Who remembers the watergate scandal? Who remembers the Iran/contra scandal?

[ralfy]

 

[Craig234]

I seem to recall Starr help press conferences in a hall with nude statues. He had the statues draped with cloth.

You might be confusing him with Attorney General John Ashcroft.

 

[Craig234]

It turns out Eisenhower was the exception.

In ways he was, but he wasn't really an exception. He appointed the horrible Dulles brothers, and his administration was filled with people who owned stock in the United Fruit Company - the Dulles Brothers had created the company's land grab in Guatemala - and the administration overthrew democracy in Guatemala brutally to serve the company, among other corruption. The Iran coup was corrupt as well.

 

[Craig234]

This is somewhat related to my thread about how almost all the good big things government has done the last century have been by Democrats, usually with super-majorities.

 

[jnug]

What stands out to me that bonds these R debacles (Watergete, Iran/Contra, Iraq2 and Virtually the entire Bush43 Presidency, J6 failed coup) is the massive ABUSE OF POWER they represent. I was not only alive but an adult for all of them.

The highlight IMO of the Bush43 Presidency was electronic surveillance conducted on every American citizen with a computer or a smartphone by the NSA which does not have the authority to conduct ANYTHING on anybody domestically. Blithering IDIOT Bush43 and Dick Ashcroft I suspect talked into it by Dick Cheney, Alberto Gonzales, Admiral Haiden and Don Rumsfeld all of whom should be in jail RIGHT NOW. Why are they not?

Did we just grow numb to the idea of big name R's abusing their authorities? Was the giant list of modern day convicted R's just too much for us to bear? Notice if you will that while the events identified in the first paragraph all represent massive abuses of power they get worse from Watergate on to J6 failed coup). Honestly having lived all of them, Iran/Contra seems like kids playing with toys compared to the Bush43 Administration abuses and the J6 failed coup.

 

[Razoo]

Are today's republicans really just as corrupt as republicans from years gone by? I've been watching a few documentaries about both of them recently and the one thing that stands out, the lying. Before trump came along Reagan was the fire breathing mad cowboy out to destroy communism, that was his public face. Nixon too was going to put communism in its place until he went off the deep end seeing enemies everywhere, which oddly enough seems to have turned into a gop tradition. Anyway to keep the string intact W lied us into a war with Iraq over WMD's that didn't exist and yet republican voters over the years just keep voting republican even after finding out their leadership lies to them on huge scales. Why? How do you make these things ok in your minds?

Watergate set the pace for the FAKE GOP life of crime to this day. Reagan/Bush has multiple acts of crime going
on ............. Bush/Quale made a contribution, GW/Cheney definitely left a trail behind then comes Trump/Pence
and their paper trail which is deep.

 

[Razoo]

This sort of implicates Biden......

https://apjjf.org/-William-E.-Odom/2335/article.html

Strategic Errors of Monumental Proportions - What Can Be Done in Iraq?

Good afternoon, Senator Biden, and members of the committee. It is a grave responsibility to testify before you today because the issue, the war in Iraq, is of such monumental importance.

www.hudson.org

 

[Razoo]

PNAC POLICY OF WAR
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Project_for_the_New_American_Century

The more the USA government expands the policy of war the more irate the world becomes toward the USA government. Fortunately across the world others know the majority of the USA citizens do not support this policy.

However that does not stop the growing disdain for our government. This foreign policy of war deserves to be called in, put in the trash never to be seen again.

USA Radical Right Wing Libertarian foreign policy = more war = infiltration of the ALEC Right Wing Libertarian Front.

Bringing radical libertarians back to power brings back this very right wing imperialistic foreign policy position.


Meet PNAC:

"Rebuilding America's Defences," openly advocates for total global military domination” (Very dangerous position which threatens OUR freedoms and the nations security)

Our aim is to remind Americans of these lessons and to draw their consequences for today. Here are four consequences:

• we need to increase defense spending significantly if we are to carry out our global protection for Wal-Mart, Oil, Coca Cola, Pepsico, diamonds, gold etc etc etc

• we need to strengthen our ties to dictator regimes friendly to American interests and Bogus values;

• we need to promote the cause of the political right wing and economic rape for corp USA abroad;

• we need to accept responsibility for America's unique role in forcing others to accept our corrupt principles.

Such a war mongering policy of military strength and immoral clarity may not be fashionable today. But it is necessary if the United States is to build on the extortions of this past century and to ensure our security and our greatness no matter how many innocent USA soldiers and innocent mothers,children and fathers abroad die.


The Plan :

Strategic Errors of Monumental Proportions

http://www.antiwar.com/orig/odom.php?articleid=10396

http://www.antiwar.com/orig/stockbauer1.html

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Project_for_the_New_American_Century

 

[jnug]

This sort of implicates Biden......

https://apjjf.org/-William-E.-Odom/2335/article.html

Strategic Errors of Monumental Proportions - What Can Be Done in Iraq?

Good afternoon, Senator Biden, and members of the committee. It is a grave responsibility to testify before you today because the issue, the war in Iraq, is of such monumental importance.

www.hudson.org

Not really. The degree to which the Bush43 Administration pushed Iraq2 was beyond belief. Sent Powel to the UN to LIE about what we were doing. Sent Admin officials to the HILL to LIE through their teeth.

