Political Corruption In America

Author : Sarah Chayes
Publisher : Vintage
ISBN 13 : 0525654860
Total Pages : 432 pages
Book Rating : 4.65/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book On Corruption in America written by Sarah Chayes and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2020-08-11 with total page 432 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the prizewinning journalist and internationally recognized expert on corruption in government networks throughout the world comes a major work that looks homeward to America, exploring the insidious, dangerous networks of corruption of our past, present, and precarious future. “If you want to save America, this might just be the most important book to read now." —Nancy MacLean, author of Democracy in Chains Sarah Chayes writes in her new book, that the United States is showing signs similar to some of the most corrupt countries in the world. Corruption, she argues, is an operating system of sophisticated networks in which government officials, key private-sector interests, and out-and-out criminals interweave. Their main objective: not to serve the public but to maximize returns for network members. In this unflinching exploration of corruption in America, Chayes exposes how corruption has thrived within our borders, from the titans of America's Gilded Age (Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, J. P. Morgan, et al.) to the collapse of the stock market in 1929, the Great Depression, and FDR's New Deal; from Joe Kennedy's years of banking, bootlegging, machine politics, and pursuit of infinite wealth to the deregulation of the Reagan Revolution--undermining this nation's proud middle class and union members. She then brings us up to the present as she shines a light on the Clinton policies of political favors and personal enrichment and documents Trump's hydra-headed network of corruption, which aimed to systematically undo the Constitution and our laws. Ultimately and most importantly, Chayes reveals how corrupt systems are organized, how they enable bad actors to bend the rules so their crimes are covered legally, how they overtly determine the shape of our government, and how they affect all levels of society, especially when the corruption is overlooked and downplayed by the rich and well-educated.

Author : Larry Sabato
Publisher : Crown
ISBN 13 : 9780812924992
Total Pages : 456 pages
Book Rating : 4.91/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Dirty Little Secrets written by Larry Sabato and published by Crown. This book was released on 1996 with total page 456 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Political corruption in America is worse today than it has been since the Watergate era. Americans know it, and the politicians have known it for years. Urgent calls for reform have become standard fare, but nothing changes. A Democrat President and a Republican Congress were both elected on the strength of their promises of reform. Neither has delivered. Americans contemplate the tottering remains of our ethically bankrupt political system with despair. Fact: The Christian Coalition's 1994 voter guides appear to have been skewered to favor Republican candidates in key congressional races across the country, in direct contravention of federal election law. The truth is, the politicians couldn't be happier dickering over the remains of the welfare state. Because, as you'll learn in Dirty Little Secrets, there is probably not a politician in America who does not benefit directly, personally, and continually from the status quo. Fact: The state Democratic party in Tennessee paid sums in excess of six figures to a number of groups and organizations for various political services in 1994. The problem? None of the groups actually exist, except on paper. Our Politicians, from those in the highest reaches of the Republican and Democratic parties to those in the humblest state congressional districts, evade, massage, and even break the law in order to hold on to power. But instead of merely unmasking corrupt politicians in every region of the country, Dirty Little Secrets analyzes why corruption persists in American politics, despite scandal after scandal, and in spite of periodic bursts of reform. Fact: On the eve of the 1994 elections, mock "pollsters" called up thousand ofvoters in one Wisconsin congressional district to ask whether their electoral decisions would be influenced if they knew one of the candidates was a lesbian. Most politicians want to do the right thing. But they also want to be reelected, and the system is far stronger than any honest man or woman. The influence of money and the intricacies of the levers of power make it easier for politicians to ignore the law than to obey it. In Dirty Little Secrets you will read of the conservative movement's hidden manipulations in 1994, and learn the truth about Newt Gingrich's twenty-year program of political destabilization. The history of the corrupt House the Democrats built with the help of liberal interest groups stands revealed. And Larry J. Sabato and Glenn R. Simpson expose the corrupt and illegal tactics both parties have used for decades to protect and promote their own power. Fact: In 1994, in Alabama, one local election was decided by three hundred votes. Seventeen hundred ballots cast in that election were illegally admitted absentee ballots, some of them submitted by dead people. Sabato and Simpson's fresh reporting and thousands of hours of background research include interviews with influential politicians, consultants, and political operatives, Freedom of Information Act requests, and thousands of pages of obscure campaign reports. They prove corruption is not about bad apples or colorful local traditions. And they offer a completely original plan for reform--Deregulation Plus--that will frighten both parties and make the American electorate smile for the first time in years. Dirty Little Secrets pulls together the corruption story from all parts of the country sooverwhelmingly that no one--from the White House to your house--will be able to deny that political reform must be one of the key issues of the 1996 election campaign.

Author : Mark Twain
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 628 pages
Book Rating : 4.80/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book The Gilded Age written by Mark Twain and published by . This book was released on 1884 with total page 628 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : George Charles Sumner Benson
Publisher : Lexington, Mass. ; Toronto : Lexington Books
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 376 pages
Book Rating : 4.45/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Political Corruption in America written by George Charles Sumner Benson and published by Lexington, Mass. ; Toronto : Lexington Books. This book was released on 1978 with total page 376 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : Michael A. Genovese
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781604977738
Total Pages : 408 pages
Book Rating : 4.36/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Corruption and American Politics written by Michael A. Genovese and published by . This book was released on 2011-06-01 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: ..". this timely and fascinating book ... is a handbook for those interested in gaining perspective on the appearance of and actual corruption in the American system, and ... can be read cover to cover to great profit ... it will find its way into classrooms. Scholars will use it as a means to engage and extend many of its provocative findings. However it is used, the effort is well worth the time invested." - Presidential Studies Quarterly"This volume, edited by two well-respected professors of US politics, represents the fine effort of nearly a dozen scholars to tackle this challenging subject ... Several of the essays are especially illuminating ... an important contribution to the study of political corruption in the US. Recommended."- CHOICE

