comment #1

christian says ...

Well said. Tho I wish Reagan had followed that advice when he was beaten earlier in his first runs for the nomination in 68 and 76.

And if you want to see spoiler-sports, Team Obama has that attitude down.

comment #2

Sweetbubba says ...

Why would anyone hate the American people so much that it would hope that they'd been denied Reagan?

comment #3

Monument says ...

Christian is one of those guys with who uses blinders in addition to his 20/20 hindsight.

comment #4

christian says ...

That's right Monument. Reagan was a great man. I must hate America. But you're the true rational thinker. Now drink your Obama milkshake.

comment #5

DarthCorleone says ...

I suck at pitching woo. Glad to know it's not my lack of tenacity that keeps me down.

comment #6

Edward says ...

The great Regan lied about selling arms to Iran and was commander and chief during the horrific Contra affair and other dirty CIA escapades. Why is he so great?

comment #7

Dave says ...

"Harvey Milk lost election bids for a San Francisco city supervisor post three times before he finally won after running a fourth time. "

And that really worked out peachy for him, didn't it?

(Sorry, tasteless, it was there, I couldn't resist)

comment #8

le corbeau says ...

The great Regan lied about selling arms to Iran and was commander and chief during the horrific Contra affair and other dirty CIA escapades. Why is he so great?

Because you didn't have to ask that goddam question in Russkie, son!

comment #9

Rod32303 says ...

Maybe this is taking a toll on the young girls, and maybe she finds family more important than...all of this. And maybe she'll recant...but I don't fault her for speaking her mind. WHO is this unattractive to? She's said it for weeks...as he continues to win...so it's obviously not bugging everyone.

comment #10

Dave says ...

". . . was commander and chief during the horrific Contra affair"

Horrific?

comment #11

Edward says ...

Regan just happened to be president when the Soviet Union collapsed. It would have collapsed with or without Regan. That's just Conservative propaganda.

comment #12

Dave says ...

"Regan just happened to be president when the Soviet Union collapsed. It would have collapsed with or without Regan. That's just Conservative propaganda."

I don't remember Don Regan being quite that important in the collapse of communism, but I guess I'm not current on my conservative propaganda.

comment #13

MoroccoMole says ...

Reagan fiddled while AIDS ran roughshod over this nation. I wish I believed in Hell, so I could think that he's there now.

comment #14

Edward says ...

Boy I am cranky. I always go off when people tout Regan's greatness.

comment #15

Dave says ...

Reagan drowned puppies! Reagan stole children's lunch money!

It's amazing we survived the 1980s, what with all that fascism running about!

comment #16

Monument says ...

Like I said, 20/20 hindsight with blinders on.

comment #17

christian says ...

And Reagan saved us from dealing with Hussein by sending Rumsfeld over to kiss his ass while he gassed Kurds.

I'm glad WE were spared the heroic Contra in action:

"The Contras blew up bridges, civilian power plants and schools, they burned fields of crops and attacked hospitals. Their tactics included rape, kidnappings of peasants and civilians, ambushes and massacres against small rural communities, farms, co-operatives, schools and health clinics. Contra raids caused extensive damage to crop fields, grain silos, irrigation projects, farm houses and machinery. Numerous state farms and co-operatives were incapacitated; other farms still intact were abandoned because of the danger.

Witness For Peace, an American Protestant watchdog body, collected a list of Contra atrocities in one year, which included murder, the rape of two girls in their homes, torture of men, maiming of children, cutting off arms, cutting out tongues, gouging out eyes, castration, bayoneting pregnant women in the stomach, amputating the genitals of people of both sexes, gouging out eyes, scraping the skin off the face, pouring acid on the face, breaking the toes and fingers of an 18 year old boy, and summary executions. These were the people Ronald Reagan called "freedom fighters" and "the moral equal of our founding fathers."

One survivor of a Contra raid in Jinotega province, which borders Honduras, reported: "Rosa had her breasts cut off. Then they cut into her chest and took out her heart. The men had their arms broken, their testicles cut off and their eyes poked out. They were killed by slitting their throats and pulling the tongue out through the slit." The human rights organisation Americas watch, concluded that "the Contras systematically engage in violent abuses…. so prevalent that these may be said to be their principle means of waging war."