The administration holds all the cards. There is no Congressional CIA, NSA or DNI and the incentive to support a President making a case to go to war is great in this country. I view Biden as no more or less responsible than any other D that voted to go fight Iraq2......and that is a looooooooong list.

 

[Nickyjo]

What stands out to me that bonds these R debacles (Watergete, Iran/Contra, Iraq2 and Virtually the entire Bush43 Presidency, J6 failed coup) is the massive ABUSE OF POWER they represent. I was not only alive but an adult for all of them.

The highlight IMO of the Bush43 Presidency was electronic surveillance conducted on every American citizen with a computer or a smartphone by the NSA which does not have the authority to conduct ANYTHING on anybody domestically. Blithering IDIOT Bush43 and Dick Ashcroft I suspect talked into it by Dick Cheney, Alberto Gonzales, Admiral Haiden and Don Rumsfeld all of whom should be in jail RIGHT NOW. Why are they not?

Did we just grow numb to the idea of big name R's abusing their authorities? Was the giant list of modern day convicted R's just too much for us to bear? Notice if you will that while the events identified in the first paragraph all represent massive abuses of power they get worse from Watergate on to J6 failed coup). Honestly having lived all of them, Iran/Contra seems like kids playing with toys compared to the Bush43 Administration abuses and the J6 failed coup.

I think that for some time, going back to Joe McCarthy perhaps, there has been a minority part of the GOP that is identified as described in your post, one whose actions and rhetoric suggest everything from impatience with to scorn for the law and rational political discourse. There is the same on the left to be sure, but it is not present as much in the Democratic Party itself.

 

[Buckeyes85]

Watergate was blown way out of proportion and caught Nixon in the middle, so he did the right thing and resigned.

Iran-Contra was a whole different ballgame as President Reagan undoubtedly knew nothing about the details (plausible deniability). Blame Casey and to a much lesser extent - Oliver North, a true American hero, if you need a scapegoat.

And what about the conspiracy by the democrats re: Trump and Russian collusion hoax? Nothing tops that farce. Dems need to stop lying all of the time.

Wow, talk about drinking the Kool-Aid? You drank the whole jug.

 

[NWRatCon]

I think that for some time, going back to Joe McCarthy perhaps, there has been a minority part of the GOP that is identified as described in your post, one whose actions and rhetoric suggest everything from impatience with to scorn for the law and rational political discourse. There is the same on the left to be sure, but it is not present as much in the Democratic Party itself.

I think that's an astute observation. Republicans like to graft onto the Democrats any left wing ideologues, but sometimes they reach pretty far to do so - Venezuela, really? Ilhan Omar, and AOC are favorite targets, but if you look at their actual positions, they are pretty mainstream.

But if you look across the aisle, you find plenty of wingnuts, many in positions of influence. Tuberville, Gosar, Boebert, Greene, Jordan, Comer.. it's a long list.

I've mentioned before I was alive during Watergate, supported Ford and Bush, Sr., but realized that the cover-up of Watergate started a trend in the GOP that is now a policy plank - indeed, the only clear priority. Trump was inevitable, as were Greene and Santos. How long was King allowed to serve? There must y isn't a comparison any more.

 

[jnug]

I think that for some time, going back to Joe McCarthy perhaps, there has been a minority part of the GOP that is identified as described in your post, one whose actions and rhetoric suggest everything from impatience with to scorn for the law and rational political discourse. There is the same on the left to be sure, but it is not present as much in the Democratic Party itself.

True, but Joe McCarthy and his following was clearly not as dangerous and his ilk did not even scratch the surface of the scope and scale of integration into the GOP these loons have achieved today. If McCarthy could have found a few of his Commies in the US Government he would have died a happy man. A coup designed to take down the Republic and replace it with God knows what was entirely beyond his scope of imagination.

 

[Craig234]

I think that for some time, going back to Joe McCarthy perhaps, there has been a minority part of the GOP that is identified as described in your post, one whose actions and rhetoric suggest everything from impatience with to scorn for the law and rational political discourse. There is the same on the left to be sure, but it is not present as much in the Democratic Party itself.

It goes back further, the Republican Party was split in the 1952 election similarly.

 

[Nickyjo]

T

It goes back further, the Republican Party was split in the 1952 election similarly.

To be fair, democrats had Dixiecrats, that starting to end in the 1950s, and gone after Goldwater won the South for the GOP.

 

[Craig234]

To be fair, democrats had Dixiecrats, that starting to end in the 1950s, and gone after Goldwater won the South for the GOP.

That's right, Republicans had the Taft/Goldwater side, Democrats had the Dixiecrats and a few 'conservative Democrats'.

 

[NWRatCon]

That's right, Republicans had the Taft/Goldwater side, Democrats had the Dixiecrats and a few 'conservative Democrats'.

Remember the "Rockerfeller Republicans"?

Neither do they.

 

[Craig234]

Remember the "Rockerfeller Republicans"?

Neither do they.

Yes, I do.

They seemed to go extinct abut 1981.