Why do I keep coming back to Reagan?

[Flagrante]

Last edited Sat Dec 15, 2012, 04:04 AM - Edit history (1)

"Government is not the solution to our problem, Government is the problem." -R. Reagan. The single, most damaging sentence uttered by an American President that our country has ever had to suffer. Ushering in decades of small minded ideology that has lead to, among other tragedies, the underfunding of mental health services and education, the two things that could have spared those children today.

Every time a big, ugly issue like this surfaces, as I try to understand why it happened, it always ends up back at Ronald Reagan. In this case, before Reagan became governer of California, CA had an extensive mental hospital system where the mentally ill got good care. Reagan pulled the funding from that, and threw the mental patients out into the streets. When he attained the Presidency this deficient style of budget priority infused the entire Republican party, and it has left the nation a shambles. We now live the result of decades of underfunded social systems surrounded by under educated, paranoid troglodytes convinced that they are safer if everyone owns a few guns. Welcome to Ronald Reagan's America.

[quinnox]

1. blaming Reagan for this is quite a stretch

Lets not get carried away.

[Flagrante]

3. I disagree

What Reagan did was create a new normal, where social help like mental health services don't exist. The unfortunate shooter, and his parents, needed a strong mental health system to rely on for his care. It doesn't exist, because in the new normal there is no such thing.

[PatrynXX]

10. Which is rather Ironic since

1. he was shot himself and 2. his mind was pretty much gone 1986 onwards.

[JaneyVee]

25. I agree in a way. He created the 'FU I got mine' mind-state which allows Govt services to be slashed

in favor of unfettered capitalism & the 'drowning of Govt in a bathtub' mentality. That 'Govt is the problem' statement undermines our entire democracy. WE are the Govt, the people.

[eppur_se_muova]

4. Others see it too ...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x171126

My post in that thread links to this article: http://www.sociology.org/content/vol003.004/thomas_d.html

[quinnox]

9. Reagan was dead years before this kid was born

Jeez, lets blame Reagan for 9/11 then while we are at it.

[coalition_unwilling]

13. FAIL! Lanza was 20. Reagan died in 2004. You do the

math.

[quinnox]

15. ok, I was wrong about that

I was thinking Reagan had died earlier and that the shooter was younger. Still, to me, blaming Reagan is strange when he died years ago. He did some bad things, but that was in the 80s.

[coalition_unwilling]

32. Sorry I came across as so harsh. (Late at night on a very

trying day.) I think what we are witnessing now in many sectors of American society is the apotheosis of Reaganism. It may be a bit of dirty pool 'blaming' someone who is not around to defend him- or herself. However, that said, history is all about assessing cause and effect and yesterdays shootings are an effect that can be traced to the cuts to mental health services (and de-warehousing of the mentally ill) that Reagan instituted.

Let's put the question another way: is there any other president you can think of who deserves more blame than Reagan?

[loudsue]

14. You're a Reagan fan???

Reagan was the beginning of banking deregulation, breaking the Air Traffic Controllers strike, eliminating the Fairness Doctrine, which gave more power to the likes of faux news/rush limpballs, trashing government and all government stood for. He mocked and smirked about the EPA, FDA...the guy started the "greed is good" meme that took hold at the time in business schools all across the country.

Reagan was the beginning...a b-movie hollywood actor ACTING with charm, humor and charisma, to turn this country in the direction it has been going ever since.

Defend him at your own peril.

[quinnox]

17. I grew up under Ronald Reagan

And at the time I liked the man. I was not into politics as a kid, so I had a good feeling about Reagan. Hell, even President Obama said some good things
about Reagan in the past, and probably because of the same reasons, he was a young man when Reagan was president.

I'm not defending Reagan, just saying it seems a little loopy to blame him for this shooting.

[truebluegreen]

30. Can't find a link to the strip,

but this is the transcript from Doonesbury, 8/25/1980:

BD: I feel good today. Know why I feel good today?

Mike: I'll bet we're going to find out.

BD: I feel good because I woke up this morning and it suddenly hit me there's an excellent chance our next president is going to be Ronald Reagan!

It's the beginning of a new age, gentlemen, it's a whole new ball game, you better make plans.

Zonker: I already have. I've decided to shoot myself.

Mike: Good choice. Hand guns should be cheap and plentiful.


Edited to add: at the time I thought it was funny.

[coalition_unwilling]

12. It is indisputable that Reagan cut funding for public

mental health services.

I don't see why it's 'quite a stretch.'

[BlueToTheBone]

31. Actually, no.

Reagan emptied the mental hospitals in ALL the states with some term like community care. That was about the time disabled, mentally ill vets began turning up on street corners and it has only gotten worse. Some of these cruel policies take generations to come to fruition, but these are truly the fruits of those actions.

[daleo]

2. Reagan was a disaster

He gave people cover to wallow in their worst instincts.

[Skittles]

5. because he made greed and idiocy fashionable

things that should just be considered rightwing wacko LUNACY are now "debated"

[Initech]

6. Worst president ever.

[TahitiNut]

19. No, that infamy belongs to George W. ...

... but Reagan is down there, I agree, despite the insanity of the deification of a mentally-deficient puppet.

[Egalitarian Thug]

22. Depends on your criteria. Without reagan, there probably wouldn't have been a bush.

reagan's damage to the culture as well as his policies make it a real contest, IMO.

