You guys can attack Reagan's legacy all you want, but he carried 49 of 50 states, and I would guess that most of us who voted for him then would vote for him again and would have picked up a lot of new converts by now.
bush-hatred is not a moral disease, he has earned every ounce of dislike from those who dislike him. it fascinates me that dislike of bush comes under this heading. i suspect when the conservatives disliked clinton and pulled every trick to remove him from office that this was not a moral disease that drove them to it.
If 100% had voted for Reagan or 1% the facts would be the same. Popularity does not translate into infalibility. If that were so, Nixon, who won by a wide margin, would not have been brought down.
edgar:
You need to remmber you're dealing with people who have created a religion, complete with preachers(AM-Radio/FOX).
I hope eventually Chomsky, Zinn, et al do a less-fawning assessment.
I'm sure the next "Nation" will have some juicy bits.
Here's aview of Reagan that I'm sure will gladden the Republicans hearts:
MORE PROOF ONLY THE GOOD DIE YOUNG
Sunday, June 6, 2004
by Greg Palast
You're not going to like this. You shouldn't speak ill of the
dead. But in this case, someone's got to.
Ronald Reagan was a conman. Reagan was a coward. Reagan was a
killer.
In 1987, I found myself stuck in a crappy little town in
Nicaragua named Chaguitillo. The people were kind enough, though
hungry, except for one surly young man. His wife had just died of
tuberculosis.
People don't die of TB if they get some antibiotics. But Ronald
Reagan, big hearted guy that he was, had put a lock-down embargo
on medicine to Nicaragua because he didn't like the government
that the people there had elected.
Ronnie grinned and cracked jokes while the young woman's lungs
filled up and she stopped breathing. Reagan flashed that B-movie
grin while they buried the mother of three.
And when Hezbollah terrorists struck and murdered hundreds of
American marines in their sleep in Lebanon, the TV warrior ran
away like a whipped dog ... then turned around and invaded
Grenada. That little Club Med war was a murderous PR stunt so
Ronnie could hold parades for gunning down Cubans building an
airport.
I remember Nancy, a skull and crossbones prancing around in
designer dresses, some of the "gifts" that flowed to the Reagans
-- from hats to million-dollar homes -- from cronies well
compensated with government loot. It used to be called bribery.
And all the while, Grandpa grinned, the grandfather who bleated
on about "family values" but didn't bother to see his own
grandchildren.
The New York Times today, in its canned obit, wrote that Reagan
projected, "faith in small town America" and "old-time values." "
Values" my ass. It was union busting and a declaration of war on
the poor and anyone who couldn't buy designer dresses. It was the
New Meanness, bringing starvation back to America so that every
millionaire could get another million.
"Small town" values? From the movie star of the Pacific
Palisades, the Malibu mogul? I want to throw up.
And all the while, in the White House basement, as his brain
boiled away, his last conscious act was to condone a coup d'etat
against our elected Congress. Reagan's Defense Secretary Casper
the Ghost Weinberger with the crazed Colonel, Ollie North,
plotted to give guns to the Monster of the Mideast, Ayatolla
Khomeini.
Reagan's boys called Jimmy Carter a weanie and a wuss although
Carter wouldn't give an inch to the Ayatolla. Reagan, with that
film-fantasy tough-guy con in front of cameras, went begging like
a coward cockroach to Khomeini pleading on bended knee for the
release of our hostages.
Ollie North flew into Iran with a birthday cake for the maniac
mullah -- no kidding --in the shape of a key. The key to Ronnie's
heart.
Then the Reagan roaches mixed their cowardice with crime: taking
cash from the hostage-takers to buy guns for the "contras" - the
drug-runners of Nicaragua posing as freedom fighters.
I remember as a student in Berkeley the words screeching out of
the bullhorn, "The Governor of the State of California, Ronald
Reagan, hereby orders this demonstration to disburse" ... and
then came the teargas and the truncheons. And all the while, that
fang-hiding grin from the Gipper.
