Ronald Reagan

[Traitorfish]

Was the October Revolution as self-evidently heinous as the abuses of Stalin and his successors? It involved very limited bloodshed and enjoyed popular support, which can't be said of much else on that list. I get the impression that, yet again, Kochman's mouth has outpaced his understanding.

(Of course, he won't reply to this, as outlined below, but it was a point worth making.)

 

[Behind The Mask]

Ok, good point... I haven't really listed all the USSR's flaws in one area (I don't have enough time for that really, so here is a big summary)... I'll list all the things that bother me about the USSR... NOW, please, don't assume that this means I think the USA was perfect, or expect me to mention how the USA wasn't perfect...
*Joseph Stalin murdered when he ruled the Soviet Union is 20,000,000
*The exploitation of natural resources from "satellite" nations
*The annexation of the Baltic States and domination of Eastern Bloc
*The crushing of the Hungarian and Czech Revolutions, with tanks
*The NKVD (secret police), watching every move
*No elections until Gorby (and those were highly suspect, with only Communist Party leaders running)
*Angola, Cuba, Vietnam, etc
*Soviet war crimes, WW2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_war_crimes#1944.E2.80.931945_2
*Bolshevik Revolution and all that entailed
*etc, etc, etc

Congradulations; you have further proved my point! I don't know how you imagined that was a rebuttal to my point then simply more of the same.

For someone so opt to comparisions, particularly between the USA and USSR, you do very little comparisions.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

It was a grey area... but the USA can definitely claim the moral high ground.

I think this attitude is where this 'discussion', for the lack of a better word, goes south.

Claiming the moral high ground is not a relative concept. You don't claim the moral high ground by being not as bad as some other nation. You claim it by upholding moral values. This was your response to propping up dictators, and your case seems to be, in comparison to the USSR.

Furthermore, when you state: 'the USA was not (always) perfect' (I'll let the 'always' slip for now) it doesn't really show your distaste for the times when it acted downright badly. 'Not perfect' isn't that big of a condemnation. It leaves the floor open for, for instance 'near perfect', 'good', etc.

USA has been more than naughty at times, not as naughty as the USSR, but naughty still. And that deserves a little harsher judgement than "alright, it wasn't perfect".

Having said that, what a weird discussion you guys are having. Shouldn't we be talking about how Reagan wasn't always perfect?

 

[kochman]

Congradulations; you have further proved my point! I don't know how you imagined that was a rebuttal to my point then simply more of the same.

For someone so opt to comparisions, particularly between the USA and USSR, you do very little comparisions.

Ok, so, you want some kind of pie charts or something?
The point is, the USSR's stuff is sooooooooooooooo vastly worse, it is a waste of time.

I think this attitude is where this 'discussion', for the lack of a better word, goes south.

Claiming the moral high ground is not a relative concept. You don't claim the moral high ground by being not as bad as some other nation. You claim it by upholding moral values. This was your response to propping up dictators, and your case seems to be, in comparison to the USSR.

Furthermore, when you state: 'the USA was not (always) perfect' (I'll let the 'always' slip for now) it doesn't really show your distaste for the times when it acted downright badly. 'Not perfect' isn't that big of a condemnation. It leaves the floor open for, for instance 'near perfect', 'good', etc.

USA has been more than naughty at times, not as naughty as the USSR, but naughty still. And that deserves a little harsher judgement than "alright, it wasn't perfect".

Having said that, what a weird discussion you guys are having. Shouldn't we be talking about how Reagan wasn't always perfect?

I'm not resting until you move to America and tattoo Reagan's likeness over your heart and drive a pick up truck with a Bald Eagle motif painted on it.

 

[GamezRule]

Where's Stalinist Karalysia when you need him?

 

[Dachs]

A nation that had completely worn itself out by fending off an aggressive military juggernaut isn't going to be thinking "Hm, let me see if I can defeat the relatively unscathed foremost industrial power in pitched war." Yeah, right.

To be entirely fair, the United States had just spent several years fighting off two countries that, despite being exhausted by other conflicts, had just tried to defeat the relatively-unscathed foremost industrial power in the world in full scale war.

