Listen, I loved Reagan. But time has a way of making people forget the bad and only remember the good. Reagan was a great President and will go down as one of the top five in my book, but he did do things that would have conservatives of today yelling and screaming.
Don’t tell that to Peggy Noonan tho, who today wrote a harsh piece against Bush (once again) basically saying that he destroyed the Republican party:
On the pundit civil wars, Rush Limbaugh declared on the radio this week, “I’m here to tell you, if either of these two guys [Mr. McCain or Mike Huckabee] get the nomination, it’s going to destroy the Republican Party. It’s going to change it forever, be the end of it!”
This is absurd. George W. Bush destroyed the Republican Party, by which I mean he sundered it, broke its constituent pieces apart and set them against each other. He did this on spending, the size of government, war, the ability to prosecute war, immigration and other issues.
Were there other causes? Yes, of course. But there was an immediate and essential cause.And this needs saying, because if you don’t know what broke the elephant you can’t put it together again. The party cannot re-find itself if it can’t trace back the moment at which it became lost. It cannot heal an illness whose origin is kept obscure.
I don’t agree with some of the things Bush has done, but I have never, nor will I ever agree with any President on all the issues. It’s just not possible. There is no such thing as the perfect candidate, or President, because for that guy to be perfect to one person means he will be imperfect to someone else who holds different believes and experiences.
Reagan cut taxes, but the following year agreed to a large rollback of corporate tax cuts and a smaller rollback on individual tax cuts which undid about a third of his initial tax cut the year before. I would call that raising taxes.
He initially wanted to restructure Social Security and proposed some large cuts to the program. The Senate almost unanimously threw it out and in the midterms of 82 the GOP lost 26 seats. The next year he agreed to a 165 billion dollar bailout of Social Security which dramatically increased payroll taxes on both employees and employers, added new federal workers into the system, AND for the first time Social Security benefits were taxed.
As Governor he passed The Therapeutic Abortion Act which dramatically increased abortions, something for which he later greatly regretted and worked tirelessly to correct as President.
In 1977, during a radio address as Governor, he wondered about the:
“the illegal alien fuss. Are great numbers of our unemployed really victims of the illegal alien invasion, or are those illegal tourists actually doing work our own people won’t do? One thing is certain in this hungry world: No regulation or law should be allowed if it results in crops rotting in the fields for lack of harvesters.”
In 1980 he mused about a workers program for immigrants:
“I believe we must resolve the problem at our southern border with full regard to the problems and needs of Mexico. I have suggested legalizing the entry of Mexican labor into this country on much the same basis you proposed, although I have not put it into the sense of restoring the bracero program.”
And we all know what he did in 1986. He signed the Immigration Reform and Control Act which included a provision for legalizing immigrants already in the states. True amnesty. During the signing he said:
“We have consistently supported a legalization program which is both generous to the alien and fair to the countless thousands of people throughout the world who seek legally to come to America. The legalization provisions in this act will go far to improve the lives of a class of individuals who now must hide in the shadows, without access to many of the benefits of a free and open society. Very soon many of these men and women will be able to step into the sunlight and, ultimately, if they choose, they may become Americans.”
Now its true that Reagan did a whole lot more good for the GOP then he did bad, but he did run counter to some basic conservative principals as leader of California and the nation. To say otherwise is just being dishonest. He was a practical man and politician who would bend when he needed to ensure that the more important aspects of his policies were enacted.
Reagan wasn’t perfect, neither is Bush. But to say that Bush has destroyed the Republican party is just absurd.
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Frankly with all the abuse that Bush has taken, I’m surprised that he didn’t completely give in long ago. Show me another that could have withstood the barrage of bull crap that man has withstood. The hate and vitriol day after day after day, you to would have softened on a lot of issues. He’s only human. The only real disappointment I have with him is Immigration, for that I can’t forgive.
Did you forgive Reagan?
President Bush has busted the dhimmi’s ego’s so bad they’ll never recover. BDS is alive and well.
Point taken, but the difference is that we saw what happened with that.
Peggy has really disappointed me the past few years. I used to admire the way she used words and communicated her passion with them. But when I hear or read her now I feel disconnected from what she is saying.
I’ve noticed that many of the folks who were big stars during the Reagan era and afterwards have felt somewhat left out in the 21st Century Bush era. And I think it bothers them. Maybe they are just saddened that they are no longer in the loop and they take it out on Bush.
Probably a good explanation Mike. I loved her books on Reagan and you can tell she admired the man greatly, as should us all but the vitriol emanating from her on Bush is just so over the top its amazing.
I saw her on “The Factor” tonight with Laura Ingraham. It’s been a few years since I have seen her on TV (she doesn’t usually do Fox News) and her age is starting to catch up with her. She’s 57 now. Last time I saw her she was wearing some leather bomber jacket trying to look young and hip.
Now, she’s got a Margaret Thatcher hairdo and gone is the leather jacket.
I hope I will be able to enjoy her work again. She really nailed what it was like to be in the Regan White House.
Peggy has really disappointed me the past few years. I used to admire the way she used words and communicated her passion with them. But when I hear or read her now I feel disconnected from what she is saying.
I feel the same way.
I seem to recall Reagan promising to reduce the size of government; yet he expanded it by adding a secretary of veteran affairs to the Cabinet.
