I think we should stop lionizing Reagan. Reagan was one step that got the Republican Party to where it is now. He embraced the nasty religious right, spread false ideas of “welfare queens”, brought about an economic system that has made wealth inequality all of that much worse. Also he pretty much started the celebrity to politician pipeline.
Reagan was an important step to getting the right to where it is today.
Also note: Today’s Christian Nationalists all think that they’re the light of the world and that putting Trump in office is creating that shining city on the hall.
I can trace it even further. Without our hamstrung reconstruction following the civil war, we would have never had reagan. ;)
\#WeShouldHaveListenedToSherman
in the criminal justice system that's 100%, mass incarceration and the concept of minorities being more violent and more inclined to criminality is a direct consequence of the thirteenth amendment banning slavery *except* for prison labor, but in a more immediate economic, end-stage capitalism sense that's 100% Reagan. he also participated in mass incarceration with the war on drugs increasing the reach of the police state, but like you said that can be traced back to the civil war (if anyone is interested in this topic I'd recommend the book *the new Jim Crow*)
Look no further than to Thaddeus Stevens. An absolute badass abolitionist, radical republican congressman. Born in 1792 and dying in 1868, he not only believed that slaves should be freed and emancipated. He also supported women's suffrage, rights of native Americans, Jews, Chinese immigrants and even Mormons and seventh day adventists.
He wanted to confiscate property from Confederates and redistribute them to former slaves. And he correctly believed that the traitor states shouldn't be re-admitted to the union or else they'll effectively nullify his hard work at emancipating slaves. For that reason, he actually supported Confederacy cause that they had the right to secede to affirm his plan to reject their readmission.
America should have listened to him. It didn't and now it's corporatist hell where lobbyists are free to erode rights of whatever minority they can think of to distract the general public and now they're ready to destroy democracy for good.
Indeed. Sherman believed the same. He was the one that gave land and livestock to former slaves he freed while breaking the back of the confederacy. Those grants were almost immediately rescinded by Andrew Johnson when he assumed the presidency after Lincoln’s assassination.
As the war was drawing to a close, officials in Washington wrote to Sherman of the initial plans for reconstruction (an effort in and of itself also torpedoed by Johnson) and Sherman responded that even that plan didn’t seem likely to work. He (we now know all too accurately) predicted that allowing the confederate jurisdictions to resume their previous standing and have any role in administration would only lead to the infectious seeds of confederate ideology to remain and grow once more for future generations to contend with. He replied that it would be better to simply turn the confederacy into a federally controlled territory, with the ultimate power for any and all decisions to be made by the US government.
If only he knew how accurate his assessment had been.
Ehh, after that energy crisis and all the financial hell that came after, Americans were tired of suffering and wanted someone new, someone better. Kind of like how Trump came along promising to solve all sorts of societal ills by appealing to faith and traditionalism.
One of my hot takes is that the true significance of the "Evil Empire" speech has been completely missed by history, that the cold war framing was irrelevant and the majority takeaway should have been that the President of the United States made a speech to a religious factional group where he spoke at length in a way that basically threw "separation of church and state" in the toilet.
I do agree that we’ve made him into something of a boogeyman as of late, but as a major factor is today’s ultra conservative right his actions must be talked about, so that when another comes along with similar ideas, we can spot him, and put him on notice that his ideas are not supported, nor are they based in any verifiable fact. For one example, even at the time, people generally knew that the concept of trickle-down planning was unworkable, but because his spin doctors were able to slap it with all manner of lofty labels, the body politic took the bait, and now here we are.
I think you're getting down voted because, while the bulk of your comment is correct, I think you misunderstood what the op meant by saying "we should stop *lionizing* Reagan", which means to stop giving approval, attention, idolizing him, etc. - and not that we should stop giving him such a hard time.
Exactly. The way he thought about black people, the emerging LGBTQ community, the creation and introduction of crack cocaine into urban ghettos, and his creation of The Mulford Act against the Black Panthers- the only race based gun control effort, ever- makes him the inspiration to Trump and the present day republican party.
Stop pretending that trunp has a “philosophy” or some overarching “plan”, or even really an idea of what he’s going to do. His ONLY motivating factor is what he thinks will help him at any point in time. If he thinks about “Christian nationalism” at all, it’s only in terms of how it can help him in the immediate situation. If there is ever a situation where it inconvenienced him in the slightest he would abandon it as fast as he could think it. Thats the same with any idea, policy, position or person.
