Showing posts with label mythology. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mythology. Show all posts
Sunday, July 21, 2013
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Five myths about Ronald Reagan (guest post from The Washington Post)
I didn't write it but wish I had:
1. Reagan was one of our most popular presidents.
It's true that Reagan is popular more than two decades after leaving office. A CNN/Opinion Research poll last month gave him the third-highest approval rating among presidents of the past 50 years, behind John F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton. But Reagan's average approval rating during the eight years that he was in office was nothing spectacular - 52.8 percent, according to Gallup. That places the 40th president not just behind Kennedy, Clinton and Dwight Eisenhower, but also Lyndon Johnson and George H.W. Bush, neither of whom are talked up as candidates for Mount Rushmore.
2. Reagan was a tax-cutter.
Certainly, Reagan's boldest move as president was his 1981 tax cut, a sweeping measure that slashed the marginal rate on the wealthiest Americans from 70 percent to 50 percent. The legislation also included smaller cuts in lower tax brackets, as well as big breaks for corporations and the oil industry. But the following year, as the economy was mired in recession and the federal deficit was spiraling out of control, even groups such as the Business Roundtable lobbied Reagan to raise taxes. And he did: The Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 1982 was, at the time, the largest peacetime tax increase in U.S. history.
Ultimately, Reagan signed measures that increased federal taxes every year of his two-term presidency except the first and the last. These included a higher gasoline levy, a 1986 tax reform deal that included the largest corporate tax increase in American history, and a substantial raise in payroll taxes in 1983 as part of a deal to keep Social Security solvent. While wealthy Americans benefitted from Reagan's tax policies, blue-collar Americans paid a higher percentage of their income in taxes when Reagan left office than when he came in.
And the middle- and lower-classes have been getting additionally screwed ever since, no less so than when George W. Bush and the Republicans gave huge tax cuts to the wealthiest in the country, as though they needed it, while adding trillions to the national debt.
3. Reagan was a hawk.
Long before he was elected president, Reagan predicted that the Soviet Union would collapse because of communism's inherent corruption and inefficiency. His forecast proved accurate, but it is not clear that his military buildup moved the process forward. Though Reagan expanded the U.S. military and launched new weapons programs, his real contributions to the end of the Cold War were his willingness to negotiate arms reductions with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and his encouragement of Gorbachev as a domestic reformer. Indeed, a USA Today poll taken four days after the fall of the Berlin Wall found that 43 percent of Americans credited Gorbachev, while only 14 percent cited Reagan.
4. Reagan shrank the federal government.
Reagan famously declared at his 1981 inauguration that "in the present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem." This rhetorical flourish didn't stop the 40th president from increasing the federal government's size by every possible measure during his eight years in office.
Federal spending grew by an average of 2.5 percent a year, adjusted for inflation, while Reagan was president. The national debt exploded, increasing from about $700 billion to nearly $3 trillion. Many experts believe that Reagan's massive deficits not only worsened the recession of the early 1990s but doomed his successor, George H.W. Bush, to a one-term presidency by forcing him to abandon his "no new taxes" pledge.
5. Reagan was a conservative culture warrior.
Reagan's contributions to the culture wars of the 1980s were largely rhetorical and symbolic. Although he published a book in 1983 about his staunch opposition to abortion (overlooking the fact that he had legalized abortion in California as governor in the late 1960s), he never sought a constitutional ban on abortion. In fact, Reagan began the odd practice of speaking to anti-abortion rallies by phone instead of in person - a custom continued by subsequent Republican presidents. He also advocated prayer in public schools in speeches, but never in legislation.
Will Bunch is the author of "Tear Down This Myth: The Right-Wing Distortion of the Reagan Legacy." He is a senior writer for the Philadelphia Daily News and a senior fellow with Media Matters for America.So you know, there is far more to the article than what is shown here. I only put up a bit for brevity.
So much for the mightily-revered Ronald Reagan and his presidency, eh?
Happy 100th birthday, Ron, wherever you are.
Link to original post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/04/AR2011020403104.html?sid=ST2011020403674
1. Reagan was one of our most popular presidents.
It's true that Reagan is popular more than two decades after leaving office. A CNN/Opinion Research poll last month gave him the third-highest approval rating among presidents of the past 50 years, behind John F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton. But Reagan's average approval rating during the eight years that he was in office was nothing spectacular - 52.8 percent, according to Gallup. That places the 40th president not just behind Kennedy, Clinton and Dwight Eisenhower, but also Lyndon Johnson and George H.W. Bush, neither of whom are talked up as candidates for Mount Rushmore.