Indeed, in WW1 there was no tremendous assault, but it was war nonetheless. In WW2, however, there was that spectacular attack. So it's entirely reasonable to assume the USSR would not be okay with another arrangement like they had before the war.

Reasonable? Possibly. You can explain virtually any of the actions through "reason". That doesn't make the actions of the Soviet government in the mid-to-late 1940s at all less imperialistic or any more excusable. In the previous century, Russia had faced a similar construct in international relations - a dual hegemony over Europe with the British, with Europe loosely divided between their two spheres of influence. But the only reason it worked was because there was an independent, neutral center, and because even in the areas in which Russian influence predominated, the Russians only exercised their hegemony very lightly. Nikolai I did not dispatch troops into Germany because of the activities of the Burschenschaften.

Under Stalin and his successors, Central and Eastern Europe were not independent. You cannot refer to those regions as "buffers" in any sense except a military one. Diplomatically, they merely formed part of a Soviet-controlled glacis, a fortress wall. (And the most elementary study of military history will show that a fortress is useful on the defensive, yes - but arguably even more useful on the offensive.) Had Central and Eastern Europe been genuinely independent - this goes for France and West Germany, too, incidentally - the region could actually have fulfilled the role of "buffer" and alleviated tensions between the Americans and the Soviets. After all, the Cold War happened because there was no such buffer: American and Soviet spheres butted up against each other in the Middle East and Central Europe and caused a great deal of tension. (Playing the blame game with the tensions in the Middle East in 1947-8 is largely irrelevant to this discussion, although it is clear that Stalin, not Truman, would lose it.) That Stalin did not opt for that choice is obviously understandable, but it does not make it correct.

Let put out a list of countries whose dictatorial oppressive leaders are there because of direct US government action.

1) 1953 Iranian coup d'état by the CIA transformed Iran's Constitutional monarchy into an Authoritarian one

If I've told you once, I've told you a thousand times...

 

[Behind The Mask]

Ok, so, you want some kind of pie charts or something?
The point is, the USSR's stuff is sooooooooooooooo vastly worse, it is a waste of time.

I'm just entertained that your response to be accused of hypocrisy and bias is essentially telling me not to expect any sort of evidence contrary:

NOW, please, don't assume that this means I think the USA was perfect, or expect me to mention how the USA wasn't perfect...

It just comes off as a little daft that you can be expected to argue one point when almost entirely denying the other; as we can see we can't rely on you to even acknowledge anything contrary to your position.

Thats where I find your arguement collapses.

 

[kochman]

I'm just entertained that your response to be accused of hypocrisy and bias is essentially telling me not to expect any sort of evidence contrary:



It just comes off as a little daft that you can be expected to argue one point when almost entirely denying the other; as we can see we can't rely on you to even acknowledge anything contrary to your position.

Thats where I find your arguement collapses.

My argument doesn't collapse at all, you just won't get off this idea that if I say what bad the USSR has done I must pair it with what the USA has done... it's a nonsensical idea and I'm not going to waste my time on the moot point you are making. You're essentially telling me, if I don't write the things you want me to write, the rest of what I write is irrelevant.
Doesn't work that way.

 

[Behind The Mask]

My argument doesn't collapse at all, you just won't get off this idea that if I say what bad the USSR has done I must pair it with what the USA has done... it's a nonsensical idea and I'm not going to waste my time on the moot point you are making. You're essentially telling me, if I don't write the things you want me to write, the rest of what I write is irrelevant.
Doesn't work that way.

I'm telling you that if you're not writing the things you are claiming to write, then your arguement essential fails.

You tell me that you are writing comparisons; but you are not... a comparison is taking two subjects (USSR : USA) and comparing them. But you haven't compared them; you've gone on a long exposition on the evil of the USSR while giving no commentary on the history of the Cold War USA.

It would be like comparing apples and oranges and opening with a long resounding condemnation of apples that drags on for hours, then you end with "oh, and oranges suck!" and expect that to be taken as comparison.

If you're going to fail at doing what you claim to be doing I'll point it out for all its hypocrisy, double standards and bias.

 

[kochman]

I'm telling you that if you're not writing the things you are claiming to write, then your arguement essential fails.

