I Just Do Not Understand This. Why is This Guy still So Popular among Self-Anointed Conservatives?

[Xtcy2083]

Old Ronnie

Ronald Reagan.
Now, before anyone says, "What would you know? You weren't there", I should just add that I actually know how to research a subject (in this case, a past U. S. president), so unless you have something of actual value to add to the discussion, then don't say anything. I know enough about this man to confidently state that there wasn't a single thing he accomplished during his two long terms as president that warrants admiration or imitation. His presidency was an abject failure, a disaster on so many levels that I don't even know where to begin (although the image pasted above is as good a place to start as any, and that little fact was something I had not previously known about).
Disclaimer: I am neither "progressive" nor "conservative". I have no agendas to push, and there have been awful Democratic presidents as well, although not as many (ex. Obama). I'm not a U. S. citizen either, but I do have a brain between my ears, and eyes with which to see, so if anyone resorts to childish name-calling they will be reported and blocked without hesitation. I know how hot and bothered people can get over politics, but remain calm anyway.

It's due to nostalgic feelings for the 1980's, the erroneous belief that it was a decade of prosperity and peace.

Simple ignorance.

An inability to examine his reign objectively, due to an emotional investment in what he allegedly stood for.

Other (see below).

Updates

+1 y

I was instantly blocked by 'BeMuse' below, so this is my response to his response here:
"Oh boy. Of course I had to expect at least one comment here would be like this. How, exactly, is the media controlled by the "left" (whatever that means)? Do you mean, for example, how whenever the Russian president just so much as sneezes, outlets like CNN (which is supposed to be left-leaning) will get all hot and bothered about it and start advocating for war with Russia?

Updates

+1 y

Cont:
"The media is a tool to control the masses", you allege. Well, if that's the case it doesn't seem to be working, and you haven't factored in the fact that due to the technological advances we've made since the 1980's, people can find out whatever they like from wherever they want, and there is nothing anyone within the "mainstream media" can do about it.

[nightdrot]

A fair case can be made that Reagan's was one of the most effective and consequential presidencies of the 20th century, if not in all of American history. Three issues, two specific, the third more general, buttress this claim. Inflation, the Cold War and the national mood.

In the first, as Robert Samuelson wrote in his book, The Great Inflation,' by the end of the 1970s, galloping inflation had almost come to be accepted among policymakers as the systemic condition of democracy. That democratic electorates would not tolerate the policy changes necessary to reign it in.

Thus, by 1979, the rate of inflation hit 14.5% - the highest annual rate in peacetime and 13.1% by 1980 - the first time the country had experienced back-to-back years of double digit inflation in peacetime. Reagan, unlike previous presidents, refused to pressure the Fed to idle back on interest rates, and in tandem with his tax cuts that provided an offsetting stimulus, brought inflation down to 1.1% by 1986, breaking the back of inflationary expectations.

In terms of the Cold War, it is hard to recall the degree to which it was seen as a permanent fixture of international affairs - with its overtones of nuclear annihilation. As Kenneth Adelman points out in his book on the Reykjavik summit, Reagan intuited that the Soviet system was on the brink. A fact that Western intelligence agencies could not confirm until the eve of the summit when they discovered a secret speech that Soviet leader Gorbachev gave to the Soviet leadership.

Reagan's policies were seen as belligerent, but they had the effect of forcing the Soviets to push their defense spending to 42% of GDP. (For comparison, even at the height of WWII, U. S. defense spending reached only 32% of GDP.) This was unsustainable and in the end brought about the USSR's collapse. A fact that Gorbachev himself later confirmed in his own memoirs.

Finally, there was the change in the national mood. The nation experienced in the 1960s and 70s a level of social tumult it had not seen since the 19th century. (Not unlike the nation's current tensions.) Reagan's personal style helped to reduce this leading to the relative social peace of the 80s and 90s. (This was captured brilliantly in a cartoon that showed a pollster asking a voter what he thought of Reagan's policies - #@*!! was the response. Next panel - What the voter thought of Reagan personally - "Oh nice guy!! Friendly, jovial'")

Add it all up and you have the case for Reagan's significance and why he remains - justly so - such a popular figure. Certainly far superior to anything we have seen since.

[Avicenna]

This answer was the one that deserved an MHO

[NYCQuestions1976]

@Avicenna I agree. This is a perfect answer by @nightdrot.

[nightdrot]

@NYCQuestions1976 @Avicenna Thank you both for your generous compliment and kind remarks.

