Right Wing Trick

[SoDesuKa]

The latest right wing trick is to make wildly unsubstantiated claims about the late Ronald Reagan. Then, when you question these absurd claims, they get hugely indignant. "Couldn't you at least wait until the man was properly buried?" they demand.

Actually the time to contest spurious claims about the Reagan presidency is when they are made. If objections to overblown statements is really all that offensive, right wingers might consider making more modest claims about him.

For instance, they should come down to earth on this story that Reagan defeated Communism. It wasn't true when he was alive; it's not true now. Reagan was only a mediocre administrator at best, and his popularity sagged as a result of Iran Contra. If he weren't a professionally trained actor, he probably wouldn't have gotten away with playing dumb about it, and he might even have been impeached.

If right wingers truly want respect for Reagan, they should make sure what they say about him is true. When they puff him up too much, it invites a backlash.

[KissMyAsscroft]

1. They know that they have a week that they can shove through propaganda...

They can hide behind Reagan like little children and throw their little grenades...let them..it's childish and people are sick of it.

Kerry is taking the high road as he should. All of the Democratic leaders have.

[Philostopher]

2. I agree on this.

<< Kerry is taking the high road as he should. All of the Democratic leaders have.>>

And don't you bet that doesn't incense them. It pisses them off so much, they have to resort to finding Internet message boards to find people saying things they can become 'shocked' and 'outraged' over.

I said to someone today, 'don't you think you'd be seeing them dancing the 'Macarena' if Bill Clinton had walked out in front of a bus on Saturday afternoon, instead of Reagan finally shuffling off this mortal coil after all these years? Get real.'

They want to be defensive and pissed off and play victims, but the Dem leadership aren't giving them any room to be. God, how they must hate that!

[yardwork]

3. I've seen a level of outrage that is truly absurd on many boards.

The mildest comments critical of Reagan cause hysterical reactions. I think it is a sign of how badly the Chimp has effed this country. His insane behavior and bullying rhetoric is having a very bad affect on weak minds.

[amber dog democrat]

5. Saint Ronald

Its pathetic that such a mediocre and mean spirited ideologue can be elevated to the level of a holy American Icon.

The myth transcends all else.

[Philostopher]

6. What's pretty sad to me is ...

Whatever you believe about his time in office, Carter was probably one of the most intelligent and moral/ethical men to hold the office in the past fifty years, but because he didn't weep and rend his shirt immediately, Saturday night, for the press to report about -- waited until Sunday to comment -- that was somehow disrespectful. This is the guy Reagan essentially (or at least partly) f*cked out of another four years with that little stunt with the hostages in Iran, who's spent the last twenty years building houses all over the world for those who can't afford their own ... the one man who ever entered the White House of whom I would never, ever consider an accusation of mistakes by hubris, who may even have thought, 'well, I'm kind of a footnote now, as far as my term in the White House goes, it's been so long -- let the ones who are really involved have their say, I have no desire to draw attention to myself at this moment,' though I don't know if this is true (it certainly could be, judging from Carter's behavior the past fifteen years or so) ... but because what he said was quiet, correct but not fawning, and came the next day, some Republicans apparently accused him of not being sufficiently respectful.

[amber dog democrat]

7. Its so obvious whom the real hypocrates are.

That is why they are so vocal. Call it cognative dissonance, projection, and a total lack of honesty - what ever, its all hidden behind the myth of Saint Ronnie.
I think he will actually grow in stature until we have people swearing he causes miracles and parted the Red Sea.

There was an old saying that goes, God is on the side of the large battalions, not the little platoons. There is something so rewarding in jumping on the band wagon and singing in the chorus. And this is just a remove or two from the Volksgemeinschaft of the Third Reich, or the crowd contagion of a lynch mob. There is no room for decency here. This is especially true for a party that believes the ends justify the means. You can't debate them since they won't act fairly. Its all about opprotusism and getting the advantage by any means possilbe.

As Thoreua once said...( though taken out of context ) " yet even they expect to go to heaven at last"

That may be why I have been an agnostic since I was 15.

[Philostopher]

8. Took me four more years than you to realize I was agnostic.

I was 19. I turned 19 during Reagan's first term in office, as a matter of fact, and it was the people in my parents' church attempting to canonize St. Ronnie back then that was part of my awakening that much of organized religion wasn't really about God at all -- it was about idolatry, either of figureheads/icons or money. It was the only church I'd ever known, for 19 years, and that they seemed to think Ronald Reagan -- B-movie actor, divorced Catholic -- was some kind of example Christians everywhere should follow just shorted me out.

You're right about the cognitive dissonance -- I don't see how some of them can go through the day, the way their heads must scream 24/7.

If anybody thinks this attempted canonization started at any time other than during the 1980 campaign, they're either pretty forgetful or too young to remember, though. The Reagans thought they were royalty. We used to call the old empty suit 'King Ron.' The fawning over him caused me to cease to believe in something else, too -- I started college as a journalism major, but the lack of objective criticism of Reagan in the press back in the early 80s convinced me the media were no grand institution anymore, either. I pretty much bailed out on believing either organized religion or journalism had any relevance to my life in 1984. I've been proved absolutely right about both, as far as my life is concerned, in the intervening 20 years, too!

[amber dog democrat]

9. I find cold comfort in being right - sometimes I wish it were otherwise.

I have to think sometimes the press gets it right.... but this is an exception to the rule.

To my mind : Organized Religion = Orginized Crime.

I love researching the Reformation. There is enough sex, violience, and intreague to keep me turning pages all night long. Those were the good old days.

I knew a Lutheran Minister who used to refer to some of the Christian fantasies as " Angel Food Cake "

[lapfog_1]

4. My answer about "defeated communism"

is that, why, if communism is defeated, do more than 1.5 billion
people still live in officially communist countries?

Not to mention that the fastest growing economy in the world is a
communist country.

Not that I am defending communism in any way, but we should all deal
in facts, not fantasy.