You tell me that you are writing comparisons; but you are not... a comparison is taking two subjects (USSR : USA) and comparing them. But you haven't compared them; you've gone on a long exposition on the evil of the USSR while giving no commentary on the history of the Cold War USA.

It would be like comparing apples and oranges and opening with a long resounding condemnation of apples that drags on for hours, then you end with "oh, and oranges suck!" and expect that to be taken as comparison.

If you're going to fail at doing what you claim to be doing I'll point it out for all its hypocrisy, double standards and bias.

The things I compared them to were already written by folks such as yourself in this thread... need I line them up for you precisely and assign a point total to each categoy in an atrocity olympics? Or can you stop beating this incredibly mutilated dead horse already?

 

[bombshoo]

So as for Ronald Reagan...

He had above average approval ratings.(Not by much.)
He had something of a hand in speeding up the collapse of the USSR. (Specifics debatable.)
He compromised with Dems. (No specifics.)
He liked parks.
Jews voted for him.
He was better than Hitler.
He was a wizard.

You're telling me that this is why today's Republicans idolize him.

Well, it's nice to have a reason to not take that seriously.

I laughed quite hard at that list.

 

[Behind The Mask]

The things I compared them to were already written by folks such as yourself in this thread... need I line them up for you precisely and assign a point total to each categoy in an atrocity olympics? Or can you stop beating this incredibly mutilated dead horse already?

Except you still do not compare them to the given examples; you might post retalitory examples but you never compare them or even acknowledge them.

In fact, the closest you've come if "eh he, thats pretty bad... but!" which doesn't serve to compare at all.

You continue to accuse me of beating a dead horse, a term you've used so much now that using it is just becoming sadly ironic in its usage... you refuse to address the points and claim it would pretty much be a waste of time too, but if you spent even 1/3rd of the time you dis at compiling info to feed your own bias by actually putting together some logical refute beyond "but this is worse!" then perhaps this vicious cycle would come to an end.

 

[kochman]

Zzzzzzzzz

Moderator Action: Trolling and spam
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889

 

[Racsoviale]

Seeing Kochman rambling about "tanks crushing civilians" a few times makes me think of the Kent State shootings and how the US handled protests in the 60s and 70s.

 

[Crezth]

Source? That's certainly debateable.
Anyhow, individual opportunity was still better in the south, all else being equal...

The individual opportunity to be routinely rounded up and jailed?

The South Vietnamese government was incredibly unpopular. This is well-documented.

*The exploitation of natural resources from "satellite" nations

This is one of your big problems with the USSR? For heavens' sake, man, why aren't you up on the pulpit about the UK for exploiting entire continents at one point?

To be entirely fair, the United States had just spent several years fighting off two countries that, despite being exhausted by other conflicts, had just tried to defeat the relatively-unscathed foremost industrial power in the world in full scale war.

Arguably, the USSR was more worn out, which is really my point here.

Reasonable? Possibly. You can explain virtually any of the actions through "reason". That doesn't make the actions of the Soviet government in the mid-to-late 1940s at all less imperialistic or any more excusable. In the previous century, Russia had faced a similar construct in international relations - a dual hegemony over Europe with the British, with Europe loosely divided between their two spheres of influence. But the only reason it worked was because there was an independent, neutral center, and because even in the areas in which Russian influence predominated, the Russians only exercised their hegemony very lightly. Nikolai I did not dispatch troops into Germany because of the activities of the Burschenschaften.

Under Stalin and his successors, Central and Eastern Europe were not independent. You cannot refer to those regions as "buffers" in any sense except a military one. Diplomatically, they merely formed part of a Soviet-controlled glacis, a fortress wall. (And the most elementary study of military history will show that a fortress is useful on the defensive, yes - but arguably even more useful on the offensive.) Had Central and Eastern Europe been genuinely independent - this goes for France and West Germany, too, incidentally - the region could actually have fulfilled the role of "buffer" and alleviated tensions between the Americans and the Soviets. After all, the Cold War happened because there was no such buffer: American and Soviet spheres butted up against each other in the Middle East and Central Europe and caused a great deal of tension. (Playing the blame game with the tensions in the Middle East in 1947-8 is largely irrelevant to this discussion, although it is clear that Stalin, not Truman, would lose it.) That Stalin did not opt for that choice is obviously understandable, but it does not make it correct.

