General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsMy dear friend Frank posted a Reagan meme on Facebook. Do you think my response is too harsh?
Here's what Frank posted:There is no perfect man but when you side with Good instead of Evil, you find men like this:
Here's my response:
He then proceded to make the government much bigger. Did you know that a majority of the job growth under Reagan was in the public sector--that is, government and nonprofit jobs?
In contrast, the millions of more jobs created under Obama are overwhelmingly in the private sector. So what you've posted is a hypocritical lie by a man who was a bigger socialist than Obama.
Sigh, what is it with Republicans and facts? Can't yall learn to get along?
blm
(113,136 posts).
Bigmack
(8,020 posts)3catwoman3
(24,133 posts)...who bleat about government being the problem are so eager to get in and stay in government jobs. They start campaigning for re-election the day after e-lection.
LibDemAlways
(15,139 posts)staunchly Republican, government hating, Reagan loving cousins:
Transit worker for state of New Jersey
Retired New Jersey public school teacher
Police Detective -Princeton New Jersey (Retired before age 50 with a public pension)
Military Contractor - Washington DC (also has daughter and sister-in-law on the payroll)
My aunt, wife of the transit worker and mother of everyone else, looks forward to her Social Security check each month. She's retired from a job with a major defense contractor.
Hypocrisy at his finest.
PatSeg
(47,770 posts)Government evidently did nothing for them, right?
LibDemAlways
(15,139 posts)have a dog named Reagan for Christsakes. They would vote for Charles Manson if he had an R by his name.
PatSeg
(47,770 posts)That is scary!
It is funny, because the Reagan that today's republicans revere is not the Reagan in the White House in the 1980s. Today's Reagan is a mythological character and the real person was not very popular with the republican establishment at the time. Today he is a god (of their own creation of course).
I have heard people on Social Security or disability or unemployment, using food stamps and Medicare call President Obama a socialist or communist, totally clueless. Reminds me of that classic Craig T. Nelson quote from a few years ago: "I've been on food stamps and welfare, did anyone help me out? No."
renate
(13,776 posts)I should have known better. Of course he did.
It's not the stupidity that pisses me off, it's the absolute conviction with which they say these things. They think they're so completely and utterly right.
PatSeg
(47,770 posts)It was like something "Coach" would have said, but he was deadly serious. Evidently Nelson wasn't acting when he played Coach.
I've known so many people like this and they are totally sincere. They really don't see the contradictions in what they are saying. They are self-sufficient and they have earned any entitlements that they collect, BUT that guy over there.........he is a worthless, lazy leach. It is truly mind-boggling.
allan01
(1,950 posts)ive heard it from those people too , and they feel so imune to cuts in the program. hem have a great day.
PatSeg
(47,770 posts)place for a couple of years. Most of the people there relied heavily on government programs to survive, but they watched Fox News and complained a lot about "government" and politicians. I had to get up and walk away numerous times.
dbackjon
(6,578 posts)I engage on a sport message board with a large number of right-wing anti-big government conservatives, 95% either work for:
US Government (Defense)
Defense contractor
LibDemAlways
(15,139 posts)"welfare queens" who buy steak and lobster with food stamps and cart them home in shiny new cadillacs. They have completely bought into every racist myth perpetuated by Reagan out there.
mntleo2
(2,535 posts)LibDemAlways
(15,139 posts)3catwoman3
(24,133 posts)...would ignore it because it is contrary to dearly held beliefs. We don't need no stinkin' facts.
Matt_R
(456 posts)compared to private sector jobs. I know quite a few that work a Government job because of the benefits. Let alone wages have been stagnate in the private sector, that is if you exclude the few union jobs around.
Race to the bottom at its finest.
LibDemAlways
(15,139 posts)horrible the government is and who claim to hate paying taxes have no problem accepting a government paycheck courtesy of the taxpayers.
1StrongBlackMan
(31,849 posts)receptionist at a government job that I worked. (We worked for the State's AG's Office) She was always complaining about Big Government and talking about the need to cut government.
So, I finally asked her, "Can you draft a Complaint or an Answer? ... Because I can answer my own phone. Be careful of what you wish for."
It was clear that she was not catching my drift ... so, I asked her, "You do know you work for government, right? And, you do realize that this place operates just fine when you take a day off, right?"
She was just amazing in her ignorance ... Here she was a 40+ year old, high school drop out, working as a Receptionist, getting paid 40+K/yr., with full benefits, including a defined benefit retirement plan (this was about 15 years ago) at a Government agency ... lamenting that government was too big.
Populist_Prole
(5,364 posts)She's wonderful but I'm beginning to see she's quite the fascist. Plus, she works for the government, but is always throwing around "governemnt job", "government workers" etc. To hear her tell it, she's the only person with good work ethic at the facility she works in. Must be tough for Ms Atlas to hold the world up on her shoulders.
yeoman6987
(14,449 posts)The way you presented the OP. I thought you were going to slam frank. Lol. Had you done that, I was going to say delete and send personal Facebook PM. But you did good. Factual and if frank is honest as I am sure he is. He will read you post and think about it. And maybe even agree or at least agree to disagree. Lol.
Bucky
(54,094 posts)partly brainwashed where politics is concerned.
