What are some good things Republicans have done?

[yvr girl]

They weren't all as evil as the current crop...

-If I remember my wee bit of American History correctly, Lincoln was a member of the GOP so the Emancipation Proclamation counts.

-Betty Ford did a lot to take substance abuse out of the shadows and she did a tremendous amount for breast cancer awareness as well.

_____

You may ask why I started this topic. It's not to praise them necessarily, just to humanize people who have voted for them. I think it's easier to bring them onside if you understand them a bit.

[noahmijo]

1. They've been the source of a great number of laughs

I seriously have never laughed so hard as I have in the last 5 years......but I needed the laughs to combat the anger and sadness of the last 5 years...

[slybacon9]

2. The current administration is not Republican

just like it is not Christian.


and anyone who supports it is brainwashed or making a huge profit.

[buff2]

3. Ummmmm........let's see......

[SnowGoose]

4. Nixon started the EPA, IIRC.

n/t

[japple]

11. and the Legal Services Corporation

to provide civil legal representation for the poor. Then Reagan tried his best to axe them. I quit working for Legal Services in 1987, but they are still going....

[Ignacio Upton]

5. There are only a handfull of good Republicans in history

I will list some of them right now:

Abraham Lincoln
Theodore Roosevelt
Bob La Follette
Hiram Johnson
Dwight Eisenhower
Susan B. Anthony (she tried voting Republican in her attempt to vote against the power of the authorities.)

[mikeiddy]

24. Don't forget Jeanette Rankin

[elfin]

6. Actually - Nixon

established the EPA, inner city enterprise zones, China trip to begin opening dialogue - Ike started supporting Civil Rights early plus Interstate Highway Act to namne a few.

Without his criminal paranoia, Nixon was a centrist and had some innovative thinking about our nation and the world (except for a biggie - Viet Nam).

[eglide]

7. The Civil Rights act

and the Voting Rights act were both filibustered by Senate Democrats (Senator Fulbright from Arkansas and Senator Byrd from West Va.) but the filibusters were broken with Repub. votes and support from LBJ when he was President.

[Ignacio Upton]

36. I'm just glad that Byrd is no longer on their side

Unlike Strom Thurmond, Trent Lott, Jesse Helms, Phil Gramm, and all those Dixiecrats who became Republicnas.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

49. Everett Dirksen would be a Democrat today

The Republicans from the north who joined with northern Democrats in passing the Civil Rights legislation in the mid '60s were old timers and would be seen as moderates today. Of course there are no moderates tolerated in the GOP so they probably would have joined the Democratic party.

[Lubernaut]

8. The Aquaducts.

Wait, wrong empire.

[notadmblnd]

9. thinking.... thinking.... thinking......

.......nope, can't think of a thing

oh, and I just learned that long subjects require periodic spaces

[Ian David]

10. Some of them died recently. E.g. William Rehnquist and Strom Thurmond.

That was nice of them.

[politicaholic]

12. They combined their super powers to save New Orleans right?

and then all of the rich people took their tax break money spread it accross the land creating a blockaid against poverty and affordable health care for everyone.

Then my dog said to me...

[Name removed]

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[MN ChimpH8R]

15. TR also pushed for antitrust laws

too bad modern repukes don't believe in enforcing them.

[Name removed]

17. Deleted message

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[Spider Jerusalem]

20. Sure they are.

He was a crazed imperialist who thought military might was an excellent way to resolve international questions, too. And he loved war with a passion that can't be described as sane. I've actually seen TR described as a "proto-neoconservative".

[Greyhound]

45. He did wonderful things and was reviled as a class traitor.

He was supposed to get in and push their agenda just like shrub did.

[Chan790]

14. Teddy Roosevelt.

too much to list.

For just one facet, which I have outlined below, you wouldn't be too far off to call him the most "Green" president we ever had.

The short list:
-Passed first food-safety laws regulating meatpacking and food production, including livestock care.
-Created the National Park Service and entrusted it with environmental protection powers that were later spun-off into the creation of the EPA by Nixon.
-Spoke publicly for Conservation. (First President to do so.)
-Was influenced by Emerson and Thoreau and the theory of naturalism, thrusting these previously philosophical theories into the political discourse. Without this there probably is no Green party or Green movement.

[Ikonoklast]

22. Also fomented a false war

of "Liberation" in a foreign sovereign state to steal the land from Columbia for the Panama Canal.

Yes, just like today. Same bullshit, national interest, blah blah, ultimatum, blah, blah, the people were oppressed, they wanted us there, good for the world, etc., all the same GODDAM LIES.

Panama was STOLEN from the country that it belongs to. We created it. Read some history. Roosevelt is no saint.

[La Coliniere]

35. I agree to a point about TR

foreign policy nightmare, domestic policy progressive. Hell of an interesting character to read about however. Kind of like LBJ.

[Ignacio Upton]

37. It was, but Panamanians also wanted to break away

Otherwise there would not have been a revolt against the Columbians. It was still wrong though, and we should have made a better deal with the Columbian Senate to build it instead of instigating the uprising.

