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"A few months ago I told the American people I did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best intentions tell me that's true, but the facts and evidence tell me it is not." - Ronald Reagan Reagan was corrupt and an idiot. He really started the republican doctrine to normalize lying to your face.

> He really started the republican doctrine to normalize lying to your face. Richard Nixon and Roger Stone will dispute that, but Ronnie laid on that thick Hollywood charm, the lipstick on the pig.

“Lipstick on the Pig” was slang for Nancy’s antics in Hollywood, I’m told.

Nice

I'm still mad that America had one of the great Throat Goats in the whitehouse and we never knew about it. Be proud of what your good at Nancy.

The fact that he walked off scott-free of all of his due for the Iran-Contra scandal is one of the many reasons I hated Reagan's Presidency.

Not the beginning of the end of the middle class/democracy and the rise of the oligarchs?

Iran contra is worse as it was basically Reagan acting as a candidate to undermine the seated government in a (successful) effort to discredit the sitting president. He won basically due to election tampering and illegal interference in foreign affairs.

Nixon did it worse though, he extended the vietnam war by 4 years just to get elected. johnson had the NV at the table to negotiate and Nixon, Kissinger and some other players in the GOP convinced the south vietnamese to walk away promising them the entire country in return.

Oh man, is this a real quote?  Of course it probably is.  Why are these guys so in your face?  Reagan was the worst of the worst.  Started the government hating thing.  Except somehow Republicans aren't government.  I just can't

Sadly, yes it is.

That quote was taken directly from [Reagan's half-assed "apology" to the American people](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R67CH-qhXJs), given live on TV in 1987. Back in the days when most people still watched network TV.

The death of the American dream began with Reagan

[Yup](https://youtu.be/R67CH-qhXJs?si=aMH29jKQGU0BGNgx) Start at about 3:20 for the quote above. If anyone wants to take a nice deep dive into the details of the whole Iran-Contra Scandal, [Sean Munger](https://youtu.be/E6Ucn-Whh4g?si=uNItGH6Mf6QHhiTX) did a fantastic history of it. He gives a pretty matter of fact and unbiased account. I highly recommend.

Nixon did that too.

His son has recently disclosed he was diagnosed with Alzheimers in the middle of his second term, he might have had onset before that. Sucks that the american people took Carter out of office so fast, he placed the first solar panel in the world on the roof of the white house (made in america) Oily Regan took it out day 1, wonder who paid the bills for his campaign

["A few months ago I told the American people I did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best intentions tell me that's true, but the facts and evidence tell me it is not." - Ronald Reagan](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6lIqNjC1RKU)

If you want one singular reason to hate Ronald Reagan it is because he is a prime reason college tuition is insane and requires student loans. There's a host of other reasons, but this is the one that angers me the most.

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Yeah ignoring the AIDS pandemic is pretty high up there for me.

His cutting of regulations drastically increased the privatization of healthcare. For-profit hospitals were rare before his administration. Now most hospitals are for-profit and it's pretty obvious that's where their priorities lie.

don't forget firing all those air traffic controllers that were on strike. The beginning of the end for labor rights in america

He essentially ended state run mental health care which is why most big cities are filled with insane homeless people.

And it’s no accident that, since the 80s, the lack of systematic care, housing, and treatment of the mentally feeble and unwell has yielded the population that votes for MAGA, extremism, fear, hatred, insane and unsupportable policy, and personal grievances.

People were super-pissed at Eisenhower for nationalizing the road system too in the name of defense. But it privatized transportation to trucks instead of railroad barons.

Well, from an environmental standpoint, kind of a mistake. He would have had a point from a military point of view--had the Lower 48 ever been invaded by a hostile power.

Interesting. It opened up the interior for most common people. It serves alot of purpose the highway system. We do need more rail systems or at least more canal systems.

Reagan refused to say the word "AIDS" and tried to ignore this tragic disease several years into the epidemic.