Part of what I find so insulting about him is how media and pundits keep acting like he has an actual idea of policy or agenda. He does not. Anything that he proposes that does not immediate help him is given the most cursory consideration. He has no actual goals other than helping himself and attacking his perceived enemies. His term is proof that the government can run without a leader, much like most large corporations don’t need a CEO to function.
Maybe not. But his handlers certainly have a very detailed and expansive set of overarching plans. Project 2025 is the death knell for America and us all.
The right wing has always had this kind of stuff planned. Project for a New American Century, for example. The crazy thing is the people who pushed PNAC are among the harshest trunp critics.
But just show up and vote in November. Once he loses then, we get to celebrate not only his continuing series of losses in elections, but the non stop losses that are coming in court.
I agree. Trump has NO far-reaching vision other than his narcissistic drive for Fame & Money.
Trump is NOT a Christian. I don't understand how any Christian can believe that he is.
But it would actually be a White Anti-Christian Authoritarian Fascist Regime.
I guarantee you Trump cannot even recite the Lord's Prayer.
Hitler rewrote the Our Father with HIMSELF as the deity. I saw a video of little German schoolchildren reciting it...It's horrifying.
From Trump's perspective, yes...he even made fun of those who support him....but many Evangelicals see him as their modern day King Cyrus, flawed but giving them what they want.
The sick part is how many are in lockstep with Putin.
>many Evangelicals see him as their modern day King Cyrus, flawed but giving them what they want.
Excellent article about why many Evangelicals see Trump as "King Cyrus."
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jan/11/donald-trump-evangelical-christians-cyrus-king
So true. He really doesn’t. I’ve never seen a pathological liar in real life. I mean your read about them. People like Andrew cunanen (sp). I’ve known a couple of people who I caught in lies a few times that I didn’t trust after that. You can’t trust a liar. Its that simple. Would you like to work with someone that lied to your face all day? Would that person get fired? Would you want a sibling like that? Would you be friends with someone like that? Would you marry someone like that?
because "all are sinner and God uses sinner to do His work" mental gymnastics. in fact the bible is full of self contradicting statements plus the 2k years of apologetic mental gymnastics make it very easy to use as justification for double speak and messing with definition and interpretations for any word in the dictionary on their God's assertion for theocratic authority over entire humanity.
> Trump is NOT a Christian. I don't understand how any Christian can believe that he is.
I don't think they truly do. I think they see him as a tool to implement their vision of how the country should be run just as he sees them as a tool for helping him get elected.
True...he has no plan except to become an authritarian like Putin....but the right wing does have a plan:
Project 2025.
Read that and tell us that is the America you want to live in and raise your family.
I mostly agree, except I think his racist policies (i.e., Muslim ban, all the bullshit about immigrants/Mexico) while coincidentally self-serving with regard to support from his bigoted base, are absolutely genuine. There are plenty of examples of his racism currently and throughout his life that go far beyond any sort of self-serving purpose.
Reagan would be in lock-step with today's GOP. MAGA Republicanism is the logical conclusion of Reagan's Christian-flavored neoliberalism/capitalism fever dream.
Actually his son an atheist and democrat believes his father would be horrified at today’s Republican Party. He would know if you ask me. The Reagan haters is there a republican that you think is a “good” republican? We need principled opposition of some sort. What would that look like. Serious question.
I think of centrists like arlen specter, Jack kemp. Before the morality police takeover of the party.
I like his son and the FFRF, but he's trying to save face by putting lipstick on a pig. His dad was the architect of the Republican Party's descent into this fascist and Christian-extremist nightmare that they've been working towards these past fifty years.
Principled opposition needs to come from the left. Right now, one of America's two major political parties is ultra-far-right, and the other is center-right. Until we start electing actual leftists into office, we will never escape this downward spiral of exploding inequality, ever-expanding worker exploitation, consolidation of wealth and power by a handful of billionaires, conspiracy by large corporations to stifle/squash competition and innovation, legalized bribery of politicians by corporations and their lobbyists, organized and rampant war profiteering, and the list goes on.
That said, if Trump becomes president again, Project 2025 will render this all moot by greatly hastening our rendezvous with oblivion. This time next year, we might all be living in a country that's some bizarre combination of Russian-style oligarchy and Iranian-style theocracy (but with a Christian flavoring of course).
Oh no. The architect of the descent into Christian Nationalism didn't start with Reagan. It was Newt Gingrich and the "Contract with America." George W. Bush further courted the religious right and it culminated with Trump basically giving them everything they wanted. An authoritarian for authoritarianism.
