Tuesday, June 29, 2010

He Lives



As I've said here in various ways at various times, it's been clear from the time of his ascension that the Undead King of Republicans started this country on its inexorable descent from greatness. Selling smoke, as he used to sell smokers, he convinced his subjects of something patently impossible, like perpetual motion (and, by golly, the idea lives perpetually): namely, that you can have everything you want, and not pay for it. Even if by "you" is meant "you, and not... them." Ronnie, revered as only false gods can be revered, told people what they wanted to hear, let them believe what they wanted to believe, and set sail on the course to ruin, holding the tiller while Republicans rode rapturously. Rowing still a sunken ship, his rudderless retinue of relics regale recalcitrant regretters of receded royalty with raptuous rhetoric, rarely regarding recent reality. Ruinous Ronnie Reagan: razer of the Republic.

So, here's an article that displays it quite well. Not, of course, that such data will convince believers. Belief, after all, is what you use when evidence is either lacking or refutes your magical thinking. But, always hopeful that a single person might, for a second or two, have clarity before shrinking from it as Nosferatu shields himself from sunshine, I offer this:

"It seems that you can look at a chart of almost anything and right around 1981 or soon after you'll see the chart make a sharp change in direction, and probably not in a good way. And I really do mean almost anything, from economics to trade to infrastructure to ... well almost anything. I spent some time looking for charts of things, and here are just a few examples. In each of the charts below look for the year 1981, when Reagan took office.

Conservative policies transformed the United States from the largest creditor nation to the largest debtor nation in just a few years, and it has only gotten worse since then:"





There follow, in the article, several more charts in logical sequence, showing the same trend, the same break point, in various economic parameters.

The year of our lord nineteen eighty one is exactly the time to which Congressional Republicans, the RWS™, and Foxobeckian teabaggers would like us to return. (After Reagan, ever so briefly, there was a moment when a Republican was, by some measure, serious about fiscal responsibility. He was, naturally, summarily disowned by the true believers.)

Twenty years ago, the last serious Republican effort to reduce the budget deficit took place when George H.W. Bush agreed to negotiate with congressional Democrats on a budget deal. As a consequence, many Republicans disowned his efforts and abandoned him in 1992, leading to his defeat. Today, the idea of cooperating with Democrats on deficit reduction is viewed as a total loser by all Republicans. Until that perspective changes, the elder Bush will remain the last Republican who took fiscal responsibility seriously.

Hey! Now that I think of it, if we could teabag our way back in time, we should. AND VOTE RONNIE OUT OF OFFICE BEFORE HE EVER GETS IN. Now THAT'S what I'd call taking our country back!!


15 comments:

  1. Sid Sid Sid Sid Sid.....
    Anal Sex with a Corpse is a Crime where I come from...but don't worry, nobody asks,I won't tell...
    And I know your just jealous cause the Gippers Alzheimer's didn't become apparent till he was in his 70's.
    Seriously, everyone smoked in the 40's, its the current Muslim-in-Chief who smokes-em-when-he-gots-em.
    And as for not payin for stuff, only taxes that have gone up so far are on tobacco and tanning, sure the Bush Tax Cuts go away January 1st 2011, just like Git-mo closed January 20th 2010(it didn't)
    Did you know more Americans have already died in Afghanistan/Iraq than during Reagan/Bush I's terms combined? Of course you didn't cause your Brains a gigantic Neurofibrallary Tangle.
    and BTW, the Republicans didn't take over the House, where all spending bills originate until 1995, which was such a great year, the Braves even won the World Series.
    Now take your Aricept,

    Frank

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  2. My personal favorite demonstration of the Right's complete break with reality: Most adults, whatever their politics, have known people with Alzheimers and can thus appreciate how long it takes the casual observer to recognize that apparent moments of distraction, disinterest, memory lapses, hearing loss, etc. are in fact signs of dementia--particularly someone who is systematically protected from the press and is widely promoted as one who speaks "simply."

    Even knowing this, they're convinced that Reagan had a special form of short-onset Alzheimers, of which he was the only known case. "Reagan losing it while in office? How disrespectful! Just shows you, those Liberals will say anything!"

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  3. "the Gippers Alzheimer's didn't become apparent till he was in his 70's.

    Didn't become apparent to YOU, maybe, Frankie.