Withdrawing our forces when 241 American servicemen were killed in their barracks in Lebanon only emboldened Hezbollah.
There are a number of things you could be critical of Reagan for. For today’s Bush critics who worship at the altar of Reagan, I think it’s a rightwing strain of BDS that has afflicted them. The unrelenting criticism from the left has finally cowed them into distancing themselves from President Bush. For the purists, if they want to disown Bush as “no true conservative” and make the claim that Bush 43 “destroyed the Republican Party”, then he’s in good company, with Ronald Reagan. What conservative will ever be immaculate enough, for them? The country is evenly divided 50/50. Political leaders have to work with that reality.
And Peggy has been living in New York for years. She’s probably tired of defending Bush and finds it easier to get along with her Bush hating lefty friends if she trashes him too.
I bet she gets more party invites after her latest column.
Peggy Noonan lost it many years ago, and this latest column confirms it even more.
On the morning of the President’s inaugural in 2005, she praised his address that morning on FoxNews. She continued to praise his speech later in the day. However, in a column the next day, she said the address was all nonsense with no direction. “A mighty disappointment,” paraphrasing her. What happened overnight? Was it envy that she didn’t write the address, which was well received? Or, that she had become another has been speechwriter?
I think we already know the answer to these questions.
Firstly the illegal alien count at the time of Reagan’s amnesty was about 3 million. A far less intimidating number than we have today. Reagan’s amnesty came with enforcement attached. In fact many of the unenforced laws that could be used to protect the border exist because of Reagan.
Reagan’s amnesty with enforcement was a one-shot deal that was expected to end the issue once and for all. It failed. Its why we know to reject amnesty (even if it has a few trivial penalties to make it not amnesty, technically).
Your joking right? Are you seriously trying to excuse the bill he pushed through? Did you read his writings on the subject in which he was almost in sync with GWB’s feelings on the subject?
As I said, Reagan was a great President but in no way shape or form was he perfect. Neither is Bush. But both are great Presidents.
Bush took away many of the conservative arguments for supporting the GOP. Not that it means one should support the dems, but it makes it hard to make a case.
His Generals and his JAGs are going after our own troops.
Our guards in Gitmo and our troops are fighting with one hand tied behind their backs.
He is overspending like crazy. Cutting taxes, yes, but handing over the deficit as a talking point to the dems.
He is pandering to Mexico. We have border agents in jail for shooting illegal alien drug runners. Those runners get Mexican legal aid and US immunity to testify. We are convicting agents SOLElY on testimony from Illegals.
He allows increased immigration and visas from muslim countries.
He has allowed women to continue to serve in harm’s way.
His military has puffed up females in combat situations that didn’t deserve it. AA is alive and well in the armed forces.
He supports castrating Israel.
He gives money to terrorists in Palestine.
He kept on liberal morons like George Tenet, and got screwed.
He hires asshats like Colin Powell who screwed him too.
McCain-Feingold is unconstitutional.
We continue to give the Chinese intelligence coups.
He is letting central america go socialist, a la Jimmy Carter.
He is about to screw Mushariff over and let Pakistan go crazy a la Carter, only this time, the Paki’s have nukes.
So when I try to argue with a liberal that the dems are bad for us, they have plenty of ammo to use against me that I agree with.
Noonan is right, Bush has broken the GOP. The RINOs own it.
I forgot how he want’s to let illegal aliens who stole people’s identities collect the social security earned in those false identities. Who arbitrates when the citizen claims the income as their own? Is the illegal assumed to be just as honest as the citizen?
Interesting essay on Reagan, who I believe is the most influential figure in the last 1,000 years. I am not joking. His sins on amnesty and tax increases are forgiven many times over given his achievement in facing down the USSR at an epic moment in history (Adropov ascendant, the USA hobbled and weakened by Liberal self-doubt and decay, two superpowers whose armaments threatened the human race with extinction…).
The five-hour Frontline documentary is among the best I’ve seen on Reagan’s iron will and backbone in pursuit of America’s victory.
Godspeed to the Great One, and may we be blessed with a leader with even 1/10th what he brought to the Office.
Reagan was a human being who was loyal to this country, but he wanted peope to like him, so he did the disastrous amnesty. Bush is a traitor, plain and simple. He attacked a country based entirely upon his own lies, slaughtering 400,000 innocent people, including 5,300 Americans.
This was thousands of times worse than Clinton affair or Nixon’s nothing scandals, yet Bush was protected, and was not even investigated or impeached. His amnesty of 15 million illegals, 5 times the amount Reagan amnestied, would have wrecked thsi country. Thank God the Congress defeated it twice.
IMHO, the “traitor” moniker should be hung around your neck. There has been plenty of time for you to do due diligence, you instead choose to foolishly perpetrate “the lie” in the oh so familiar, extreme, lefty fashion. Lazy, BDS or just too easy to fall back on discredited talking points? 🙄
You’ve landed in the wrong spot to deliver your extreme, ugly rant about President Bush, not only have the FA authors studied the WOT from the beginning, they have also poured through every intel, commission, Senate and House report, and then kindly shared their work with the FA community.
There’s much in the archives, as was Noonan’s “absurd Bush rant”…………here’s just a tiny taste of what else is archived, just to put the shame to your faulty comment:
Also see the actual amended SSCI committee conclusions: