I'm Glad You're Dead

The BBQ Pit
1

They say that we should not speak ill of the dead.

I dunno if I agree with this.

I mean, if we go to your granny’s funeral, that’s one thing. I certainly don’t want to get up for the eulogy and begin going on about what a whore your granny was. Particularly if she wasn’t. Hell, even if your granny WAS a whore, she was at least providing a useful service and making people happy. At least, that’s the theory.

Y’see, today, I was thinking about Richard Nixon.

Every so often, I rail and rant about that loony George W. Bush and how he’s an idiot and how he’s a loony and how he’s a plutocrat who couldn’t care less about the American people except for the ones who can hurt him politically or the ones who gave money to his campaign fund or the ones who are important to the Republican Party for one reason or another, right? And I say, “Why in ghod’s name did we ever elect this man?”

And the old people laugh at me.

They say, “In 1968, I said the exact same thing about Richard Nixon. And in 1972, I said it again, only louder.”

And they’re right. This isn’t the first time America has elected an evil screwhead to office, you see. And we liked him so much, we reelected him. And then turned on him when it became violently CLEAR what an evil screwhead he was… although some of us knew it pretty clearly well before Watergate ever broke.

But that’s all ancient history. No, what I was thinking of was when Nixon died.

I saw it on the news, and I was waiting for the wild rumpus to begin. I know Dan Rather didn’t like Nixon any more than I do, and I was waiting for ole Gunga Dan to rip into the corpse with gusto, right?

Nope. Not a word about malfeasance in office. Not a word about the “Divine Right Of Presidents”, not a word about lying, cheating, stealing, or “stonewalling”. Not a word about the eighteen minutes of Rosemary’s tape. It was mentioned that he resigned – the only U.S. President in history to do so – but it was remarkably unclear why he did so, from the news story.

Not one quote from “When the President does it, that means it is not illegal.”

Instead, they talked about his career, his children, his loving wife, his service in Congress and as Vice President, his service to his country. They talked about how he opened diplomatic relations with China, and what a miracle that was in its time. They went on about his incredible ability with foreign relations, his supreme political savvy.

On every channel. On every news show.

I was about sick.

What the HELL, people? Have we forgotten that this was “The Most Hated Man In The World” for two years running, beating out Hitler, for potato’s sake? Have we forgotten what an incredible stain this man left on our history? Have we forgotten that this man once and forever broke and shattered the idea that we should ever trust our politicians, or that the government was interested in our well-being, and that they listen to us?

Not a word. You don’t speak ill of the dead.

And now, Ronald Reagan has Alzheimer’s, and he isn’t feeling well.

I don’t like Ronald Reagan. The man promised to eliminate the deficit, then turned around and tripled it. He made the rich richer while cutting benefits for nearly everyone else. He deregulated industry and business, generating insane problems for nearly everyone who wasn’t an industry or business, and directly caused the Savings And Loan disaster. He ignored the AIDS crisis as long as humanly possible, until even the stupidest American could see that it wasn’t just the homos and Haitians who were croaking off by the carload, it was potentially ALL of us!

But then, homos and Haitians don’t vote Republican.

The man may well have traded arms for hostages, and he directly contributed to the current mess in the middle east by encouraging massive arms sales to Iraq, to counterbalance the arms sales he might have made to Iran.

And what was worst, he made us love it all. The economy was great, because we were deficit spending like mad. We felt safe because we had our hostages back, and the Russians were terrified of Mad Ronnie and his Nuclear Hit Parade. He made it clear to all politicians to come that it was possible to screw things up, feed the rich, screw the poor, bleed the middle class, fill the special interests to bursting, and STILL GET REELECTED, because Americans will believe any fraggin’ thing as long as you come across like Father Knows Best while you say it.

Ronald Reagan screwed up America.

And he’s gonna die before too much longer.

And they won’t say a word about all the wrong he done.

Nope. They’ll dwell on his wife and children (he had two wives, and his children didn’t much like him, but we won’t hear about that) and his strong and steady statesmanship, and blah blah blah.

Man, it makes me sick in advance.

Why do we speak ill of the dead?

I think it would have been much more educational, at Richard Nixon’s funeral, for example, to make a point of dwelling on the man’s sins.

