As the June 5 anniversary of her father’s death draws near, daughter of former President Ronald Reagan Patti Davis reflected on how he would feel about the current state of American politics in a Sunday Washington Post piece.
“He would be appalled and heartbroken at a Congress that refuses to stand up to a president who not only seems ignorant of the Constitution but who also attempts at every turn to dismantle and mock our system of checks and balances,” she wrote. “He would plead with Americans to recognize that the caustic, destructive language emanating from our current president is sullying the dream that America once was. And in a time of increased tensions in the world, playing verbal Russian roulette is not leadership, it’s madness.”
She said that though her father did not always like the press, he never would have tolerated the current sustained attacks on it from government leaders. She added that he would have felt strongly that cruelty is not a substitution for immigration policy.
She concluded with a quote from her father’s famous 1964 address, “A Time for Choosing.” “You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We’ll preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we’ll sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness.”
Yeah, don’t count on it Patti. The dog whistles just had to be of a slightly higher frequency back then. And as a “culture” we hadn’t yet invented reality TV and begun our journey to the Idiocracy in earnest. Ronny Raygun was just a kindler, gentler sort of grifter, but grifter he was nonetheless.
I’m sure Reagan would be appalled at the results of what he started. He should have thought of that at the time instead of constantly playing for political advantage. Trump is simply Reaganesque policies carried to their logical conclusion.
The Bedtime for Bonzo co-star (who, it must be said, took second billing to a literal chimp), and anti-Medicare shill for hire, would be appalled that a grifter and reality TV celebrity is president?
Color me skeptical. If it weren’t for Reagan, I’m pretty sure we wouldn’t have Trump. Reagan set the stage for unqualified celebrities to run for high office.
Funny though how you can draw a direct line from today’s Government by reality star circus straight back to good old union busting RR. He championed trickle down tax breaks for the rich, he fought tooth and nail against health care reform, ended the fairness doctrine in the media that allowed Murdoch and Ailles to corrupt half the country. The decline and fall of the American middle class began with his presidency, I would think he’d be thrilled to see how far into the future his dreams of working class servitude to the wealthy elite have come.
The southern strategy, inviting the Christian Right into the party with open arms, telling the Iranians to hold on to the American hostages until after the election, Iran/Contra, union busting…fuck Reagan. But if the daughter of St. Ronnie can get through to some congressional R conspirators to help save the country so be it. Not that I think this will do any good anyway.
Agree with jgabriel - if it were not for Reagan we may not be in this situation today.
late: oh and Grenada, Star Wars, blew up the deficit… Did I forget anything else on the list?