It is said that Americans travel fast because they travel light - unburdened with a long historical memory. That may have some advantages I suppose, but it would be a great misfortune if Mr. Reagan's presidency went down the memory hole.

We have to keep perspective. He was not Lincoln, but there cannot be any doubt that his presidency was a consequential and striking success - and certainly one of the best in the 20th century if not all American history.

Thanks again to both of you.

[Avicenna]

Well said

[cloud9vortex1234]

Probably because they think of him most when it comes to presidents most responsible for the downfall of the Soviet Union (even though Soviets really helped do themselves in by having policies that would never work) as well as being a master at Presidential Speeches.

[Xtcy2083]

Exactly. His admirers always go on about how he supposedly (and they imply single-handedly) brought about the demise of the USSR, but the truth is that he had nothing to do with it.

[Curmudgeon]

The Soviet Empire would never have collapsed had it not been deterred and faced down. The same Leftists who want to claim the Soviet Union was doomed to fail anyway, regularly ridiculed people who predicted it would be doomed to fail back in the 1980s. I was there on campus, I saw and heard that, or should I say I was lectured to like that.

[collie22]

i didn't live through the Reagan presidency so i can't say much. What i do know about is the Reagan administration was a big defeatist spender and that's something i truly don't believe is good for our country

[FilmGuy93]

He was pretty awful in hindsight, but you have to remember that Reagan was operating on the belief that bringing western business to Asia would help break the Communists' control over the economy. I think Reagan's actions make more sense when you frame them in a light of making the world "safe for Democracy." The assumption was that we wouldn't have the problems we do today because the Chinese people would see the comforts of a capitalist society and then kick the communists out. Unfortunately that didn't happen (obviously), but there wasn't really a good way to know that it wouldn't happen at the time.

With Reagan's economics; you have analyze his policies from the perspective of someone who is trying to elevate the working class in his own country by exporting the unskilled labor work elsewhere. This idea only works if the country you export the labor to isn't a raging band of shitheads.

Reagan was fantastic for big business and multi-national corporate oligarchs who wanted to expand corporate involvement with China and SE Asia. The Walmarts and Apples of the world, for example. All of that corporate activity was supposed to benefit the working folks of both the US and China, by providing more opportunities for work and cheaper goods to buy. If the strategy of getting China to become democratic had actually worked, the working class American would be in a much better position because they would have the opportunities to become better skilled laborers. Instead, the Chinese remained Communist, and they control the world's manufacturing.

[Xtcy2083]

If that was his intention, then you're right, it clearly didn't work. It backfired badly. Also, we shouldn't forget that way back then China was still recovering from the disastrous economic policies of Mao, Vietnam and North Korea were still pariah states to the U. S. (N. Korea still is), and other Asian economies (ex. Singapore) were already thriving and didn't have to worry about the communists taking over.
I was prompted to ask this question because of someone else's response to another question here, and within his response he presented a graph demonstrating the dramatic increase in income and overall wealth inequality and attached a graph. external-content.duckduckgo.com/.../
This isn't the same graph, but it's actually a much better one, and there are many others just like it, showing how since the 1980's things have been going downhill and show no signs of reversing.

[FilmGuy93]

Yikes! That's definitely a scary graph and it would be even scarier if it included up through 2021. I'm not too sure what income dispairty with the 1%ers has to do with Reaganomics though. The kind of people in the 1% these days are doing it with stock market manipulation, private military contractors and real estate holdings. Big businesses are a relatively small part of what they have going on.

[Avicenna]

Well, the Fairness Doctrine hasn't been brought back even when Democrats controlled Congress and the White House and had a veto-proof majority in the Senate, so clearly it's not wanted by most. Have you considered why Reagan vetoed it and why it was abolished?

Reagan is one of the Presidents that leftists simply cannot understand. @joeldalton explained most of it to you (economic revitalization after the Carter stagflation is also a huge part of it), and it defies reason to suggest that an apparatchik like Gorbachev could have ended Communism in Europe by himself- only someone with no knowledge of the Soviet system and an unwillingness to give Reagan credit for pressuring it could believe such a thing. No, Reagan wasn't 100% responsible, but he recognized how utterly rotten the Soviet system was and that that was its Achilles heel, and he ensured the US presented an alternate option that contrasted sharply with Communism.

