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The Record of Republican Corruption : [ What kind of "Christian" imagines that Jesus Christ would want any part of this party? ] |
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2 click here for the original "JesusNoRepublican.org" site. |
in High National Offices : As Abe Lincoln once said, "Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power."
The logical place to start might be at the top, namely corruption at the presidential level. But since it's corruption in Congress that is on people's minds these days, despite my view that it is a more serious matter than corruption of Congressmen, I've moved my section on corruption in the White House to the bottom of this page. So we'll start with Congress, and then down to the state and local level, and then back to the presidential level. Before I present the myriad of examples of Republican corruption that I have collected over the years, please note the contrast between the type of evidence that you will see here and that offered by conservative critics of liberals. Many of the instances of malfeasance that conservative spokespeople like Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin, and David Horowitz offer as proof of liberal corruption are "nobodies", i.e. people who are unknown and whose very identity cannot even be verified. When these conservatives quote emails that they have supposedly received from liberals, they treat the public as too stupid to know that such emails could have been produced by anybody, including these very conservatives themselves. What you will find here on my site, however, are verified instances of public malfeasance by well-known public figures who are not just members of the Republican Party, but people chosen by Republicans to lead or at least represent their party. "Hall of Shame " Award winner for 1997, 1998 and 1999 Senator Bill Frist" took money from the tobacco industry, $23,000 so far (Source Center for Responsive Politics at URL http://www.crp.org/tob96/tobacco91-96.htm ). He gives good return to the industry for their investment in him, by voting in their interests in most instances. Public Citizen gives Frist a rating of 13% [ the ideal being 100% ] on tobacco issues. . . When Republican Senators killed the McCain Bill (S1415) which, properly amended, would have been a powerful force to reduce the damage tobacco does to our society, Frist voted in favor of the tobacco industry on 12 out of 14 votes, for a cumulative score of 14%. That's a failing grade in any school ! Check it out for yourself at Public Citizen http://www.citizen.org/tobacco/mcpac.htm#List.
The big deal is that [in addition to being elected to be a representative of the public,] Bill Frist is a doctor! Not only is he a doctor, he is a thoracic surgeon! Thoracic surgeons have more personal experience with the suffering of patients with tobacco caused diseases than most other physicians. They are the best, and often the only, hope of cure for patients suffering from tobacco caused diseases, including coronary artery disease, lung cancer, stroke, aortic aneurysm, peripheral artery disease and emphysema. Frist was actually a super-specialist who transplanted new lungs into emphysema sufferers. The senator is a very bright man; a Harvard man. He can't claim ignorance of the fact that cigarettes cause 480,000 premature deaths in our country alone each year (not to mention the mounting number of deaths American tobacco is causing in other countries, now that their profits are being squeezed a little in the U.S.A.) Sen. Frist's unexplained resignation from the Senate, however, probably has more to do with the pending investigation into charges of "insider trading" regarding "the sale of shares of HCA Inc. held in a blind trust earlier this year, one month before a weak earnings report sparked a drop in the company's stock. Nashville, Tennessee-based HCA, the biggest U.S. hospital chain, was founded by Frist's father and brother." [ See bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=aYyQPZcoBolY&refer=us ] See http://www.kentucky.com/454/story/214167.html . Republican presidential candidate Fred D. Thompson has been crisscrossing the country (in 2007) on a private jet lent to him by a businessman and close adviser who has a criminal record for drug dealing.
Yet in 2002, The D. James Kennedy Center for Christian Statesmanship named DeLay "Distinguished Christian Statesman of the year." "The Texas congressman openly shares his faith and has voluntary Bible studies with his staff." The corruption of House Majority Leader, Tom DeLay, and his gang of "40 thieves" is so extensive that it takes whole web sites to cover, such as http://www.dropthehammer.org/corruption/, & http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_DeLay. Mary Kahn, wife of Mr. Gingrich's Congressional campaign manager during the 1970s said, "Newt uses people and then discards them as useless. He really is a man with no conscience. He just doesn't seem to care who he hurts or why." Keep those to quotes in mind as you read what Mr. Gingrich told the Washington Post on January 3, 1995: "I have an enormous personal ambition. I want to shift the entire planet. And I am doing it."  didn't hamper his five (or seven) year affair with a married woman with three kids, an affair that continued even after the woman's husband, Fred Snodgrass, found out about it and demanded that Hyde leave his wife alone.
Yet, when this leader of the Clinton impeachment process in the Congress was asked how he felt about his own infidelity and the breaking up that family, he exonerated himself on the basis that it was "a youthful indiscretion" (committed in his early forties when he was not much younger than Clinton!).This same . "Mr. Roman Catholic Layman", who divorced his wife of 45 years in 1992, was the leading spokesman for the Catholic pro-life stance in the Congress. ( See Hypocrite of the House). This 11-term Republican is chairman of the Ways and Means subcommittee on Health. In June, (2003?) the Bakersfield Californian reported that Thomas, who is married, was having an affair with health care lobbyist Deborah Steelman, who steered huge campaign gifts to Thomas' war chest. In an "open letter to friends and neighbors" (voters), Thomas did not deny the relationship, but said during his legislative career, " . . . Any personal failures of commitment or responsibility to my wife, family, or friends are just that, personal. I have never traded a public responsibility for a personal one and I never will." The Chairman of the House Government Reform & Oversight Committee. He hates President Clinton so much that he publicly called him a "scumbag". Following an expose, Burton was forced to admit that he fathered an out-of-wedlock child, a fact he denied for years. He has yet to admit, however, that during 38 years of marriage he has committed adultery with dozens of women, sexually assaulted others (including a lobbyist for Planned Parenthood), and kept mistresses on his campaign and public payrolls - to the tune of at least a half-million dollars. Wade pleaded guilty in February 2006 to bribing former Rep. Randy ''Duke'' Cunningham of California. Congressman Schmitz' daughter, Mary Kay LeTourneau, made national headlines when as a school teacher, she was arrested twice for having sex and producing two children with an underage student of hers (beginning when he was only 13 years old). Dan Crane (R-Illinois) was censured for having sexual relations with a 17 year-old female page. Gerry Studds(D-Mass.) was censured for having sexual relations with a 17 year-old male page. Conservative Republicans try to get some kind of political advantage by treating these two cases as morally equivalent, or they speak only of the Democrat, Studds. But here's the rest of the story that they don't want people to know:
October 7, 2005 "Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), a U.S. legislative watchdog group, has released a report attempting to document the unethical and illegal activities of who they are calling the "most tainted members of Congress". In describing the reasons for the report Melanie Sloan, executive director of CREW said, "[CREW] was compelled to research and release a report on these corrupt members because the ethics committees in both the House and Senate are completely inert. The report calls for the House and Senate to act to investigate and take appropriate action against them for these violations of the rules." She went on to attack both parties regarding ethics, "Democrats are just as much to blame as Republicans for the current ethics deadlock. The Democrats won't file ethics complaints against even the most egregious violators like DeLay and Ney. The Democrats are spineless." The report is entitled "Beyond DeLay: The 13 Most Corrupt Members of Congress", seeking to capitalize on the current media attention on ethics that has come about due to the indictments of former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. The report covers possible violations of federal laws, as well as congressional ethics rules. To compile the report, CREW drew upon Federal Election Commission (FEC) reports and audits, sworn testimony, emails, and personal financial and travel disclosure forms. By analyzing that information, CREW then attempted to determine if the member's activities violated federal laws, regulations, or congressional ethics rules. (excluding the obvious Republican Majority Leader Tom Delay)
(The 11 Republican and 2 Democratic) "most corrupt" members of Congress covered are: For a great analysis of the vast network of Republican corruption involving Congress and those who fuel and benefit so much of that corruption, see the gop auction house site and click on the pictures of any of the principals that may interest you. Check out this great Mark Fiore "Ethics Liquidators - Saleabration" animation. [ requires that speakers be turned on ] and the great rogues' gallery of pictures of Republican scoundrels at http://www.culture-of-corruption.net. The Public Campaign Action Fund features a letter by a number of honorable former Republican congress members who are ashamed of their party's current leadership in Congress:
Here's an interesting article from "Pat & Jerry Country": "Convicted sex offender wins 'Republican of the Year' award", by Matthew Roy, The Virginian-Pilot © February 13, 2002 Suffolk,VA -- " previous commitment will keep a Suffolk man from traveling
to Washington, D.C., to accept a Republican of the Year award: He's
serving a 26-year state prison sentence. { www.pilotonline.com/news/nw0213per.html for the original article.) |
then our nation would have had a Republican Senator from Conn., named Philip Giordano at least until he was sentenced to serve his 38 year sentence in Federal prison as a result of the FBI investigating him for financial shenanigans and discovering in the process that this crooked, disgusting Republican office holder had been repeatedly molesting the 8 and ten year old daughter and niece of his prostitute-mistress (in the mayor's office among other places).
