The GOP Dumps Reagan 25 Years Later -- But He Can Still Sell Shirts
The New Hampshire Union Leader, one of our nation's most conservative daily newspapers, reflects on how the GOP sells Reagan's name, but sold out his principles.
RONALD REAGAN was first elected President of the United States of America 25 years ago Friday. In that quarter century, so much about America changed for the better that it is easy to forget how dramatically Reagan reshaped our politics. Sadly, those most forgetful of Reagan's ideals are members of his own party.
Democrats never really understood Reagan, but Republicans got him, some more than others. There always was a split between true Reagan Republicans and those who only campaigned as such. Today, after a decade of Republican dominance in Congress — including four years with a Republican in the White House —it is perfectly clear which wing of the party has won. It isn't Reagan's.
Non-defense discretionary spending has grown at a higher rate under President Bush than it did under any President since Lyndon Johnson. Discretionary spending under President Bush has grown more than twice as fast as it did under President Clinton. Last week, the day before the 25th anniversary of Reagan's election, Senate Republicans cut $36 billion in spending — and promptly added $35 billion. And they touted this as fiscal responsibility.
"The Republican Party came into power in 1995 by advocating limited government, but in the last four or five years, there has been no evidence that GOP officials in the federal government have any remaining commitment to this vital principle," former representative Pat Toomey, head of the Club for Growth, said last month.
Republicans are, and have been for a long time, invoking Reagan's name while squandering his legacy. It is a disgusting act, and one that will bear profoundly negative consequences for both the party and the country.
NH Union Leader
7 comments:
This article must be talking about a different legacy than the one I remember, or for that fact the one that V.P. Chaney remembers. Chaney remarked during the 1st Bush term, that "Ronald Reagan proved that deficits don't matter " ( paraphrased). If you recall Reagan also increased the deficit higher than the total of every president that proceeded him. He like Bush, talked about fiscal conservatism while acting in the totally opposite way. The Reagan "legacy" this article alludes to is a myth. Remember Reagan squandered $80 Billion on his Star Wars Missile Defense, a technology that to this day has never worked and is still being promoted. At the same time Reagan slashed social programs to a unprecidented degree. To me he was the father of homelessness. So let's stop perpetuating the Reagan Myth.
Darth Chaney...
Cheney to Treasury: "Deficits don't matter"
Former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill was told "deficits don't matter" when he warned of a looming fiscal crisis.
O'Neill, fired in a shakeup of Bush's economic team in December 2002, raised objections to a new round of tax cuts and said the president balked at his more aggressive plan to combat corporate crime after a string of accounting scandals because of opposition from "the corporate crowd," a key constituency.
O'Neill said he tried to warn Vice President Dick Cheney that growing budget deficits-expected to top $500 billion this fiscal year alone-posed a threat to the economy. Cheney cut him off. "You know, Paul, Reagan proved deficits don't matter," he said, according to excerpts. Cheney continued: "We won the midterms (congressional elections). This is our due." A month later, Cheney told the Treasury secretary he was fired.
The vice president's office had no immediate comment, but John Snow, who replaced O'Neill, insisted that deficits "do matter" to the administration.
Concerning Paul O'Neils book, The Price of Loyalty...
In the book, O’Neill says that the president did not make decisions in a methodical way: there was no free-flow of ideas or open debate.
At cabinet meetings, he says the president was "like a blind man in a roomful of deaf people. There is no discernible connection," forcing top officials to act "on little more than hunches about what the president might think."
This is what O'Neill says happened at his first hour-long, one-on-one meeting with Mr. Bush: “I went in with a long list of things to talk about, and I thought to engage on and as the book says, I was surprised that it turned out me talking, and the president just listening … As I recall, it was mostly a monologue.”
He also says that President Bush was disengaged, at least on domestic issues, and that disturbed him. And he says that wasn't his experience when he worked as a top official under Presidents Nixon and Ford, or the way he ran things when he was chairman of Alcoa.
I remember that Ragan believed in the trickle down theory. The only problem was that it was only a theory, with no trickle down effect, actually quite the opposite.
He was also responsible for throwing people out on the street, by shutting down halfway houses for people with emotional difficulties. That leaves the police to be responsible for them because there is no place to house them.
Viva la Reagan Revolution!!!!!
Dear Dr. Phil:
Obviously, you've been on Oprah's casting couch for way too long...
Hey Dr.Phil,
When M.Jackson is out working in the mine
digging for Reaganite, he won't be so funny!
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