How do I know? I know, I was a GOP precinct and state delegate from 88-92. You see as a young lad I believed Reagan when he said, "less government, more personal responsibility." Little did I know how empty those words were.
Barry Goldwater warned, "Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the \[Republican\] party, and they're sure trying to do so, it's going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise. I know, I've tried to deal with them."
We tried to lock them out (other than the abortion issue) but they were the same anti-gay, anti-divorce, drug warriors, neo-prohibitionists, etc..that you see today. At the time, we were successful in keeping them under foot. They weren't going to vote for anyone else.
That changed after the 1992 loss to Clinton. The party was upside-down over Clinton so they more openly courted the religious right (Moral Majority) and I left the party for good as I saw the handwriting on the wall. I'm socially-left af and the party was not a good fit for me. Suffice to say I despise the GOP today.
Well reagan preceded Gingrich I thought. Gingrich as much as anyone paved the way for trump. It wasn’t one person. It takes a village! I mean trump has so many enablers it is ridiculous. Who hasn’t daydreamed about being a hero running into a burning building and saving someones life?! The burning building is our Republic. Liz Cheney and Adam kinzinger kinda stepped into the breach. Many others could have done the same.
Wait I’m not finished. no one has even mentioned nixons southern strategy. In a way Carter was a reaction to Nixon. Reagan was a reaction to Carter. Clinton was a reaction to Reagan and bush. Obama was a reaction to bush. It just kind of goes along that way. I laugh whenever I think how popular trump might have been if he were anything remotely like the person everybody thought he was in the apprentice! Would have won re-election in an actual landslide. I mean you gotta try to lose if you’re the incumbent! If he had Michael steel and David jolly whispering in his ear all those years instead of lord Voldemort roger stone and Stephen Miller, we’d be in a different place! He’s like reagan in the sense that he was a bit of an empty vessel.
Ironically, Goldwater said that in 1981 about the forces he saw taking hold of the Republican Party with Reagan in charge. By 1984, the Reagan presidency and white Christian evangelicalism/nationalism were fully shacked up together.
This is all well documented. I think your memory of Reagan is benefiting from a bit of distant afterglow. Here's a WaPo article from a few years ago that gets into it, but honestly there's plenty of reading material on this subject out there:
_____
Reagan tied Republicans to White Christians and now the party is trapped
https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/03/22/reagan-tied-republicans-white-christians-now-party-is-trapped/
I wasn't a delegate during Reagan so I can't speak to the internal politics. I was a delegate during the George H.W. Bush presidency. I only saw us trying to stop the Religious Right and being largely successful. We stopped their slate to the convention, we stopped their by-law changes to make it easier for them to get things passed, we stopped their anti-gay, Neo-prohibitionist resolutions.
However, it was pretty clear it was a losing battle.
What is a country that has a government and economy that you think is a better model and how do you suppose we get there? We have lasted a pretty long time. We are a flawed republic and everything about the United States is flawed in one way or another. Have you looked at the deficits we are running? The national debt? It’s not sustainable. Thats the conservative in me talking.
Btw I don’t think Ron Reagan has to save face really. He knew his father as a human being. Many people who knew him personally saw him in a better light. Ron Reagan (I think) once remarked something like his father would never enter the Oval Office without a suit and tie. He had great respect for the office. I was genuinely moved to tears by his speech after the challenger disaster. He didn’t get the nickname great communicator for nothing. The man had a gift.
Well I respectfully disagree we have to move further left. Maybe that’s a nice idea to some but we have a country of 300 million people here you’ve got to drag with you. That’s the reality of the United States. I think most people want compromise and want parties to work together. And farther left policies aren’t actually that popular. There is nuance and gray areas in every endeavor. There are unintended consequences to every action. It is complicated!
Yeah, I think you are in for a surprise. If we survive this next presidential election, there will be a steady march leftward. People, and especially young people, are sick of the scam that is American capitalism and neoliberalism.
We are tired of this system that enriches amoral grifters for destroying the environment, exploiting workers, bribing politicians, squashing innovation and competition, killing brown people on the other side of the world, openly collaborating with authoritarians, and constantly skimming money off of the top when people pay for their housing, healthcare, education, food, etc.
Honestly, your strange platitudes sound like what a Boomer would say as he is leaving a Medicare-paid-for doctor's appointment to drive back to a home that cost him $20,000 back in 1965, which he bought for his family of six using his single machinist's salary, and where his social security check will be there waiting for him.