Of 201 House Republicans, at least six are known to have attracted the attention of federal investigators - and four are from California. Their woes come in the wake of the lurid corruption scandal that sent disgraced former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham of San Diego to prison last year for taking $2.4 million in bribes.
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That's a job for "Christian" Republicans politicians:
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Ironically, big-time political strategist Roger Stone was one of the GOP’s top strategists urging Republican politicians to emphasize family values and integrity . . . until he was exposed in a story in the National Enquirer revealing that he and his wife (pictured at lower right) were swingers. [ http://www.madcowprod.com/05182007.html ]
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administration in U. S. history." Informed Americans, as opposed to those who get their news and political education from the "fair and balanced" sources like Fox News, know that the contenders are all CONSERVATIVE administrations, which for the past 70 years has meant "Republican", but in the 70 years prior to that was more likely to be "Democratic".
While posing as paragons of virtue and truth, conservative Republicans claim that Bill Clinton's administration was "the most corrupt administration in American history", despite the fact that history contradicts everything about that statement. It may be hard to order them exactly, but here are the contenders for the first, second, third & fourth "most corrupt administrations in American history". ( I wanted to include only instances of current corruption on this site, but because of the charge by conservatives and/or Republicans that the Clinton administration was "the most corrupt in U. S. history", I have had to go back in history to show what really corrupt administrations were actually like.) http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h234.html : "The frequency of these events led to the use of the term "Grantism", a word synonymous with greed and corruption. Many people at the time speculated that money from these ventures was being funneled into Republican Party coffers. These unsavory dealings led to the establishment of a more moral "liberal." Republican Party. "The Harding administration is infamous not only for the Tea Pot Dome Scandal but for the general corruption of his administration. He was most unprepared to be President even though he had served in the state senate, as Lieutenant Governor, Governor, and Senator from Ohio. He did not have the physical stamina or the strong character required for leadership in the White House. Like U.S. Grant's administration, blind party politics and bad appointments led to vast corruption." See http://www.shakerwssg.org/warren_g_hardingmarion_ohio.htm. Republican Calvin Coolidge, who had become president upon Harding’s death, attempted to tar both parties, but it wouldn’t wash; the corruption was strictly Republican. Republicans had tried repeatedly to shut the investigations down, and nearly succeeded, aided by public apathy. [ Read "The Teapot Dome Scandal, How Big Oil Bought the Harding White House and Tried to Steal the Country" by Laton McCartney, published 8 April 2008 ] By the end of Reagan's two terms, 138 officials in his administration had either been convicted, indicted, or had been the subject of official investigations for official misconduct and/or criminal violations. "In terms of number of officials involved, the record of his administration was the worst ever." The corruption of Ronald Reagan's administration was so massive, and so under-reported, that it requires a separate web page all unto itself:
George Walker Bush Reaped $14 million from selling his $600,000 stake in a deal that involved the building of a new stadium for the Texas Rangers. George profited handsomely while taxpayers were stiffed for the money to subsidize Bush and his investment partners. A Big Slice of the Texas Rangers for a Little Money (and a Big Profit)
