Do Politics and Crime Now Mix?

Something has happened to the political culture of this country which I don’t understand. Maybe it’s me. Maybe I’m just too old to appreciate how and why things change.

But maybe it’s something else. So, I’m going to try and describe what I think has happened and maybe some of you will drop me a line and help me understand, because right now I can’t figure it out at all.

Let me describe the situation by taking you back to 1958 and a scandal that broke in the White House involving Sherman Adams, who was Eisenhower’s Chief of Staff.

Adams had previously been Governor of New Hampshire, had also served a term in the House of Representatives, and was considered someone who really knew his way inside the Beltway, as well as being totally and completely in charge of the West Wing.

Adams was forced to resign when a media story broke that he had accepted a vicuna coat and an oriental rug from a Boston businessman who was doing business with the federal government but was charged with some possible violations of the federal code in his dealings with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC.)

The gifts to Adams were presumed to have been in return for Adams’s help in dealing with the FTC, although contacts between Adams and the federal agency were never shown to have actually occurred.