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I just looked up "reagan accomplishments" and copy pasted because that one dude was pissin me off.

biccat wrote:

40kFSU wrote:If high, oppressive taxes and huge governments worked, the European Union would rule the world. Instead they are teetering on financial collapse. Again, America isnt the most powerfull nation in the world because our DNA is different, its because we have freedom and low taxes and small government. Until 2008, and you see where we are in that short time.

Point of order.

The government wasn't "small" before 2008. You pretty much have to go back to pre-TR/Wilson to find a "small" government in the US. Although both Clinton and GW Bush dramatically increased the size of our government.

Fixed!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I do feel there is a bit of rose-colored-glasses with Reagan, but he was one of the few President's in US history that had extremely high approval ratings, managed to get an opposition party to cooperate multiple times and made most people feel better about their situations after Carter's abysmal 4 years. You know it's bad if the Democrat Party runs someone against you in a Primary. Especially Ted Kennedy.

Did Reagan really end the cold war?

Yes and no. Yes his policies helped end the cold war, but not he can not be given all the credit. His cold war anti communist policies were not really all that different from George HW Bush, Jimmy Carter, Ford, Nixon, LBJ, JFK, or Eisenhower, and the Soviet Union pretty much had the same problems attempting to keep up with us in an arms race over a 30+ year period of time before they collapsed. That and the Soviet Union technically collapsed under HW Bush's watch.

Does he deserve his reputation for fiscal prudence i.e lowering taxes and reducing federal involvement in trade and commerce.

Yes, but the thing to keep in mind is when he took office tax rates were much higher than they are right now. The higher tax rates are the greater the + effect will be of lower taxes, and the lower tax rates are the lesser the + effect is of lowering taxes. Tax rates in 2011 are the lowest they have been since Eisenhower, so lowering tax rates now will have less of a + effect now than they did back when tax rates were much higher before Reagan went into office.

What about the time he locked up the air traffic controllers? Or the arming of various groups/interests in South America?

No sympathy for the air traffic controllers. Easily exploitable public sector workers that have few job options such as sanitation crews exc should by all means have the right to go on strike. IMO it's extremely unethical for highly payed professional public sector workers that are responsible for immediate public safety such as air traffic controllers or police to go on strike. Doing so at best hold the entire nation's economy hostage , and at worst places human lives in danger. Society can sustain a 50 day teacher's strike, but we can not sustain a 15 day police strike without descending into complete anarchy or martial law.

The Soviet union or Cuba backs 1 group of armed thugs South America + the USA backs another group of armed thugs in South America=South Americans pointlessly die as pawns. Business as usual, and pretty much the same things were going on under Carter, Ford, Nixon, LBJ, and JFK.

Did he have an affair with our Maggie!

No they were both pretty much prudes, but nobody has dis-proven Clinton having an affair with princess Diana.

schadenfreude wrote:That and the Soviet Union technically collapsed under HW Bush's watch.

Hey, now! We all know he stood up to those godless commies and said, "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!", and sure enough, by the power of Reagan, it came down!*

*2 and a half years later, when George H.W. Bush had been in office over 11 months

schadenfreude wrote:
Yes and no. Yes his policies helped end the cold war, but not he can not be given all the credit. His cold war anti communist policies were not really all that different from George HW Bush, Jimmy Carter, Ford, Nixon, LBJ, JFK, or Eisenhower, and the Soviet Union pretty much had the same problems attempting to keep up with us in an arms race over a 30+ year period of time before they collapsed. That and the Soviet Union technically collapsed under HW Bush's watch.

The problem is that there isn't any evidence that the Soviet Union tried to keep pace with the US in terms of defense spending, which at least suggests that the arms race had no material effect on the Soviet collapse. You could argue that there was a sort of morale effect which contributed to the dissolution of the USSR, but that ignores the role of the Brezhnev Doctrine, and the greater autonomy it granted to satellites of Moscow, which basically became a policy of non-engagement with respect to revolutions in Eastern Bloc states.

Put differently, the collapse of the USSR had very little to do with the peripheral conflicts between it and the United States, and everything to do with the abysmal Soviet economy.

schadenfreude wrote:Did Reagan really end the cold war?

Yes and no. Yes his policies helped end the cold war, but not he can not be given all the credit. His cold war anti communist policies were not really all that different from George HW Bush, Jimmy Carter, Ford, Nixon, LBJ, JFK, or Eisenhower, and the Soviet Union pretty much had the same problems attempting to keep up with us in an arms race over a 30+ year period of time before they collapsed. That and the Soviet Union technically collapsed under HW Bush's watch.

No, seriously, this is just wrong. I've already referenced CIA studies that showed Soviet spending did not increase in response to US defence spending increases.

The Soviet Union collapsed because communism doesn't work. That's all that caused it.

Yes, but the thing to keep in mind is when he took office tax rates were much higher than they are right now. The higher tax rates are the greater the + effect will be of lower taxes, and the lower tax rates are the lesser the + effect is of lowering taxes. Tax rates in 2011 are the lowest they have been since Eisenhower, so lowering tax rates now will have less of a + effect now than they did back when tax rates were much higher before Reagan went into office.

Lowering tax rates is about the worst possible form of stimulus. If you want to credit Reagan with any element of the recovery, it would be his increased spending - but I suspect that doesn't get talked about because conservatives don't like accepting the positive effects of increased spending.

The Soviet union or Cuba backs 1 group of armed thugs South America + the USA backs another group of armed thugs in South America=South Americans pointlessly die as pawns. Business as usual, and pretty much the same things were going on under Carter, Ford, Nixon, LBJ, and JFK.

While South America has long been a playground for US presidents, Reagan amped up the stakes, though, and backed some pretty crappy people.

sebster wrote:
While South America has long been a playground for US presidents, Reagan amped up the stakes, though, and backed some pretty crappy people.

To illustrate:

The Contras (read: Somozas: authoritarians), Noriega, Plan Mexico (which ended up funding the present cartels), Plan Colombia, Pinochet, the rest of Condor (which saw huge funding increases under Reagan), and many more.

And then there's the School of Americas which, under Reagan, saw its funding tripled.