Crisis Papers: Collection of Bush/GOP Scandals

[Catchawave]

Here's a snip:

David Corn: 'Will Jackgate destroy the GOP?, DavidCorn.com, January 9, 2006
"With nervous Republicans angling to toss DeLay overboard, the indicted ex-House majority leader had not much choice but to jump before being unceremoniously shoved aside. But GOPers still have reason for fear for at least two reasons: 1. The Abramoff inquiry is big. 2. As big as the Abramoff probe is, it could extend far beyond the corrupt dealings of Jack Abramoff and his pals on Capitol HIll and K Street. My friend Karen Tumulty reports in this week's Time that Justice Department prosecutors are running a decent-sized investigation." (1/10)

Associated Press: Controversial Lobbyist Had Close Contact With Bush Team,
USA Today, January 7, 2006
"In President Bush's first 10 months, GOP fundraiser Jack Abramoff and his lobbying team logged nearly 200 contacts with the new administration as they pressed for friendly hires at federal agencies and sought to keep the Northern Mariana Islands exempt from the minimum wage and other laws, records show. The meetings between Abramoff's lobbying team and the administration ranged from Attorney General John Ashcroft to policy advisers in Vice President Dick Cheney's office, according to his lobbying firm billing records. ... The documents show his team also had extensive access to Bush administration officials, meeting with Cheney policy advisers Ron Christie and Stephen Ruhlen, Ashcroft at the Justice Department, White House intergovernmental affairs chief Ruben Barrales, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick, Deputy Interior Secretary Steven Griles and others." (See also Looking Back to Abramoff's Youth ) (1/10)

Jennifer Loven: Analysis: GOP woes don't end with DeLay, Associated Press, January 8, 2006
"Republicans worried about their party's future have succeeded in pushing embattled former Majority Leader Tom DeLay off the stage. Even so, the Republicans' election-year troubles are far from over. Need a reminder? President Bush, the titular head of the GOP, is waging an unpopular war in Iraq and presiding over a nation with lingering economic anxieties. He suffers from approval ratings around 40 percent - near record lows for his presidency. Questionable stock transactions by the top Republican in the Senate, Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee, are under investigation. A special prosecutor's probe continues into whether Bush administration officials outed a CIA operative in retribution for her husband's Iraq war criticism. A secret anti-terror program that Bush approved to eavesdrop on people inside the United States without warrants is raising concerns about overly broad presidential powers. Potentially most damaging is an influence-peddling scandal on Capitol Hill." (1/10)

E.J. Dionne, Jr.: The life of the party, Working for Change, January 6, 2006
"Over the last few days, politicians -- from President Bush and House Speaker Dennis Hastert on down -- raced to return Abramoff contributions, or compassionately sent the moolah off to charity. There's a scramble to treat him as a wildly defective gene in an otherwise healthy body politic, and to erase the past. But seeing the record of the past clearly is essential to fixing the future. Abramoff, who palled around with close Bush allies Grover Norquist and Ralph Reed in College Republicans and has been a central figure in the rise of Republican dominance in Washington, is not a lone wolf. He is a particularly egregious example of how the GOP's political-corporate-lobbying complex has overwhelmed the idealistic wing of the Republican Party. Scott McClellan, the White House press secretary, insisted on Wednesday that Bush does not know Abramoff personally. But the record makes clear that Abramoff was a loyal and serious player in Bush's circles." (1/10)

More, and all hyperlinks work here too:
http://www.crisispapers.org/topics/gop-scandals.htm