OT: A defense of historical truth is in order here, lest we make the mistake of not knowing our past and thereby repeating it.
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Is it true the Clinton administration was more scandalous than any of its predecessors? No.
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Presidential Scandals of the 20th Century
"Part of the purpose behind these quick blurbs summarizing these notorious abuses of power is to illustrate that events we've been hearing about [regarding the Clinton administration], even if true, are laughable in comparison (or even not in comparison) to the scandals mentioned below. As said in Crocodile Dundee, 'You call that a knife? .. Ah..that's a knife.'"
americanhistory.about.com
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Name a recent administration that was worse.
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The Reagan Years: How Soon We Forget Real Corruption
"Gleeful charges by Republicans that Whitewater is comparable to Watergate and that the Clinton Administration is more corrupt than any recent administration are ludicrous when compared to the actual record of corruption in the Reagan-Bush administration and when it is noted that the charges against Clinton result from goings-on in Arkansas long before he became President. With Reagan, scandals occurred while he was President.
"Pulitzer-prize winning journalist Haynes Johnson's book, Sleep-Walking Through History: America in the Reagan Years (1991, Doubleday), chronicles the U.S.'s fall from dominant world power to struggling debtor nation during the Reagan years.
Johnson says 'two types of problems typified the ethical misconduct cases of the Reagan years, and both had heavy consequences to citizens everywhere. One stemmed from ideology and deregulatory impulses run amok; the other, from classic corruption on a grand scale.'
‘By the end of his term, 138 administration officials had been convicted, had been 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.'
(P. 184).
Reagan's customary response to instances of wrongdoing by aides was to criticize those who brought the charges or to blame the media that reported them.
Three great scandals stained the Reagan record, and they all involved the age-old form of corruption formed by the connection between money and politics. What distinguished them in the Reagan years was the number of buyers and sellers involved, and the amount of money there was to be made. The sheer volume of both had multiplied beyond any previous measure. Nothing better illustrated the problem than a case that connected some of Reagan's closest
associates, a score of top government officials in several departments and agencies, and the kind of political corruption that extended back to the Washington of Grant and Harding: influence peddling, government contracts, cash, bribes, kickbacks, fraud and conspiracy. Before it was
ended, it had dragged Atty Gen. Meese, advisor Lyn Nofziger, and many others into the net; led to indictments, trials, and convictions; and besmirched the reputation of the Reagan
administration. It became known, popularly, as the Wedtech case."
us.net
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Why, then, do some people suppose the current administration was more scandal-ridden than others?
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How Great Was Ronald Reagan? A Symposium
"Forecasting history's judgment of a presidency is a tricky business. In addition to lacking the perspective that time alone can provide, we are impaired by two features that inhere in the office. The first of these is that the presidency is dual in character: the president is head of government, which is an administrative and managerial function, and he is also head of state, which is a ceremonial, ritualistic, and symbolic function. Our tendency is to judge the president, while he is in office, largely in terms of the latter, and therefore personality weighs heavily.
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The second feature arises from the lame-duck syndrome. During his first term, the president and the members of his party in Congress, looking forward to the support they can provide one another when seeking reelection, tend to cooperate effectively. After the president is reelected, the bond of reciprocal dependency is dissolved; and besides, the president, who is almost invariably returned to office by a greatly increased majority, tends to regard dealing with Congress as beneath his dignity. The president thus moves toward overseas adventuring, where his hands are relatively free, and congressmen of both parties are progressively estranged from him. At some point during his second term he becomes fair game for the most vicious attacks from politicians and press alike, and scandals (real and bogus) become commonplace. This is not something that began with the presidency of Ronald Reagan, or even with those of Richard Nixon and Lyndon Johnson. It is the fate suffered by George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, Theodore Roosevelt, and almost every other two-term president. But as time passes, the attacks are forgotten and the achievements (or failures) in foreign policy tend to determine the president's niche in history."
policyreview.com
The Reagan Years: How Soon We Forget Real Corruption
"In the years since Ronald Reagan left the White House, sufficient time has passed for congressional committees, journalistic exposes, and even criminal prosecutions to reveal a pattern of high-level corruption in Reagan's administration. Indeed, in his first term, forty-five presidential appointees resigned as a result of criminal or ethics investigations (Simon and Eitzen, 1986: 6-7). Revelations surrounding the arming of U.S.- backed guerrillas in Nicaragua, drug trafficking by these same "contras," arms shipments to the Middle East, government collusion with money laundering entities such as the Bank of Credit and Commerce and International (BCCI), and foreign policy decisions benefiting countries facilitating drug trafficking, particularly Panama and the Bahamas, heightened the perception of a "sleaze factor" in the Reagan administration. But, while the Reagan White House was clearly scandal-ridden, the underlying malignancy of that presidency has not been as clearly articulated. Information which has been developed in the many investigations of unethical and criminal activities in the Reagan presidency has with the passage of time and distance revealed a most disturbing fact. Ronald Reagan, the law and order, get-tough-with-criminals President, was from the inception of his Presidency in bed with organized crime."
policestudies.eku.edu
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How can history 'newbies' be so ignorant of their own nation's history? Here's a clue.
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Remembering The 1980s: The Press Slept While Reagan Rambled
by Jeff Cohen
"In her new book "Reporting Live," former CBS White House correspondent Lesley Stahl writes that she and other reporters suspected that Reagan was ‘sinking into senility' years before he left office. She writes that White House aides ‘covered up his condition'-- and journalists chose not to pursue it.
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The truth about relations between the press and presidency is that while some things have changed, much remains the same. What's changed is the willingness of mainstream journalists to unveil, even revile, the person of the President. With Reagan, relevant questions about his mental competence weren't even raised-- and a President being asleep at the wheel should be as newsworthy as a President sleeping around."
fair.org
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Want to know the facts instead of merely regurgitating unfounded gossip? For your election eve reading....
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Presidential Scandals
Hardbound: $99.00. 300 pages. October 1999. ISBN
1-56802-414-2.
"Presidential scandals are no recent phenomenon in the history of the United States. Though the headlines that continue to swirl around President Clinton have touched off a storm of controversy around the world, U.S. presidents for the past two hundred years have wrestled with scandal.
Now there is available a concise single-volume survey of presidential scandals in the United States that will help put the current controversy in perspective. The book looks at the behavior and public image of every president from George Washington to Bill Clinton."
store.yahoo.com |
