operation that no small set of people can oversee properly like a massive war, the crooks and thieves move in under the banner of "business interests".

In a country founded to make its first immigrant class feel rich and rather inevitably intended to be exploited resourcewise as Europe already was, with such massive resources before them the various kinds of Founders didn't tether 'business' with a whole lot of social obligations. They didn't have citizens putting billions away in offshore banks, and they didn't really care about the messy details of how money was to find its way down the economic food chain.

As for your specific question, don't forget that Richard Nixon got his political education in the '40s and '50s from the politicians and upper echelon supports of the business interests-only Party that Roosevelt defeated after it ran the country into the ground in the 1920s. Those people didn't just go away- they hated Roosevelt endlessly for what he did and beat it into their Party to ruin the New Deal, however long and whatever it took.

There's a chain of colonial and corporatist empire building that goes back a long way- GM didn't invent it in the '50s, AT&T didn't invent it in the '20s, Rockefeller and Carnegie didn't invent it in 1890s. Maybe Stanford, Huntington, and the railway and industrial magnates did a lot of it during the industrial expansion during and after the Civil War/coming of age of the Age of Steam. (The Union Pacific Railroad was a great 'advance' in stockholding/stock profiteering schemes.) But you can probably trace the style back to plantations and the trading companies (Yankees used to mean something particular in world trade), to post-Napoleon European trading and industrial empires, and ultimately the Virginia Land Company- the first utterly ruthless business entity based on U.S. soil.

In short, the Republican Party became a party heavy in business interests during the Civil War, became almost thoroughly that in the Johnson Administration, and by the time Grant gets into office it's all rotten.

[FDRrocks]

10. When Lincoln got shot?

:)

[mrbill]

11. the republican party was corrupted in 1980 with the advent of reganism

nixon tried to warn us about these assholes.

[cryofan]

12. power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolitely

sorry to break the news but both the GOP and the Dems are quite powerful, and quite corrupt.

[LeahMira]

14. My thought as well.

sorry to break the news but both the GOP and the Dems are quite powerful, and quite corrupt.

There are good individuals and way less good ones in both parties. I don't suppose Gerald Ford was too bad a person. The problem is that disreputable individuals will stop at nothing to get in power while honest folks refuse to stoop so low.

[DeepModem Mom]

13. When the yay-hoos and racists took it away...

from the principled, responsible, moderate conservatives who used to provide balance to our political system. Balance on the other side was provided by Democrats, traditionally more liberal. Now that balance is shot, and we as a nation careen precariously along a road to ruin, in a virtual one-party system driven by the extreme right.

[Stupdworld]

16. all repukliKKKans are corrupt by default

they hate everybody except white male christians and capitalists. those nazi bastard KKK reich wing etc etc etc etc

[UTUSN]

17. When Lincoln Died

Scoundrelism is a core belief of Repuke-ism.

[leftofthedial]

18. i don't know about corruption, but the GOP changed

radically when Nixon was outed.

Personally, I believe the neocon Bush GOPNAC Cabalists were involved in nailing Nixon so that they could seize control of the Republican Party, which they have done.

It is NOT the same party since Nixon.

I didn't like them before. Now I hate them.

[amber dog democrat]

19. During the Grant Administration.

For starts I would begin with Charles Durant and the Credit Mobilier scandal - as a part of the trans contenental railroad land acquisition.

But it does not end there....I'd look at Coollidge and Harding as well.

[cryofan]

20. about the same time that the ....

....Democratic Party become corrupt, which would be always....

[Bozola]

21. 1978 - When Clinton became Govenor

Obviously Clinton's penis is at fault here. It synchronistically affected the psyches of Republicans through out the US and made them corrupt against their wills.

The Invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq, the destruction of civil rights, the countless violations of international law, and the looting of the US Treasury are, in fact, the accidental by-product of the efforts of Heroic(tm) 'Merikuns who are fighting a desperate battle against the evil spell cast by the former demoNcratic President's genitalia.

You're either with Bush's Dick (Cheney), or Bill's Willy.

[Hippo_Tron]

29. Agreed...

Every problem in this country is definately the fault of Clinton's Penis.
:eyes:

[kentuck]

22. In my lifetime, Nixon's part in the McCarthy hearings of the 1950's..

But I'm almost sure it started long before that.

[PATRICK]

23. After TR

The last bit of reform minded, value loyal Republicanism was purged from the top, illusions kept in the base. Corporations therefafter ruled top down, aloof greed infecting the bottom.

The Democrats have been going into reverse starting from a liberation of the South(irony) to Westerner farmers and then Eastern labor. Biggest successes eventually in the vote rich East with pro-Labor values that didnot translate into their Southern anti-GOP base. Coming to grips with people ideology over power politics has led to strange transformations of both parties. Despite the modern battle lines a lot of people in both parties are not represented very well or honestly.

I think the GOP has given up relying on the the people fooling element in reality and decided to go for it with classic control measures and a lot of lies. They are going for the gold the heck with the rules of democracy. Some Democrats stupidly have decided to trample over the same boodies to catch up. Can't win that way and won't be a people's party either- so get smart and stay committed. There is no hope for anyone in the GOP right rush.

[WillyT]

24. 1988

Ask Pat Robertson.

:evilgrin:

[banana republican]

26. In the 1930's; Hoover Sucks

Were the repukes vaccume cleaner salespersons then??????

[arewethereyet]

27. when was any pol NOT corrupt ?

its the nature of the game.

It operates on a sliding scale based on the individual but all polititians are corrupt and no party holds a very strong advantage over the others in terms of most or least.

I accept that my guy Edwards is corrupt. I don't think he's as bad as the others and therefore should be supported over the others and has tended to take actual political action more in accordance with my beliefs than the others.

This ain't no Never-Never Land...

[FlemingsGhost]

28. When the cowardly American public let them get away with it

Nixon should have been tossed in jail.

And since the Reagan/Bush crimes went unpunished, the sky's the limit...