“Sharply” Left? Only to those who lean so far to the Right that they need to prop themselves up on their walking sticks to avoid falling on their sides.
“Sharlpy” left would indicate that stoid was a moderate or held majority views on most political and fiscal topics. That is clearly an absurd characterization. Heck, in terms of the topic of this thread, it is not hard to discover actual Conservative and Conservative/Libertarian posters (e.g., Airman Doors and John Mace), who have voiced opposition to the state that Bush has currently brought the country.
<pokes head above burrow, waves timidly to the OP>
Then there are some of us who love our country and keep our heads down; who have a quiet surge of feeling when we watch WWII vets march by or the 343 young firemen carrying flags, one for each fallen 9/11 brother, in the St. Patrick’s Day parade; who think often of our ancestors, forsaking the Old World (which was often screwing them over–the Enclosure Acts got a lot of my farming family over here in the 1820s) to come here and within a few generations being able to lead lives that are still the envy of the world; who think nothing of passing by people from six continents on the streets every day; who vote with dislike but not hatred against the other guy; and who don’t use words like ‘ilk’ without thinking of Berke Breathed.
We’re often afraid of being yelled at or having endless cites thrown at us by people with too much time on their hands, but we’re out here on the boards. Be nice to us and we’ll pop our heads out like prairie dogs from time to time in threads like this. I appreciate the OP’s question and I’m glad he’s asking it.
As Shodan indicated above, Bush is not on the ballot in 2008. Yet Democrats will have a precedent in running against him. I often say party platforms aren’t worth a lot, but in this case they illustrate a point.
If you look at the 1984 Republican platform, Jimmy Carter, although not being on the ballot, appears no fewer than 20 times. Typical are these snippets:
Only once is Mondale mentioned without a Carter- prefix, and that was in raising the spectre of a Mondale-Ferraro tax hike.
Of course, it’s hard to break old habits. After running against Carter in 1976, 1980, and 1984, they ran against him in 1988 as well.
The 1988 Republican platform mentions Carter five times (seven and a half years since his presidency) and Dukakis not at all. Typical snippets:
So Reagan ran as “I’m not Carter” in 1980 and 1984, while the competent President Bush ran as “I’m not Carter, either” in 1988. All this against a president who didn’t lie to start a war, who didn’t have an attorney general with a constantly-growing nose, who didn’t sanction the use of torture, who didn’t cut off scientific research to placate a religious faction, and who is now widely regarded as one of the most moral men to hold the office.
As it turned out, Carter didn’t lose any of the hostages. He could have gone in with guns blazing but he took a calm, measured approach.
I’m not sure how Carter is responsible for Afghanistan. During his term, the Soviets invaded and Carter protested. The Soviets eventually got bogged down and left. How is that Carter’s fault?
The Shah fell because of lack of ‘moral’ support from the USA
SAVAK were pussy cats compared with the Mullahs, and anyone with understanding of the Russian 1917 revolution would have understood that.
With Afghanistan, we and the USA should have actively supported the USSR, you might accuse me of 20/20 hindsight, but I and a few others believed that in 1979.
The Russians knew what they were fighting, we and the USA armed our natural enemies. The Soviets understood that they had met an ideology that was more dangerous than their own - with help it could have been contained, or ideally wiped out.
If you were supporting the USSR in the Afghan war, you were in the distinct minority. Do you think that any other president (let’s just say Ford or Reagan) would have handled the situation much differently?
As for the Shah, the US habit of propping up despots can backfire once the despot falls. Maybe the mullahs are worse than SAVAK, but at the time the Iranian people knew only of the brutality of SAVAK.
This had nothing to do with the fact that the military was in terrible shape under Carter and the attempt to go in with guns blazing failed because too many of the Copters in the rescue mission failed to work under the desert conditions?
Are you perhaps rewriting history to meet your own opinion?
Define “terrible shape” please. Under Ford and Carter, the military necessarily shrunk as a consequence of the end of the Vietnam. But the US successfully fought back all invasion attempts at the time.
