GOP Clings to Reagan Myth

[Joanne98]

The six candidates for the chair of the Republican National Committee who appeared before the National Press Club last week were asked who in their opinion was the best ever Republican president.

To a man (a seventh candidate, a woman, wasn't there) they proclaimed it to be Ronald Reagan.

Astounding. Ronald Reagan the best Republican president in history?

Abraham Lincoln, the Republican who saved the Union, who freed millions of African-American slaves, who inspired generations of Americans to reach for the stars, who is immortalized on Mount Rushmore, wasn't even mentioned by the men -- two of them African-Americans at that -- who want to lead the Republicans back to power.

That speaks volumes about what has happened to the leadership of the national Republican Party and why its influence continues to wane in so much of America.

Its leaders can't wean themselves from the Ronald Reagan myth -- that somehow he was a great president and everything would be all right again if the Republicans just returned to the days when Reagan ruled.

Yes, it's a myth.

The GOP can't bring itself to admit it, but so many of today's economic problems and the divisiveness that came to mark American politics these past years can be traced back to the presidency of a man who refined the GOP's "Southern strategy" and the cultural wedge issues that flowed from it.

My first political memory of Reagan goes way back to the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. Ronald Reagan was then the governor of California. He didn't have much praise for the slain civil rights leader, blaming his murder on "a great tragedy that began when we began compromising with law and order, and people (i.e. King) started choosing which laws they'd break."

continued>>>
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/01/14-10

[blm]

1. 'The era of big government is over' was the sound of Reagan's mythological legacy being set in stone

for generations to come. Reagan and Bush1's real legacies were the growing of global fascism, the nurturing of global terror networks, Bush2, 9-11, and the collapse of the world economy.

[Jackpine Radical]

2. What Raygun meant to say was

"The era of functional government is over."

[blm]

3. It was Clinton's declaration to the nation in SOTU speech. Getting a Dem president to make

that statement TO the entire nation assured Reagan would be deified for his vision. And Bill's decision to keep books closed on IranContra, BCCI and CIA drugrunning operations benefited the rehabbing of both Reagan and Bush's legacies.

[Jackpine Radical]

7. Yeah. I guess neither one of us is a charter member of the

DU Clinton Fan Club.

[HillWilliam]

4. Let them wallow in their wackadoodle world

the nuttier they get, the better we look and sound.

The pugs only stop shooting themselves in the foot long enough to reload. And when your enemy is busy making mistakes, don't interrupt them.

[Deja Q]

5. Surely Eisenhower was the best Republican president in recent history?

http://www.liberalslikechrist.org/about/Reagan.html

A good page on Reagan's legacy; which shatters myths.

I didn't know MLK broke any laws either. Maybe Reagan was senile back then too.

(and even if he did, the only one I'd begin to fathom is 'adultery'. Not every state considers adultery a crime, and not every state that claims it is jails people for committing it - there are far worse crimes whose implications are far worse than what adultery does...)

[DCKit]

6. I thought adultry was one of the new Republicon values.

Sheesh, I just can't keep up.

[blm]

10. I'd go with Eisenhower, too.

.

[enuegii]

8. Speaking of myths...

Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation did not free the slaves. It allowed Union forces to seize slaves in Confederate territory as war reparations. They, of course, were then freed, but slavery continued to exist legally in Union slave states-- Kentucky, Missouri, Maryland and Delaware-- until the 13th Amendment was passed in December, 1865, after Lincoln was assassinated.
Did Lincoln wish to free the slaves? I'm certain that he did. But the fact of the matter is that he couldn't, because a constitutional amendment was required to do so, and, in spite of what Cheney and the Bushbaby believe, no president has or has ever had that power.
I do agree with the basic point of the article, though. Ronald Reagan was nothing but a babbling idiot, and the Right's continuing veneration of the old creep that's dead is really disturbing.

[vinylsolution]

9. Worst president ever....

.... until Dubya came along.

[Demeter]

11. There Isn't Anything ELSE To Cling To: Dumbya Destroyed the Party Franchise

[roseBudd]

12. Here is the link to the original article... please click through to the Capital Times

I love that sites like DU & Common Dreams make it possible for me to find articles I want to read, but I feel very strongly that liberals need to support the organization that paid the reporter or columnist who wrote it.

Our page views should go to the Capital Times of Madison Wisconsin.

http://www.madison.com/tct/opinion/column/432435

[Skittles]

13. Reagan was a fucking disaster for America

shame on anyone who fell for his garbage

[OwnedByFerrets]

14. Raygun was the worst thing to happen to america in the last

65 yrs. Especially middle america. I would spit on his grave if I walked by it.