Remember the day a mediocre actor was elected president-

[undeterred]

and that horrible feeling we had?

Wasn't that wonderful compared to the last 4.5 years?

[Deja Q]

1. We were innocent back then. We had no idea what that treasonous filth was

going to do. They made it seem like an optimistic time anyway.

Meanwhile, alternative energy was denounced as being obsolete.

Iran Contra.

S&L Scandal.

I could go on for months about those traitors.

[newswolf56]

5. Your "One nation under Dog" picture...

...nearly made me spray coffee all over my keyboard and VDT. Heartfelt thanks for the best laugh I've had in a long time.

That said, I remember both the Nixon and Reagan years all too well: the nagging when-will-he-suspend-the-Constitution paranoia of the Tricky Dick darkness, the profound depression inflicted (both psychologically and economically) by the 1980 election, the nagging sense of economic insecurity that has lingered in our country ever since. As to Bush II, it seems to me he combines the very worst of those eras -- that plus the added fears imposed by the growing evidence of his own tyrannical theocratic intent.

[Inland]

2. And I've got nostalgia for Nixon too.

Back in the day when the felonious, protofascist president striking at the heart of democracy was a moderate felonious, protofascist president. And people cared enough to bring him down. Good times, good times.

[acmejack]

3. No one expected the total commitment to destruction

No one noticed the implications of the decision to stop enforcing Taft-Hartley, we didn't realize what the PATCO thing symbolized, we missed a lot of the agenda being put into place. St. Ronnie indeed, perhaps at the altar of the WSJ.

[newswolf56]

12. Not to nitpick, but...

...Taft-Hartley is the ANTI-union measure, passed by the Republican 80th Congress over President Harry Truman's veto.

What Reagan refused to enforce was the National Labor Relations Act, part of FDR's New Deal.

By refusing to enforce NLRA, Reagan began the union-busting campaigns that have continued to this day, (permanently) reducing the labor movement to a shadow of its former self. Alas, Clinton was hardly better: note his support for NAFTA, the alleged workforce and environmental protections of which have all been nullified.

[undeterred]

4. In 1980 I thought the worst thing about Reagan was that he was

just an actor, and that older ladies voted for him because they thought he was handsome.

My school showed the movie "Bedtime for Bonzo" on election night.

[expatriate]

6. I cried that day.

It seemed as if I was the only person in my vicinity who remembered Ronald Reagan being an FBI informant and testifying before the House Unamerican Activities Committee. I knew people who lived in California and despised him during his years as governor there.

Policies coming out of the Reagan Whitehouse destroyed the economy in my home state of Louisiana. Unemployment went as high as 33% in some towns. I worked in an employment agency for a while and had grown men in tears sitting opposite me every single day, begging for any kind of job.

I really cried when he was re-elected.

[noiretextatique]

13. so did i

one of the worst periods of my life...until recently, of course.

[Melynn]

7. You know, something strange about that election

Reagan and Carter were running neck and neck in the polls. Then election night the results started coming in and by magic, Reagan won by a landslide. There was few news stories about why the polls were so wrong and then the whole subject was forgotten about. I never gave it much thought but looking back the 1980 election follows the pattern of the 2004 election where the polls saying one thing and the election results saying something else.

Makes you wonder if the 1980 election was the first election where the results were cooked by voter fraud.

I also remember that John Lennon was murder a month after the election. I didn't realize it at the time but Lennon's murder was omen that the monsters were taking over.

[undeterred]

8. I remember Carter being very emotional and saying he loved this

country. And yes, the election was strange, but we weren't on guard for 24 more years.

[Melynn]

9. Remember John Anderson ran for President?

Anderson was a liberal Republican (yes, there used to be real liberal Republicans back in the old days) who ran for President and took votes away from Carter.

The whole election year was weird, with the Iranian hostage situation being the number one issue that year. The neo-cons in the Reagan campaign made a deal with Iran not to release the hostages until Carter was gone from office. Poppy Bush was the go between for that deal. That's treason for those you scoring at home.

It wouldn't surprise me that the neo-cons were the ones who were really in charge in the Reagan administration with Reagan just being the front man.

This is a good thread. I've thought about 1980 election in years.

[undeterred]

10. Actually I had forgotten about him. And Ross Perot too.

I think its good to have several candidates, as long as they are all allowed to be in the debates.

[newswolf56]

11. I had forgotten about the polls...

...but you're absolutely right: Carter was tied (and it seems to me in some polls maybe even slightly ahead) going into the election. But recognizing the national penchant for instinctively embracing economic fascism (particularly in times of economic stress), I was terrified Reagan would win anyway. And economic fascism is precisely what we got: remember Reagan's war against the disabled, arbitrarily throwing hundreds of thousands of disabled people off SSI and Social Security?