[lbo-talk] Fw: Greg Palast: Bye-Bye Ronnie Reagan -- Killer, Coward, Conman

[Dennis Perrin]

> PR is fairly important, and RR was a pretty important historical
> figure. He transformed the image of American conservatism from
> someething marginal, cranky, and backward-looking into something
> revolutionary and optimistic. He managed to appropriate a lot of
> ideas long associated with the left and make the left in turn look
> cowardly and backward-looking. Of course he didn't do this alone, but
> he had a lot to do with it. There's a good reason the right admires
> him so deliriously.
>
> Doug

Oh, I agree with you, Doug. I'm quite aware of R's legacy -- hell, I was
FAIR's rightwing specialist when he was prez (read all the reactionary rags,
even Human Events!). I just find this confetti-tossing somewhat adolescent.
Yeah, sure, piss on his grave. Whatever makes you feel righteous.

Fact is, Reagan won many of the battles his admin engaged. And the Lib Press
let him get away, quite literally, with murder. Recall that when Iran/contra
first broke, R was defended by the likes of John Chancellor (who raved on
NBC that the US couldn't afford another failed presidency), Mark Shields and
Richard Cohen. I understood why R was never impeached, but could never get
over that he wasn't, esp when it was happening to Clinton.

Trust me, I was as militantly opposed to R as anyone back then. But he's
gone (and been gone for some time), and as the Dead Kennedys once put it, we
got a bigger problem now.

DP