Oh, what a tangled and dangerous web they have woven....

[kentuck]

It all starts with a little lie. People don't question it and it becomes conventional wisdom for those that wish to believe it. I'm talking about today's Republican Party.

They said the country was going to hell in a handbasket because of the terrible inflation of Jimmy Carter near the end of his term. It was bad but it was not the end of the world. It was mostly created from high energy prices. But the Repubs were able to exaggerate it to a point that they created their own "misery index". But, no one ever called them on it.

Then they said if we cut taxes to the bone, the economy will grow like crazy. We will have more revenues coming in than ever before. Sure enough, after they raised Social Security taxes and cut all the tax breaks for working and middle class people, revenues increased. But we had the largest deficits in the history of our nation. We went from the world's largest creditor nation to the world's largest debtor nation. But, no one called them on it. It became conventional wisdom that they had the right formula.

Then, they said you-know-who won the Cold War. We outspent the Soviets and they collapsed. Yes, they collapsed but not because they got in a defense spending war with us. In fact, and the CIA reported after the collapse, the Soviet spending on defense had remained flat during the period of the '80s. We spent ourselves into huge deficits with massive military spending alongside the huge taxcuts. Still, no one called them on it. The little lie grew and grew.

Along comes a non-curious leader in 2000, with a Republican majority in Congress and every branch of government under their control. They bring out their big lie and present it to the people again, as if it was written in stone. The way to get the economy growing is to cut taxes, they said. Of course, when they said that, the unemployment rate was 4.1% - a record low for modern times. The lie exploded in their faces. Yet, no one called them on it. It must have been some other reason for the downturn and the huge deficits. It couldn't be the big lie that the Repubs have adopted as their conventional wisdom. It must be something else?

[ArkDem]

1. You trust what the CIA says?

[mhr]

3. The CIA Fact Book Is Quite Accurate, It Is Done By The Research Side Of

The Agency, not the spook side.

[mhr]

2. Thanks For Summarizing "The Big Lie" - Well Done!

eom

[Az]

4. The real discovery of the Reagan years

Was that when there was a deficit it enabled them to cut programs. Ronnies economic plan was a failure. Supply side economics trickled on peopel but it wasn't what they were advertising. It shoved our government into massive deficits. The only way to counter this plunge was to cut programs as fast and as deep as could be managed. And this was the amazing discovery.

The right had been trying to find ways to cut programs for decades. But they could never overcome the lefts defense of them. With the stupendous nature of the deficit all resistance melted. It was this that caused neocon supporters to swoon at the mention of Reagan's name. Neocons see all benefits and welfare type programs as illness and corruption within the government. Anything that justifies cutting them is like mana to them.

Thus when * came into office the first thing he did was plunge us into a deficit in order to counter the temptation of creating new programs on the surplus we had. With the deficit in place he immediately began spending like crazy on progrects he wanted in order to cut off even more programs from the left. This forced even deeper cuts than had ever been required before. We are watching the wholesale destruction of the federal government. And the Neocons are loving every minute of it.

[kentuck]

6. Excellent point about spending the surplus...

in order to prevent it being spent on new social programs...

[Straight Shooter]

9. Yeah, let's make as many Americans as possible, weak and stupid

No proper prenatal care, malnourished childhoods, lack of proper education. That's how we build a strong America?

Thanks, RR. Thanks, GB. We have so much to be proud of as Americans.
:eyes:

[TreasonousBastard]

5. For a more realistic view of Reagan and the Cold War...

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2004/060704.html

[cosmicdot]

7. hope you don't mind me riding Greg Palast's piece here

http://www.gregpalast.com/detail.cfm?artid=336&row=0

~snip~

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.

~snip~

[Oilwellian]

10. Thanks for the link

I've read several of the articles attached to this story and will do so again instead of watching the media lie their asses off this week where Reagan's legacy is concerned.

The U.S. news media’s reaction to Ronald Reagan’s death is putting on display what has happened to American public debate in the years since Reagan’s political rise in the late 1970s: a near-total collapse of serious analytical thinking at the national level.

Isn't that the truth! That my friends is why we're in so much trouble with the rest of the world today.

[UTUSN]

8. Thanks for the Great Post n/t