From The Top A Smell Of Corruption
From The Top A Smell Of Corruption
Even Republican partisans cannot miss the overpowering rank smell of corruption that seems to be coming from the Bush White House and the upper ranks of the national Republican leadership. It is little wonder that fewer and fewer Americans are identifying themselves as supporters of the Republican Party.
The shear number of scandals that seem to link back to the highest reaches of the Bush White House is alarming. They are so numerous that a short article is insufficient to even list them much less accurately detail them. From the CIA Agent Outing Scandal to the firing of US Attorneys for not playing politics as prosecutors, links to George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Karl Rove are everywhere.
The scandals include large matters like the Cheney Energy Taskforce and lying to the American public to take us to war in Iraq. It goes into clearly illegal political matters like the jamming of Democratic phone lines to rig US Senate elections in New Hampshire. Often, the corruption is clearly financial like the billions of taxpayer dollars missing in Iraq or the questionable actions of Republicans in government like Paul Wolfowitz who used his position to get a raise of over $100,000 a year in taxpayer dollars for his girlfriend.
The corruption includes campaign funds and public policy. Trade deals that benefit large corporations but shaft taxpayers and American workers are key components of the Republican culture of corruption. Blocking universal, single-payer health care because of campaign donations is part of the corruption.
Making unionization of workers difficult or impossible is part of the Republican culture of corruption. It is little wonder that this corrupt White House is threatening to veto the Employee Free Choice Act. The right to unionize has been stripped from huge number of American workers including many nurses, graduate students and government employees.
Corruption has weakened worker safety and anti-pollution efforts. Ineffective enforcement of mine safety regulations may have been directly responsible for many recent deaths of American miners.
American elections are being impacted by the Republican culture of corruption. There has never been a effective, unbiased criminal investigation of Katherine Harris and the illegal fake felon purge in Florida just before the 2000 presidential election. This seemingly illegal activity is directly responsible for putting the Bush gang in charge of the federal government including law enforcement, prosecutors and court appointments.
The US Attorney firings are beginning to show the intense fear of the Bush Republican leadership over exposure to unbiased law enforcement. Hopefully, Americans now understand why the national Republican leadership has so aggressively sought to pack the courts with ideologically extreme, highly partisan judges.
We can all understand the Republican push for more and more government secrecy. We understand why Bush Republicans seem to push the idea that Bush Administration personnel should not testify under oath and in public. We now understand why the Bush Republicans seek powers to spy on American citizens including the media and political opponents.
The common thread tying all these factors together is the Republican culture of corruption. Citizens can expect investigations to be attacked by Republicans with charges of witch hunts and blocked at least temporarily by claims of executive privilege. The dam has broken. The flood cannot be stopped. Hopefully, with the help of American voters, the culture of corruption will finally be washed away.
Written by Stephen Crockett (co-host of Democratic Talk Radio http://DemocraticTalkRadio.com .) Mail: P.O. Box 283, Earleville, Maryland 21919. Phone: 443-907-2367. Email: [email protected] .
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