So please all you Reagan apologists, STFU.

Apropos of propaganda, here'a beautiful essay on the failures of our corporate media:

The Corporate Media takes partisan stands (often in favor of the Republican Party, but always in defense of corporate interests) by sabotaging political candidacies, especially those of candidates who challenge corporate power. This year it blacklisted the populist candidacy of John Edwards, suffocating his ability to compete for the Democratic nomination.

Mainstream American opinion is no fan of George W. Bush and does not take him seriously as a credible leader. A very substantial percentage has long wanted him and Dick Cheney impeached and removed from office. The CM does not tolerate such a discussion, and utterly marginalizes Rep. Dennis Kucinich, the veteran Congressman who has dared to seriously raise the possibility.

Mainstream American opinion is committed to protecting what's left of the natural environment. The Corporate Media makes an occasional show of sharing that concern, but stops where Corporate interests might be impinged. On the other hand, it promotes failed technologies, such as nuke power, where centralized, corporate profits are huge.

Never in our history has the control of the nation's sources of information been more centralized, or more at odds with what the country as a whole believes.

This divergence is not limited to the attack pack fringe of far-right bloviators who dominate the Corporate opinion print columns and talk shows. Virtually all "personal" opinion expressed on the corporate airwaves and in the syndicated big newspaper columns is significantly to the pro-corporate right of moderate American opinion.

The "news" pushed by the major radio/TV networks and newspapers slants unerringly toward the interests of the five major corporations that own the bulk of them. They bury stories of vital importance while spewing endless hours and column inches at the mind-deadening likes of Paris Hilton and Brittany Spears.

Their excuse is that they "give the public what it wants" and are "in business to make a profit."

But the real profit centers of the corporations that own the CM are not in providing news and information. General Electric, Westinghouse, Disney and the other media-financial-industrial behemoths have too much to lose from an accurate reporting of the true news of the world. To protect their core interests, they are bread-and-circus PR/diversion machines, not real news organizations. They resemble the old Soviet official mouthpieces Izvestia and Pravda far more than the news providers envisioned in the First Amendment, by Founders who saw balanced, aggressive reporting as the lifeblood of democracy.

Email
Print
Comment
Nor does the corporate right never hesitate to attack. Since Vice President Spiro Agnew assaulted those who dared report the truth about the Vietnam War, the absurd myth of a "Liberal Media" has been used to intimidate and silence mainstream opinion.

In fact, the term is used to apply to any outlet that harbors even the slightest expression of dissent. Even conservative newspapers or broadcasts that may be overwhelmingly pro-corporate, but which occasionally tolerate a whiff of dissent, are branded as subversive, ungodly and "out of the mainstream."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/harvey-wasserman/theres-nothing-mainstrea_b_86157.html

comment #18

Dave says ...

I await the perfect global paradise of milk & honey your political favorites will usher in for all of us, Christian.

comment #19

christian says ...

Oh me too, Dave. Me too.
You just wait for the revolution, brother.

comment #20

MAGGA says ...

"Because you didn't have to ask that goddam question in Russkie, son!"

Sigh... Soviet was on a downward spiral since at least the early seventies. Their own system defeated them. Reagan is supposed to have "outspent" them, but in reality they did that to themselves. And reagan was horrible when it came ti AIDS, he started the involvment of religious fanatics in electing gouvernment, and he let the neo-cons start to have influence (something Bush Sr heroically tried to oppose). I find the ruthlessreviews-guy who pissed on Reagans grave quite endearing.

comment #21

christian says ...

Of course, Reagan was a commie when he headed SAG.

comment #22

nemo says ...

"Why is he so great?"

"Because you didn't have to ask that goddam question in Russkie, son!"

Pochemu Reagan tak veliki? There, that wasn't so bad asking it in Russian.

Reagan and Nixon both reached the White House after multiple tries. Bill Clinton himself originally considered his 1992 run to be a practice run for 1996. He was as surprised as anyone else that he got the nomination on his first try, much less the big prize itself.

comment #23

Sweetbubba says ...

Anyone silly enough to not give Reagon credit for being a great President, and acknowledge his role in ending the Cold War, initiating an almost unabated 30 year economic boom, and generally rebuilding America's confidence and status in the world, is no doubt too young to remember the dreadful Carter years and the state of the world back then. The "Regan" misspelling says it all.

