Reagan vs. who?

Great Debates
1

The Republican party has never replaced Ronald Reagan as a leader. Every would-be Republican candidate tries to cast himself as the next Reagan; in my opinion, none has succeeded. There would be some Republicans who would say Bush, Jr., but I doubt that will continue past the end of Bush’s presidency. I know Reagan is widely hated on this board, but the fact remains that Reagan was a bridge-builder and a unifier in a way that Bush, Jr. is not. There was a substantial faction of Reagan Democrats in 1980 and 1984; I have seen almost no Bush Democrats.

Who is the last Democratic president that the Democrats remember as fondly as the Republicans remember Reagan? I don’t think Bill Clinton fits the bill; a lot of Democrats liked him, and certainly most were more pleased with him than they would have been with Bush Sr. or Dole, but his lack of principle and pandering seems to have alienated a lot of Democrats; even Molly Ivins found some of his weaseling hard to take. I am sure most Democrats would happily take Clinton in 2004 over Bush, but I doubt most of those Democrats, if they could have anyone they wanted in the White House, would choose Clinton.

Jimmy Carter is remembered as a good man by many people; even many Republicans concede that he had a good heart, but even the many Democrats who liked him probably don’t consider him to have been a great president.

As for Lyndon Johnson, I think there are more Democrats who hate him than there are Republicans.

Which brings us to John F. Kennedy, who I think is the Democrats’ Reagan, the man they really wish they could have back in the White House again in the same way the Republicans wish they could have Reagan back. Even though he was elected only once and that by a razor-thin majority, Kennedy was charismatic and appealing, perhaps even more so than Reagan.

But perhaps Harry Truman is the Democrats’ Reagan, as the man who turned the Democratic party into a force for black Americans’ rights, who was tough and no-nonsense in a way that Clinton could never dream of being.

Or is the Democrats’ Reagan Franklin Roosevelt, the creator of the New Deal and the vision of government as the people’s caretaker that still animates so many Democrats today? But he is also the man who interned the Japanese-Americans, threatened to pack the Supreme Court, and thus attacked the constitutional rights many Democrats hold very dear.

2

West Wing president Bartlett.

3

It WAS Bill Clinton. He was enormously effective politically and was a much, much better president than he is currently given credit for.

And the blow job is nothing compared to the far more significant crimes committed by the Reagan administration.

4

*Au contraire[/], Danimal, I would say that Newt Gingrich replaced Reagan as the party’s leader. I would say that the GOP’s current dominance in American politics began under Gingrich’s leadership in the mid '90’s. They seized control of the House in 1994, thanks in part to Contract with America.

5

While both Diogenes and Coyote are correct in what they say, I think that Danimal is looking for a capital-L leader, and in this, I agree with him that Reagan (whom I despise no less than anyone here!) was one, and that Clinton (whom I admire on the main) was not one.

Truman, Eisenhower, and Kennedy were probably the last of the breed. Of course, each of them was thoroughly hated by a significant number of people at the time, something it’s easy to overlook in hindsight.

Today’s gridlock, with the lack of a supermajority, makes it very hard for anyone to accomplish anything. No one admires the filibuster as a means of policy.

Both liberals and conservatives live in an atmosphere of worry, afraid that their most precious institutions (medicare or marriage, for instance) are in peril.

No one is out there offering hope and courage. Rough times.

Trinopus

6

I don’t know why you bring up Clinton’s blow job, unless you mean to refute what I said about Clinton weaseling and lacking principles. If so, that’s not what I meant.

Let’s pretend Clinton never told a lie about his sex life. Let’s talk politics, but not the promise of a middle class tax cut, not the promise to stop coddling the “butchers of Beijing,” not the idea of liberalizing entry into the country for oppressed Haitians. Let’s talk instead about an issue I know is dear to your heart, Diogenes, equal rights for gay people.

You recall that Clinton campaigned on the issue of ending the ban on gays in the military. Instead, he kept the ban and instituted the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. Better than nothing, I’m sure you’ll say, but does it not make you the least bit uncomfortable that today it is right-wing military men ardently defending Clinton’s don’t-ask-don’t-tell policy while the vanguard of the gay liberation movement is shouting for its replacement with real acceptance of gays in the military? Do you never wish, down in your heart of hearts, that Clinton had dealt with the issue in the same forthright, no-nonsense way that Harry Truman dealt with the integration of black Americans into the military? Not trying to convince you that Clinton wasn’t a good president; I know I could never succeed in that. Only that there have been Democratic presidents you’d prefer to him?

Heck, don’t you wish Barry friggin’ Goldwater, rather than Clinton, had been president for just that one day, the man from Arizona who straightforwardly said he would have let gays fight in a heartbeat?

You believe that when Republicans sleep they dream of President Gingrich? The man who was kicked out of the House leadership by his own party amidst bitter recriminations? Whose most prominent role in the 2000 primary was as cellar companion to the likes of Pete Davis? No, I can’t see that.

1994 was a watershed for the Republicans, I’ll grant you, but it would be a mistake to give Gingrich and his Contract the credit for that. The Contract wasn’t what gave the Republicans the victory, it was an almost unprecedented groundswell of resentment against Clinton. The Contract chiefly served to unify the Republicans’ enemies after the election and served almost as Clinton’s rallying point.