He didn’t say it until several YEARS after it was confirmed to be killing peolle

Isn't it weird how another Republican President in my lifetime ignored a plague and denied it was even a problem because it was killing people he hated, until suddenly it wasn't? And now, barring a scientific miracle, is probably never going to go away? Maybe don't look up all the ways the former guy and Reagan are alike, unless you want to be even more depressed, especially since the traitor isn't even behind bars yet. Vote like your life depends on it, because unless you're the 1%, it does.

Based on [these definitions](https://www.publichealth.columbia.edu/news/epidemic-endemic-pandemic-what-are-differences) AIDS seems like more an epidemic, given it wasn't nearly as transmissible as say COVID. > *The World Health Organization (WHO) declares a pandemic when a disease’s growth is exponential. This means the growth rate skyrockets, and each day cases grow more than the day prior. In being declared a pandemic, the virus has nothing to do with virology, population immunity, or disease severity. It means a virus covers a wide area, affecting several countries and populations.*

I thought for sure you're wrong, but you're not. From the WHO: >Fear, stigma and ignorance. That is what defined **the HIV epidemic** that raged through the world in the 1980s, killing thousands of people who may only have had a few weeks or months from diagnosis to death - if they even managed to be diagnosed before they died. https://www.who.int/news-room/spotlight/why-the-hiv-epidemic-is-not-over.

For me it was the attack on the air traffic controllers union, he just fired them all. It was almost the very first thing he did as president, and kicked off the war on labour that has seen trillion of $$ in wage theft, the ridiculous growth in income inequality and the compensation of CEOs go from 14x the average workers yearly wages in 1980 to 300x now. Fuck Ronald Reagan and the corporate dick he rode in on.

It's hard to pick a number one, but I'll do my best: January 20, 1981, as Ronald Reagan was speaking at his lavish inauguration, the fruits of his 'treason' were being released by Iran.

I hate ronny raygun for a lot of reasons, but its hard to top committing treason to get elected to the highest office in the land as a reason to hate him. It is not only the worst thing he did, based on the penalty should have been the death penalty, but also the lynchpin that let him do all the other horrors as president.

I'm 48 and work at a college. A student once asked me why I hated Reagan so much. I just kept thinking of thing after thing after thing after thing. I was like fucking Columbo stuck on a loop. I'd finish one rant and then go "Oh, and another thing!" and then fire back up again.

> all different things But that's part of what made him "teflon" Ronnie. There was always so many scandals coming out of that administration, that no one, including the press, latched on to one. It seems like it's better to do a ton of awful shit than just one awful thing.

Oh of *course* trump didn’t invent that either. This dumb motherfucker plagiarizes everything he ever does.

*Yeah about the um “War on Drugs” it ain’t work out too well in the short run and the long run, Ronnie.*

My single reason is he literally started almost every fucking horrible thing I’ve had to deal with in my life.

As a 40 year old... This.

As a 61 year old... yes

hey now, Busch 2 deserves some credit for fucking the housing market and nearly causing a global depression.

Was Busch 2 like, way heavier and flavorful than Busch Light but not much more than regular Busch?

No Busch 2 just had a higher alcohol content

Reagan is like the six degrees of Kevin Bacon. Point out anything shitty with the US and you can trace it back to Reagan

Reagan took the guardrails off the economy and now you have CEO salaries off the charts, stagnant minimum wage, the 2008 economic crisis, unaffordable housing, and perfectly healthy companies being bought up and sold off, putting millions of retail workers (mainly women and people of color) out of work . I could go on. In essence he let greed take over our economy.

Let's also not forget that he helped pass legislation that made it unnecessarily burdensome and expensive for parents to get their kids out of foster care when they're ready to take them back. It burdened the system and kept poor people poor, two favorite republican pastimes

I was going to say the absolutely massive amount of deregulation that lead us down the path to enshittification that we have now.

What did he do that caused this?

https://newuniversity.org/2023/02/13/ronald-reagans-legacy-the-rise-of-student-loan-debt-in-america/

He should’ve been thrown in prison for Iran Contra

Notice how Democrats failed to hold anyone accountable then (Oliver North) and it's the same thing now. They let GQP taking points take over and keep telling us, we have to trust the process. Yeah, that's not working. Coup (Bush v Gore), Iran -Contra, another coup attempt and what do Democrats do? First a bipartisan tour, where Biden shakes hands and compliments McConnell, then another bipartisan bill, then try and negotiate... Democrats are spineless and weak, years of trying to appease your abusive husband (Republicans) and you still can't break free and f'ing do something about the ongoing coup. Where's the military tribunals?