Watching the Blade Runner release recently - it actually functions as a great time capsule for capturing the general mood of the time - predicting the "inevitable" dominance of Asian (Japanese, in particular) culture in the future, the general entropy and bleak prospects, etc.

comment #24

Dave Polands Gut says ...

Anyone that pines for the Carter years like Christian here obviously has a few screws loose.

comment #25

christian says ...

I don't "pine" for Carter but I rue Reagan and his anti-intellectual capitalist crusade to destroy unions and pretend that trees cause more pollution than man. And he ILLEGALLY TRADED WEAPONS TO IRAN you nudnicks. Plus, he gave us Rush Limbaugh and TOP GUN. And of course he was a Hollywood actor, which I know righties hate.

I was there, I remember and I had my first taste of political contempt. I wasn't the only one.

And one whose screen name is Dave Poland's Gut shouldn't charge others with insanity.

comment #26

York "Budd" Durden says ...

Reagan's so-called economic boom? You righties are nuts. If there's been a boom, it has been in corporate profits versus real wages for working people, to the tune of a 40% increase versus a barely 2% increase. So, yeah, if you're one of the elites, the supply-side union-buster Reagan was a god.

Sort of like being glad you voted for a Texas oilman who has presided over a 150% increase in the cost of a barrel of oil, started a war over nothing in the middle of the world's oil reserve countries, et cetera ad nauseum.

comment #27

Jay T. says ...

And really, I think we all want to follow in the footsteps of Harvey Milk. Oh, wait...

comment #28

bents75 says ...

"Anyone silly enough to not give Reagon credit for being a great President, and acknowledge his role in ending the Cold War... is no doubt too young to remember the dreadful Carter years and the state of the world back then. The "Regan" misspelling says it all."

And about the "Reagon" misspelling Sweetbubba?

Does that say it all too? Or not so much?

comment #29

christian says ...

Ditto snaps!

comment #30

CMed1 says ...

You righties with your worship of Reagan is much more weirder than Jeff's worship of Obama.

comment #31

BurmaShave says ...

Reagan believed communism was actually a tangible thing, being kept inside the Kremlin like the gimp was kept in Zed's basement. He just wanted to punch it. He had no domestic policy to speak of, but younger guys like me have no real appreciation for his psychological effect on this country. I may not like what it's turned into, but he did pull this nation out of the Vietnam/Watergate morass. And as much as we might like to think so, it's no accident the Soviet Union collapsed on his watch.

comment #32

christian says ...

"I may not like what it's turned into, but he did pull this nation out of the Vietnam/Watergate morass."

And into a morass of military excess, de-regulation, union-busting, AIDS denial, anti-enviromentalism and funding death squads with Iranian cash.

And thank God there's no Vietnam/Watergate morass today. Unless you count the Iraq War, torture and illegal surveillance among other thangs...

But Reagan made insecure patriots feel good about themselves. So let's win one for the Gipper....

I refer you to this absolutely brilliant sketch from "Fridays" at the outset of Reagan's prez tenure in 1980. It scarily predicts his right-wing influence over the culture:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8sVAslUphUQ

comment #33

D.Z. says ...

Mgmax: "Because you didn't have to ask that goddam question in Russkie, son!"

Russia didn't need to beat us, since Japan got there first with their cars. But hey, in spite of plants closing, the economy is "fine".

Dave: "Horrific?"

Helping train Ahmadinejad for combat isn't horrific in your eyes?

"It's amazing we survived the 1980s, what with all that fascism running about!"

Yep.

Bubba: "Anyone silly enough to not give Reagon credit for being a great President, and acknowledge his role in ending the Cold War,"

So Reagan was the one who gave the Russians Gorbachev?

"initiating an almost unabated 30 year economic boom,"

Technically, a five year economic boom with four recessions.

"and generally rebuilding America's confidence and status in the world,"

He did it by crippling our infrastructure and life expectencies...

"is no doubt too young to remember the dreadful Carter years and the state of the world back then."

Yeah, peace with Egypt and green power was scarier than a revival of Cold War tensions.

comment #34

affiliatesreview says ...

really good post :) Thank you
Best regards!
----------------
Free pc games
Affiliate review