[Initech]

33. We wouldn't have had George W. if Reagan wasn't elected.

[stevenleser]

7. Reagan deserves a lot of blame for a lot of things.

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/lesersense/2012/11/30/making-sense-with-steve-leser--political-commentary-1

Besides what I talked about in my above Nov 30 radio show, he delayed research and government action on AIDS by 8 years and thus 8 years worth of AIDS victims and the extent of the penetration of AIDS into the populations of many countries is his fault and many, many other things.

[world wide wally]

11. Reagan said that the 9 most frightening words in the English language are...

I'm from the government, and I'm here to help.

But I must correct him. The nine most frightening words in the English language are... "I'm from a corporation, and I'm here to help

[pansypoo53219]

16. wrong

i'm from the corporation. pay me to help.

[cantbeserious]

18. I Agree - Reagan Is At The Root Of Many Of America's Present Ills

eom

[Resonance_Chamber]

20. Many of America's ills and problem today originated with that POS

Who can forget Greyhound therapy that was popular with him and his Pub Pals.

The ever popular ketchup is a vegetable

Ignoring the homeless and of course the total denial of AIDS.

But what chaps my ass the most is the number of people who say they are a Democrat who voted for that POS and still have the audacity to call themselves a democrat.

[Egalitarian Thug]

21. He gave people permission to be as ugly as they wanted to be.

Certainly, America was not paradise by any stretch of the word, but it was getting better. Sometimes it got a lot better and sometimes only a little, but the nation was steadily lurching forward.

Sexism was still rampant, but by the 70s it had become embarrassing to openly express blatantly sexist opinions in large parts of the country.
Racism was still very much a part of the dominant culture, but by the 70s hardly anyone dared to call a black person n***** in public and those who did risked real consequences.
Poverty certainly existed but people living on the street were rare and those that were did have options available to them in most places, the Great Society programs, while seriously flawed and frequently wasteful, were making a real difference.
Openly gay people were coming out of the closet. In fact, both those terms originated in the decade prior to our regression.
State after state eliminated the death penalty, as did the federal government.
Hardhats and Hippies were beginning to believe that the others might not be entirely evil.
Some of the most unlikely people were beginning to explore some of the radical new ideas about what really matters in life, that there might be more to life than working until you dropped dead at your job or having an immaculate house in the suburbs.
The nation was starting to realize the benefits of essentially socialized higher education.

America was really changing. and most people are very uncomfortable with change.

And along came a grinning huckster, a failed actor turned car salesman turned politician who told people that it was acceptable to reject all these uncomfortable changes.

Why do you keep coming back to reagan? Because he was the voice for all of our worst impulses. Because the people he represented ruined a century of progress and allowed the nation stop looking up.

[Chan790]

24. This is why I hate Ronald Reagan.

He made Americans smaller, more petty and considered it virtue.

[Egalitarian Thug]

26. Maybe it was just that I was so young, but I swear that the whole feel of the nation

changed almost overnight when that truly evil man got power. We stopped caring about our communities and each other. We stopped looking forward to the future, like the air was just let out of optimism.

[socialist_n_TN]

34. As an above post said, Reagan.......

gave people cover for indulging in their worst instincts rather than their better ones.

[kydo]

23. I blame Raygun aka saint ronnie aka reagan

The US didn't have a homeless problem before the 1980's. Yes we had homeless people but it was no where near the homeless problem we have had since. Why? Cause Raygun dismantled our mental health programs. Kick them out to save money. So now these people have no help. This action not only kicked the mentally ill basically to the streets it also created a huge hole for any future people that may have mental issues during their lives. These people will really never get treatment and help they might need.

Add to that guns and this is the result.

The violence that we have come to be numb to, contributes but is not the root of the problem, it only exasperates situation.

This is not a slam on people with mental problems. Mental health is just as important as body health. Some people just need counseling others some meds, still others need monitoring or all of the above. There are so many different types of mental issues and everyone that my have a mental problem reacts differently.

This is one of the many shames that raygun has befallen our country.

Did I mention guns? Why do we need ak 47 assault machine guns? Why is it easier to get a gun then to vote in many states?

We need more practical gun laws and even better mental health system.

[reformist2]

27. Today's GOPers have taken Reaganism to ridiculous extremes.

I can see how many might see Reagan as the "root cause," but I don't think this is fair. Today's GOP policies are a clownish distortion of the platform Reagan ran on in 1980. And actually, it makes more political sense to inform voters of this fact, rather than to convince them that Reagan was the root of all that is evil.

[Brainstormy]

28. Reagan and the assault on anti-trust laws

I always wonder why people don't blame Reagan for essentially dismantling our anti-trust laws and making way for unlimited mergers and the birth of the mega-corporations. I think we can credit Reagan for our now common understanding of the "1%." He helped to make it happen.

[Zorra]

29. Because Reagan, and the Reagan era, began the process that set the social evolution of this country

back by 50 years.

That's a primary reason why RWers are known as regressives.

I hope that someday in the future, it is generally understood that Reagan was shallow, greedy, egotistical freak.

I'm right there with you, Flagrante.

[indepat]

35. And yet, the deification process for the Gipper nears

completion.

[democrattotheend]

36. In his defense

He did publish an op ed in 1991 supporting the Brady Bill.

But I agree with the crux of what you are saying. He laid the foundation to really turn people against government. Which is why I think Obama's presidency has been more successful than a lot of people realize, because he has, at least to some degree, been able to stand up for the role of government and convince people that government is not the problem. On election night, one of the pundits pointed out that he is probably the first candidate to ever get elected president on a platform of raising taxes. I think his narrative about us being a society where we help each other and are all in this together is a powerful counterpoint to the Reagan mantra.