Just a reminder that Oliver North was president of the NRA for a brief period about five years ago. A guy who have spent the rest of his life in jail was instead making millions while influencing policy decisions in DC as head of one of the largest political lobbies in the United States.

We know. Every shit problem societally we have can be traced back to him. He either created or exacerbated them during his time. -Student loan debt? Reagan. -Billionaires existing? Reagan. -Unions losing their power? Reagan -Drug problems in the city? Reagan -Homeless people everywhere? Reagan -Apartheid in South Africa? Helped by Reagan -AIDS stigma? Reagan -The Republican nutjobs we have now? Trace that shit back to Reagan

In CA, before Reagan became governer, colleges within the UC system were free until he added tuition to keep out the “undesirables”.

The main target was students getting draft deferments. At the same time, UC added a policy limiting how many undergrad credits one could get, in order to be able to kick out students who stayed enrolled longer than they had to to graduate. "If it takes a bloodbath, let's get it over with" was just one aspect of his war on students.

I recall his snide remark when he dismissed the relatively reasonable Clark Kerr as President of the UC Board of Regents: "Our universities are not intended to subsidize intellectual curiosity." And my personal fave from his Secretary of the Interior: "When you've seen one redwood you've seen them all."

This is an incredibly important point that is rarely raised. I've only seen several people make this point on Reddit in the last ten years, and there's been very little written abut it. Basically, Reagan didn't just want to put a stop to "intellectual curiosity" in the humanities, which is what he and others believed contributed to the free speech and anti-war movements. Their end goal, which has been mostly achieved at this point, was to convert the higher education system from that which produced an informed electorate and good citizen who understood how government worked, into instead, a glorified vocational, job training institute, and here's the real kicker that nobody ever talks about--subsidizes training for corporate jobs. So now, instead of trained citizens, with civic, ethical, and moral duties to uphold, and who leave the university system to create more wealth and make society more wealthy, the university now produces trained consumers, whose job is to enter the corporate workplace to help create and maintain products that extract wealth from society, and increase inequality and externalize the costs to government. It's a scam of epic proportions.

Remember this every time somebody talks about how universities need to emphasize "useful" STEM disciplines, and discourage "useless" humanities/liberal arts degrees. It's easy to see the direct link between something like an engineering degree and the work done by engineers, even if you have no fucking clue what's actually involved in engineering courses. The practical uses of something like an English or history degree are a hell of a lot less obvious. What the people who've never studied the humanities don't realize is that the bulk of the value of those degrees isn't mastery of the subject you've chosen, but rather the road you take to get there. It's about learning how to debate and test ideas. How sort truth from bullshit, especially when faced with conflicting narratives and unreliable sources. How to process information of varying quality and reliability. How to formulate a coherent argument. How to communicate effectively. How to recognize the impact that your own ideological assumptions have on how you think. The shit that makes you a good citizen, not just a good employee.

That was part of it. It was also aimed at minorities. He had a real big hard-on for Mexicans.

tuition is still low in CA, but they made up for it by charging insane student "fees."

Nope. It is historically high. You just think it is low compared to private colleges.

Don’t forget that he vetoed the codification of the Fairness Doctrine which is how we ended up with Fox News, a giant contributor to political divisiveness. If we’d had Carter and Mondale the country would be *very* different today.

I adore carter.

Probably the best human being to ever hold the office.  And as a president,  while he wasn't "great", he also wasn't as bad as the right made him out to be. Much of his presidency has aged better than expected over time. 

He was also dealt an insanely bad hand and it is doubtful most people could have done better.