“Richard Nixon started out in Congress, and achieved prominence by riding the hell out of McCarthyism, even to the point of jailing Alger Hiss with nearly no evidence, and in violation of certain laws, which everyone ignored at the time because they thought Hiss was a commie.”

“Richard Nixon willingly and eagerly participated in the destruction of thousands of careers and lives during the Red Scare, because he knew he could ride it to power. This is how he became Vice President.”

…and just keep going on in that vein. Make a point of bringing out into the light all the evil this dead man did… and finishing up with,

“… and now, Richard Nixon is among us no more. This evil, venous, power-hungry man is dead, and has passed on to whatever waits beyond this life, in the darkness and the unknown. Richard Nixon has gone to meet whatever God there may be out there… and these are the deeds he worked while he was among us, and they are all that is left of him.”

“Let us pray.”

Man… that would give ME something to think about. A life that dark, that evil, and now he’s DEAD and can’t do a damn thing to fix it or change it or redeem it. No Jimmy Stewart moment, no joyful ending with an angel getting his wings.

Just a dead guy, going to meet his judgement with a record that does not speak well of him.

Man, that would get ME to seriously pondering my life, and what I’d done with it.

And it certainly wouldn’t do many of us harm to do that.

Admittedly, I suppose his widow might have been a little bent out of shape, but, well, you can’t make an omelet, right…?

2

Uhh, didn’t Pat die first?

3

Shit, you think it’s bad here in the US? So you didn’t like how Nixon was treated by some of the press when he died? As I recall there was plenty of Watergate talk mentioned at the time too, maybe not enough for you, but it was there. On the other hand take Spain, please.

I happened to be living in Spain when Franco died. Now, Franco was dictator. More than that though, he was a fascist dictator. A former ally of Adolf Hitler fascist dictator. A man who ordered nazi planes to bomb villages in Spain, not because they were in a civil war and those villages were in enemy hands, no. He ordered the bombings as a lesson and warning to other villages! A man who ordered the jailing and execution of his own coutrymen, because they disagreed with him politically. A man who ordered universities rid of communists and unionist. By any means necessary.

Everyone in Spain knew this. Very few people didn’t have some connection to someone who died directly as a result of Franco’s actions. And yet, dictators tend to get good press. It’s a perk of the job. Comes along with the power to jail, bomb, or execute anyone who disagrees with you politically.

So here’s Franco. Finally and officially dead. Laid out for public viewing. And tens of thousands of people lined up to view him. And every one of them, except for me and my dad who were there because when history happens and you’re there you should see it, every one of them crying and whailing, men and women. And for years afterward, even after the king stepped aside and made room for a democratic government, and even after a military coup was put down, and Spain finally realized that this democracy thing was here for good, no one, in the press or pretty much anywhere in public said anything bad about Franco.

Only very recently, last couple of years or so, has any public examination of the Franco years begun. Mass graves are being dug up, and the bodies of young men and women are being identified by their now elderly relatives. But still, no one is saying much about about Franco. It is just “about the times”. As though it was “the times” that lined up university students, shot them and buried them in the countryside.

So buddy, count yourself lucky. So not everyone felt compelled to rant about Nixon when he died. Some did. Publicly. And some even did it while he was alive. Same for Reagan. Same for Clinton. And same for Bush.

4

After that, I can only add this:

Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead!

5

I understand what you’re saying, but (and I could be totally wrong), I think the prevailing attitude is that it’s all well and good to criticize, mud-sling and generally speak out against people when they’re alive because they can defend themselves. They can’t always defend themselves in practicality, but the option is there for them to face their detractors and defend their own actions.

A dead person can’t. A dead person may have the worst track record in the history of mankind, and everyone may know it, but people refrain from talking about it afterwards (generally) because it’s bad form to pick on someone who can’t defend themselves-- just like you don’t pick on little kids, the senile, the diseased, the mentally unstable. If they can’t conceivably stand up to you, you don’t call them to the carpet.

The fact that the same goes for public figures is, I think, a gesture of respect for all the time those people HAD to take criticism wherever they went, unendingly, day in and day out, while they were alive. Nixon may have been a class-A jerk, and a bit crazy to boot, but no one needs to point that out in the days after his death.

