How bad did Democrats abuse their power when they were in control ?

[kentuck]

I have heard comments lately that the Repubs are doing some of the same things the Democrats did when they were in power? I suppose it all depends on whose ox is getting gored, but I do not recall the same degree of tyranny now at play in the House and Senate. There was some bi-partisanship. Now there is none. Perhaps I am wrong?

[Nite Owl]

1. I don't recall it being anything like

these repukes at all. Wasn't Jim Wright taken down by the ethics committee? Now there is no more viable ethics committee. The repukes were always making a stink over something and the dems usually compromised. That's what I remember anyway.

[Vickers]

2. Well, the Little Baby Jesus said, "Two wrongs make a right"

so I guess it's all OK.
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Oh wait, Jesus could never be that fucking stupid.

[Cats Against Frist]

11. Hey -- that was going to be my exact reply!!!

:thumbsup: :hi:

[Vickers]

18. My dear, you have a sick mind!

:pals:

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

3. Not nearly to the same degree.

No doubt, abuses did take place, but we were never as fascist as these assholes are.

[BurgherHoldtheLies]

4. Even if it were true...

My response would be the same as it would to my young children using this excuse, "Two wrongs do not make a right."

Also, I really don't remember the Democrats flaunting their power in such a repulsive, antagonistic manner. Tip O'Neil and Ronald Reagan could fight bitterly over a piece of legislation, but at the end of the day, they could work towards fair compromise. (Don't flame me for the Reagan analogy...I'm simply bringing up the bipartisan relationship)

[Montauk6]

5. Oh well, just ask actor Michael Moriarty...

He was SO OUTRAGED at the fascism of Janet Reno, spooked by the idea of her practically storming down his bedroom door, that he walked away from a steady gig with NBC's Law & Order and fled to Canada where he had hoped, by forming his own political party, hoped to take over and turn the Great White North into Galt's Gulch.

Interestingly, we haven't heard a peep out of him since the BFEE took over (even the occasional arrests for barroom brawling died down). Maybe someone convinced him to take his meds.

And let's not forget how Bill and Hillary used the presidency to kill everybody in Arkansas and how the administration staged cocaine-fueled orgies and cocaine parties.

We KNOW it's true because Jerry Falwell so. And godly men don't lie. <sardonicism off>

[ReadTomPaine]

9. Are you serious!

That's quite a tale about MM, esp considering Ben Stone's character.

RTP

[Montauk6]

12. OOPS!!! I stand corrected!!!!

Mikey's still at it (as of late 2004):

http://www.american-partisan.com/cols/2004/moriarty/qtr4/1021.htm

[Montauk6]

13. In fact, MM is STILL BATTLING THE 'CLINTONISTAS'

From the current issue of Enter Stage Right (emphasis mine):

Meanwhile, on the other side of the Atlantic lies the American contingent of Socialist Career-lovers. Unfortunately, compared to Bill and Hilary Clinton, they really are rank amateurs. At least Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the president who introduced the Socialist panacea to the United States, had "old money," which the Radical Chic of American literati have always admired, to bolster his credentials. Traditional elitists and federalists like Alexander Hamilton paved FDR's way to the Oval Office.

So, in my own humble opinion as a momentarily reformed drunk from Detroit, I see no American politician on a par with the giants of Euro-Russian history, except for William Jefferson Clinton, who remains Socialism's greatest and most successful careerist. That this gentleman's Christian credentials are hypocritical is an understatement. However, a new category of the circles of hell must be added to Dante's design in The Divine Comedy. The lowest a soul can go in the Inferno is hypocrisy. I believe careerism outdoes hypocrisy. Why? I will tell you in a future editorial entitled The American Eric Dorf. (Dorf was the Nazi careerist I portrayed in Holocaust.)

I'm still looking for SOME comment from him on the BFEE (y'know, hoaxed war, Patriot Act, such and such). Nothing so far...

[ReadTomPaine]

14. I'm stunned - thanks for the info.

Much appreciated. It's like a mental illness for these types, isn't it?

On edit - He must have bit his lip dozens of times filming early Law and Order episodes as his character often had very progressive dialog and viewpoints, I'm surprised he agreed to do the part at all give his outspoken conservative outlook. He's a better actor than I thought.

RTP

[TreasonousBastard]

6. Nothing like this at all...

back in the old days, Dole and Kerrey could fight like cats and dogs over issues on the Senate floor, but have a beer later that night and laugh about it. No more-- the atmosphere has been poisoned, and it's the new Republicans that did it, not the old guard, which has been purged or marginalized.

Old-time Democrats, when they ran the House, all came from a long line of local party hacks who knew that you couldn't have it all, and at least threw bones to the opposition. Compromise was the order of the day, and there were those issues you could agree on. Sure, Republicans always bitched and moaned that they didn't get what they wanted, but they got enough to keep them reasonably satisfied. You never get all you want, after all.

[zbdent]

7. I don't remember the Dems calling the police

because someone was in the library . . .

[Dyedinthewoolliberal]

8. Tha answer if simple.....

the Dems didn't share the money they stole with the rePubs! So now the Pubs gotta get their share of looting the public treasury in tribute to an American tradition dating back to the Revolutionary War.
What, me cynical? :evilfrown:

[ReadTomPaine]

10. In the Huey Long thread, yesterday, there was some discussion of this..

LBJ's near dictatorial powers were cited during his tenure. Your mileage may vary.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x1731526

RTP

[seabeyond]

15. not true not true. not factually true

i am not going thru all the things repugs are doing now the dems absolutely didnt do. but a glaring one was when committees were working on stuff, the majority didnt keep the minority out of the meetings for one.

it is unheard of what repugs are doing

[Yupster]

16. I think there's a lesson in it

For years the congress was run by the Democratic leadership, and the Republican leadership were guys like Bob Michel who pretty much got along, but didn't get much done or make much of a fuss.

There was a younger group of Republicans led by Gingrich who didn't appreciate the get along ways of the leadership which seemed to accept losing on everything and then slapping backs.

They led an insurection inside the party, and threw out the leadership.

It was the young radical group which organized the successful takeover of congress.

There were abuses that they pointed out and took advantage of. Most were of the petty corruption type. Stuff like the House banking scandal and the Rostenkowski affair.

One policy that did bug them was the proxy system in committees though. There would be 10 D's and 8 R's on a committee. Showing up at the meeting would be 7 R's and 1 D. But the one D held the proxy votes for the other 9 D's. So every amendment vote had seven yes votes and then the one D would vote no 10 times for the absent D's.

The R's changed that, and got some benefit out of changing other nondemocratic rules, but it seems like after 10 years in power, they're slipping into the same kind of arrogant power grabs.

I think if a younger group of D leadership could overthrow the old guard, the R's are pretty ripe for the pickings.

Maybe Dean is it.

[noonwitch]

17. So badly that the GOP had to prosecute Clinton to get even

1. The Dems took down a president who was a crook.
2. The Dems wouldn't fund a bunch of drug dealers posing as "freedom fighters" in Nicaragua. They also opposed selling weapons to terrorists (you know, the ones who held our diplomats hostage and funded the guys who blew up our marines in Beiruit, and are now part of the Axis of Evil) to raise the funds that they wouldn't vote for the same drug dealing nun-murderers.
3. The Dems (specifically Carl Levin) had a problem with the military wasting $900 per toilet seat for planes, among other military overcharges, during the Reagan administration.
4. The Dems kept Bork off the high court (thank God!).

[Stinky The Clown]

19. Whoever is in power tends to be heavy handed ... but .....

our side, on our most criminally insane day, was never as bad as these fuckers on their most ecumenical day.