2. Reagan was a tax-cutter.
Certainly, Reagan's boldest move as president was his 1981 tax cut, a sweeping measure that slashed the marginal rate on the wealthiest Americans from 70 percent to 50 percent. The legislation also included smaller cuts in lower tax brackets, as well as big breaks for corporations and the oil industry. But the following year, as the economy was mired in recession and the federal deficit was spiraling out of control, even groups such as the Business Roundtable lobbied Reagan to raise taxes. And he did: The Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 1982 was, at the time, the largest peacetime tax increase in U.S. history.
Ultimately, Reagan signed measures that increased federal taxes every year of his two-term presidency except the first and the last. These included a higher gasoline levy, a 1986 tax reform deal that included the largest corporate tax increase in American history, and a substantial raise in payroll taxes in 1983 as part of a deal to keep Social Security solvent. While wealthy Americans benefitted from Reagan's tax policies, blue-collar Americans paid a higher percentage of their income in taxes when Reagan left office than when he came in.
And the middle- and lower-classes have been getting additionally screwed ever since, no less so than when George W. Bush and the Republicans gave huge tax cuts to the wealthiest in the country, as though they needed it, while adding trillions to the national debt.
3. Reagan was a hawk.
Long before he was elected president, Reagan predicted that the Soviet Union would collapse because of communism's inherent corruption and inefficiency. His forecast proved accurate, but it is not clear that his military buildup moved the process forward. Though Reagan expanded the U.S. military and launched new weapons programs, his real contributions to the end of the Cold War were his willingness to negotiate arms reductions with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and his encouragement of Gorbachev as a domestic reformer. Indeed, a USA Today poll taken four days after the fall of the Berlin Wall found that 43 percent of Americans credited Gorbachev, while only 14 percent cited Reagan.
4. Reagan shrank the federal government.
Reagan famously declared at his 1981 inauguration that "in the present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem." This rhetorical flourish didn't stop the 40th president from increasing the federal government's size by every possible measure during his eight years in office.
Federal spending grew by an average of 2.5 percent a year, adjusted for inflation, while Reagan was president. The national debt exploded, increasing from about $700 billion to nearly $3 trillion. Many experts believe that Reagan's massive deficits not only worsened the recession of the early 1990s but doomed his successor, George H.W. Bush, to a one-term presidency by forcing him to abandon his "no new taxes" pledge.
5. Reagan was a conservative culture warrior.
Reagan's contributions to the culture wars of the 1980s were largely rhetorical and symbolic. Although he published a book in 1983 about his staunch opposition to abortion (overlooking the fact that he had legalized abortion in California as governor in the late 1960s), he never sought a constitutional ban on abortion. In fact, Reagan began the odd practice of speaking to anti-abortion rallies by phone instead of in person - a custom continued by subsequent Republican presidents. He also advocated prayer in public schools in speeches, but never in legislation.
Will Bunch is the author of "Tear Down This Myth: The Right-Wing Distortion of the Reagan Legacy." He is a senior writer for the Philadelphia Daily News and a senior fellow with Media Matters for America.So you know, there is far more to the article than what is shown here. I only put up a bit for brevity.
So much for the mightily-revered Ronald Reagan and his presidency, eh?
Happy 100th birthday, Ron, wherever you are.
Link to original post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/04/AR2011020403104.html?sid=ST2011020403674
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Notes after having seen Avatar
Spoiler alert: if you don't want to know how it ends, don't read the last (11th) note
1) It's nice to see an anti-war movie again
2) It's nice to see a successful, anti-war film, period
3) It's nice to see a pro-environmental film
4) It's nice to see an anti-corporate film (that also happens to be wildly successful)
5) It's nice to see a film that leans on "The Wizard of Oz" for two references, at least--the first being the general's quote at the beginning of the film to his men "You aren't in Kansas anymore..." and the 2nd being when the "dragons" took off for flight at one point, they looked just like the monkeys at the Wicked Witch of the West's castle, also taking flight
6) If I were a native American Indian, I think there is a strong likelihood that, if I saw this movie "Avatar", I would be incensed that, after 200 years and untold, uncounted and countless slaughters of my people, in one way or another (out-and-out murder, taking away their clothing, history, tongue, culture, etc., and replacing it with government food, alcohol, etc., and, not to be forgotten, the accidental--mostly--introduction of disease and diseases to their people, among other things), it would irritate me that the American people finally "get it" about taking care of the planet but only because some mega-rich guy made a fictional movie about it that added more money still, to his accounts.
