Frisky.com offers a comparison/score of sex scandals between democrats and republicans. The low score wins (see Frisky.com for the details).
Final score: Republicans 67 and Democrats 75
Next, Kickin’ the Darkness.com says, “It’s easy to find Democrats in sex scandals, and Republicans in financial ones, but there just seems to be a party-dependent bias in the nature of scandals… Those principles to which a party most strongly clings seem to also be the ones on which their weaker members seem most likely to stumble.”
However, Salem News.com said, “Republican Sex Scandals Dwarf Those of Democrats (if you click on the link and scroll down, you will see a long detailed list of republicans and their sex scandals) in the last decade…” and Nerve.com claims, “Republican sex scandals outnumber Democrat sex scandals two to one…”
Then the Washington Monthly reported, “As a rule, when a high-profile U.S. senator is facing a criminal investigation, the media shows at least some interest. When that investigation involves sex, the media tends to show quite a bit of interest… Here we have John Ensign, a ‘family values’ conservative Republican, who had an extra-marital sexual relationship with his friend’s wife, while condemning others’ moral failings. Ensign’s parents offered to pay hush-money. He ignored ethics laws and tried to use his office to arrange lobbying jobs for his mistress’ husband. The likelihood of Ensign being indicted seems fairly high… And yet, there’s no media frenzy. No reporters staked out in front of Ensign’s home. No op-eds speculating about the need for Ensign to resign in disgrace. Instead, the media’s fascinated with Charlie Rangel.”
United States: A Long History of Political Corruption
Then from a known conservative media source, Fox Business.com listed America’s Most Corrupt States in March 2012, and the top eight are listed below.
Taking it further, I researched each of these states to see which political party the governor belonged to and which party held the majority in both houses of each state legislature, which Fox did not do.
The most corrupt states in America according to Fox Business.com:
8. Michigan — Republican governor and both houses controlled by the GOP
7. North Dakota — Republican governor and both houses controlled by the GOP
6. South Carolina — Republican governor and both houses controlled by the GOP
5. Maine — Republican governor and both houses controlled by the GOP
4. Virginia — Republican governor and both houses controlled by the GOP
3. Wyoming — Republican governor and both houses controlled by the GOP
2. South Dakota — Republican governor and both houses controlled by the GOP
1. Georgia — Republican governor and both houses controlled by the GOP
According to Fox, states with stagnant political environments often encourage corruption. Governments with high levels of corruption tend to have a political party—either the Democrats or Republicans—in power for too long. The states that have had a “machine” in place for a long time often tend to be the most corrupt. Machines tend to want to protect themselves.
It would seem from this Fox Business.com report, that there isn’t much of a difference between the US and China—in fact, many in China complain of corruption but most believe it takes place at the provincial or city level and that the national leaders in Beijing are honest. The difference is that corruption and scandals in the US often start at the state level and lead to Washington D.C. and even, at times, the White House.
Continued August 1, 2012 in The real “INFAMOUS” role model of scandals and corruption – Part 3 or return to Part 1
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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of The Concubine Saga. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. This is the love story Sir Robert Hart did not want the world to discover.
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[…] Information on the eight most politically corrupt states in America came from two sources: Fox Business.com (a known conservative media corporation) and iLook China.net. […]
Surprisingly, most of the states that received high marks have big governments with long histories of corruption and political machinery. Connecticut and California fit this description. New Jersey, where it seems former and current officials are indicted every year on ethics charges, received the highest grade in the country. Despite its colorful political past and present, New Jersey received a perfect score in areas such as lobbying disclosure and internal auditing. According to the report, the reason states with historical problems with corruption now have high accountability scores is precisely because of their former offenses. Those past problems led to strict enforcement measures that have kept politicians honest and information readily available.
Interesting. From what I recall of the piece, the FOX list of the top-eight most corrupt states comes from more recent data on political corruption cases. To be clear, FOX never says that the governments in those states are all controlled by the GOP from the governor on down. All FOX did was report that these states, according to the data comparing all fifty states are the most corrupt. I had to dig deeper to find out the political majorities in each state and was surprised to discover that all eight were totally controlled by Republican majorities. I did not expect that.
If you read this one, you may be interested in a new post I scheduled to appear on one of my other Blogs on August 22, 2012 comparing conservatives to liberals using a completely different method of comparison I’m sure no one has done before.
http://lloydlofthouse.org/anything-goes-a-blog/
I see that you mention Connecticut and California — both vote Democratic in Presidential Elections. Your insinuation is that these states are controlled by corruption and a political machine. While this may be true at a city level, I disagree that these alleged machines could control the complex federal and state legal system to the point that they would squelch all corruption and cover it up.
This alleges that the Democratic Party in California and Connecticut are machines that control the state as if they were a crime mob. However, that cannot be the case.
In California, the Assembly has 52 elected Democrats and 27 Republicans while in the Senate there are 25 Democrats and 15 Republicans. In Connecticut, the Assembly is 99 to 52 and in the Senate 22 to 14 with the majority Democrats in both houses.