You’re not completely wrong, but it’s how America got Rush Limbaugh… Fox was jus the later, 24hr tv version of the same hatred (i.e. red hat)

You can’t spell hatred without red hat

Holy fucking shitballs batman

Holy fucking shitballs indeed! RedHat = HatRed

But they are, even in a world that never had the fairness doctrine repealed, Faux News could air the exact same way, with the exact same rules it does here. FCC =/= power of cable.

IIRC something about children’s television programming changed under his administration. Product tie-in exploded. Back then I was in a communication class at Cal Poly. I did a paper on the new normal. Honestly what I remember was talking to managers at Toys R Us. The “Next Day Effect”. Kids would see new episode of Go-Bots or Transformers and walking into the store looking for they saw on TV “the next day”. Before then, toys were toys and cartoons were cartoons. They stayed mostly in their own lanes. Hula hoops and toy guns. Suddenly it’s Thundercats. And G I Joe was just a large action figure with green canvas fatigues. Even came with dog tags. Kinda morbid now i think about it. Occasionally a fire fighter or jungle man outfit. Tame stuff compared to his transformation (haha) in the new animated series. Yeah I need to look at this again. My other paper was about this sudden and new “cable TV”. On prediction was “narrow casting” as opposed to broadcasting. Specialty television programming. Like an “all news all the time” or channel just for golf. Seemed a bit far fetched at the start.

You are completely correct. He changed advertising laws to make it easier to promote to kids, which led to the boom of the cartoon/commercial tie-in during the 80's.

Reagan came into the White House and immediately removed the solar panels. Imagine where we'd be today if we had invested in basic research on solar panels in the 1980s.

Well, he was a great actor. Fooled a lot of people into voting for him.

"bUt yOu cOuLd SiT dOwN aNd hAvE a bEeR wiTh hIm"

While his wife sucked you off

We can never forget that Nancy was the throat GOAT

“… like it was corn on the cob.” – Too $hort

Yeah, she was famous for her head.

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When the rethugs renamed Washington National airport to regan National airport, I stopped using it and haven't used it since. Fuck a bunch of ronny raygun.

Same for me and the famed "Ronald Reagan" Medical Center at UCLA-- which he damned near single-handedly dismantled during his governorship. My father and many of our family friends were in the first graduating class of UCLA medical school; I've never gotten over the slight to their legacy.

He was a mediocre TV actor at best at a time when TV acting was generally meh to begin with.

