Sep 29 2005
Republican Leadership in Trouble
Update: Welcome to folks visiting from the Columbia Journalism Review today… feel free to add your thoughts below.
You might have heard yesterday that Republican House Leader Tom DeLay of Texas was indicted on a single charge of criminal conspiracy and forced to hand over his leadership role while the investigation continues.
It’s got to be a distressing time for the Republican leadership in America. Not only is their #1 guy in the House of Represenatives now facing criminal charges, but Sen. Bill Frist - the majority leader in the Sentate - is also under investigation for insider trading after he dumped all his stock in a family owned business days before a disappointing profit outlook was issued.
Then there’s the nominee for deputy attorney general Timothy Flanigan from the Justice Department who has ties to lobbyist Jack Abramoff (who also has ties to DeLay of course), a man who is under more federal investigations than I can count on one hand.
Of course, we can’t forget that whole CIA leak thing in which it’s rumored that Karl Rove had a part in and will face jail time himself once the truth comes out.
So not only are the most powerful members of the Republican party in the House of Represenatives, Senate, and White House possibly corrupt, but so are other Republican figures in the Justice Department and Office of Management and Budget facing investigations as well. On every level of Government, Republican party leaders are being unmasked as a corrupt and power hungry people who think the law doesn’t apply to them.
Right now the Republican Party stinks of corruption. Thankfully in 2006 we have a change to clean house and restore some small bit of honor and integrity back to government.
Not to mention they kill kitties.
Interesting about the comparison between what you say Daniel and the “Gingrich Revolution” of the mid-90’s.
What is your take on the similarities?
Well james, I wasn’t really too involved in politics back in the early-mid 90’s, but from what I’ve read about then and now there are a fair number of similarities.
The Democrats had been in control of Congress for quite some time, and as it tends to happen when one set of people is in power too long, some of them became corrupt. I think the main difference between now and then is the multiple levels at which there is corruption in today’s Republican party.
Not only are the leaders of both sides of Congress in trouble, the White House, DOJ, and other agencies are all facing allegations of wrong doing and ethics violations. This Jack Abramoff character for example has ties to just about everyone in the party, and it’s looking like he’s dirty as sin. Then there are things like former Illinois Gov. George Ryan who just this week is finally being held accountable for his role in state corruption over the past decade.
It just seems you can’t turn on the news in the past few years without hearing about someone from the GOP who’s under investigation, and I think that’s the big difference between the situation that brought forth the “Gingrich Revolution” and the situation we have within the Republican party today.
Of course, that’s not to say that current Democrats don’t have their issues either. William Jefferson is a Represenative from Louisiana for example who’s under investigation for corruption. But I don’t think it’s anywhere near the level of corruption we’re seeing from the Right, because as I said above, it usually takes long periods of being in power to corrupt people, and the Democrats haven’t been in control for a long time.
I think the level of corruption that brought about the “Gingrich Revolution” was far less than what we have today. Hopefully the American peoplw will show though that they don’t like corrupt politicians from either party in control and sweep the GOP out of office in 2006.