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Post by jdredd on Feb 5, 2011 16:18:16 GMT -5
The celebration of Reagan's 100th birthday is in full swing, and of course it is a good way for the GOP to propagandize for itself, since arguably he is the best postwar President we've had (not that that is saying much). Even libs are jumping on the Reagan bandwagon, 30 years after he took the oath. The only downside I see for the Republican Party is this: Build the guy into a god, and all your successive Presidential wannabees are going to seem like mere mortals. Plus, they really don't make them like they used to. None of the current crop of GOP hopefuls grew up in the times Reagan did, they all come from affluent and easy times.
But hey, if we Democrats (and I might change my party affiliation soon) had anyone of his reputation (how many people believe he ended the Cold War? Lots) we'd have all this hoopla too. Instead, all we've had in the last 40 years is Carter and Clinton. Ewwwwwww....it's a wonder we still have a Democrat party!
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Post by Tired in CV on Feb 6, 2011 4:11:06 GMT -5
The only downside I see for the Republican Party is this: Build the guy into a god, and all your successive Presidential wannabees are going to seem like mere mortals. Plus, they really don't make them like they used to. None of the current crop of GOP hopefuls grew up in the times Reagan did, they all come from affluent and easy times. Well, it is true we don't want to make him out to be a God. That seems to have happened with Roosevelt and the Democrats haven't had a decent president since! There was an opportunity with Kennedy but his term was ended short. Yet, as hard as some try, no Democrat since Kennedy could come close to him, let alone Roosevelt! Of course, few Democrats mention Roosevelt anymore. Their voters wouldn't know who he was and the few who do would remind them that Roosevelt and Reagan were Democrats together. i.e. Roosevelt was about where the left wing of the Republicans are now. As Reagan stated, "I didn't leave the Democrat Party, they left me!"
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Post by Tired in CV on Feb 6, 2011 16:51:04 GMT -5
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Post by jdredd on Aug 13, 2013 12:39:18 GMT -5
www.nytimes.com/pages/obituaries/index.html"William P. Clark, who as one of President Ronald Reagan’s most trusted advisers successfully nudged him toward more hard-line positions on military spending, arms control and involvement in Central America, died on Saturday at his ranch near Shandon, Calif. He was 81. During Reagan’s first term, Mr. Clark — who served as deputy secretary of state, national security adviser and secretary of the interior — was understood to be pre-eminent among presidential aides. Time magazine called him the second most powerful man in the White House. Some of his influence came from his deep knowledge of Reagan over the years. He realized that the president responded to visual aids, particularly films, more than written reports. So he showed him Defense Department films about the Soviet threat, the Middle East and other international issues in the White House theater, Lou Cannon reported in “President Reagan: The Role of a Lifetime” (1991)." Another Reaganite bites the big one. Why do I care? Sometimes I think the so-called "Greatest Generation" took sadistic pleasure in sticking it to young leftists during the eighties, so I am glad at every reminder that that era is getting farther and farther behind us. Yet it is also amusing to remember how simple-minded the Gipper was, which I suspect is really part of the reason he was popular with so many Americans.
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Post by jdredd on Aug 14, 2013 22:14:27 GMT -5
www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/14/mandatory-minimum-drug-sentences_n_3758418.html"Former Rep. E. Clay Shaw, Jr. (R-Fla.), an author of the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 that imposed mandatory minimum penalties for drug crimes, said during an Al Jazeera interview that Congress "may have overreacted" in passing the law. Shaw, who retired from Congress in 2007, said the bill was drafted at a time when crack cocaine "started popping up like crazy." He admitted he'd never heard of the drug before then, and noted that crack, at the time, was preferred by "the least affluent.""It's like welfare reform," Shaw said. "We looked at it as a rescue mission, not as a source of punishment." Now, Shaw said, it's time for the law to be reviewed." Well, DUH. Another evil legacy from the Reagan years.
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Post by Tired in CV on Aug 18, 2013 20:59:54 GMT -5
The Reagan legacy is under attack with the traitorous film, "The Butler" starring Hanoi Jane Fonda. It is no wonder that Hanoi Jane was picked to play Nancy Reagan as the whole theme for the movie is to destroy the Reagan administration and the conservatives. Just look at who is starring in the movie and who financed the movie. No, I will BOYCOTT that film. No Vietnam veteran would go to see it unless they developed the liberal disease that Michael Savage mentions.