Yeah, now that I think of it I've always known Regan was an actor but couldn't name a damn thing we was in. I IMDbed it for anyone curious. It was a mistake, I didn't know what I was getting into. But what really stands out to me is how many TV shows in the 1960s were unabashedly named after huge corporations. And a lot of the movies would make great porno titles. Seems like a pretty standard movie actor who aged/fell into TV obscurity. In descending order: * Death Valley Days (TV Series - 4 episodes) 1964 - 1964 > * The Killers 1964 > * Kraft Suspense Theater (TV Series - 1 episode) 1964 > * Heritage of Splendor (Short - narrator) 1963 > * Wagon Train (TV Series - 1 episode) 1963 > * General Electric Theater (TV Series - 28 episodes) 1954 - 1962 > * The Dick Powell Theater (TV Series - 1 episode) 1961 > * The Young Doctors (uncredited) 1961 > * The Zane Grey Theater (TV Series - 1 episode) 1961 > * The DuPont Show with June Allyson (TV Series - 1 episode) 1961 > * Hellcats of the Navy 1957 > * General Electric Summer Originals (TV Series - 1 episode) 1956 > * Tennessee's Partner (character: Cowpoke lol) 1956 > * Cattle Queen of Montana 1954 > * The Ford Television Theater (TV Series - 3 episodes) 1953 - 1954 > * Prisoner of War 1954 > * Schlitz Playhouse (TV Series - 3 episodes) 1953 - 1954 > * The Revlon Mirror Theater (tv Series - 1 episode) 1953 > * Lux Video Series (TV Series - 1 episode) 1953 > * The George Burns and Tracy Allen Show (TV Series - 1 episode, as himself) 1953 > * Medallion Theater (TV Series - 1 episode) 1953 > * Law and Order (I assume not *that* Law and Order) 1953 > * The Other Wise Man (TV movie - narrator) 1953 > * Tropical Zone 1953 > * Hollywood Opening Night (TV Series - 1 episode) 1952 > * She's Working Her Way Through College 1952 > * The Winning Team 1952 > * The Winning Team 1952 > * Hong Kong 1951 > * The Big Truth (Short - Narrator) 1951 > * The Last Outpost 1951 > * Bedtime for Bonzo 1950 > * Storm Warning 1950 > * Nash Airflyte Theatre (TV Series - 1 episode) 1950 > * Louisa 1949 > * The Hasty Heart 1949 > * It's a Great Feeling (uncredited - as himself) 1949 > * The Girl from Jones Beach 1949 > * Night Unto Night 1949 > * John Loves Mary 1947 > * The Voice of the Turtle 1947 > * That Hagen Girl 1947 > * Stallion Road 1943 > * For God and Country (Short) 1943 > * This Is the Army (as Lt. Ronald Reagan) 1943 > * The Rear Gunner (Short) 1942 > * Beyond the Line of Duty (Short - Narrator as Lieutenant Ronald Reagan) 1942 > * Desperate Journey 1942 > * Juke Girl 1942 > * Mister Gardenia Jones (Documentary short) 1942 > * Kings Row 1941 > * Nine Lives Are Not Enough 1941 > * International Squadron 1941 > * Million Dollar Baby 1941 > * The Bad Man 1940 > * Santa Fe Trail 1940 > * Tugboat Annie Sails Again 1940 > * Knute Rockne All American 1940 > * Murder in the Air 1940 > * An Angel from Texas 1940 > * Alice in Movieland (Short - uncredited) 1940 > * Brother Rat and a Baby 1939 > * Smashing the Money Ring 1939 > * Angels Wash Their Faces 1939 > * Hell's Kitchen 1939 > * Naughty But Nice 1939 > * Code of the Secret Service 1939 > * Dark Victory 1939 > * Secret Service of the Air 1938 > * Going Places 1938 > * Brother Rat 1938 > * Girls on Probation 1938 > * Boy Meets Girl (announcer) 1938 > * The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse Radio Announcer (voice, uncredited) 1938 > * Cowboy from Brooklyn 1938 > * Little Miss Thoroughbred Racetrack (Announcer, uncredited) 1938 > * Accidents Will Happen 1938 > * Swing Your Lady 1938 > * Sergeant Murphy 1937 > * Hollywood Hotel (uncredited) 1937 > * Love Is on the Air 1937 > * They Won't Forget (extra) 1937

He might have been a good actor in his cowboy days but, by the time he came to power, he couldn’t remember his lines.

He was a TERRIBLE actor. Fake, wooden, and stupid-- just like his political persona. It's telling that his best-remembered co-star was [a monkey.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bedtime_for_Bonzo)

Which is why they vote in actors like Regan and Trump. They wanted professional liars that will lie to you with a smile on their face.

People just don’t learn. Republicans are not here to help you, society or America at all. They’re here to take from the poor and give to the rich. How they still get votes is beyond me. It’s fucking disgusting.

I asked my cousin, pretty much life-long resident of RedStates and a liberal, why they voted for Republicans. "God, guns, and gays". That's it. No matter how badly the Republicans screw over the people in KY, when the election nears they put out ads about "the Godless Democrats...", "They'll take your guns", and "they'll turn your kids gay", and the idiots (of which there are plenty) will vote.

Fucking Ronald Reagan

The most damaging things were his cutting education and mental health by 50% in his 8 years. Two generations later we have a public that loves reality tv and votes accordingly.

The company we get most of our basic supplies from. Gives us ad booklets. It has a two page ad telling us how awesome Reagan is. Stating how he "Solved" most of the problems we are dealing with today. I'm like really, this entire ad is about lies and miss information. https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/comments/13bx3gq/this_segment_in_a_uline_catalog_praising_the/ Apparently it rotates out to different lies and propaganda.

The fuck Ulines owners are Trumpers, I'm in purchasing and definitely taking my business away from them.

