Response to the "rising tide" comment

[jmowreader]

One of Saint Ronnie's favorite sayings was, "a rising tide raises all ships."

What he left out was, the water to make the tide rise comes in from the bottom of the ocean.

Ronnie also forgot to point out that when the tide rises HERE, it causes the tide to fall THERE.

Why am I doing this? Reagan was a fucking idiot who should have been impeached for cracking a joke that almost started a nuclear war with the Soviets.

[bbinacan]

1. Actually,

don't tides rise because of the moon?

[PBS Poll-435]

3. Jeopardy said it was the Sun & the Moon

I always just thought it was the Moon.

[jmowreader]

8. They do...

but you're not following the meme: Reagan's "rising tide" comment meant, "if we give massive tax cuts to the rich, everyone will benefit."

The problem we had with this is, when we gave rich people huge tax cuts they took the excess money to Michael Milken and invested in Drexel junk bonds which were used to buy up companies and throw the "excess" workers out of jobs.

If you want to supercharge the consumer economy Reagan gave us, you give money to people who will spend it on goods and services that employ a huge number of workers. The very simplest example: a rich person who suddenly comes in contact with $5 million might buy a new yacht. A yacht company employs 300 to 500 people. The dealer he bought it from employs what, fifty? And the spending doesn't "expand employment" because yachtmaking is a very complex skill, and the yacht company already has people on staff who know how to do it. And the most worrisome part: if the rich person has any brains at all, he doesn't buy a new one anyway--you buy a three-year-old yacht from someone else who's already gone through the boat and tightened all the screws that loosened up while they were hauling it from the East Coast factory to the West Coast marina it's going to live in. That's all well and good, but three-year-old boats do almost nothing to stimulate employment. OTOH, if you take that same $5 million and give it to regular guys so they can buy jon boats...now, THAT is going to increase employment.

[bbinacan]

13. Give money to people?

I think it's better to say that people can keep their money. The former implies that all assets are the property of the government. The last I checked, I'm not a feudal serf.

[Angry Dragon]

20. The last I checked, I'm not a feudal serf.

Just give it time and we all will be ..........

That is the grand plan of the wealthy

[bbinacan]

21. Or the government. n/t

[ladjf]

22. Yes, the moon has a small gravitational pull and the Earth bulges

at the equator due to centrifugal force. nt

[Merlot]

2. Does a tide actually rise?

I thought a tide would come in, or go out. or be high tide. But "rising tide" doesn't make sense. Tide moves horizontally, not vertically.

[bbinacan]

4. Correct

And a tide rises due to the depth of the affected area.

[Merchant Marine]

9. Definition of tides from Bowditch, the American Practical Navigator

The rise and fall of tide is accompanied by horizontal
movement of the water called tidal current. It is
necessary to distinguish clearly between tide and tidal
current, for the relation between them is complex and
variable. For the sake of clarity mariners have adopted
the following definitions: Tide is the vertical rise and fall
of the water, and tidal current is the horizontal flow. The
tide rises and falls, the tidal current floods and ebbs.

[Merlot]

10. Thanks, that clears it up for me.

Still doesn't make the metaphor any less stupid though.

[bbinacan]

15. delete

[Curmudgeoness]

5. And my favorite response was "not if your boat has a hole in it".

I am working class. I have a hole in my boat. The rising tide never helped me.

[johnaries]

11. Yep, I've used that one, too. I also like to mention that huge yachts

tend to swamp canoes.

[bbinacan]

6. Not a very good analogy.

Rising tides are pulled from above by the Sun and Moon.

[Curmudgeoness]

16. Great analogy. The rising tides comment was

pulled from above too, from the sun, the moon, astrological signs, you name it. Or from someone's ass, you know, where to sun don't shine.

[bbinacan]

19. Huh? n/t

[bbinacan]

7. btw

what joke almost started a nuclear war? I haven't heard this before.

[jmowreader]

12. It was during a soundcheck for a Reagan speech

Ronnie was going to give a televised address. He was sitting in a chair on a stage. There was someone working on his mike, someone putting the makeup Reagan claims to never have worn on him, someone doing the lights, and Ronnie was saying different things so they could set the various sound levels. Anyway, one of the things he said was "the missiles are on their way." (Or something similar.) Unfortunately, the engineers were testing the transmitter at the same time, and the "missiles are on their way" comment was broadcast. The entire Soviet air defense establishment went on very high alert after he said that until they figured out it was just senile old Ronnie.

At this we should be very, very glad Hair Trigger Yuri Andropov wasn't the Soviet premier then; Yuri woulda launched a counterstrike before anyone realized it was just Reagan fucking around.

[bbinacan]

14. BS

That mic check was not a live feed. It only came out later. And here's what he said.

My fellow Americans, I'm pleased to tell you today that I've signed legislation that will outlaw Russia forever. We begin bombing in five minutes.

no "missles are on their way"

Do some fucking research will ya.

[johnaries]

17. Actually, it was a JFK quote that St. Ronnie usurped.

" A rising tide lifts all the boats. If we are moving ahead here in the West, if we are moving ahead in agriculture, if we are moving ahead in industry, if we have an administration that looks ahead, then the country prospers. But if one section of the country is strangled, if one section of the country is standing still, then sooner or later a dropping tide drops all the boats, whether the boats are in Boston or whether they are in this community."

http://hnn.us/articles/73227.html

[bbinacan]

18. Thanks for posting

historical accuracy.

[johnaries]

23. My pleasure. it just shows how devious the Repugs can be.

JFK meant it to show how interconnected we are as a nation - all sections, all classes. St. Ronnie tried to use it to justify helping the rich get richer.

[Canuckistanian]

24. More like the water rising in a lock

It only has room for few boats and you have to own a boat big enough to be let in.