7) I understand Mr. Cameron plans to apply this current, new 3-D technique to some old films. If so, I hope he does "2001: A Space Odyssey" and the original "Star Wars" films--the first trilogy, as soon as possible
8) With all Mr. Cameron's wealth, first from "Titanic", now "Avatar" and then, finally, all the millions--billions?--he is likely to make from this same 3-D technology (you know he patented it), he could likely feed, clothe, house and nurse the Third World very soon. I don't think it will happen but I hope he does find philanthropy, if he hasn't already
9) See if you don't agree that the world Mr. Cameron created on this planet doesn't look like he took a great deal of inspiration from an old "Yes" (the band) album. A GREAT deal. It looks like it could be right off Roger Dean's easel
10) the seats that shake in the theater, to enhance the experience, are over-rated, in my view
11) And here's the spoiler (don't say you weren't warned twice): It's terrific to see the environment and nature defeat the "war machine"
Question: Can we now, as a country, say we have learned our lesson about nature and make mountain-top removal illegal, for obtaining coal?
We should but we won't.
And a final side note on our culture: With so few young people reading news regularly, it's a sad state of the nation that so few people in the country, also, know what's happening in their name, by their own representatives even though they are expected to vote for or against different issues and politicians and points of view. It's shocking to me.
We have created these magnificent ways of creating beautiful visual stories--now in a new, super-realistic 3-D but we don't pay attention to our own worlds--the social, political and other worlds for which we are responsible.
Crazy. Really crazy.
The world's likely spun out of control, I think.
1) It's nice to see an anti-war movie again
2) It's nice to see a successful, anti-war film, period
3) It's nice to see a pro-environmental film
4) It's nice to see an anti-corporate film (that also happens to be wildly successful)
5) It's nice to see a film that leans on "The Wizard of Oz" for two references, at least--the first being the general's quote at the beginning of the film to his men "You aren't in Kansas anymore..." and the 2nd being when the "dragons" took off for flight at one point, they looked just like the monkeys at the Wicked Witch of the West's castle, also taking flight
6) If I were a native American Indian, I think there is a strong likelihood that, if I saw this movie "Avatar", I would be incensed that, after 200 years and untold, uncounted and countless slaughters of my people, in one way or another (out-and-out murder, taking away their clothing, history, tongue, culture, etc., and replacing it with government food, alcohol, etc., and, not to be forgotten, the accidental--mostly--introduction of disease and diseases to their people, among other things), it would irritate me that the American people finally "get it" about taking care of the planet but only because some mega-rich guy made a fictional movie about it that added more money still, to his accounts.
7) I understand Mr. Cameron plans to apply this current, new 3-D technique to some old films. If so, I hope he does "2001: A Space Odyssey" and the original "Star Wars" films--the first trilogy, as soon as possible
8) With all Mr. Cameron's wealth, first from "Titanic", now "Avatar" and then, finally, all the millions--billions?--he is likely to make from this same 3-D technology (you know he patented it), he could likely feed, clothe, house and nurse the Third World very soon. I don't think it will happen but I hope he does find philanthropy, if he hasn't already
9) See if you don't agree that the world Mr. Cameron created on this planet doesn't look like he took a great deal of inspiration from an old "Yes" (the band) album. A GREAT deal. It looks like it could be right off Roger Dean's easel
10) the seats that shake in the theater, to enhance the experience, are over-rated, in my view
11) And here's the spoiler (don't say you weren't warned twice): It's terrific to see the environment and nature defeat the "war machine"
Question: Can we now, as a country, say we have learned our lesson about nature and make mountain-top removal illegal, for obtaining coal?
We should but we won't.
And a final side note on our culture: With so few young people reading news regularly, it's a sad state of the nation that so few people in the country, also, know what's happening in their name, by their own representatives even though they are expected to vote for or against different issues and politicians and points of view. It's shocking to me.
We have created these magnificent ways of creating beautiful visual stories--now in a new, super-realistic 3-D but we don't pay attention to our own worlds--the social, political and other worlds for which we are responsible.
Crazy. Really crazy.
The world's likely spun out of control, I think.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