6

And also, especially when someone has very recently died, there are many people who are actively grieving. Saying what an asshole Nixon was while his survivors are mourning him is crass, at best.

7

Maybe one reason why there was less outrage expressed upon Nixon’s and Franco’s deaths is that time sometimes has the effect of making people forget someone’s sins–no matter how grievous. In the case of Nixon, 20 years had passed since his resignation and, during that time, he had partially rehabilitated his reputation. Whereas, if he had died within a year after resigning, his obituaries would’ve certainly been a lot more vitriolic. In fact, one can argue that Nixon inadvertently picked the right time to die because, a few years later when his presidential papers were released, he turned out to be even more vicious, devious, and unstable than even most of his harshest critics thought.

The same is true for Franco. He’d been dictator for about 40 years when he died. Most Spaniards had probably known no other leader than Franco during their lives. In some perverse way, they had gotten used to him. He may have been a monster will he was alive but he was THEIR monster. Hence, people cried when he died.

And Franco was not the only despot who was mourned by the abused people of his nation when he died. The same thing occurred in the USSR when Stalin died after ruling the country for more than 25 years. Granted, a lot of the tears were state-prodded ones but there were still a lot of Russians who were sincerely grief-stricken when he died. Moreover, to this day, many old Russians are still nostalgic about Stalin and wish he was still around. The same is true with Mao Zedong in China. Or, look at what happened in Iran when the Ayatollah Khomeini died. The frenzied rioting that took place at his funeral looked like what would take place when a young movie star or rock star died and not a dour old religious fanatic.

Anyway, time can erode a person’s misdeeds. That’s why it’s important to keep remembering and not let one’s righteous outrage be diminished.

8

I saw Ronnie give a press conference yesterday. He wanted to announce that he had Alzhimers.

9

Well, you could always go spit on his grave, if it makes you feel any better.

Or post a long rant against Reagan on a messageboard.

The trouble being, it tends to show people that those who oppose Republicans are bitter, hateful people, who take pleasure in insulting sick old men, and attacking those who cannot defend themselves.

One way people judge others is by the class of their enemies. Is this really how you want the loyal opposition to look?

It’s over, and there are other battles to be fought.

The horse is dead. Leave it alone.

Regards,
Shodan

10

Lessee, Nixon, Reagan, GHWBush, Dubya, Cheney, Ashcroft. I consider all of these to be enemies of mine. I guess all I need to do is get everybody else to consider them my enemies, and I’m looking GOLD!!!

11

Creative and lopsided reconstruction of history combined with longstanding bitterness finds vent in thinly veiled attack against Republicans.

Coming up next is the weather.

12

[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Wang-Ka *

Have we forgotten that this was “The Most Hated Man In The World” for two years running, beating out Hitler, for potato’s sake?
PLEASE!! FOR THE SAKE OF THE POTATOS!!! REMEMBER!!

13

Pffft.

Y’r missin’ the point.

I come to bury Nixon, not to kick him. Same with Franco.

Valid points have been made … it does lack class to kick someone while he can’t defend himself, and I’m certain that there must have been at least two or three people out there who shed a tear when Stalin died. Even Hitler had a mother. Compared to some I could mention… and others that HAVE been mentioned … Nixon, Reagan and Bush are small potatoes.

What I meant is this: when you have a guy who has so violently screwed over so MANY people… who has wrought such UGLY change over so WIDE an area… jeez, don’t we have an obligation to LEARN something from this, as opposed to spreading flowers and finding one or two good things to stretch over a dark and shadowed life? Man, there are kids walking around today who don’t even know who Nixon or Franco WERE!

14

Beadalin: And also, especially when someone has very recently died, there are many people who are actively grieving. Saying what an asshole Nixon was while his survivors are mourning him is crass, at best.

You have a point. But funny, I don’t remember hearing these pleas for tolerance and moving on and not speaking ill of the dead after the demise of, say, Pol Pot in 1998. Journalists were shoving and elbowing to get to the front of the line to proclaim what an evil genocidal maniac he was, practically before his ashes were cold. Nobody seemed to think that was unfair or insensitive to his survivors.

But apparently in the case of Nixon—the guy, by the way, whose Cambodian bombings killed tens of thousands of Cambodians and impoverished and radicalized hundreds of thousands of survivors, weakening local opposition to Pol Pot’s bloody Khmer Rouge and exacerbating its violence—criticizing his record after his death would have been a “crass”, “bitter”, “hateful” “attack on those who cannot defend themselves”.