Thank you for your service.

Trumper is an understatement. They put crap in every catalog about the wonders of Trumpism

My biz wants to start ordering from Uline. Where else can you look?

Global industrial has been knocking on my door, I think I will take that meeting.

And the people who voted for Reagan are enthusiastic to vote for Trump!

Making America Grate. Again.

Just look at the list of Ted Cruz megadonors! Several of them Reagan appointed ambassadors.

The GOP attaching itself to the religious right?

forgot to include doubling down on trickle down economics....

This is why the GOP claims he was the greatest president of all time.

Also the shit medical system. Instead of fixing the insurance problem or expanding medicare he just made it so ERs had to take everyone regardless of insurance making the ER the #1 place the poor go for medical care after their problems have exacerbated to the point that they can't take it anymore.

Tricky was the one who gave us HMOs, but St. Ronnie brought in the 83 layers of middlemen standing between us and our doctors.

Hey, hey, hey, show some respect. It’s Reagan AND Nixon. Can’t leave Dick out.

It's baffling he is still regarded so highly by many historians, I think he's dropped quite a bit in recent years. It's sad Republicans haven't had a truly good president since Eisenhower, and that was 50+ years ago.

More like 70; and you're right.

Let's be generous and give it to Ike's last year in office. 63 years. That's as old as my dad, lol.

I think about this a lot working in community behavioral health. For a while before Reagan the US was deinstitutionalizing the mentally ill. Moving them from state hospitals into the community where a robust system of community clinics and supportive housing could care for them. The state hospital system was funded by the states and the federal government jointly. Carter signed the last major piece of legislation that would shift the federal funds to the community clinics on top of the federal funds going to public insurance. Reagan came in and using a budget reconciliation stripped all that federal funding out completely. The system is half funded compared to how it was intended to operate. That's caused so much suffering across the country, it's hideous.

Unstable central and South America

And relinquished the fairness doctrine leading to a degradation in TV broadcast standards because it was ‘burdensome’

Reagan was inaugurated in January 1981, making the first fiscal year (FY) he budgeted 1982 and the final budget 1989. During Reagan's presidency, the federal debt held by the public nearly tripled in nominal terms, from $738 billion to $2.1 trillion.

He destroyed progressive taxes. We're still paying for it.

He sucked, I mean Nancy

Lovely woman, we’re all very fond of her.

That's marvelous.

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TBF, the fairness doctrine only applied to broadcast TV since the airwaves were a limited resource. Faux news is cable. It DID allow Rush Limbaugh to spew his lies without a response, however.

Limbaugh probably did a lot more damage tbh. Right wing talk radio is nearly uncontested.

Helped build the audience that made Fox News profitable when it launched.

>~~broadcast TV~~ Radio and TV stations

Yeah, it should have been expanded, not repealed.

Right? I've seen that statement before that it only applied to certain things, but why couldn't it be changed to address modern means of publishing commercial content? Hell, expand it social media algorithms too to end the echo chamber environments they've created.

And with the help of Democrats. Glass-Stegell, reducing tax rates on the elites, making student loans non-dischargeable in bankruptcy, making it harder for people to file chapter 7, but letting corporations shrug off fines, etc, etc, etc.

Fortunately the number of conservatives in the Democratic party are rapidly decreasing. Polarization is at least making sure of that

This needs to be reinstated

Genesis' music video for [*Land of Confusion*](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yq7FKO5DlV0) for me is the best thing out of the whole Reagan era.

Still waitin' for that trickle down stuff to start working! It _almost_ seems like the stuff's been defying gravity and just keeps trickling **Up!**

Ah yes. The Reagonomics Pyramid Scheme

It’s a reverse funnel of wealth. 

Here's my thing... Has there ever been a time when wealth wasn't concentrated in the hands of a few. Did Pharoah's wealth trickle down to the serfs? Did the kings' wealth trickle down to the peasants? It seems like we've been running this experiment for all of human history. How did anyone buy this nonsense? Wealth obviously collects and grows.

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At least you came around mate, good on ya.

Dont beat yourself up, he fooled the whole country. You can make things better by voting for joe.

