Republicans after Eisenhower just can’t seem to win the presidency without great wrongs.
(Eisenhower won without scandal by him (Nixon, his VP, had the scandal), but wasted no time approving the disastrous coup against the Iranian government that led to the hostage crisis in 1979.)
Putting aside things like Nixon's mob funding, he knew the key to his election was the public's opposition to the Vietnam war.
He made every effort to take advantage of Hubert Humphrey’s limitations as Vice-President in opposing it, just as JFK had taken advantage of Nixon’s as VP regarding saber-rattling on Cuba.
But that’s not the worst, the treason is that as LBJ spent the last year of his presidency, after deciding not to run, trying to end the war, Nixon contacted the South Vietnamese government secretly and offered them to do more for them than LBJ, if they’d agree to refuse any peace agreement, and they did.
George W. Bush’s brother in Florida’s actions are pretty bad as well.
The third Republican to take the presidency from Democrats since Eisenhower is, of course, Reagan, and that involves the Iranian hostages.
Thanks to our excellent media, probably the most politically impacting issue of the election was the Iranian hostage crisis.
We know that President Carter worked for a year to negotiate their release, but they were not released until minutes after Ronald Reagan was sworn in.
The narrative for that Republicans like is that Reagan was ‘strong’ and so the Iranians knew they had better not keep the hostages with him in office. This is false.
It’s always been very suspicious that there was some skullduggery — the first time I’ve ever had a chance to use that word, I think — with his Vice-President the former head of the CIA.
But I only just learned of some of the investigate results that strongly established it — Republicans meeting with Iranians and promising money, weapons, and more for their cooperation. And that meant Iran refusing any deal to release the hostages with the Carter administration. An eerie echo of Nixon’s treason complete with moles in Carters government and more.
Note, we don’t have any information on whether Reagan knew of these activities during the campaign. A top investigator in the video below suspect he did not, then.
His empowering people but not necessarily being informed of all of their actions would help explain perhaps the most bizarre statement ever made by a president addressing the nation:
“A few months ago I told the American people I did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best intentions still tell me that's true, but the facts and the evidence tell me it is not.”
Of course, George H. W. Bush pardoning top administration figures convicted of crimes in Iran-Contra is a large stain.
Following is a link to a forum with very good information on these findings.
I’m sure others who have followed this more closely can add more. But I think it’s very valuable for our country to learn and remember this history.
It’s yet more reasons to oppose the Republicans.