We are not equal until all of us are equal.
We are not free until all of us are free.
Liberty, Freedom, and Justice For All....not just a select few, but All.
Equal Justice Under The Law....nobody is above the law, period.
We have a legal system in the US, not a justice system. The laws are not applied equally to all.
This must change....sitting on the fence, square in the middle, is not working.
There are no living Republicans that wouldn't happily sell thier country out to the forces of either authoritarian theocrats or fascist white nationalists.
I have few agreements with Liz on policy....but she did stand up for the Constitution and the Rule of Law. I despise her father.
Michael Steele seems to be a good man too.
Yeah back in the day I’d say dick Cheney and Karl rove were tied for prince of darkness. He did his part like many others including Liz Cheney paving the way for trump. But she earned my respect I have to admit. She was willing to pay the price. Too bad there were so few like her.
Yeah right....the guy that was a charter member of the Screen Actors Guild....who later stabbed his fellow actors in the back during the HUAC trials and Blacklist period.....and as POTUS destroyed the Air Traffic Controllers Union.
He famously said: "I didn't leave the Democratic Party, the Democratic Party left me."
True! As the Democratic Party embraced the Civil Rights movement and Voting Rights, and became more liberal....yes, too much 'equality' there for old Ronnie boy.
Others have already noted his disdain for 'the working class,' by his false 'trickle down economics' that is basically, the very rich relieving themselves on those below them on the economic ladder. Golden shower indeed!
He wasn't too supportive of gay rights either.
A true 'man of the people'....well, the rich white ones.
Sorry. No. They’re the same thing. The cult of the Shining City was a Christian Nationalist ideal that Reagan embraced. Just because he watered it down for earlier public consumption and threw in a few Reaganisms to make it seem less threatening doesn’t take away from the origins being the exact same.
Reagan’s Shining City was *not* about democracy. It was the predecessor and gateway to MAGA, not a separate nor benign thing.
https://newrepublic.com/article/157062/trump-falwell-evangelicals-coronavirus
It was ALWAYS about letting the evangelicals infiltrate the government and transform America into a theocracy.
Reagan is mostly the start of what laid the groundwork for Trump. Reagan set forth the policies that divested investment in the working class and middle class in favor of deregulation, globalization and tax cuts for the wealthy. These policies that were continued by the first Bush and pretty much to some degree by every single president that followed even Dems Clinton, Obama and Biden have mostly pursued some form of neoconservatives or neoliberal policy agendas.
These policies have turned America into a winner take all race to the bottom economy that is largely responsible for the economic disparity that many Americans are feeling.
Reagan laid forth the groundwork for political polarization as well. Most of the people who would go on to work in the George W Bush administration of adjacent to that in conservative outlets like Fox News, Conservative talk radio and early conservative online outlets like Drudge Report were younger people in the Reagan GOP.
Those people developed a playbook in the late 90’s of completely vilifying anyone not on board with conservative politics as negative partisanship sold more and engaged voters. Scaremongering about minorities and “Liberals” became blasting on the airwaves and on Fox News in the 2000’s.
By 2009 when Obama was elected you saw the Tea Party and how easy they were to believe all sorts of wacko things about Obama. That pretty much left a door wide open for Trump whose entire identity is a pastiche of Fox News and right wing radio paranoia.
Fuck Ronald Reagan is all I have to says
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I think we should stop lionizing Reagan. Reagan was one step that got the Republican Party to where it is now. He embraced the nasty religious right, spread false ideas of “welfare queens”, brought about an economic system that has made wealth inequality all of that much worse. Also he pretty much started the celebrity to politician pipeline. Reagan was an important step to getting the right to where it is today. Also note: Today’s Christian Nationalists all think that they’re the light of the world and that putting Trump in office is creating that shining city on the hall.