[Avicenna]

* filibuster proof majority in the Senate

[BeMuse]

Obviously you don't know how to research shit considering the entire media is controlled by the left wing. You are presented left wing views, and then controlled opposition to those left wing views in an attempt to capture those leaving media control and shift them slowly left over time. You're stuck in the media matrix. Until you get out of that, you're mind is trapped in a cage and you will not understand anything. The media is a tool to control the masses. There are bad actors on both sides of the political divide, but the left was most easily captured by the NWO/Communists via corruption, so the media leans that way to support their attack on the world. You don't even understand that. Their goal was to capture at least one party if not both parties. They succeeded at capturing the left, because they are more prone to group think and more easily psychologically pressured with emotional triggers. You're brainwashed... Maybe you will wake up in a few years...

[WhiteBoyChill]

Also if you really did block her bro I’d undo it cuz that kind of a dick move

[BeMuse]

@WhiteBoyChill It's not a dick move. She's a moron. For example she thinks that leftist don't have anything to do with wars, while history proves communists have started endless revolutions and genocides. She's not capable of intelligence discussion. It's a judgement call.

[WhiteBoyChill]

Yeah that’s fair. Personally I did not even care to read what she wrote

[Curmudgeon]

What a joke. Fox news hasn't had to pay out any libel and defamation lawsuits lately have they? CNN and MSNBC have...

"the fact that due to the technological advances we've made since the 1980's, people can find out whatever they like from wherever they want, and there is nothing anyone within the "mainstream media" can do about it."

Gee, you haven't been paying attention to what the tech monopolies have been doing to much of the internet lately, have you?

And what has happened to you people Down Under? You were once a place of former convicts turned adventure seekers and risk takers, and now you cower before a controlling quasi-police state in the name of virus from which the overwhelming number of people do recover.

[888theGreat]

Liberal resources will give unfavorable view of his Presidency. He started out a Democrat. witched to Republican and was more conservative than in office. He was the best debater of the 20th Century. Even Destroying the Kennedy's in debates. He was a broadcaster , spokesman , actor, and politician.

He made Soviet union tear down the wall and united Germany. He broke the back of Soviet Union winning the Cold War. He built the strongest defense in US History. Lowered taxes, and had a booming economy using Supply Side Economics which has worked 100% of the times used. Kennedy and Reagan used it.

He was shot and almost killed. He knew nothing about Iran Contra Deal , but apologized anyway , and the guilty persons went to prison.

He was the best modern day President.

[888theGreat]

The fairness thing was Liberals wanting equal time on radio. So stations give Limbaugh 3 hours , they had to give 3 hours to a liberal. The problem is that only one Liberal ever had success on AM Radio and that was Larry King. Radio Stations would have gone bankrupt.

[Xtcy2083]

Your first paragraph is correct; he was indeed an actor, Democrat and so on. You mess things up in the second paragraph: he did not "make the USSR tear down the Berlin Wall". That simply is not the case, because the removal of that wall was ultimately due to the so-called reforms of the Gorbachev administration that allowed, due to the opening up of the nations of Eastern Europe to the West (i. e. glasnost), the people of East Germany to demand of their government eventual reunification of Germany.
He lowered taxes for the rich, and no one else. The "booming economy" was like a house built upon sand, with no foundation. Even his vice-president Bush called it "voodoo economics".
"He built the strongest defence in U. S. history" - In other words, he took much needed cash from programmes that desperately needed funding, and fed the bloated armaments industry instead. What a criminal waste!

[888theGreat]

1) Yes he destroyed the wall and USSR. Even Liberals give him credit for that. So take your resources of lies somewhere else.

2) He won Cold War with strength by building a war machine. He also created millions of high paying jobs.

3) Economy today has nothing holding it up. Reagan had a robust economy with actual growth , not fake Gov't printing money and no real growth today,

[Xtcy2083]

1. No, he did not.
2. Wrong again.
3. The economy wasn't "robust"; it was fickle, fragile and built upon debt, waste and inefficiency.

[genericname85]

well i would argue we are more misinformed today, cause liberals are trying to abolish this and dictate the opinions that are supposed to be taken as a fact by the people.

democracy means listening to everyone and then finding a consensus. not just silencing someone. i mean that's litterally how people used to think the earth is flat. today there's still people who claim it is. but thanks to every side being heard, we can now figure out that the earth is of course not round. every time government tries to silence one side, that means government is crossing the line and taking too much power.

[Hispanic-Cool-Guy]

Bush Jr. Is still popular among Republicans and conservatives though he screwed them over economically big time and brought many to financial ruin.