You may ask, why can’t that be the case? Good question. It cannot be the case because there are still elected Republicans in both houses and if there was that level of corruption, I doubt that those politicians would keep quiet. In addition, in California, of the last five governors (1975 – 2012), three were Republicans and only two were Democrats. To control the state totally, one Party would have to dominate both Houses of the Legislature and the governor as the top eight most corrupted states are dominated by GOP political candidates.
For a political machine to be successful, it must control both houses of the legislature, the courts and the position of governor. As for the courts, since governors often appoint some judges for life, that means both Republican and Democratic governors would have appointed many of the judges in each state meaning a diverse political representation at the legal level.
When we check out Connecticut, the same situation may be found. If we go back to 1975, of the seven governors that served in that state during that period, three were Republicans and three were Democrats and one was from an independent party.
Since you brought up California, Connecticut and New Jersey inferring they may be more corrupt that the eight states dominated by the Republican Party that earned the title Most Corrupt, let us compare them (Note: although Democrats hold every major political position in California and the majority in both houses of the State Legislature, the Superior Court of California, the highest court in the States has six Republican judges and one Democrat).
Michigan: Since 1969, this state has had three Republican governors and two Democratic ones. The state Senate has been dominated by the Republican Party since 1984 but the state house has shifted several times in favor of Democrats.
North Dakota: Republicans have dominated the State Senate since 1996, the State House since 1885 and the Governor’s post since 1993; the Attorney General has been the same Republican since 2004. In fact, every major political position but one is held by a Republican.
South Carolina: Every major political position in the estate is held by a Republican. Since 2003, the state has had a Republican Governor and the Attorney General has been a Republican since 1995. Both houses of the State Legislature are overwhelmingly Republican: Senate 27R – 19D; House 75R – 48D.
Main: Votes for Democratic Presidential candidates but the Governor is a Republican and State Legislature is dominated by Republicans.
Virginia: The Governor is a Republican and so is the Attorney General. In addition, the State Senate is split 20R – 20D but the State House is 67R – 32D with 1 independent.
Wyoming: Every major political position is held by a Republican and the State Legislature is dominated by Republicans – Senate 26R -4D; House 50R – 10D. Except for one Democratic governor (it must have been lonely and difficult) it has been this way since 1995.
South Dakota: Since 1979 the Governor has been a Repbulican; since 1975, the Attorney General has been a Republican; Since 1976, both house of the State Legislature has been controlled by the Republican Party except for the State Senate in 1993 – 1994: today the State Senate is 30R – 5D and the House is 50R, 19D and one Independent.
Georgia: Every major political position in the state is held by a Republican and the GOP holds the majority in the State Senate: 35R – 21D; State House 116R – 63D and 1 independent. However, before the 2008 Presidential election, Democrats held much powerful political position in the state. Since President Obama was elected, the shift away from the Democratic Party has been complete.
Then we have the State Integrity Investigation that was released March 19, 2012. This investigation ranked all 50 state governments for corruptibility. Source: The Center for Public Integrity
http://www.stateintegrity.org/investigation_ranks_50_state_governments_for_corruptibility
Only 5 stares earned a B grade
19 states received a C
18 got a D
Eight states received failing grades of 59 or below from the Project. Those eight states are listed above and are the ones Fox.com reported (all eight are dominated by the Republican Party)
However, the top five were (four of the top five were controlled by the Democratic Party—Blue— and one was controlled by the Republican Party—Red)
New Jersey earned a B+ (87) a Blue State
Connecticut earned a B (86) a Blue State
California earned a B- (81) a Blue State
Washington earned a B- (81) a Blue State
Nebraska earned a B- (80) a Red State
The Center for Public Integrity says, Washington, DC – March 19, 2012 – “State governments are largely doing a poor job delivering transparency and accountability to their citizenry. Meanwhile, statehouses remain ripe for corruption and self-dealing. This is the discouraging picture that emerges from the State Integrity Investigation, a first-of-its-kind, data-driven assessment of transparency, accountability and anti-corruption mechanisms in all 50 states.
“In the ranking, not a single state received an A from the months-long probe, which is a collaboration of the Center for Public Integrity, Public Radio International and Global Integrity.”
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Then Free Thought Blogs.com reports that Republicans are more dishonest than Democrats.
http://freethoughtblogs.com/dispatches/2012/06/08/politifact-republicans-more-dishonest-than-democrats/
“One of Andrew Sullivan’s readers compiled the data on Politifact’s findings on most of the leading Republican and Democratic leaders and media pundits, as well as President Obama and Mitt Romney, and found that the Republicans are dishonest — especially highly dishonest — significantly more often than Democrats.
“Politifact offers six categories for claims made by politicians and pundits: true, mostly true, half true, mostly false, false and pants on fire. By nearly every measure, Republicans are found to be considerably more likely to be distorting the facts with their statements. Among all party leaders rated (Romney, Boehner, Mitch McConnell, Gingrich, Perry and Santorum for Republicans; Obama, Biden, Reid, Pelosi, and Hillary Clinton for the Democrats), the Republicans are more than 4 times more likely to be rated “pants on fire” (and that isn’t even including Michele Bachmann, who averages about one such statement per day). Democrats are higher on all the true-ish categories and lower on all the false-ish categories.”
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