# was Reagan a mean, divisive partisan? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [January 2, 2013, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856 "2013-01-02T18:22:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pseudotriton_ruber_ruber)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2013, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/1 "2013-01-02T18:22:55Z")
That’s my memory of him, anyways. Just with a smile, and some “Aw, shucks” to him, but basically a very divisive figure. Over [here](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=677481), though, the OP introduces an anecdote in which RR, as I understand the anecdote, likens working with Tip O’Neill (or Democrats, or something) to working with children which I find snide and dismissive, and consistent with RR’s persona. Even the way he described his conversion from liberal Democrat to right-wing Republican (I think he explained it as “I grew up” or something of that sort) is incredibly smug, and snide and superior, though he was often credited with being affable and charming. I think a lot of Americans (and Democrats) got taken in by his outward charm, his self-confidence, his acting ability (he certainly knew how to PLAY a President) but if you put his remarks down on paper, he seems to have gotten an awful lot of slack for saying very partisan, very divisive remarks, such as I cite in the link. Would you agree that, whatever your politics, that there was a lot of difference between RR’s partisan rhetoric and the way that rhetoric was perceived? In the linked thread, I asked if you could imagine Obama speaking as dismissively of Boehner–I really can’t. I think if he made a similar remark, tighty-whiteys would be calling for impeachment. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2013, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/2 "2013-01-02T18:28:25Z")
I remember him as an evil bastard who did things like drag his feat on AIDS in the hopes it would kill as many homosexuals as possible. I recall a gay talk show host in San Francisco getting in trouble when he sang “Ding Dong! The Witch is Dead” on air after Reagan died. ---
**Author:** ![Ulfreida](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ulfreida/32/8014_2.png) [@Ulfreida](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulfreida)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2013, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/3 "2013-01-02T18:42:32Z")
He destroyed one of the best public education systems in the country when he was governor of California. Among other things. Like the whole fucking economy. I hate him. Also, that smarmy avuncular tone? I hated that from the first word I ever heard him say, and my hatred burned harder every time I heard it again. Club of one, it seems. ---
**Author:** ![pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pseudotriton_ruber_ruber)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2013, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/4 "2013-01-02T18:45:58Z")
I meant, “tighty-righties,” of course. And I remember a lot of people really hating Reagan, for various reasons, but what I’m asking about is the kind of things he actually SAID that were over-the-top partisan, mean-spirited, divisive remarks that he seems to have skated by on. My memory tells me he said a lot of unnecessarily partisan remarks but was almost never called on it by the media. I suppose I should google “Reagan conversion to Republicans” to find the one remark I think I do remember, and see what flak, if any, he caught for it. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2013, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/5 "2013-01-02T18:46:11Z")
What would Ronald Reagan do If he was here right now? He’d hear a plan And he’d claim it, too, That’s what Ronald Reagan’d do! When Ronald Reagan was in the Army Fighting World War II, He never left the States, but said He was there and freed the Jews! When Ronald Reagan was in Hollywood, Heading up the SAG, He turned the names of Comsymps in To the fucking HUAC scumbags! So what would Ronald Reagan do If he were here today? I’m sure he’d stab a back or two, That’s what Ronald Reagan’d do! (With apologies to Stone & Parker, and Brian Boitano.) ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2013, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/6 "2013-01-02T19:33:57Z")
It was my understanding that he was generally viewed as a _really_ NICE divisive partisan. ETA: The above is based upon my having read only the title of the thread. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2013, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/7 "2013-01-02T19:44:07Z")
> [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](#): > > That’s my memory of him, anyways. Just with a smile, and some “Aw, shucks” to him, but basically a very divisive figure. I don’t think of him as divisive so much as dismissive. “Well. there you go again,” anyone who disagreed with him could just be handwaved away. That played well to the partisans, but he was supposed to be governing the whole country. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2013, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/8 "2013-01-02T19:51:10Z")
They didn’t call him the Teflon President for nothing. If Reagan walked in the rain, Jimmy Carter caught a cold. He got all of the credit for everything good that happened in his era, or even after it was over, as in the fall of the USSR. The Iran-Contra scandal would have been terminal for anyone else, but it was overlooked as a senior moment for RR. He was the kind of guy who could simultaneously get union voters to go his way while at the same kind busted PATCO, the flight controllers union. Reagan the myth is the infallible god of the far right, on a pedestal along with the Founding Fathers. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2013, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/9 "2013-01-02T22:58:46Z")
I don’t feel Reagan was divisive. A lot of politicians really need opposition - their whole political philosophy is based on having enemies to fight. But Reagan didn’t work that way. He would have been happy to have everyone convert to his way of thinking. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2013, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/10 "2013-01-02T23:09:34Z")
> [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](#): > > Would you agree that, whatever your politics, that there was a lot of difference between RR’s partisan rhetoric and the way that rhetoric was perceived? In the linked thread, I asked if you could imagine Obama speaking as dismissively of Boehner–I really can’t. I think if he made a similar remark, tighty-whiteys would be calling for impeachment. You need to distinguish between things he said in private and his public remarks. It’s been a long time since RR was president, and many people have already revealed their recollections of things he said in private. Not so with Obama. I’m sure Obama is saying much nastier things about Boehner et al in private than he’s saying in public, but for the most part this isn’t being publicized at this time. You seem to be visualizing the reaction to Obama publically saying nasty things about Boehner, which is not the appropriate comparison. ---