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Post by jdredd on Aug 18, 2013 23:18:39 GMT -5
The Reagan legacy is under attack with the traitorous film, "The Butler" starring Hanoi Jane Fonda. It is no wonder that Hanoi Jane was picked to play Nancy Reagan as the whole theme for the movie is to destroy the Reagan administration and the conservatives. Just look at who is starring in the movie and who financed the movie. No, I will BOYCOTT that film. No Vietnam veteran would go to see it unless they developed the liberal disease that Michael Savage mentions. I don't intend to see the movie myself, if only because it looks STUPID.
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Post by jdredd on Feb 5, 2014 3:18:37 GMT -5
For some reason I was thinking back to Reagan's firing of the PATCO workers almost 33 years ago. There are a lot of people alive now who are too young to remember it, and I suppose it was popular with a majority of Americans at the time, but I'm wondering if is one of the sources of the ugly polarization we are suffering in America today, since it may have emboldened many management types to take a harder line against Unions in subsequent years. Was it really necessary?
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Post by jdredd on Jun 11, 2014 22:51:15 GMT -5
So there is a big rush of children from Central America coming over the border, fleeing the crime and corruption in Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, etc. There is no way of knowing how things would be if Reagan had not crushed reform movements in those countries branded as "Commies", but I do wonder if we are reaping a little of what Reagan sowed.
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Post by jdredd on Mar 15, 2015 21:30:51 GMT -5
Yes, the 80's were the right's glory years. You had the holy trinity in office: Reagan, Thatcher, and Pope John Paul II. The whole decade ended with the collapse of European Communism, and 1989 is the year they love to remember. Kind of sad for them that the confluence of factors that made the 80's the heyday of the conservatives will probably not occur again for many years if at all.
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Post by jdredd on Apr 11, 2015 23:12:58 GMT -5
www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/el-salvador-set-become-deadliest-peace-time-country-world/"El Salvador is on track to become the deadliest peacetime country in the world. Despite no formal war taking place on its streets, 481 people were murdered in March — roughly 15 murders a day in the country of six million people — which became the deadliest month on record in more than a decade. Already, there have been 73 murders during the first five days of April. Many of the victims were killed as a result of escalating gang violence that is overrunning the country, and the homicides show no sign of subsiding. Should the killings continue, El Salvador could soon surpass Honduras as the deadliest peacetime country in the world." Yep, good thing Reagan saved El Salvador from becoming another Cuba, along with other Central American countries, isn't it? Look how they are enjoying their "freedom".
Just looked it up. Cuba's murder rate per 100,000 people: 4.2, Honduras is 90.4
477 people were murdered in Cuba in 2012, in Honduras it was 7,172
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Post by Turk on Apr 12, 2015 11:33:03 GMT -5
So it is safer to be in El Salvador than Chicago.
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Post by jdredd on Apr 12, 2015 12:32:43 GMT -5
The murder rate in Chicago in 2012 was 18.5 per 100,000. More than Cuba but less than El Salvador's 41.2.
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Post by Turk on Apr 13, 2015 10:25:27 GMT -5
I guess you haven't seen the movie Insurgent. LOL
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Post by tpfkalarry on Apr 16, 2015 21:41:51 GMT -5
The tipping point- Even hindsight isn't always 20-20. The military action in El Salvador probably started that region down the road that led to where it is today. But would it have gotten there without other influences? How much did the change NAFTA brought to agriculture impact the middle class (relative term) of Mexico and Latin America and lead to some of the problems they are currently experiencing. How much did the IMF's limits on social programs as a result of restrictions related to development loans increase the number of people deciding the drug trade was the surest way out of poverty. Clearly the conflicts in the Middle East started when we let the sisters (Standard Oil, BP, Texaco and others) carve up the middle east. Did the creation of OPEC and the poor distribution of wealth push the region further? OBL began his crusade against the US when Bush cut Afghanistan loose, but Bosnia clearly pushed him even further. Our support of the Shah (particularly the covert portions) clearly alienated the Iranians, but what was the actual tipping point? We can blame Bush for his mistakes (my personal first choice), but Clinton's policies played a hand, as did Bush Sr., and even Reagan's. Policy decisions made over twenty or thirty years and half a dozen different administration's all go hand in hand and lead us to where we are today (Arab spring and the rise of IS). You can argue about the blame perhaps back to the crusades but the political party of the president does not seem to be the obvious common denominator. I don't think the lifers in the State Department are the answer either, but the short term thinking of those with term limits seems to be flawed. If we learned anything from Viet Nam it was not evident in the thinking that led to the invasion of Iraq. I hope if we learned anything in Iraq we will apply it to our thinking about Syria and Yemen.
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