The moral appears to be, Wang-Ka, that if you have criticisms of Reagan you should be sure to voice them now, while he’s still alive. Remember, it’s only Communist leaders that we’re allowed to complain about after they’re dead.

15

BULLSHIT! :mad:
If you don’t like someone, you don’t like someone. But at least don’t fucking lie about them!

16

Lie?

At what point did I lie?

I stated the truth as I see it, bud. If you disagree, well, this being America, that is your right.

But I did not lie. Ronald Reagan, as previously stated, screwed up the country horrendously. He tripled the deficit. He deregulated everything he could get his hands on. He – but I repeat myself.

If you want to believe that Reagan was a fine, upstanding, great American, whatever, well… again, that is your right. Believe whatever you like, bud, be it Reagan’s morality or flying saucers. Makes no diff to me.

But if you think I’m lying, you might state precisely where I did so. Did he NOT triple the deficit? Did he NOT deregulate everything in sight, thus stage-managing the S&L crisis? Am I misinformed, or what?

…and this is exactly what I’m talking about. A politician does incredible horrible stuff, and when I made a point of SAYING SO, someone calls me a liar. Geez, and I didn’t even wait until Reagan was DEAD!

No doubt pkbites will be among the eulogists when Reagan finally meets his maker. Even while his taxes are STILL going to pay off the mess the man made…
Oh, and Scylla – admittedly, my history may be lopsided; there are any number of persons I could have used for examples, but did not. Creative? I think not. Again, WHERE DID I LIE? Which of my facts is incorrect?

If you’re going to call me a Limbaugher, guys, then POINT OUT MY LIMBAUGHS! Last I heard, they were the TRUTH!

17

Wang-Ka has a valid point.

Whitewashing a politician’s past misdeeds upon the occasion of his death smacks of the “loose-leaf textbook” school of history.

Publicly asserting the truth about Nixon in the face of, possibly misleading, media silence is Fighting Ignorance.

18

I just want to say that I, too, think Reagan screwed up America pretty bad.

19

I should also point out that I think (and I can’t prove this – this part IS just my opinion) that BOTH THESE MEN, Nixon and Reagan, KNEW what they were doing. They did what they did NOT for the good of their country, but for reasons of their own, either political or profit-motivated.

And this is why I regard them as “evil men.” They weren’t Hitler, no, but when a President ignores the well-being of the citizens when it isn’t convenient for his agenda, what the hell else do you call it?

You may note that I have not bashed George Bush Sr. as part of my “bitterness”. I can’t say I cared much for the man or his administration… but I also can’t say I saw him do anything that I thought he was doing for the wrong reasons. I never saw him do anything that seemed motivated by greed, or lust for power, or as a political favor for an ally, or to help out the Republican party. He could argue that he did every single thing in his Presidency solely because he thought it was best for this country… and durned if I could argue with him. I certainly couldn’t swear that he was doing it for political reasons or whatever.
…and even if I don’t like him, I can respect him. Not only is he a veteran, he actually saw combat, as opposed to more than a few of our current crop of politicos, who hid out in the National Guard or whatever.

Is he a good politician? I don’t think so. Was he a good President? I don’t think so. Was he an EVIL MAN?

Um… I don’t really think so.

…and therein lies my point. If you want to stand before George Bush Senior’s coffin and talk about his good points, his love of country, his love of family… well… durned if I see any point in bringing up that Iran-Contra “outta the loop” business. What good would it do?

But to stand before the bier of Richard Nixon and go on about what a great statesman he was?

This is hypocrisy. This is revisionist history. This is crap… and we forget history at our own peril, folks. If we’re going to jump up and down on Pol Pot’s corpse, let us not ignore what goes on in our own back yard…

20

Maybe it’s because anger at the dead, however much deserved, has an undeniable aspect of futility.

Imagine someone at the grave of a parent who had been an abusive alcoholic. He can stand there and scream, spit, piss, etc. all he wants, and as a part of the greiving process that indeed has some validity. But ultimately the best results will come from thorough analysis of the dead person’s deeds and their reprecusions.