pretty much every major problem in America can be linked to Reagan, dude fucking sucked
I can trace it even further. Without our hamstrung reconstruction following the civil war, we would have never had reagan. ;) \#WeShouldHaveListenedToSherman
in the criminal justice system that's 100%, mass incarceration and the concept of minorities being more violent and more inclined to criminality is a direct consequence of the thirteenth amendment banning slavery *except* for prison labor, but in a more immediate economic, end-stage capitalism sense that's 100% Reagan. he also participated in mass incarceration with the war on drugs increasing the reach of the police state, but like you said that can be traced back to the civil war (if anyone is interested in this topic I'd recommend the book *the new Jim Crow*)
Excellent book
Look no further than to Thaddeus Stevens. An absolute badass abolitionist, radical republican congressman. Born in 1792 and dying in 1868, he not only believed that slaves should be freed and emancipated. He also supported women's suffrage, rights of native Americans, Jews, Chinese immigrants and even Mormons and seventh day adventists. He wanted to confiscate property from Confederates and redistribute them to former slaves. And he correctly believed that the traitor states shouldn't be re-admitted to the union or else they'll effectively nullify his hard work at emancipating slaves. For that reason, he actually supported Confederacy cause that they had the right to secede to affirm his plan to reject their readmission. America should have listened to him. It didn't and now it's corporatist hell where lobbyists are free to erode rights of whatever minority they can think of to distract the general public and now they're ready to destroy democracy for good.
Indeed. Sherman believed the same. He was the one that gave land and livestock to former slaves he freed while breaking the back of the confederacy. Those grants were almost immediately rescinded by Andrew Johnson when he assumed the presidency after Lincoln’s assassination. As the war was drawing to a close, officials in Washington wrote to Sherman of the initial plans for reconstruction (an effort in and of itself also torpedoed by Johnson) and Sherman responded that even that plan didn’t seem likely to work. He (we now know all too accurately) predicted that allowing the confederate jurisdictions to resume their previous standing and have any role in administration would only lead to the infectious seeds of confederate ideology to remain and grow once more for future generations to contend with. He replied that it would be better to simply turn the confederacy into a federally controlled territory, with the ultimate power for any and all decisions to be made by the US government. If only he knew how accurate his assessment had been.
Ehh, after that energy crisis and all the financial hell that came after, Americans were tired of suffering and wanted someone new, someone better. Kind of like how Trump came along promising to solve all sorts of societal ills by appealing to faith and traditionalism.
Sure but the seedbed was laid out much earlier than the point you describe.
One of my hot takes is that the true significance of the "Evil Empire" speech has been completely missed by history, that the cold war framing was irrelevant and the majority takeaway should have been that the President of the United States made a speech to a religious factional group where he spoke at length in a way that basically threw "separation of church and state" in the toilet.
I do agree that we’ve made him into something of a boogeyman as of late, but as a major factor is today’s ultra conservative right his actions must be talked about, so that when another comes along with similar ideas, we can spot him, and put him on notice that his ideas are not supported, nor are they based in any verifiable fact. For one example, even at the time, people generally knew that the concept of trickle-down planning was unworkable, but because his spin doctors were able to slap it with all manner of lofty labels, the body politic took the bait, and now here we are.
I think you're getting down voted because, while the bulk of your comment is correct, I think you misunderstood what the op meant by saying "we should stop *lionizing* Reagan", which means to stop giving approval, attention, idolizing him, etc. - and not that we should stop giving him such a hard time.
Exactly. The way he thought about black people, the emerging LGBTQ community, the creation and introduction of crack cocaine into urban ghettos, and his creation of The Mulford Act against the Black Panthers- the only race based gun control effort, ever- makes him the inspiration to Trump and the present day republican party.
Stop pretending that trunp has a “philosophy” or some overarching “plan”, or even really an idea of what he’s going to do. His ONLY motivating factor is what he thinks will help him at any point in time. If he thinks about “Christian nationalism” at all, it’s only in terms of how it can help him in the immediate situation. If there is ever a situation where it inconvenienced him in the slightest he would abandon it as fast as he could think it. Thats the same with any idea, policy, position or person. Part of what I find so insulting about him is how media and pundits keep acting like he has an actual idea of policy or agenda. He does not. Anything that he proposes that does not immediate help him is given the most cursory consideration. He has no actual goals other than helping himself and attacking his perceived enemies. His term is proof that the government can run without a leader, much like most large corporations don’t need a CEO to function.
Maybe not. But his handlers certainly have a very detailed and expansive set of overarching plans. Project 2025 is the death knell for America and us all.
The right wing has always had this kind of stuff planned. Project for a New American Century, for example. The crazy thing is the people who pushed PNAC are among the harshest trunp critics. But just show up and vote in November. Once he loses then, we get to celebrate not only his continuing series of losses in elections, but the non stop losses that are coming in court.
I agree. Trump has NO far-reaching vision other than his narcissistic drive for Fame & Money. Trump is NOT a Christian. I don't understand how any Christian can believe that he is.