Author : Zephyr Teachout
Publisher : Harvard University Press
ISBN 13 : 0674050401
Total Pages : 385 pages
Book Rating : 4.02/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Corruption in America written by Zephyr Teachout and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2014-09-29 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Louis XVI presented Benjamin Franklin with a snuff box encrusted with diamonds and inset with the King’s portrait, the gift troubled Americans: it threatened to “corrupt” Franklin by clouding his judgment or altering his attitude toward the French in subtle psychological ways. This broad understanding of political corruption—rooted in ideals of civic virtue—was a driving force at the Constitutional Convention. For two centuries the framers’ ideas about corruption flourished in the courts, even in the absence of clear rules governing voters, civil officers, and elected officials. Should a law that was passed by a state legislature be overturned because half of its members were bribed? What kinds of lobbying activity were corrupt, and what kinds were legal? When does an implicit promise count as bribery? In the 1970s the U.S. Supreme Court began to narrow the definition of corruption, and the meaning has since changed dramatically. No case makes that clearer than Citizens United. In 2010, one of the most consequential Court decisions in American political history gave wealthy corporations the right to spend unlimited money to influence elections. Justice Anthony Kennedy's majority opinion treated corruption as nothing more than explicit bribery, a narrow conception later echoed by Chief Justice Roberts in deciding McCutcheon v. FEC in 2014. With unlimited spending transforming American politics for the worse, warns Zephyr Teachout, Citizens United and McCutcheon were not just bad law but bad history. If the American experiment in self-government is to have a future, then we must revive the traditional meaning of corruption and embrace an old ideal.

Author : Edward L. Glaeser
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 0226299597
Total Pages : 398 pages
Book Rating : 4.94/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Corruption and Reform written by Edward L. Glaeser and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2007-11-01 with total page 398 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Despite recent corporate scandals, the United States is among the world’s least corrupt nations. But in the nineteenth century, the degree of fraud and corruption in America approached that of today’s most corrupt developing nations, as municipal governments and robber barons alike found new ways to steal from taxpayers and swindle investors. In Corruption and Reform, contributors explore this shadowy period of United States history in search of better methods to fight corruption worldwide today. Contributors to this volume address the measurement and consequences of fraud and corruption and the forces that ultimately led to their decline within the United States. They show that various approaches to reducing corruption have met with success, such as deregulation, particularly “free banking,” in the 1830s. In the 1930s, corruption was kept in check when new federal bureaucracies replaced local administrations in doling out relief. Another deterrent to corruption was the independent press, which kept a watchful eye over government and business. These and other facets of American history analyzed in this volume make it indispensable as background for anyone interested in corruption today.

Author : Robert Clarkson Brooks
Publisher : Dodd
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 342 pages
Book Rating : 4.71/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Corruption in American Politics and Life written by Robert Clarkson Brooks and published by Dodd. This book was released on 1910 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : Jay Cost
Publisher : Encounter Books
ISBN 13 : 1594038686
Total Pages : 408 pages
Book Rating : 4.86/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book A Republic No More written by Jay Cost and published by Encounter Books. This book was released on 2016-07-12 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: After the Constitutional Convention, Benjamin Franklin was asked, “Well, Doctor, what have we got—a Republic or a Monarchy?” Franklin’s response: “A Republic—if you can keep it.” This book argues: we couldn’t keep it. A true republic privileges the common interest above the special interests. To do this, our Constitution established an elaborate system of checks and balances that disperses power among the branches of government, which it places in conflict with one another. The Framers believed that this would keep grasping, covetous factions from acquiring enough power to dominate government. Instead, only the people would rule. Proper institutional design is essential to this system. Each branch must manage responsibly the powers it is granted, as well as rebuke the other branches when they go astray. This is where subsequent generations have run into trouble: we have overloaded our government with more power than it can handle. The Constitution’s checks and balances have broken down because the institutions created in 1787 cannot exercise responsibly the powers of our sprawling, immense twenty-first-century government. The result is the triumph of special interests over the common interest. James Madison called this factionalism. We know it as political corruption. Corruption today is so widespread that our government is not really a republic, but rather a special interest democracy. Everybody may participate, yes, but the contours of public policy depend not so much on the common good, as on the push-and-pull of the various interest groups encamped in Washington, DC.

Author : Robert I. Rotberg
Publisher : Springer
ISBN 13 : 3319940570
Total Pages : 322 pages
Book Rating : 4.71/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Corruption in Latin America written by Robert I. Rotberg and published by Springer. This book was released on 2018-10-19 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is the newest and one of the very few existing examinations of the full nature of corruption throughout Central and South America. In detailed chapters written by experts with extensive in-country experience, it reveals the political and economic roots and consequences of corruption in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, and Peru. The editor’s introduction and conclusion texts synthesize their work and provides an over-arching view of corrupt practices and anti-corruption initiatives throughout Latin America. Corruption in Latin America shows the extent to which corrupt practices engulf each of the countries discussed, the involvement of political and corporate entities in the pursuit of ill-gotten gains, and the drag on development caused by corruption in each political entity. The book will be of interest for social scientists, political actors and social activists involved in the fight against corruption in Latin America by providing in-depth analyses of the topic and discussing how best to pursue anti-corruption efforts through civil society actions, judicial endeavors, legal shifts, or elections.