Edwards vs. Cheney- What Happened to Wyoming and
American Heritage rates Ronald Reagan
October 7, 2004
The current Bush administration has raised bureaucratic expenditure, with more people and higher pay then the Clinton Administration- military aside!~ Reflective of the past Vice-Presidential Debate, Cheney's voting record was horrible and he is too! There were actually Democrats elected in Wyoming at one time or another! Not that long ago Wyoming had Gale McGee for 20 years as a Senator and Ed Herschler, a governor who served 12 years and 3 terms up until 1987. Of course at the time Cheney was a Congressman, circa 1982, when he had won with 71% of the vote his ADA rating was 5 and his ACLU rating was zero! Even the conservative GOP Senators at that time Wallop and Simpson had ratings of 10/32 and 15/39! Yes he was a coming individual back in the early 1980's, but boy is he a scary figure now!
Edwards handled himself quite well. Ideology aside, my issue is domestic tranquility as opposed to a divided society at loggerheads with itself. Since the so-called Reagan revolution, where the right-wing got its foot in the door with their national Flaksperson in the Great Communicator we have spiraled out of control in regards to divisive rhetoric. Not helping all of this has been the lack-luster Presidents that we have had to endure. Many people do not like Clinton, but he was genial, well-liked, admired abroad and a hero to minorities in this country; women, blacks, Latinos and Jews. Unlike Carter, Ford, Bush and the current dunce, Clinton actually had a very, very good 8 years. Other than the lunatic fringe right who was mourning for Ruby Ridge, the demise of the nutty Branch Dividians, the Cuban boy sent back to Castro and a few other miss-steps, crime was down remarkably, government shrunk, deficits disappeared, surpluses emerged, jobs were created (22 million), peace was accomplished in the Kosovo Region (no American casualties) and there was engagement with the Israelis and the so-called Palestinians. But Newt Gingrich and his cohorts came in with Ronald Regan and vestiges of them remain in the (nut) House. They talk of family, small businesses, freedom, less government, but they wish to wiretap, censor, export jobs, cut taxes but spend more. They complain of illegal immigrants, but their friends in big business: hospitals, farms and big restaurants need them to survive and the government looks the other way. The President talks and regard himself as a “compassionate conservative” but he has left unfunded most of his so-called initiatives. His Congress did seem fit to find the time to round-up the votes to extend the assault weapon ban. But they want to allow guns to be carried in D.C. The NRA has an office right in the White House.
Interestingly enough in this month's current issue of “American Heritage” Magazine- run by Steve Forbes, not Mr. Liberal bleeding-heart. AH lists its annual Underrated/Overrated analysis, and lo and behold, Ronald Wilson Reagan is regarded as “overrated.” “In general, his adherents like to portray Reagan as a 'big vision' President, who was an expert at delegating and did not get bogged down in the details of governing…yet it is not clear whether his vision was really wide enough. His administration was engulfed in scandals, after all, ranging from the Iran-contra operation to the Savings and Loan debacle (the costliest in American and possibly world history).” To sum it up Reagan was seen by Forbes as being overrated, and as not being the person who should be credited for “winning the Cold War.” “The supposed sterling economic record of the Reagan eighties was, in fact, bracketed by a deep recession and a stock market crash, while the go-go years in between were fueled be record peacetime deficits his successors labored for ten years to make up- and actions which contradicted nearly everything Reagan claimed to stand for before taking office.” Besides all of that, he was indifferent to those who were victims of almost anything but communism. His reaction to the AIDS epidemic was sluggish, he opposed all basic civil rights legislation, he was hostile to almost all social-welfare legislation, despite the fact that his own family was rescued through government intervention during the Great Depression. He even invented and continued to popularized the infamous story of the black, Cadillac-driving “welfare queen” who never actually existed. This is all virtually word for word from this month's “American Heritage.” By the way, FDR is listed as the most underrated. It is only justic