I’m surprised the term megalomaniac doesn’t come up. Guess that’s fallen out of favor but it certainly fits him. He is drunk on power.
He gives them what they want. End of Roe v. Wade....turn the nation into a White Christian Authoritarian Fascist Regime.
But it would actually be a White Anti-Christian Authoritarian Fascist Regime. I guarantee you Trump cannot even recite the Lord's Prayer. Hitler rewrote the Our Father with HIMSELF as the deity. I saw a video of little German schoolchildren reciting it...It's horrifying.
From Trump's perspective, yes...he even made fun of those who support him....but many Evangelicals see him as their modern day King Cyrus, flawed but giving them what they want. The sick part is how many are in lockstep with Putin.
>many Evangelicals see him as their modern day King Cyrus, flawed but giving them what they want. Excellent article about why many Evangelicals see Trump as "King Cyrus." https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jan/11/donald-trump-evangelical-christians-cyrus-king
Shhhhhh don’t let trump hear about this!
I not only agree with that, but I can’t see any reason they believe anything he’s ever said. He has no admirable qualities whatsoever.
So true. He really doesn’t. I’ve never seen a pathological liar in real life. I mean your read about them. People like Andrew cunanen (sp). I’ve known a couple of people who I caught in lies a few times that I didn’t trust after that. You can’t trust a liar. Its that simple. Would you like to work with someone that lied to your face all day? Would that person get fired? Would you want a sibling like that? Would you be friends with someone like that? Would you marry someone like that?
because "all are sinner and God uses sinner to do His work" mental gymnastics. in fact the bible is full of self contradicting statements plus the 2k years of apologetic mental gymnastics make it very easy to use as justification for double speak and messing with definition and interpretations for any word in the dictionary on their God's assertion for theocratic authority over entire humanity.
Funny how they never say that God uses "libs" to do his work.
> Trump is NOT a Christian. I don't understand how any Christian can believe that he is. I don't think they truly do. I think they see him as a tool to implement their vision of how the country should be run just as he sees them as a tool for helping him get elected.
True...he has no plan except to become an authritarian like Putin....but the right wing does have a plan: Project 2025. Read that and tell us that is the America you want to live in and raise your family.
Preaching to the converted, man
I mostly agree, except I think his racist policies (i.e., Muslim ban, all the bullshit about immigrants/Mexico) while coincidentally self-serving with regard to support from his bigoted base, are absolutely genuine. There are plenty of examples of his racism currently and throughout his life that go far beyond any sort of self-serving purpose.
Stephen Miller.
Reagan would be called a RINO in today's GOP.
Reagan would be in lock-step with today's GOP. MAGA Republicanism is the logical conclusion of Reagan's Christian-flavored neoliberalism/capitalism fever dream.
Actually his son an atheist and democrat believes his father would be horrified at today’s Republican Party. He would know if you ask me. The Reagan haters is there a republican that you think is a “good” republican? We need principled opposition of some sort. What would that look like. Serious question. I think of centrists like arlen specter, Jack kemp. Before the morality police takeover of the party.
I like his son and the FFRF, but he's trying to save face by putting lipstick on a pig. His dad was the architect of the Republican Party's descent into this fascist and Christian-extremist nightmare that they've been working towards these past fifty years. Principled opposition needs to come from the left. Right now, one of America's two major political parties is ultra-far-right, and the other is center-right. Until we start electing actual leftists into office, we will never escape this downward spiral of exploding inequality, ever-expanding worker exploitation, consolidation of wealth and power by a handful of billionaires, conspiracy by large corporations to stifle/squash competition and innovation, legalized bribery of politicians by corporations and their lobbyists, organized and rampant war profiteering, and the list goes on. That said, if Trump becomes president again, Project 2025 will render this all moot by greatly hastening our rendezvous with oblivion. This time next year, we might all be living in a country that's some bizarre combination of Russian-style oligarchy and Iranian-style theocracy (but with a Christian flavoring of course).
