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dballance

(5,756 posts)
Wed Feb 6, 2013, 03:07 PM Feb 2013

One of my TN Friends has a Pic of St. Reagan on His Page With "Happy Birthday Mr. President..."

and then this little tidbit: "Happy Birthday Mr. President - Your legacy will never be forgotten."

I was so tempted to post - Yep, his legacy of ignoring the AIDS crisis. His legacy of union busting with the Air Traffic Controller's Union. His legacy of Iran Contra and giving us Ollie North as a conservative commentator. His legacy of the clearly ineffective voodoo economics of trickle-down. His legacy of having more people in his administration indicted and convicted than any other president before him or since.

Yep, his legacy will not be forgotten.

Feel free to rant and add more things for which his legacy will not be forgotten in the comments. It will give you a chance to rant, let off some steam and avoid pissing off your FB friends who will never be convinced St. Ronnie was an evil, evil man. It will be cathartic.

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maxsolomon

(32,987 posts)
2. I couldn't articulate what they think his legacy consists of.
Wed Feb 6, 2013, 03:12 PM
Feb 2013

They think he made the USSR collapse, but beyond that? He made them feel good about being flag humping yahoos again?

 

dballance

(5,756 posts)
3. Oh, the USSR - Even the Russians and Gorbachev Admit the USSR...
Wed Feb 6, 2013, 03:19 PM
Feb 2013

was doomed long before Reagan. I think recently Gorbachev said the political and economic fallout, so to speak, of Chernobyl had a great impact toward the fall of the USSR.

LeftofObama

(4,243 posts)
4. I would like to invite a bunch of reagan loving buffoons over
Wed Feb 6, 2013, 03:37 PM
Feb 2013

and trickle down all over them! I'd make it rain up in here!

Fawke Em

(11,366 posts)
6. I'm in Tennessee and I would gag if that was on my Facebook.
Wed Feb 6, 2013, 03:43 PM
Feb 2013

Which begs the question, what difference does it make where your friend lives? There are a good many people all over this nation who worship Reagan and a good many people in the South - and in Tennessee - who hate Reagan.

Just wondering.

 

dballance

(5,756 posts)
8. I'm From TN Originally so It's More of a Reference to My Old Friends in TN Than Anything Else
Wed Feb 6, 2013, 03:57 PM
Feb 2013

So don't go getting all offended because I mentioned TN. If I want to ridicule TN I can just start quoting Campfield and writing about the asinine bills he's proposing and pondering why people keep voting for him. Because it is the people of his district that keep enabling him. I'm sure I wouldn't have to scratch the surface too hard to find other examples if I tried but I haven't tried because my intent was not to ridicule TN.

Fawke Em

(11,366 posts)
14. I'm in Knoxville and Campfield is PURPOSELY not my state senator.
Tue Feb 12, 2013, 01:26 AM
Feb 2013

He'd never win if he was included in my district. We voted for the Chavez-trained Latina, Madeline Rogero for mayor.

livetohike

(22,084 posts)
7. Reagan ruined the steel industry, especially in Pgh.
Wed Feb 6, 2013, 03:55 PM
Feb 2013

He refused to impose quotas on foreign steel imports and made it "voluntary" - like that would work. Hundreds of thousands of jobs lost and Pittsburgh became the center of the Rust Belt.

I was born and raised in the area and can't believe how short the memories are around here.

Doc_Technical

(3,504 posts)
9. Destroying the Savings and Loan Industry.
Wed Feb 6, 2013, 04:08 PM
Feb 2013

Wasting millions of dollars to have a 600 ship navy composed of
many obsolete rust buckets that were soon scrapped.
Millions of dollars spent on the Strategic Defense Initiative (Star Wars)
241 U.S. Marines killed in Beirut Lebanon, sitting ducks in a hotel
doing nothing to help the civil war there. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Beirut_barracks_bombing
This cluster fuck was canceled out by the invasion of Grenada
two days later.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_of_Grenada

HughBeaumont

(24,461 posts)
10. The union busting of August 5th was far more reaching than anyone realized at the time . . . or now.
Wed Feb 6, 2013, 04:33 PM
Feb 2013
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Air_Traffic_Controllers_Organization_(1968)

Michael Moore said that Reagan's firing of the PATCO strikers was the beginning of "America's downward slide", and the end of comfortable union jobs, with a middle-class salary, raises, and pensions. Moore stated that wages have remained stagnant for 30 years. He also blamed the AFL-CIO for telling their members to cross the PATCO picket lines.

President Reagan's director of the United States Office of Personnel Management at the time, Donald J. Devine, argued that "when the president said no...American business leaders were given a lesson in managerial leadership that they could not and did not ignore. Many private sector executives have told me that they were able to cut the fat from their organizations and adopt more competitive work practices because of what the government did in those days. I would not be surprised if these unseen effects of this private sector shakeout under the inspiration of the president were as profound in influencing the recovery that occurred as the formal economic and fiscal programs."

In 2011, Oxford University Press published Joseph McCartin's book, "Collision Course: Ronald Reagan, The Air Traffic Controllers, and the Strike that Changed America". Reviewing the book in Review 31, Richard Sharpe claimed Reagan was "laying down a marker" for his presidency: "The strikers were often working class men and women who had achieved suburban middle class lives as air traffic controllers without having gone to college. Many were veterans of the US armed forces where they had learned their skills; their union had backed Reagan in his election campaign. Nevertheless, Reagan refused to back down. Several strikers were jailed; the union was fined and eventually made bankrupt. Only about 800 got their jobs back when Clinton lifted the ban on rehiring those who had struck. Many of the strikers were forced into poverty as a result of being blacklisted for employment."


Oh, and to top himself . . . the following year, he signed the Garn/St Germain bill, which relaxed FDR-era limits on thrifts and sent banksters and speculators on their 80s financial/real estate piracy, setting a precedent in the form of taking a big black axe to the savings and well being of seniors and workers. The S & L Crisis of the 80s happened in no small part due to this horrible piece of legislation. All part of the Reagan-fused "Great Risk Shift" which continues unabated to this day.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garn_-_St_Germain_Depository_Institutions_Act
 

dballance

(5,756 posts)
11. Thanks for the Links - You Are So Right - It was the Starter's Gun in the Race to Abolish Unions. /e
Wed Feb 6, 2013, 04:45 PM
Feb 2013

HughBeaumont

(24,461 posts)
12. Thus the hilarity of anyone making under $250,000 a year supporting Reagan.
Wed Feb 6, 2013, 04:57 PM
Feb 2013

This addled joker was less than a friend to labor and American citizens. Made me sick during his re-election campaign ads to see blue-collar workers support him. "The factories are humming again" . . . PFFFFFFFFFFFT. Blue collar work was transferred overseas in droves during the Reagone/Bewsh reign of terror.

LibertyLover

(4,788 posts)
13. My godson posted that photo
Wed Feb 6, 2013, 04:59 PM
Feb 2013

on Facebook. So I commented: President Ronald Reagan - STILL DEAD! I'm sure he'll have some snarky anti-liberal thing to say to me, he usually does.

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