When did the Republican party first commit treason?

[villager]

Poll question: When did the Republican party first commit treason?

[skooooo]

1. Coup against FDR?

I never heard of that one...

[villager]

4. Google "Smedley Butler" for more, but here's a quick link:

http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/Coup.htm

[hobbit709]

5. They tried to talk Gen. Smedley Butler into it.

[Recursion]

19. Google it. Smedley Butler should have gotten his 3rd Medal of Honor for stopping it

Now there was a Marine...

[Greyhound]

22. Best reason for DU to exist. The immense collection of knowledge that

can be garnered here, is impressive indeed.:hi:

[Rosemary2205]

24. I learned more here in 1 yr than 12 years of school.

it's truly amazing.

[Swamp Rat]

2. (((Calling Octafish!)))

:D

[kenny blankenship]

3. Left out Watergate

[villager]

6. I'll put it in! (Maybe 'cause that's the only time they were *caught?*)

n/t

[porphyrian]

7. I wonder how many acts of treason they would tolerate from Democrats.

It seems we have an unhealthy habit of forgiving them things that would already have us hanged.

[villager]

8. We've been a little soft on them, yes. Prescott Bush should've gone to jail

...and had his fortune stripped. Think how much that would've spared us...

[porphyrian]

9. So much would be different now, it's impossible to imagine exactly. - n/t

[KansDem]

10. For one thing, we wouldn't have had a Bush (or Bob Dole) on the GOP ticket since 1976!

And Dole was used as a sacrifice...

[porphyrian]

12. Would G.H.W. have been head of the CIA if we'd punished Prescott?

Senator McCarthy may not have enjoyed the same amount of popularity in the Fifties. Who knows?

[KansDem]

16. Good question!

It amazing how much of what appears to be unrelated events since WWII are actually interconnected.

[villager]

11. It's like a parallel universe, to imagine the "actual America"

that might've been...

[porphyrian]

13. Maybe Alan Moore can do a graphic novel about it or something. - n/t

[villager]

14. hurm...

I was kind of thinking about a *different* "alternate universe!"

[happyslug]

18. THE GOP "waived the Bloody shirt" from the 1860s till the 1930s.

Whenever DEMOCRATS are connected to Treason, the GOP waives it for decades afterward. If the Democrats where like the GOP we still be reminding people of Teapot Doom (A GOP Scandal in the early 1920s involving bribes to GOP Cabinet members).

In more recent years, the GOP yelled for 20 years about "Who Lost China" (i.e. from the fall of China to the Communists in 1949 till the late 1960s when it was replaced about how the Democrats were "losing" Vietnam".

From the election of Nixon in 1968 till even today, the GOP yells about how the Democrats and liberals lost Vietnam and are now getting ready to blame (and are blaming) the Democrats for losing the war iN Iraq. I fully expect to hear how the Democrats lost Iraq for at least the next 20 years.

As a rule since 1865 the Democrats have avoided Treason, preferring to win the vote by embracing progressive ideas (Through only half hearty from 1865 till 1896, but afterward embracing progressive ideas completely). This the GOP has grown to hate for the Democrats tried to get people's vote by Giving people what they want AND Need. The GOP opposed most of these progressive programs and have wanted to treat them as "Treason" but once passed these progressive ideas (Like Social Security, LBJ's Great Society Program, Regulations of Corporations, Civil Rights laws etc) tend to have MASSIVE Support so while the GOP view them as "Treason" most americans do not.

[Bucky]

30. To be fair, Democrats deserved to lose in the 1860s & 1870s

Their opposition to Reconstruction, their support for the Black Codes and resistance to full citizenship rights of African Americans is an ugly legacy. If I found myself waking up in 1868, I'd probably become a Repubican.

[happyslug]

33. I agree, but the GOP continue to waive it while into the 1930s

And by the 1930s the Democratic Party had grown way beyond the regional party it had been in the 1860s through the early 1890s. Even given this fact the GOP waive the bloody shirt as late as WWII. Thus my comment the GOP will waive Democratic "Treason" far longer then any Democrat will waive GOP Treason.

[Recursion]

15. 5 minutes after they lost the progressive TR wing n/t

[villager]

17. that's about right...

n/t

[carolinayellowdog]

20. "I am a Stalwart and Arthur will be president"-- Guiteau 1881

The Garfield assassination was committed by one individual, but he was inspired by intra-Republican rivalries and his act elevated the leader of a rival faction to the presidency. That faction, the Stalwarts, was held responsible in public opinion for pushing Guiteau over the edge.

[villager]

21. did that pave the way for the rise of McKinley and naked corporatism?

n/t

[carolinayellowdog]

23. Paved the way for Republican loss of the White House

Not sure about the impact on the party itself, other than inspiring civil service reform which further divided Republicans. But Garfield's archenemy Conkling helped Cleveland carry NY in 1884, just to spite the "half-breed" wing of his own party. And with NY came the White House.

I'm still reading Dark Horse, a book about the Garfield assassination, and haven't gotten to the aftermath yet.

[villager]

25. yet McKinley's bagman, Mark Hanna, was a "role model" for Rove

Don't know enough about Garfield to speculate what it could've meant, had he lived...

[tom_paine]

26. The Republic Party: Committing Treason Against Americans for 72 years

n/t

[Festivito]

27. Didn't they start in Columbus, OH, supplying Germans in WWI?

I recall it being Ohio, perhaps Columbus, perhaps supplying all sides, having railroad parts business, supplying WWI... Ironically, "the war to end all wars."

That would be where vain pleasure of war profit might well first usurp abiding pleasure of peace.

[villager]

28. "Treason: A party tradition."

n/t

[kath]

29. You forgot Iran-Contra.

treasonous in my book.
They got away with that one, and now the same group of thugs is damaging our country.

[villager]

34. I only had ten slots.. and there's *so much* GOP treason to keep track of!

n/t

[GeorgeGist]

31. When Lincoln...

betrayed the Constitution in order to preserve a false union?

[villager]

35. you mean, the Southern states should've been allowed to secede?

Well, the rest of the United States definitely would've evolved into something more benign, but then it would've had South Africa on its border.

Of course, maybe a more enlightened "North United States" would've liberated it by now, southern crackpot fundies wouldn't be ruining the country, and the world would be a better place...

[Raffi Ella]

32. I don't know...

But I hold the Republican controlled congress of the last 4+ years under the Bush administration as much in contempt as I do Bush himself; THEY allowed that madman to go unchecked and NEED TO BE HELD ACCOUNTABLE for it.

[PhilipShore]

36. Other: The Military-Industrial-Complex and the Nuclear Age

After the Atomic bomb was created -- the Republicans created the military Industrial Complex;
which was the first act of treason against humanity and the United States.

The Military-Industrial-Complex is a secret society; that has existed, to overthrow a liberal democratic way of life.

The PNAC which -- Libby and Abramoff -- are part of, are just the tip of the iceberg of a Military Industrial Complex out of control.

[villager]

37. That's actually a very good point -- and it makes Harry Truman

just as culpable