"My illness helped me to see that what was missing in society is what was missing in me: a little heart, a lot of brotherhood. The '80s were about acquiring — acquiring wealth, power, prestige. I know. I acquired more wealth, power, and prestige than most. But you can acquire all you want and still feel empty. What power wouldn't I trade for a little more time with my family? What price wouldn't I pay for an evening with friends? It took a deadly illness to put me eye to eye with that truth, but it is a truth that the country, caught up in its ruthless ambitions and moral decay, can learn on my dime. I don't know who will lead us through the '90s, but they must be made to speak to this spiritual vacuum at the heart of American society, this tumor of the soul." (in a February 1991 article for Life Magazine ) Jeb Bush Defaulted on a $4,56 million loan from Broward Federal Savings in Sunrise, Florida. After federal regulators closed the S&L, the office building that gave Jeb used that loan, the $4.56 million to finance was reappraised by the regulators to $.5 million, which Bush and his partners paid, thereby leaving the taxpayers with a $4 million LOSS. Bush Family Value$
Neil Bush and gopcorruption-3.html.
 Bush Family Scandals
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Many people say, G.O.P. corruption is no worse than Democratic corruption. ( "They're all corrupt." ) I challenge anybody to direct me to anything remotely similar to the catalogue of Republican corruption above. Here's a list to get such challengers started. It's very short, because liberal Democrats are nowhere near as corrupt as conservative Republicans. Ironically, this impeachment offers evidence of the moral superiority of the Democratic Party, inasmuch as its members did not hesitate to punish one of its own. In 1989, the Democratic-controlled U.S. House of Representatives took up the case, and Hastings was impeached for bribery and perjury by a vote of 413-3. Voters to impeach included Reps. Nancy Pelosi, Steny Hoyer, John Conyers and Charles Rangel. He was then convicted by the United States Senate, which was likewise under Democratic control. Although no Republican apologists volunteered a site, I found one that claims to do what I have been challenging Republicans to do. The site proclaims the following: The authors actually include this part of DeLay's endorsement on their book cover, "a must read for all Americans looking for the unreported motivations behind the Left's political scene." The NoAgenda.org site is hilarious, Here's are some examples of what this site's author, Matt Margolis, considers examples of outstanding Democratic corruption: I found another hillarious internet attempt by conservative Republicans to whitewash their own corruption by mudding the waters about the supposed corruption of Democrats. At thePeoplesCube.com they use very elaborate graphics in a hopelessly vain attempt to raise minor examples of corruption (except for Kwame Kilpatrick) to the level of their own Republican corruption and to claim that the MSM (mainstream media) only identify the party affiliation of corrupt politicians when they are Republicans. Check out the hypocrisy of conservative Republicans expressing all kinds of concern over "voter fraud" when they regularly practice it themselves in plain view of the public in the Texas legislature.. (The Democrats may be going along with it, but the Republicans are the ones in charge, and the Democrats who were in charge before them were the conservative "Dixiecrat" type Democrats.) The trouble with this story is that it is untrue. While Frank admitted to paying Gobie for sex several years earlier and to later hiring Gobie as an assistant, Frank denied any knowledge that Gobie allegedly ran a prostitution ring out of Frank's apartment. Frank maintained that he fired Gobie upon being told by one of his landlords that Gobie was using his residence for his prostitution business. As The Guardian reported on August 30, 1989, Frank actually "asked the House ethics committee . . . to investigate his relationship with" Gobie: In his letter to the ethics committee, Mr. Frank wrote: 'Questions have been raised about my employment of a personal assistant during a period between 1985 and 1987. I have publicly responded to these questions and I have expressed regret for the mistaken judgment involved. In order to ensure that the public record is clear, I hereby request that the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct [CSOC, commonly known as the ethics committee] conduct an investigation into these matters.' 