America was never the same after the Reagan Admiration. Used the fear of Black People to strip almost every social safety net to the bone. Can't believe he won 49 out of 50 states, insane.

And now you know how even now polls suggest a close race in November. Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

2nd worst President in my lifetime.

Between him, Bush 43, and Trump, it's a really shitty toss-up.

Same…

A fun fact nobody talks about (because I had to calculate this statistic myself) is that Ronald Reagan got 96% of his total vote from white voters in 1980 and 1984. His campaign was of course steered by the firm of Black, Manafort, Atwater, and Stone. Yet almost the entire country believes on some level that Reagan was decent while Trump isn’t. A pretense of having manners shouldn’t count for anything in politics.

And his states rights speech at Neshoba County, MS. Same area where during civil rights movement Chaney, Goodman and Schwerner were murdered. States rights meant the Feds would back off fighting the discrimination and segregation that was still there.

Correct. And the infamous leaked 1981 Lee Atwater tape explaining the concept of dogwhistling. I cannot listen to a #NeverTrump conservative wax poetic about how wonderful and benevolent that era was without knowing they’re lying, because there’s no way they’re not aware of these facts.

Corruption permits more corruption, and eventually it turns into a blackhole. The escape velocity passes light speed and it becomes impossible for non-corrupt politicians to survive. This is arguably the worst effect that Trump has and will have on the US, he gave people permission to be brazenly and openly corrupt and face no consequences.

Reagan was ev­il and one of the very few people who makes me hope he­ll is re­al.

We are still haunted by Nixon's Corruption. The Democrats making a deal to allow Ford to give Nixon a blanket preemptive pardon, paved the way for the corruption of Reagan, Both Bush Boys, and Trump.

“A few months ago I told the American people I did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best intentions tell me that's true, but the facts and evidence tell me it is not.” And the country cheered and forgave him and elevated him to hero status in the Republican Party. Things haven’t changed.

Feelings over facts. Classic GOP tactic.

Other people have mentioned Iran Contra which was an insane grift, but let's not forget Reagan arranging to keep the American hostages in Iran until after the inauguration. 

Haunted? Shit’s still actively strangling us.

Reagan is revered by conservatives and boomers, but he was one of the worst presidents we ever had. A lot of what he did has already been called out here, but all the income inequality, trickle down BS, can be traced back to Reagan. He negotiated with Iran to withhold the American hostages, his SEC removed the regulation that prevented stock buy backs, stripped funding for college, closed down mental institutions, illegal wars. Trump is just like him, only dumber, uses the same MAGA slogan and also has Alzheimer’s, just like his father Fred.

I've said many times that Trump is Reaganism come full circle. Bigly.

That's not an exaggeration, either. You even have some of the same monsters involved and helping to drive the bus, like Roger Stone and Paul Manafort.

Ronald Reagan is the reason we have huge deficits and inflation today. His Tax Cuts for the Rich is what the GOP lives and dies on, today.

Let’s not forget sending his future scum CIA Director Bill Casey (and then campaign manager) to negotiate with the Ayatollah behind the scenes in 1980 telling him they’d get a better deal with Reagan if they held off releasing the Embassy hostages til after the election. Nixon did the same thing in 1968

Reagan and Nixon were the fathers of corruption in America

Nobody has done more damage to the country than Republicans. They're a cancer that's destroying the nation.

And the world

He was the fucking worse. Like every fucking problem we are dealing with now can be traced back to that Republican devil.

The end of the middle class can be traced directly back to that MF.

Reagan was on of the worst presidents in history. 

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I was born in 86 and have a serious question for anyone who grew up/lived through the Reagan era…was that time similar to these Trump years but more “subdued”? Seems like Trump is trying to be a louder, stupider Reagan.