I blame a lot of it on Hugo Chavez, frankly, so I cut Francisco some slack. It's hard to see your country destroyed by actual socialists and keep your objectivity when con artists on the radio start conflating it with liberalism.
HughBeaumont
(24,461 posts)Especially since their pesky laws proved inconvenient to his handlers who wanted government to be run like a corporation . . . a law unto itself.
So much long-term domestic damage started under Reagan . . . Runaway income inequality, runaway CEO pay, middle/working/poor wage stagnation, job offshoring, union defanging, corporate malfeasance, Wall Street as a law unto themselves, defunding of colleges, defunding of HUD (which led to the giant homelessness problem we have today), ravaging of military benefits and VA hospitals, widespread loss of job security, news reporting traded for opinion and constructed narrative, demonization of everything progressive, merging of church and state, demonization of poor people, racism made fashionable, demonization of the LGBTQI community, rampant military spending, reliance on fossil fuels, destruction of the environment, making ignorance fashionable, etc, etc, etc . . .
procon
(15,805 posts)Basically, you're doomed. They been brainwashed to believe that all facts are tainted by some leftist conspiracy to deceive them. If you tell them Reagan raised taxes and blew up the debt, they won't bother to factcheck, they'll just filter out everything that doesn't coincide with their preconceived notions and confirmation biases.
Honestly, short of deprogramming, ignoring, or mocking the stupidity for your own amusement, there's nothing you can to change them.
samsingh
(17,605 posts)stooges who were fact challenged. Now I see it on our side in so many things as well.
But your response was good. Reagan was a liar in so many different ways.
immoderate
(20,885 posts)--imm
catnhatnh
(8,976 posts)When you discuss good and evil remember this: At over 90 years old and being treated for cancer former president Jimmy Carter still spent full days, rain or shine, donating his labor to build houses for poor people. This man was president and running for re-election when Ronald Reagan's campaign committed treason by contacting the Iranian government and arranging for US citizens who were captive hostages NOT to be released until Reagan was elected president. Your "good guy" committed a capital crime to screw the arguably nicest man ever to hold the office.
LittleGirl
(8,292 posts)alfredo
(60,082 posts)firebrand80
(2,760 posts)you did fine. Personally, I would have just ignored it.
jalan48
(13,916 posts)Vinca
(50,334 posts)I've always wondered why, if they think government is such a big problem, they want to be a part of it. Must be the great pay and perks and small amount of time they are in session supposedly doing their jobs.
Duval
(4,280 posts)And the media has/had a big part in this lie. Forget about the brain washed Republicans being able to see this. Not going to happen any time soon.
spedtr90
(719 posts)He continued, " Because what they suggest is that our brave and creative and unique experiment in self-rule is somehow just a sham with which we can't be trusted."
peabody
(445 posts)Perfect response to another Republican distortion.
Martin Eden
(12,887 posts)... so that the rich and powerful can control government to serve their own narrow interests to the detriment of the majority of citizens.
rurallib
(62,483 posts)My thought would be that ever since then republicans have been running for office just for the purpose of destroying the good that government does and thus turning it into a problem for the 99%. Republicans take care of the rich only.
Then I would ask him if he wants the return of insurance with no pre-existing condition coverage, the end of social security, the end of medicare and any oversight if Wall Street.
Does he want all roads to be toll roads owned by a corporation etc.
thesquanderer
(12,001 posts)...it implicitly accepts the premise that less government is necessarily a good thing.
It's so hard to choose, do you attack Reagan for being a hypocrite, or for having bad ideas?
wolfie001
(2,320 posts)I would have been much more profane: i.e.- Raygun fucked over the working class or some such.
beastie boy
(9,581 posts)You didn't even go into the whole Good vs Evil thingy...
Bernardo de La Paz
(49,075 posts)Donald Ian Rankin
(13,598 posts)If so, it probably was, if not, it wasn't.
Jackie Wilson Said
(4,176 posts)Glimmer of Hope
(5,823 posts)arely staircase
(12,482 posts)I will give him that.
NoMoreRepugs
(9,519 posts)relatives they are out of their f%$#ing minds for voting Republican...
needless to say my Christmas card display is really small
onecaliberal
(33,011 posts)Demonaut
(8,938 posts)muntrv
(14,505 posts)Scientific
(314 posts)AlbertCat
(17,505 posts)....so....
Salviati
(6,009 posts)F Reagan and the legacy of debt and ex-reganite cronies he left us.
Chicago1980
(1,968 posts)You could have probably gone further
allan01
(1,950 posts)on edit: this is the same gentleman who ruined the screen actors guild who thought it was for big name stars only, (took ed asniner and others 10 years to repair the damage he caused) , wrong. the same gentleman who shut down state mental health facilites and we are still paying for that . the same gentleman who ruined california, and it took 10 years to recover . same gentleman who fired the federal air traffic controllers . the same gentleman and his cronies that ruined california public schools hem not harsh enough but good
TRoN33
(769 posts)Written into the history books.
JohnnyRingo
(18,696 posts)That's my curt answer to those who advocate for smaller government and it usually works to end the debate. It implies that shrinking the federal government will actually cost be benefits for the sake of "getting it out of my way".
I'm obviously not some upstart business conglomerate or heir to a fortune.
world wide wally
(21,762 posts)I'm from a corporation and I'm here to help