Fair points, all. Thanks for that.

 

[Camikaze]

Moderator Action: Back to Reagan. How bad the USSR was compared to the US or vice versa is only tangentially related.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

I heard Reagan's admin was the one who introduced Trickle Down economics. Is this true?

I also heard he increased the gap between rich and poor by freezing the minimum wage, cutting the budget for public housing and Section 8 rent subsidies in half, and eliminating the antipoverty Community Development Block Grant program, cut the budgets of non-military programs including Medicaid, food stamps, federal education programs and the EPA. While he protected entitlement programs, such as Social Security and Medicare, his administration attempted to purge many people with disabilities from the Social Security disability rolls.

The administration's stance toward the Savings and Loan industry contributed to the Savings and loan crisis. In order to cover newly spawned federal budget deficits, the United States borrowed heavily both domestically and abroad, raising the national debt from $997 billion to $2.85 trillion. Reagan himself described the new debt as the "greatest disappointment" of his presidency.

War on Drugs
In 1986, Reagan signed a drug enforcement bill that budgeted $1.7 billion to fund the War on Drugs and specified a mandatory minimum penalty for drug offenses which did little to fight drugs, but did a lot to financially burden America. Arguably Nancy Reagan's effort of raising awareness had more effect.

 

[Cutlass]

All true. In the Republican campaign of 1980 GHW Bush called the trickle down theory, which at the time had been relabeled Supply Side economics, Voodoo economics. Bush was right. But by the end of Reagan's term, Trickle Down was the official policy of the Republican party. Most of America's federal debt stems from that. The tax cuts themselves probably only account for 40-50% of the total debt accumulated since 1981. However Reagan increased spending a great deal as well. Now to be fair, Reagan then raised taxes 7 years in a row, but not by enough. Reagan was always working with a fraudulent budget because he was too incompetent of an executive to fire people who gave him false information year after year. Eventually the spending increases and the tax shortfalls led the following 2 presidents to have to raise taxes repeatedly, as well as push some real fiscal discipline, in order to stop the annual deficits. Something GW Bush reversed within a month of taking office.

He also cut welfare drastically. Reagan claimed that he wanted to trim government by cutting weak claims, not claims by weak people. Once in office that was abandoned, and Reagan became the president of special interests at the expense of the poor. Any weak claim could get money. Any weak person was on their own.

Deregulation of finance, particularly the savings and loan industry, cost the government in bailouts some $88billion and in the long run helped set the stage for financial crisis of 2008. It was a huge loss to everyone except those robbers in the banks and Wall St.

In short, as I said early in the thread, the nation as a whole is materially poorer, and most people of the country for generations to come will be materially poorer, because Reagan was president.

 

[Tarquelne]

I heard Reagan's admin was the one who introduced Trickle Down economics. Is this true?

You're probably referring to the "wiz kid" David Stockman.

Link is to wikipedia. But there's also many, many articles about him and "Reaganomics" (or whatever you want to call it) online.

IIRC he's more or less recanted. Err... last quote from wiki article: "The Republican Party has totally abdicated its job in our democracy, which is to act as the guardian of fiscal discipline and responsibility. They're on an anti-tax jihad -- one that benefits the prosperous classes."

cutting the budget for public housing and /etc. etc./

There's a great Bloom County cartoon...

Bobbi Harlow: Your biology project, I assume?
Milo Bloom: Yup. A twelve-foot python named David Stockman. Eats rabbits.
Bobbi Harlow: Bunnies!?
Milo Bloom: Yes. I've named them after various social programs. I'm afraid it was little CETA's turn, yesterday.
Bobbi Harlow: Ugh! That's horrid!
Milo Bloom: Well, that's the point.

 

[Agent327]

Off topic:

I know how God can make a rock so big He can't move it.

God can´t. It would be called a paradox, but it isn´t: making a rock so big it can´t be moved is nonsense. (But I´d be happy hearing you explain it.)