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  4. OK Sid, I looked at your little Chart(did you? the prints kinda small) so......................
    According to you, I'm Stupid, Useless,Can't do anything right... the Best Economic Times of all were from 1977-1981, i.e. the First(and thank God, the Only) Jimmuh Carter Administration.
    I know you have trouble remembering back 30 minutes, much less 30 years, but Ummm things weren't so good back then, 20% Interest Rates/15% Inflation/Disco.
    I mean it got so bad Jimmuh was reduced to beating innocent Rabbits to death with a Canoe Paddle...
    Aricept, Love it, Live it, Take it...

    Frank "Ronald Reagan is God" Drackman

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  5. Reagan turned 70 in 1981, when he was sworn in. So Frank's right.

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  6. Okay, wow, good point. Guess what they say about blind pigs and truffles is right.

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  7. Admit it,
    My "Orianthi" reference flew over your head like a Randy Johnson Fastball....
    OK, maybe the Gipper didn't have Jimmuh Carter's Steeltrap Intellect, Walter Mondales excitement, or Michael Dukakis's friend winning and People influencing Personality...
    HE CARRIED FRIGGIN MASSACHUSSETTS!!!!!!!!!!!! JIMMUH CARTER COULDN'T EVEN CARRY MASSA-FRIGGIN-CHUSSETTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    Ha Ha, I hope Jimmuh Carter never dies, he's the gift that keeps giving...although AlGores givin him a run for his money

    Frank

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  8. Let’s see…

    The largest tax increases in the countries history – largest deficits in the countries history – to that date – before Bush topped even those - filled the lower courts with right wing racist judges, secret wars.

    Stealth basement government – interfered with Carter’s hostage negotiations by promising the Iranians a better deal if he was elected.

    Selling weapons to said Iranians while sending them a corrupt Marine Col. and a suicidal creep + a bible + a chocolate cake to finance death squads in Nicaragua “Iran Contra.”

    Thought that homosexuals deserved to die, so sparking the AIDS epidemic… another gift that kept on giving…

    Thought ketchup was “A Vegetable” for kid’s lunch programs. Actually, he was "The Vegetable" in said programs.

    We got to see him standing dazed while Nancy hissed answers to him for the press. Went to Lebanon as a welcome friend – got a bunch of marines blown up and bugged out with tail dragging.

    Staged a comic opera invasion… was it Grenada… where more medals were awarded than the numbers of troops participating?

    Saluting dead Nazis in Bitburg (Bitberg?)

    Ah yes, those were the great times. Made us all proud to be Americans.

    But Saint Ronny would get his ass kicked out of today’s Insane Clown Posse Party, wouldn’t he? Too Liberal with the commies on disarmament – even though rethugs foam at the mouth while praising his name.

    Best of all: Cheeny on deficits:

    "Reagan proved deficits don't matter"

    God, you people are sick!

    EugeneInSanDiego

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  9. The views of some of his peers and associates:

    – Jim Cannon (an aide to Howard Baker) reported that Reagan's underlings told him,
    "They told stories about how inattentive and inept the President was.... They said he wouldn't come to work – all he wanted to do was to watch movies and television at the residence."
    Landslide: The Unmaking of the President: 1984-88

    – Lee Hamilton (Representative from Indiana) in an interview with Haynes Johnson, told him:
    "Reagan's only contribution [to the subject of the MX missile] throughout the entire hour and a half was to interrupt somewhere at midpoint to tell us he'd watched a movie the night before, and he gave us the plot from WarGames, the movie. That was his only contribution." ( Sleepwalking Through History: America in the Reagan Years

    – Columnist Richard Cohen said, "This President is treated by both the press and foreign leaders as if he were a child.... It is major news when he honors a political or economic discussion with a germane remark and not an anecdote about his Hollywood days."

    – Mark Hertsgaard, wrote that
    "During Mr. Reagan's trip to Europe...members of the traveling press corps watched him doze off so many times – during speeches by French President Francois Mitterrand and Italian President Alessandro Pertini, as well as during a one-on-one audience with the Pope – that they privately christened the trip 'The Big Sleep.'"
    (On Bended Knee: The Press and the Reagan Presidency

    – Reagan's good friend, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher,
    "Poor dear, there's nothing between his ears."

    – Columnist David Broder
    "The task of watering the arid desert between Reagan's ears is a challenging one for his aides."