7

Sorry, Danimal, but I think Gingrich’s leadership led the GOP to a watershed year. You forget he had been House leader for a term or two. I don’t give a damn what Republicans dream of; Gingrich was an effective leader.

8

I am a huge fan of Reagan’s, but I’ve gotta tell you – while Reagan was in office, he was anything but a bridge-builder and a unifier. He was hated by the left.

In fact, George W. Bush reminds me of Reagan in that way, because he inspires the same kind of hatred on the left that Reagan used to. Reagan had the hundreds of thousands marching against him in Europe. Reagan was burned in effigy. The popular culture hated the man.

I was in college during the Reagan years, and I can tell you that it was tense. People handing out flyers constantly describing how evil Reagan was. Marches in solidarity with the Sandinistas in Nicaragua. Here in Canada, small towns and cities were declaring themselves “Nuclear Free Zones” because they were convinced that Reagan wanted to park nuclear missiles in their backyards or some damned thing.

During that time, the left marched against Pershing missiles in Europe. They marched against the MX missile. They marched against the cruise missile. They called Reagan a warmonger for not conceding every weapons system to the Soviets. They called him “Ronnie Ray-gun”.

On the other side of the fence, the right nearly worshipped the guy. He was the great saviour of the Republican party, which had had its reputation damaged by Nixon. He stood strong against the Soviets after years of appeasement. He lowered taxes from insane rates.

Far from being a uniter, Reagan was probably the most polarizing president to come along since before WWII, and maybe of the last century. George W. Bush is giving him a run for the title, though.

9

For most polarizing, Sam, I’d pick FDR. One large section of the population wanted him as a saint, while another large section wished him dead.

As for the issue of fondness, I’d agree with Kennedy for now, but call me back in 25 years (when the partisan fevour over every President since Nixon should be muted), and I might be able then to give a different answer.

10

Peyote Coyote, my recollection is that Gingrich was Minority Whip, not leader, before 1994. And I still have a hard time seeing how his leadership led to the 1994 avalanche, but let’s suppose you’re right and he was an effective leader. I was trying to talk about more than effectiveness; I was trying to talk about the man the party’s nominee tries to sell himself as. And I still think every Republican up to now has tried to cast himself as “the next Reagan,” not “the next Gingrich.” Just as I believe Democrats would prefer to be seen as “the next Kennedy” rather than “the next Clinton.”

Sam, you raise a fair point, and it demands I clarify my thought. Reagan was a polarizing figure as you say, and when I called him a unifier I should have said “of his own party.” He inspired and united Republicans like no one else I can think of, which is why Republicans today who want the party to unite behind them always invoke his ghost. But unlike Goldwater, he appealed to the center, the swing voters, and moderate Democrats. That’s what I meant when I called him a bridge-builder. He certainly didn’t build a bridge to the hard leftists that thrive on American college campuses (and I guess Canadian campuses too?), much less unify them behind him, and I didn’t mean to suggest that he did.

11

Way off topic, but Clinton was sandbagged by Sam Nunn on gays in the military. Before inauguration, Nunn promised he’d support an executive order permitting gays. But when, on Day One, Clinton announced this, Nunn announced that he’d spearhead a Senate move to overturn it. Nunn had the votes, and Clinton was forced to back down.

Nice being back-stabbed by a member of one’s own party. It pretty much nobbled Clinton, and set the tone for the next eight years.

There are a lot of us who put Sam Nunn right up there in Satan’s mouth with Brutus, Cassius, and Judas…

Trinopus

12

I blame Roosevelt for interning the Japanese-Americans, but his court-packing scheme was justified under the circumstances. On balance, he and Truman were the best Democratic presidents of the 20th Century. Johnson would deserve to be ranked with them if it weren’t for Vietnam. Johnson, who had experience in the House, was able to get done the things Kennedy had only talked about – the Civil Rights Act, Voting Rights Act, etc. And he deserves credit for the War on Poverty (though in my view it ended the same way as Vietnam – we declared victory and pulled out).

13

Interesting. I didn’t know that angle on the story, especially not that Nunn had initially promised Clinton any support.

Not to idealize Harry S Truman unnecessarily; I have no reason to believe he was any more enlightened about homosexualilty than his contemporaries. But had he once seen the light, I can’t see him caving in to someone like Nunn without a fight; he might have failed, but he would have tried. Clinton settled for a compromise and never stepped back into the ring. Maybe that’s the approach Democrats want for their leaders, but I suspect that most of them would prefer Truman’s style.

14

Clinton was a centrist President, mainly popular with liberals because he was the only thing standing between their ideals and the Gingrich Revolution. I remember that liberals gave him nothing but grief until 1994, when all of a sudden the guy became an icon, even though he continued to govern on a centrist path. I think that if Clinton had not been so viciously attacked by Republicans, liberals would not be so kind to him. They might have even called him a Republican stooge like some call Zell Miller for all the Republican legislation he happily signed. So perhaps Clinton is an icon, but not because of what he did. It was because of the irrational hatred the right had for him. The way I see it, Clinton continued the Reagan revolution. Republicans should at the very least be somewhat pleased with the man. We got NAFTA, welfare reform, fiscal conservatism, anticrime legislation, and military action against a couple of ruthless dictators, one of which indirectly resulted in the toppling and trying for war crimes of Milosevic.