444 days of a “calm, measured approach” that achieved - what, exactly?
But you are correct - none of the hostages died. A couple of people died when Carter did go in with guns, or at least helicopters, blazing, (n the botched military rescue attempt), true, but that doesn’t count, does it?
The part where they left certainly had nothing to do with anything Carter did, that much is true. It was Reagan’s Stinger missiles that allowed the Afghani resistance to shoot down Soviet aircraft that turned much of the balance, along with the renaissance of the American economy (and Star Wars) that aided the general collapse of Soviet Communism that did much of the rest.
But you have the general history right. The Soviets (knowing that Carter would do nothing effective) invaded, Carter protested (and achieved nothing), Reagan was elected (and started support for the muhajadeen), the Soviets subsequently were kicked out, and none of it was achieved because of Carter, whose foreign policy consisted of wearing a sweater and wringing his hands over the US malaise.
But your point is good about running against Mondale and Carter in 1988. I expect this is a function of Bush Sr. being Reagan’s running mate in 1980 and 1984. So the Republicans ran against Carter in 1980, because Carter was the Democrat nominee, against Carter’s running mate in 1984, because it was Carter’s running mate, and then in 1988 because Bush Sr. was Reagan’s running mate in 1980 and 1984.
Leaving aside that “platforms don’t mean anything”.
Ssh - don’t tell this to Polycarp - he seems pretty sure it isn’t true.
Why would Der Trihs wish to list any of his own “evils” or “stupidities” (assuming he had any) in this thread?
You would not happen to be attempting with your questions to make a direct personal attack on another poster in GD, would you? Were that the case, I am afraid that we would be required to sanction your posts, here.
Back off.
If you feel the need to attack a poster, go start or join a Pit thread on the topic.
A surgical rescue mission isn’t what I’d call “guns blazing”. It was a measured gamble as opposed to a massive invasion. One wonders what Bush would have done in his place.
I noticed that you didn’t give specific names as to who Reagan armed in Afghanistan. Does Osama ring a bell?
The notion that Reagan brought about the collapse of the Soviet Union has been thoroughly debunked, so I won’t repeat the exercise.
The military morale was very low, the equipment was in bad shape. But yes, I did overlook the invasion of the 79th Yak Brigade being successfully repulsed.
The rescue attempt was tried and was a dismal failure. That was an attempt at a guns blazing approach. It did not happen only because are equipment was not up to the job.
How do we know this? If so, how much was due to Carter and how much to Nixon and Ford losing the Vietnam war? Perhaps the military morale will slip under President Edwards as a result of Bush’s failed war in Iraq.
I followed the Carter era, which did have more to do with post Vietnam than his failings. Morale was crap under Carter and increased greatly under Reagan. Reagan pour money into the military, of course morale went up. It went up a lot. Carter had to deal with military budget cuts and the fact America had just “lost its first war”. Morale was crap in that time period in the military. I do not recall it being all that great in civilian life either. Perhaps you remember differently?
Your own overweening bias is on display, here. Name any active posters (aside from stoid) who fits any classic definition (not one invented by Limbaugh or Coulter) of Socialist or Communist. There are clearly enough left-leaning posters that the board displays a bit of a tilt, but as I have already expounded in this earlier thread, the whole “Left/Right” distinctions on this board are overly simplistic characterizations that ignore the genuinely more nuanced perspectives of the actual participants.
You appear (with many of your comments) to be so emotionally invested in defining yourself on the Right wing of society that you would consider Barry Goldwater some sort of commie fellow traveler if he posted, today.
It was not just the budget cuts, it was also, as I know I mentioned, the fact that “America had just lost its first war”. There was no message of strong support for the military from Carter either. How good is the morale of the military right now anyway? I have no way to judge. I have been out since 1989.
I do not think I made any claims that you think I made with your first sentence. I would rather you did not try to put words in my mouth. I was speaking from experience and recollection about Carter and the Reagan years.