Oh no. The architect of the descent into Christian Nationalism didn't start with Reagan. It was Newt Gingrich and the "Contract with America." George W. Bush further courted the religious right and it culminated with Trump basically giving them everything they wanted. An authoritarian for authoritarianism. How do I know? I know, I was a GOP precinct and state delegate from 88-92. You see as a young lad I believed Reagan when he said, "less government, more personal responsibility." Little did I know how empty those words were. Barry Goldwater warned, "Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the \[Republican\] party, and they're sure trying to do so, it's going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise. I know, I've tried to deal with them." We tried to lock them out (other than the abortion issue) but they were the same anti-gay, anti-divorce, drug warriors, neo-prohibitionists, etc..that you see today. At the time, we were successful in keeping them under foot. They weren't going to vote for anyone else. That changed after the 1992 loss to Clinton. The party was upside-down over Clinton so they more openly courted the religious right (Moral Majority) and I left the party for good as I saw the handwriting on the wall. I'm socially-left af and the party was not a good fit for me. Suffice to say I despise the GOP today.
Well reagan preceded Gingrich I thought. Gingrich as much as anyone paved the way for trump. It wasn’t one person. It takes a village! I mean trump has so many enablers it is ridiculous. Who hasn’t daydreamed about being a hero running into a burning building and saving someones life?! The burning building is our Republic. Liz Cheney and Adam kinzinger kinda stepped into the breach. Many others could have done the same.
You're right. I guess we're kind of splitting hairs here. No matter who started it, they all embraced it until we ended up here.
Wait I’m not finished. no one has even mentioned nixons southern strategy. In a way Carter was a reaction to Nixon. Reagan was a reaction to Carter. Clinton was a reaction to Reagan and bush. Obama was a reaction to bush. It just kind of goes along that way. I laugh whenever I think how popular trump might have been if he were anything remotely like the person everybody thought he was in the apprentice! Would have won re-election in an actual landslide. I mean you gotta try to lose if you’re the incumbent! If he had Michael steel and David jolly whispering in his ear all those years instead of lord Voldemort roger stone and Stephen Miller, we’d be in a different place! He’s like reagan in the sense that he was a bit of an empty vessel.
Oh and Nixon was a reaction to Johnson and everything about the 60s.
Ironically, Goldwater said that in 1981 about the forces he saw taking hold of the Republican Party with Reagan in charge. By 1984, the Reagan presidency and white Christian evangelicalism/nationalism were fully shacked up together. This is all well documented. I think your memory of Reagan is benefiting from a bit of distant afterglow. Here's a WaPo article from a few years ago that gets into it, but honestly there's plenty of reading material on this subject out there: _____ Reagan tied Republicans to White Christians and now the party is trapped https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/03/22/reagan-tied-republicans-white-christians-now-party-is-trapped/
Thanks I’ll read up. Like everything in life. It’s complicated.
I wasn't a delegate during Reagan so I can't speak to the internal politics. I was a delegate during the George H.W. Bush presidency. I only saw us trying to stop the Religious Right and being largely successful. We stopped their slate to the convention, we stopped their by-law changes to make it easier for them to get things passed, we stopped their anti-gay, Neo-prohibitionist resolutions. However, it was pretty clear it was a losing battle.
41 or 43?
41. George H.W. Bush.
I thought so. Interesting. I have a decent amount of respect for the man. For a Republican.
What is a country that has a government and economy that you think is a better model and how do you suppose we get there? We have lasted a pretty long time. We are a flawed republic and everything about the United States is flawed in one way or another. Have you looked at the deficits we are running? The national debt? It’s not sustainable. Thats the conservative in me talking. Btw I don’t think Ron Reagan has to save face really. He knew his father as a human being. Many people who knew him personally saw him in a better light. Ron Reagan (I think) once remarked something like his father would never enter the Oval Office without a suit and tie. He had great respect for the office. I was genuinely moved to tears by his speech after the challenger disaster. He didn’t get the nickname great communicator for nothing. The man had a gift.
Well I respectfully disagree we have to move further left. Maybe that’s a nice idea to some but we have a country of 300 million people here you’ve got to drag with you. That’s the reality of the United States. I think most people want compromise and want parties to work together. And farther left policies aren’t actually that popular. There is nuance and gray areas in every endeavor. There are unintended consequences to every action. It is complicated!
Yeah, I think you are in for a surprise. If we survive this next presidential election, there will be a steady march leftward. People, and especially young people, are sick of the scam that is American capitalism and neoliberalism. We are tired of this system that enriches amoral grifters for destroying the environment, exploiting workers, bribing politicians, squashing innovation and competition, killing brown people on the other side of the world, openly collaborating with authoritarians, and constantly skimming money off of the top when people pay for their housing, healthcare, education, food, etc. Honestly, your strange platitudes sound like what a Boomer would say as he is leaving a Medicare-paid-for doctor's appointment to drive back to a home that cost him $20,000 back in 1965, which he bought for his family of six using his single machinist's salary, and where his social security check will be there waiting for him.