Point is confused sheep just don't care, they proved it with Donald Trump who is a idiot and subtlely brainwashed people to attack the capital, get arrested and sentence to years in prison and one woman shot dead as she tried to jump over a window to a restricted area.

And Reagan vetoing the Bill was the right thing to do, News Media should have a right to give whatever opinions they desire. It's up to you to believe their B. S. or not.

[goaded]

I think the point about the Fairness Doctrine, which might have been a blunt object, was that abolishing it paved the way for "news" channels to peddle almost pure propaganda and lies. Having it there made them stick to facts, to avoid having to give a voice to the other side.

You'll hear "mandates are bad and should be fought", but not "states that outlawed mandates have had 80,000 more deaths than the others". If you don't hear the latter, it's a hell of a lot easier to believe the former.

[normalice]

He was the first to agressively invite christians to take over a political party. But, like all other things, he lied about that and they were only given power over the culture wars, as cover for the unpopular policies they wanted to quietly push towards. The Christians were given no say in economic policy.

[NamerOfStars]

It's actually quite simple: they're not conservative. This isn't just me gatekeeping some idea of what a "proper conservative" should be; it's the rise of a tangentially-related-at-best ideology that saw its fulfillment in Dubya's presidency: the "paying taxes is bad", "restricting civil liberties is good", "order above all" mentality. It has very little to do with classical conservativism- not unlike how so many modern "liberals" bow at the feet of Obama, come to think of it.

[exitseven]

I just remember that he came after Nixon and Watergate and the Carter administration. Maybe all that made him look good by comparison. I seem to remember the economy going good. And lets face it, he was a movie star before he got into politics. He looked good on camera.

[IncognitoBandito]

The Fairness Doctrine was a child-like attempt to brush all opinions under the umbrella of Left/Right, when in reality most complex issues have a wide-array of opinions. Are you going to mandate by law how many opinions every media source must give a voice to, or just the two most popular at any moment always get to dominate the discussion. You can't legislate for people to think rationally, which you'd know if you had something beyond the intellectual grasp of a walnut.

[Robber_Baron]

Ronald Reagan was one of the worst POTUS in history for the reason that he was a complete sellout and always willing to obey his sugar daddies in politics.

[najekim]

I remember listening to the radio the day Reagan was first sworn into office. Within minutes of his oath, Iran released the 52 hostages they were holding for over 400 days because they feared what Reagan would do to Iran upon entering the oval office the first time.

[RealMarek]

The Fairness Doctrine was abused to restrict left-wing commentary during Nixon’s presidency and right-wing commentary during Carter’s. Getting rid of it was the right thing to do.

[Anonymous]

Seems like a bad policy. Who decides what is the "other side" and if their story is adequately fleshed out? Does it act as gatekeeping for smaller media? I wouldn't trust CNN to present the "other side" fairly, so forcing them do so wouldn't make a difference, just clog up the works with more policy.

[joeldalton]

Lol, your ass crack in your profile is the most interesting thing about you.

[Xtcy2083]

Um... okay. :D
So, what do you think about Reagan?

[joeldalton]

Overall he was a great president. He stood up for what he thought was right. He loved America (unlike the current piece of shit in the Oval Office and his VP). He helped collapse the USSR and brought down the Berlin Wall.

[Xtcy2083]

1. "He stood up for what he thought was right" - Yes, he did that, but what he thought was right was actually wrong, in my opinion anyway.
2. "He loved America" - Yes, you could say that.
3. "He helped collapse the USSR and brought down the Berlin Wall" - Nope, he accomplished neither. If we're going to assign either credit or blame for the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe, that has to go to Gorbachev and Yeltsin.

[888theGreat]

He picked 3 major things to do , or make better and stuck with it. Where as Trump tries to do everything at once.

[888theGreat]

I wonder what her rates are.

[joeldalton]

So you’re a typical lefty

[Xtcy2083]

Not liking Ronald Reagan doesn't automatically make me a "lefty". The so-called left aren't really all that different from the right anyway when it comes to the issues that actually matter (like foreign policy).

[MCheetah]

I honestly don't know. I was never a fan of Reagan, not that I'm conservative.

[Dargil]

Why shouldn't he be. Did you ever study his record?

[Cubus]

Well, I'm a conservative, and I very liked this guy. He helped to end communism in my country.

[fjb2021]

Deep State bitches. Been around before I was born. Been around since y'all was born. Does anyone see this?