Quibbling over whether it was a “major” speech or whether it was given within the city limits misses the point by about 7 miles. When you give a speech about “states’ rights” in Philadelphia, Mississippi, you are sending an unmistakable message. A racially divisive message.
In fact, he did both, frequently. The problem with producing citations is the lack of an internet in that period and the fact that most of his remarks were made as off-the-cuff remarks rather than policy speeches.
New York Times, February 15, 1976:
On other occasions, his version of this story gave her fewer names or more Social Security cards, but he repeated this story (with his typical inconsistencies) multiple times in both the 76 and 80 campaigns. Reagan also popularized the term(s) “(Cadillac driving) welfare queen” coined by his campaign organizer, Lee Atwater.
Reagan’s “When I was growing up in Illinois, we didn’t have race problems.” is variously (mis)quoted or paraphrased (as I have done) on a few websites, but despite the lack of clear provenance, it was an actual claim that he made and it was made in response to a call by Civil Rights leaders to at least help address the problem.
If you choose to deny that the common perception of welfare issues is that of a “black” problem and that the image conjured up by “Cadillac driving Welfare Queen” is one of a black woman stealing from the system, then that is your issue of denial.
If you choose to ignore that he used that anecdote (that was simply a made-up lie) to promote that stereotype, then your denial runs pretty deep.
First, let me take a step back from my attitude. I think I was wondering into the forrest of rude and preachy.
Yes, for some strange reason, I have great luck with my HMO. I know that is not a universal experience and I don’t have any stats to argue either way. You can’t use an opinion poll because people generally don’t know what they’re answering. You would have to sit down, READ the volume of info they send you, look at the money you are spending on it, and then decide if you’re getting screwed.
That brings up a new reason to dislike HMO’s (vs insurance). You depend on the company you work for to pick the best HMO for their budget. Mine cost over $6,500 per year last time I checked. If you had to pick your own insurance, you would be focused on the big stuff, knowing that doctor’s visits come out of your pocket.
But to answer your other question, yes I think it would be harder to fight the Federal Government. Also don’t have much experience with gov’t agencies but the few times I had to face City Hall it was tedious. Not a valid indicator to pass judgement.
I was never a huge fan of Clinton’s, but there were some things about him I did like:
He was a good fiscal manager. It was his decision to embark on a program to balance the budget.
He defused the crisis in Kosovo.
He kept Newt Gingrich and his ilk in check. During much of Clinton’s time as president, Congress was controlled by right-wing lunatic extremists. Clinton out-maneuvered them and kept them from doing much damage.
He never wasted any time on personal attacks against his political opponents, despite the fact that he was subjected to more personal attacks than any other president during my lifetime.
Sorry, but no. The Haiti operation was most certainly NOT sanctioned by the UN. And the Yugoslavia operation was blocked by the UN, which is why the US went the NATo route.
magiver, we don’t worry about tone here so much as factual content and reasoning. Everybody does it sometimes.
It does look, though, like health care coverage is going to be a major theme of the next election, as IMHO it should. The subject deserves several threads of its own and will certainly get them. FWIW, my overriding concern is universality of coverage and I don’t much care what mechanism is used.
I’m not dancing at all. You are simply denying the evidence. Take the story I quoted or the phrase “welfare queen” (to say nothing of, “Cadillac driving welfare queen”) out on the street of any U.S. city and ask people to describe the person so identified. Rather fewer than one in a thousand of them will respond with something like “a petite blonde in her 20s” while the overwhelming majority of them will describe some image of a black woman. Note my express statement was that he used imagery and the image he siezed upon in multiple occasions was that of portraying (without naming) black people as perpetrators of welfare fraud.
There is no question that welfare fraud existed, but rather than point to the statistics that showed how many people (of all races) were committing that crime, he invented and repeated an anecdote that singled out one image of a welfare cheater–that of a black woman.