January 2, 2019

This video reminded me of how awful Reagan was...

I do graphic design work, and while I'm working I often play history documentaries in the background. Lately my pet topic has been assassinations and the Secret Service. I especially enjoy listening to videos of old news coverage. So I get to Reagan's assassination attempt, and I click on this video to get a sense of that period (I was a teenager back then and felt completely powerless), and before they get to the assassination coverage, you have to sit through a Reagan speech.

I know that many people will disagree with me, but this man was the absolute worst. I'm sorry someone tried to shoot him, but I found this speech more unbearable than any of Trump's. With Trump, it's a given that everything is a lie. And they are easily proven lies. But this speech brought me back to that sick feeling I had through eight years of Reagan. The self-righteousness, the anger, the extreme self-confidence of the religious right that they had "won". Nearly forty years on, it's clear that they haven't won shit. A lot of Trump's mob aren't even good Christians. They're a different crowd - ignorant trash. And yes, it's disturbing that they got their man in the White House. But ignorant trash is much more easily discredited. They can make all kinds of mistakes that are easily exposed. I do think that over the years the opposition (us) has won a lot of victories and has gotten much stronger. For example, they really went overboard when they got hysterical over the Clintons. They let the militia / patriot nutcases into their fold. I think we won our argument a long time ago, but I found the Reagan administration much more intimidating. Sit through a Reagan speech, listen to how cold and self-righteous the man is, and all of this pious rhetoric he uses, and tell me who the bigger asshole is. I think that in his "heart", Trump knows what a buffoon he is.

Notice how, if you can sit through the speech, Reagan ends his speech with "make America great again." When I watch Trump, it's clear to me he's trying to imitate Reagan. I do blame Reagan for all of this we deal with today. No Reagan, no Trump.

As tragic as the Trump presidency is for our country, I don't feel as bad about the future of our democracy as I did then. Trump is no Teflon president. He's a blatant crook and liar. So was Nixon, and I remember (as a very young child) thinking Nixon was shit and heard it from my parents all of the time. My father met Nixon when he was a waiter at a fancy hotel restaurant in downtown Chicago. He said that Nixon was the biggest asshole of all of the presidents he ever met. But I don't remember feeling despair when he was President, because it seemed that he had a healthy opposition who had won a lot of political battles. There was hope back then, and there is hope now. Reagan, however, did so much of the damage that made Trump possible.

I mean, just listen to his self-righteous crap about government spending and deregulation. Reagan started all of this shit. Fuck him.