    – Patti Davis (formerly Patricia Ann Reagan) talking about her father,
    "He has the ability to make statements that are so far outside the parameters of logic that they leave you speechless"
    The Way I See It

    – Larry Speakes (Reagan's former press secretary) describing what it was like preparing the President for a press conference:
    "...like reinventing the wheel."
    (Speaking Out: The Reagan Presidency from Inside the White House)

    – Mark Green,
    "This loathing for government, this eagerness to prove that any program to aid the disadvantaged is nothing but a boondoggle and a money gobbler, leads him to contrive statistics and stories with unmatched vigor."
    Reagan's Reign of Error

    – former president Jimmy Carter, March 6, 1984
    "President Reagan doesn't always check the facts before he makes statements, and the press accepts this as kind of amusing."

    – James David Barber, presidential scholar, "Ronald Reagan is the first modern President whose contempt for the facts is treated as a charming idiosyncrasy."
    (On Bended Knee: The Press and the Reagan Presidency, Mark Hertsgaard)

    – Simon Hoggart
    "His errors glide past unchallenged. At one point...he alleged that almost half the population gets a free meal from the government each day. No one told him he was crazy. The general message of the American press is that, yes, while it is perfectly true that the emperor has no clothes, nudity is actually very acceptable this year."
    , in The Observer (London), 1986

    But, yeah, he did invade Grenada, making the world safe for mediocre medical students. And after that crushing military defeat of an island the size of a thumbnail, he crowed that America was once again "walking tall." Having served in Vietnam, when I heard him say it, I felt cleansed.

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  10. So alot of people talked behind Reagans back, can't wait to see what they say about our Current Mullah-in-Chief, oh, Bill Clinton already is...
    and if Reagan had Alzheimers, Biden has ALZHEIMERS with a Capital "ALZ"...
    OK, your tryin to flood my Zone, so I'll blitz

    1: I thought Y'all LIKED high taxes and deficits???Make up your minds already.
    2:Most Wars give out more medals than Soldiers, you can get more than 1, I got 6 for my 96 hrs in Desert Storm...
    3:Patti Davis? She's his Daughter for Jehova's sake, you should here what my daughters say about me...
    4: Who cares what a few Limeys think? thats why we kicked there ass in 2 Wars.

    5: Larry Speakes is a Drunk.

    Seriously, the mans been dead 5 years, let it go...

    And I've gotta run, Sarah Palin's in Town :)

    Frank "How about just partially "Pluggin the Hole?" Drackman

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  11. Just thought you'd like to hear a little witnessin' to your "Ronald Reagan is God" and his miracles.

    "Dead for five years"... but the zombie's still walkin'!

    When the Brits first started talking about "Mad Cow Disease" I thought they were talking about Margaret T... is she also a drunk?

    Enlighten us please! What do your daughters say about you? Are those the ones who's conservatism you bragged about?

    It's not just you DrekMan; Sarah Palin gives everybody the runs.

    Try getting you head out of there!
    If that doesn't work, insert a couple of teabags as suppositories; they're astringent you know:)

    EugeneInSanDiego

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  12. Dear Blue: this post is about Ronald Reagan, and the effect of his policies. If you'd like to try again, feel free. You first attempt, since it was usual off-point trollage, seems to have been rejected. Imagine that.

    I look forward to the day when you find it in yourself to be useful; or, failing that, interesting.

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  13. Ronald Reagan defeated the Soviet Union, began the longest period of economic growth in American History, and had the Iranian hostages released within minutes of taking Office.
    Jimmy Carter shoots/kills his neighbors Cat(by muh-steak I'm sure) beat imaginary rabbits with a Canoe paddle, and worst of all, talked about it.
    And he wore those stupid sweaters.

    Frank

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  14. Frank, to believe that, you have to ignore a lot. Including, but not limited to, the steady decline and fundamental insolvency of the Soviet government that began long before RR, and you have to ignore the role of Gorbachev; the "growth" at the expense of rising debt, ie, the same smoke and mirrors that GWB passed off as policy: "here's a credit card, go spend." (that, of course, is the whole point of this post); and the fact that before he took office he had a cabal of guys talking to Iran, convincing them to delay the hostage release, worked out by Carter, in return for subsequent deals... But you're a smart guy, so you knew that already. Rewriting history is what keeps the corpse alive.

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  15. Wat-Eva....
    and you don't have Teenage Daughters so I'll translate.

    Wat-eva... accents on the "Eva"

    So what about the Stupid Sweaters???
    Was that the Gippers fault?Did a young Dick Chaney Brainwash that Nuclear Engineer Carter into copying the Mr. Rogers look???

    and whats a "Cabal" and I mean in your own words.

    Frank

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