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Once Woodrow Wilson vacated the White House in 1921 the [Woodrow Wilson in Presidents office]

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place was packed with Republicans for the rest of the decade first up to bat

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was warren g harding who campaigned on the promise that he would bring a return

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to normalcy to america but what a normal mean to Warren G mandatory oatmeal for [Warren sitting at desk with oatmeal]

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all it meant a return to a government that was pro-business anti-tax and anti

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regulation well during World War one the federal government under Wilson had been

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all up in the business of big business so all the big business guys told Uncle [Big Business men approach Uncle Sam]

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Sam it was time for him to get out of their offices they figured they could do

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way better with that you know Uncle Sam cramping their style also it was just

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creepy to have some random old guy chilling in their space in a moment [Old man watching kid on computer]

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Harding's Treasury secretary mega wealthy financier Andrew Mellon actually

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cut income tax rates for the wealthiest Americans from the staggering 73 percent

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to 25 percent this created tons of capital and injected jet fuel into the [Cash falling and jet flys by]

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stock market and into new businesses helping the Jay Gatsby and Andrew Mellon

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to the world make good amounts of money and like the wealthy well they could [Man dressed in money in bedroom made of money]

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have built houses made of actual stacks of money just for fun that'd be great

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no doubt that helped create an economic boom in America but it also set the

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nation up for the economic bust of the Great Depression like money was just too [Girl celebrating with rain of coins]

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easy to borrow Harding absolutely hated the government regulation of business

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instituted under the progressive administrations of fellow Republicans

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like Teddy Roosevelt and cap will come about this course he loaded the federal

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regulatory agencies with officials plucked from the industries meant to be [People thrown into regulatory agencies]

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regulated yeah so the guys who are supposed to be monitoring certain

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industries were actually from those industries well they know the industry

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better than anyone else well many of these anti regulation regulators proved

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to be not only philosophically opposed to government regulation but sadly

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insanely corrupt under Harding's administration scandal tainted many

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departments of the government with the corrupt looting of public property [Man running through field with monopoly cards]

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costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars in the most infamous incident

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called the Teapot Dome scandal Harding's anti conservationists interior

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secretary accepted bribes of nearly half a million dollars from cronies in the [Men put stacks of cash on desk]

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oil industry this was his reward for giving away drilling rights in valuable

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federal oil reserves at teapot dome Wyoming and elk Hills California well

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this kind of out-of-control corruption has led today's historians to rank

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Harding pretty high on the worst presidents lift ever this was an

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impressive achievement and Harding only served three years of his term before [Harding stood by Worst Presidents list]

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dying of a stroke while on a speaking tour yet his circulatory system was

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corrupt too [Woman point to circulatory system]

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