[Spider Jerusalem]

16. Actually, the Emancipation Proclamation doesn't count.

It was a move of political expediency that didn't actually DO anything. Lincoln freed the slaves in "those states still in rebellion on January 1, 1863", NOT in those territories actually under the control of the US government. As far as that goes, Thaddeus Stevens and Charles Sumner were two Republicans who were both much more progressive and effective on issues of race and slavery than Lincoln was. (Stevens was instrumental in getting the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution through Congress.)

[Walt Starr]

21. The political expediency probably won the war

as it was enough to keep Britain and France from joining the war on the side of the South.

And that was only made possible by the victory at Antietem Creek, which was only possible because of three cigars wrapped in a piece of paper found by a Union soldier.

[Ignacio Upton]

40. Portions of the New Deal were also through political expediency

The Wagner Act and the creation of the FDIC for example, but that doesn't mean that Roosevelt shouldn't get any credit for making them law. Same with Lincoln and the Emancipation Proclaimation. He should still get credit for freeing the slaves, even if it was for military reason.

[Spider Jerusalem]

42. But he didn't free the slaves.

Not in the US (the Emancipation Proclamation only applied to states in rebellion, NOT to Maryland, Delaware, Kentucky, or West Virginia), nor in the Confederacy (over which he had no authority at the time anyway).

[Ignacio Upton]

46. He couldn't because it was not in the Constitution

And he couldn't afford to alienate border states at the time. Can you image the Union winning the war if Maryland, Kentucky, Missouri, and Delaware (yes they had slaves) had seceeded?

[warrens]

18. Many have died....

[oregonindy]

19. dont alienate the republicans its the neo-cons of all stripes

that need to be taken out.

along with every single member of the culture of corruption.


its us (the american people) vs the culture of corruption (unlawful government officials)

[slackmaster]

23. One of them gave birth to me

And raised me into a decent adult who can think for himself.

[MN ChimpH8R]

25. Eisenhower was the first to warn us

in no uncertain terms of the dangers posed by the "military-industrial complex" and its effect on politics. Those were perhaps the most prescient words ever spoken by a late 20th century President. Were he alive, Ike would be so furious with the neo-cons and proto-fascists that his head would explode. He saw the results of this ideology in action up close and personally.

[The Stranger]

28. Beat me to it.

Ike was the last Republican before the party became a nest of thieves and criminals.

[Ignacio Upton]

39. Ike would be a Democrat today

He almost ran as one in 1952 until the Republicans drafted him.

[Enraged_Ape]

47. That was when "conservative" meant "one who conserves"

The Republican party we have today is a clown-show, Bizarro-world, twisted, depraved, perverted parody of the Republican party of old. There is nothing "conservative" about the conservatives of today. Since Ike left office, the GOP has contorted and twisted itself into an alien monster, he11-bent on destroying the middle-class and poor in this country and making us beholden to the same ubercorporate monsters that control the rest of the world.

We were once a country of mavericks. We once held ourselves to a much higher standard. Those days, sadly, are gone.

[blindpig]

26. Endangered Species Act

In my most disturbed nightmares I never thought I'd think well of Nixon. He was a damned monster but at least there was something human about him. The current crowd are demented space alien invaders.

[journalist3072]

27. Yesterday.....

Republicans and Democrats came together to scrub the Republican's original plans to take money away from the food stamp program.

I honestly thought this was a good example that when they really try, Congress can come together to do the right thing.

It made no sense for them to cut the food stamp program at a time when people might need it the most (i.e. those trying to get back on their feet from Katrina).

[mopinko]

29. nixon and agnew resigned

[Jamastiene]

30. Strom Thurmond did finally die. n/t

[WI_DEM]

31. The old guard Republican Party ceased to exist around 1980

with Reagan.

[bicentennial_baby]

32. Senator Proxmire

Made daily speeches on the floor of the Senate for years and years, lobbying for the ratification of the UN Genocide Convention

[trackfan]

43. I think Proxmire was a Democrat

even though he was best known for cost-cutting and the Golden Fleece Awards.

[MarsThe Cat]

33. when a few of them have committed hari kari-

i'll be better able to answer that question.

[Iris]

34. Well, since Betty Ford was not an elected official,

your second example doesn't really count. Who knows if she even really was (is?) a Republican?

[Ksec]

38. Outsourcing, dropping wages and benefits, corporate irresponsibility,

cut taxes to the top 1%, infrastructure in disrepair because of the tax cuts, deficits as far as the eye can see, union busting, ruination of non bias media. And those are the things they believe are GOOD !

[La Coliniere]

41. Merv Griffin

brought back Jeopardy.

[Enraged_Ape]

48. Ooooooooooohhhhhhhhh. (n/t)

[Greyhound]

44. Lincoln was more pragmatist than repug. Betty Ford wasn't elected.

The primary benefit they have provided was occasionally keeping the dems honest, a job that could have been filled by a real press corps.
OTOH the damage they have done throughout our history, would fill many, many pages just for the table of contents.

[drb]

50. All the dead ones have died. That's good! eom

nt

[shenmue]

51. Lincoln was good

I think.

That Emancipation Proclamation thing?

Good writing!