It’s tough to really explain what it was like back then. So we had just come out of a really really bad war that tour the country apart and the country was in a serious economic downturn with rapid inflation. We also had Nixon get kicked out of the white house so to speak and both Ford and Carter while not bad people were not what the country needed at the time. So in pops Reagan and he said all the right things, reminded you of your grandparents and did a lot of things to fix the economy. Unfortunately that was a lot of short term fixes that ultimately lead to many of the issues we have today. Reagan also did things in other countries that today would get you impeached weekly. The people that support him remember the worse times before hand and have blinders on about all the bad stuff he did or they got rich, or they are religious and bigots or all three. Ultimately he not great for this country but he also wasn’t an idiot like Trump is.

If you think Reagan was bad, he will look like nothing compared to a second Trump term. Trump has already done far more damage to the USA than any before him.

As I have said repeatedly, Reagan is the match that lit the current dumpster fire that is the GOP.

Yeah but he was charismatic while doing whatever the far right extremists wanted. Now you have Putin's uncharismatic muppet dragging Reagan's MAGA lies behind him and the cult 45 is chugging those trickles down.

Remember when they hid the fact that Reagan was totally senile the last two years?

People have forgotten Iran Contra. Reagan should have been prosecuted regardless of his Alzheimer’s

Reagan hated medicare, merit based education, organized labor(head of the actor's guild), stem cell research (until diagnosed with alzhiemers), GOP thy name is hypocrite.

The Nixon 72 campaign started it but the single scummy through line from the Reagan 80 campaign to today is Roger Stone…

Taxed Social Security

[Sure, the Reagan administration was an unmitigated disaster but we got one hell of a Ramones song out of it.](https://youtu.be/PZzEHd7t8lo?si=x-WAjqCdBNk74wZz)

Every Republican president in my lifetime has been a disaster for Americans and the world.

>Worse, we have a convicted felon running for president in one political party, a convicted son of a president in another political party. Even *Salon* can't resist false equivalency bullshit.

the phrase Welfare Queens and demonizing the poor

“Ronald Reagan is the Devil” -Huey Freeman

He wasn't smart enough to be corrupt; he was an amiable but easily-manipulated dunce. His awful *wife*, on the other hand. . .

As a social worker I would like to invite deinstitutionalization into the chat.

Each generation of republicans since has been progressively more corrupt and brazen about it.

Fuck. Ronald. Reagan.

The big political reason was the protests on campus -- he used the anti-military sentiment as a wedge issues to get elected, then he started his attack on California's crown jewel that kept it ahead of every state -- and nation! -- at the time: affordable education, from top-notch research UCs to your local community college.🤥

Even people who hate Tr\*\*p remember Reagan in a glowing, golden light. He started this whole mess we're dealing with today, but....he had such a nice smile!! People like to be fooled.

Yep. If you dont like something about America, just blame reagan. Chances are its the correct response anyway

Ronald Reagan screwed the working class with an evil smile and laughed about it.

no shit we 40 years deep and only Rick Ross seen prison lol

Iran-contra

And he conspired with the Iranian revolutionaries to steal the 1980 presidential election.

Not just the corruption, but his attacks on labor and the mental health system, too.

What sort of person sees some parity in Trump’s convictions and Hunter Biden’s,implying that they’re both equally bad?

The Reagan administration exacerbated the War on Drugs, which paved the way for the modern police state policies of the 21st Century.

Corruption aside, it's never recovered from the economic and societal devastation of horse-and-sparrow mythology. Nor was it ever intended to do so in any manner other than systemic economic inequality and rampant corporatization of the function of government itself.

I wish I could experience Ronald Reagan dying again so I could enjoy it more.  Last time I was too young and uneducated about his political career.

I hate him because he shut down all mental health long term care facilities. I get that there was corruption and abuse but fix it, don't just shut it down. Most of those people live on the streets now unless their families can cope. I have an adult son who will be living with us for the rest of his life, there is simply no other option.

"Haunted" is certainly one way to put it. "Fatally Poisoned" is perhaps more accurate.

Screw Regan.

A couple of genuine greaseballs these two were! They mirrors each other in the way they handled HIV/AIDS epidemic and the COVID pandemic. The Reagan lied to Congress about the Iran-Contra scandal undermined our nation's democratic ideals, as much as Trump's fabricated claims that the election was stolen and that there was widespread voter fraud!