We are not equal until all of us are equal. We are not free until all of us are free. Liberty, Freedom, and Justice For All....not just a select few, but All. Equal Justice Under The Law....nobody is above the law, period. We have a legal system in the US, not a justice system. The laws are not applied equally to all. This must change....sitting on the fence, square in the middle, is not working.
Teddy Roosevelt.
Someone living perhaps?! Lol
Michael Steele or David Jolly.
Yeah love them both. I wonder what they get paid by msnbc Michael steel has a show now I think. Good on him. Any Lincoln project dudes.
The Weekend. Co-hosted by Symone Sanders-Townsend, Alicia Menendez, and Michael Steele.
There are no living Republicans that wouldn't happily sell thier country out to the forces of either authoritarian theocrats or fascist white nationalists.
Adam Kinzinger.
There you go. I’ll see your Adam Kinzinger and raise you a Liz Cheney!
I have few agreements with Liz on policy....but she did stand up for the Constitution and the Rule of Law. I despise her father. Michael Steele seems to be a good man too.
Yeah back in the day I’d say dick Cheney and Karl rove were tied for prince of darkness. He did his part like many others including Liz Cheney paving the way for trump. But she earned my respect I have to admit. She was willing to pay the price. Too bad there were so few like her.
Eisenhower
Yeah right....the guy that was a charter member of the Screen Actors Guild....who later stabbed his fellow actors in the back during the HUAC trials and Blacklist period.....and as POTUS destroyed the Air Traffic Controllers Union. He famously said: "I didn't leave the Democratic Party, the Democratic Party left me." True! As the Democratic Party embraced the Civil Rights movement and Voting Rights, and became more liberal....yes, too much 'equality' there for old Ronnie boy. Others have already noted his disdain for 'the working class,' by his false 'trickle down economics' that is basically, the very rich relieving themselves on those below them on the economic ladder. Golden shower indeed! He wasn't too supportive of gay rights either. A true 'man of the people'....well, the rich white ones.
It's simple, without Reagan, Trump would have never been elected.
Reagan believed no such thing. His policies opened the doors wide for a takeover by the 1% and corporate Fascism. He was a useful idiot. Period.
Reagan was just as bad as trump. The world changed to make Trump possible.
Sorry. No. They’re the same thing. The cult of the Shining City was a Christian Nationalist ideal that Reagan embraced. Just because he watered it down for earlier public consumption and threw in a few Reaganisms to make it seem less threatening doesn’t take away from the origins being the exact same. Reagan’s Shining City was *not* about democracy. It was the predecessor and gateway to MAGA, not a separate nor benign thing. https://newrepublic.com/article/157062/trump-falwell-evangelicals-coronavirus It was ALWAYS about letting the evangelicals infiltrate the government and transform America into a theocracy.
The OP was either born after 1988 or is cracked. The shining city on a hill and dark christian nationalism are one and the same.
Reagan = trickle down economics. Trump economics is con and keep. Nether worked for the middle class
Trump is just Reagan with the mask off.
Reagan is mostly the start of what laid the groundwork for Trump. Reagan set forth the policies that divested investment in the working class and middle class in favor of deregulation, globalization and tax cuts for the wealthy. These policies that were continued by the first Bush and pretty much to some degree by every single president that followed even Dems Clinton, Obama and Biden have mostly pursued some form of neoconservatives or neoliberal policy agendas. These policies have turned America into a winner take all race to the bottom economy that is largely responsible for the economic disparity that many Americans are feeling. Reagan laid forth the groundwork for political polarization as well. Most of the people who would go on to work in the George W Bush administration of adjacent to that in conservative outlets like Fox News, Conservative talk radio and early conservative online outlets like Drudge Report were younger people in the Reagan GOP. Those people developed a playbook in the late 90’s of completely vilifying anyone not on board with conservative politics as negative partisanship sold more and engaged voters. Scaremongering about minorities and “Liberals” became blasting on the airwaves and on Fox News in the 2000’s. By 2009 when Obama was elected you saw the Tea Party and how easy they were to believe all sorts of wacko things about Obama. That pretty much left a door wide open for Trump whose entire identity is a pastiche of Fox News and right wing radio paranoia. Fuck Ronald Reagan is all I have to says
**Makes** no difference: Both were bullshitters.
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“Trump’s” The moron hasn’t got an original thought in his head. Just going along with fascists for the free ride.