**Author:** ![davidm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidm/32/225_2.png) [@davidm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidm)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2013, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/11 "2013-01-02T23:14:16Z")
I never liked him. His affability always struck me as phony and rehearsed. I sometimes got the impression that any appearance of job competence or even job understanding was also phony and rehearsed; that he was a figurehead chosen for his supposed charm and willingness to do as he was told. (I know the remark about job understanding sounds terrible in hindsight, considering his Alzheimers, but I think it was true even before that started to set in.) ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2013, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/12 "2013-01-03T00:16:15Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > The Iran-Contra scandal would have been terminal for anyone else, but it was overlooked as a senior moment for RR. And it **was** one, too. ---
**Author:** ![colonial](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/34f0e0/32.png) [@colonial](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/colonial)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2013, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/13 "2013-01-03T00:24:07Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > I remember him as an evil bastard who did things like drag his feat on AIDS in the hopes it would kill as many homosexuals as possible… I had gotten sort of immune to the shallow, vapid, crank quality of your writing. There is no getting used to the evil of such a fecal lie as the one you smear yourself with above. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2013, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/14 "2013-01-03T00:56:56Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > I remember him as an evil bastard who did things like drag his feat on AIDS in the hopes it would kill as many homosexuals as possible. You know that saying about not attributing to malice. . . If you can show that was his motivation, I’d like to see it. I think what’s more likely was just that he was uncomfortable about homosexuality, didn’t really identify with gays, and, so long as AIDS was just affecting gays and not “normal” people, didn’t really treat it as a high priority. It’s not really a good thing, but it’s not active malice either. ---
**Author:** ![Crane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crane/32/3495_2.png) [@Crane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crane)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2013, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/15 "2013-01-03T02:35:21Z")
Reagan set in motion the partisanship that divides the US today. Yes, he was divisive. I remember thinking it was a joke when I heard he was going to run for office. I couldn’t believe anyone would vote for him. It still amazes me anyone did because Reagan was so obviously incompetent. Crane ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2013, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/16 "2013-01-03T04:10:35Z")
What amazes me is how little time it took for someone worse to become President. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2013, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/17 "2013-01-03T04:22:06Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > You know that saying about not attributing to malice. . . If you can show that was his motivation, I’d like to see it. I think what’s more likely was just that he was uncomfortable about homosexuality, didn’t really identify with gays, and, so long as AIDS was just affecting gays and not “normal” people, didn’t really treat it as a high priority. It’s not really a good thing, but it’s not active malice either. How can that not be active malice? Oh, I don’t like gays, so it is OK that AIDS only attacks them … I’ll deal with all this over here first. It won’t matter if a few more fags are dead when I get around to signing that bill … That is pretty actively malicious. Look, if you take a disease attacking gays, and a disease attacking people who eat cows, and you take action on the mad cow as quickly as possible, and ignore the AIDS, what would _you_ call it, if not deliberately malicious? ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2013, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/18 "2013-01-03T04:28:48Z")
I think the general idea **Captain Amazing** is propounding is that it doesn’t count as _ACTIVE_ malice unless he was paying government scientists to try to come up with ways to make AIDS _more_ readily transmissible, or _more_ painful, or a generally worse overall experience. Standing back and watching (and possibly applauding) it as it happens is more of a _passive_ malice. I think. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2013, 4:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/19 "2013-01-03T04:34:40Z")
> [@aruvqan](#): > > How can that not be active malice? > > Oh, I don’t like gays, so it is OK that AIDS only attacks them … I’ll deal with all this over here first. It won’t matter if a few more fags are dead when I get around to signing that bill … > > That is pretty actively malicious. Look, if you take a disease attacking gays, and a disease attacking people who eat cows, and you take action on the mad cow as quickly as possible, and ignore the AIDS, what would _you_ call it, if not deliberately malicious? Callously negligent. Not quite the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2013, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856/20 "2013-01-03T12:10:04Z")
Right, because, of course, there are all sorts of tragedies that we, either individually or as a society, don’t do much about. It’s a little bit like the joke (that was a favorite of Reagan’s, btw): "This guy is going around collecting for the poor and he comes up to somebody, and says, ‘Can you spare some money for the poor?’ So the other guy says, ‘Look, I can’t believe you’re asking me that. Don’t know I just found out my brother lost his job and doesn’t know where he’s going to get the money to feed his family? And my sister was just diagnosed with a medical condition and needs an expensive operation or she’ll die? And my parents can’t pay the mortgage on the house that they’ve lived in for 40 years and unless they come up with the money, they’re going to get foreclosed on?’ "I’m sorry’, says the guy collecting for charity. ‘I didn’t know.’ ‘That’s right, you didn’t.’, said the other man. ‘And if I’m not helping any of them, I’m sure as hell not going to help you.’. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-reagan-a-mean-divisive-partisan/645856.md?page=2)