In Chaguitillo, all night long, the farmers stayed awake to guard
their kids from attack from Reagan's Contra terrorists. The
farmers weren't even Sandinistas, those 'Commies' that our
cracked-brained President told us were 'only a 48-hour drive from
Texas.' What the hell would they want with Texas, anyway?
Nevertheless, the farmers, and their families, were Ronnie's
targets.
In the deserted darkness of Chaguitillo, a TV blared. Weirdly, it
was that third-rate gangster movie, "Brother Rat." Starring
Ronald Reagan.
Well, my friends, you can rest easier tonight: the Rat is dead.
I don't suppose you would care to even see a source giving a different perspective than that would you Edgar? Those who hated Reagan (or George the 1st or GWB) or anybody else who doesn't fit their political ideology will distort and twist just about anything to fit what they hope history was rather than what actually happened.
In the deserted darkness of Chaguitillo, a TV blared. Weirdly, it
was that third-rate gangster movie, "Brother Rat." Starring
Ronald Reagan.
Well, my friends, you can rest easier tonight: the Rat is dead.
That is low-----do you feel good about posting that??????
I tried to be nice about Reagan, but you people just want to use the occasion to browbeat the opposition. If you can do it, I can do it.
You see us praising a president we respected and loved as browbeating the opposition?
Here is the spewer of the bile:
http://www.gregpalast.com/
From the website:
Katherine Harris calls Greg Palast, 'twisted and maniacle.' But Michael Moore calls his reporting for BBC television 'courageous.' And Noam Chomsky says: Greg Palast "upsets all the right people."
In England, Palast is known as, "the most important investigative reporter of our timeĀ
" (Tribune Magazine, UK). But, his award-winning investigative reports for BBC television have been banned from us airwaves. His writings for Britain's Guardian have been stopped at the border.
Ahh yes ... when Noam Chomsky and Michael Moore agree on the character of someone, you KNOW that they have GOT to be the pinacle of unbiased reporting.
I am going to search out that article to email a friend. It is a good one excepting the last line that went over a little of good taste.
Foxfrye, when you call people who point out his faults to put some prespective to all the glorying of reagan as hating that is browbeating the opposition. You have a habit of that and then denying you do it. It is frustrating dealing with you from the other side.
I don't make up the truth, I just comment on it. If it seems over rough, I have no way of softening it. Sorry.
Perception
At least you have some idea whose back was burdened to help the demise of the Soviet Union - the American poor. And the legacy carries on. Got a debt problem funding the Iraqi war? Solution? Give the rich billions of dollars in tax cuts and then cut aid to the destittute.
Everyone gets a cut!
And in thanks for accepting tax cuts, we'll make sure your loved ones are never threatened with being in the military. To those of you undeserving of a tax cut, we offer you employment in the military.
What could be more fair?
Revel, read more carefully. I was accused of browbeating the opposition. I didn't accuse anybody else.
What frustrates me is the liberal propensity to attack the messenger rather than the message.
PS. Remember that the 'Net has no borders.
Palast can be read over the net.
I've seen some of his stuff on BuzzFlash, etc.
billy falcon wrote:Perception
At least you have some idea whose back was burdened to help the demise of the Soviet Union - the American poor. And the legacy carries on. Got a debt problem funding the Iraqi war? Solution? Give the rich billions of dollars in tax cuts and then cut aid to the destittute.
Everyone gets a cut!
And in thanks for accepting tax cuts, we'll make sure your loved ones are never threatened with being in the military. To those of you undeserving of a tax cut, we offer you employment in the military.
What could be more fair?
Billy
I think you're viewing reality thru brown colored glasses (Brown as in excretment) Until you take those brown filters off I can't help you.
perception wrote:
Billy
I think you're viewing reality thru brown colored glasses (Brown as in excretment) Until you take those brown filters off I can't help you.
Hey! That's getting a little personal, don't you think.
fofrye
saying that you could never be a liberal because you don't have that much hate in you adn similar comments along that line is browbeating. You in effect called liberal hateful rather than having any legitmate comments.