'Based upon information obtained under subpoena and sworn testimony, the Committee concludes that the weight of the evidence indicates that Representative Frank did not have either prior or concomitant knowledge of prostitution activities involving third parties alleged to have taken place in his apartment. . . Representative Frank's landlords . . . submitted sworn testimony contradicting Mr. Gobie's assertion. . . . The Committee, therefore, further concludes that no further action is warranted.' The ethics committee concluded "with Respect to the Credibility of Stephen L. Gobie" that: 'While much has been said, written, and speculated with respect to Representative Barney Frank's relationship with Stephen L. Gobie, it is clear that most, if not all, of such media attention has been the product of assertions made by Mr. Gobie. As has been discussed in detail in prior sections of this Report, the Committee went to great lengths in seeking testimony or other information relevant to the assertions. In numerous instances where an assertion made by Mr. Gobie (either publicly or during his Committee deposition) was investigated for accuracy, the assertion was contradicted by third-party sworn testimony or other evidence of Mr. Gobie himself.' (Page 37) Republicans regularly claim that Reynolds was spared punishment for his crimes, was pardoned by President Clinton and some also claim that Reynolds has since by hired by Jesse Jackson as a Rainbow Push "youth counselor". Now for the truth (from wikipedia.org/wiki/Mel_Reynolds) :
"In August 1994, he was indicted for having sex with a 16-year-old campaign volunteer. . . On August 22, 1995 he was convicted on 12 counts of sexual assault, obstruction of justice and solicitation of child pornography. He resigned his seat on October 1, 1995. |
Several recent media reports have baselessly asserted in recent weeks that Republicans and Democrats equally engage in campaign "tricks" or smears. But to support their assertions, they typically provided only or predominantly examples of Republicans' activities, with scant or no examples of Democrats' actions:
For example, anchor John Seigenthaler Jr. introduced a segment on "dirty tricks" in political campaigns during the October 28 edition of NBC's Nightly News by asserting that "as the election draws near, this turns into the season when dirty tricks can come into play," but "[n]either Republicans nor Democrats can claim the high ground when it comes to these hardball tactics." But as Media Matters documented, the subsequent report by NBC News senior investigative correspondent Lisa Myers provided no evidence of Democratic "dirty tricks." Instead, Myers's report focused only on "Republican operative" Allen Raymond, who was convicted for his involvement in a criminal operation to jam state Democratic Party phone lines in New Hampshire on Election Day in 2002. Similarly, on the October 25 broadcast of ABC News' Nightline, co-anchor Terry Moran asserted that "both sides are playing a serious game of hardball" with "mudslinging" attack ads hitting "below the belt." However, as Media Matters noted, Moran's report provided no examples of Democratic-sponsored attack ads being aired that match the level of distortion and personal attack found in the Republican commercials -- commercials that have garnered wide media attention and been broadly condemned, both for their inaccuracies and their ugly personal attacks.
"Scientists and economists have been offered $10,000 each by a lobby group funded by one of the world's largest oil companies to undermine a major climate change report due to be published today.
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When it serves his political ambitions, Rudolph Giuliani talks about his upbringing as a devout Catholic, his thoroughly Catholic education, including a short stint in a seminary, until he entered a secular law school. But ever since he started shedding wives, he has been rather alienated from his church. His principal connection seems to be through his close friend, Monsignor Alan Placa, who was best man at his first wedding to his second cousin, officiated at his second church wedding and baptized Giuliani's son and daughter. Placa was barred from the ministry after he was accused of sexual abuse, but he received special permission to preside at the funeral of Giuilani's mother, Helen, in 2002. Placa has been working for Giuliani's consulting business, Giuliani Partners, despite the urging of abuse victims that he be terminated. ( Source : boston.com/news/local/rhode_island/ articles/2007/08/10/giuliani_evokes_catholic_upbringing_on_campaign_trail/?page=1) |
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This 1st page deals with corruption at the national level.
See Page 2 for GOP Corruption at the state and local levels. |