That's a lot of drama CC. Yes, the Cold War involved a massive military build-up. But it was a Cold War, not a hot one. Saying the US was at war, meaning hot war, is a bit overdramatic.
Okay, it was dramatic. But same things involved, only without the bloodshed. Both need alot of money.
Because the Carter regime refused to support Samoza, a man who utilized death squads to kill nuns? Please. Carter brought back the notion of human rights as being part of what US foreign policy should be about, not the mere pursuit of national objective.
Che did little in Africa. His involvement in Congo was a diaster because he found the Africans were unreceptive to his ideas.
As for supporting dictators in South America, this was part of Jean Kirkpatrick's ideas, that were adopted by Reagan. And what did we create in the process? Is it a surprise that the only peaceful country in Central American has been Costa Rica, a democracy without an army? Did we have to support repressive dictators or did they merely serve our national interest in a cheaper more effective way.
I refuse to belive there is some gigantic conservative conspiricy to keep down South American countries by installing dictators. If there was, I assume I would have been notified.
Carter did put the humanitarian work back into the army-and I respect him for that. He is, overall, a good human being, and not a terribly president.
Still, don't tell me this was some kind of policy that Reagen just dreamed up to opress said Latin Americans. Do you think Kennedy is in hell for the Bay of Pigs, or coming so damn close to nuclear war? No, he's there cause he loved threesomes.
Though I'll admit this is in no way my strong point, I think you're leaning a bit to the conspiritorial side here welsh.
Goddamnit, why could'nt you have been listening to NPR at the same time?
Best I can do is this
http://www.npr.org/news/specials/obits/reagan/
Indeed, Reagan was provocative. He came up with the whole strategy in which the US would engage the Soviet Union in any theatre should a conflict begin in one. He also brought back the idea of winnable nuclear war. One can understand why the Russians, and many Americans, thought the guy was nuts.
And why so many respect him now. He got the better of them.
Love those republican Op-eds.
I've yet to see a Republican read Salon of his own accord.
The US will not negotiate with Terrorists.
Iran is under an arms embargo.
And Nixon abused his powers of President.
American lives where at stake. What if this was you're father, or daughter, or wife? Anyone could disagree with it in hindsight, but I don't think I would have done anything diffirent at the time.
Nixon was a terrible president who was the worst singel thing to ever happen to the Republican party, and I'll never defend him.
Not sure what this refers to.
Again, Reagen did not invent Latin American policy out of thin air. Many presidents-Kennedy or anybody else-are guilty of supporting tyrants to keep out worse, red tyrants.
You are giving him causal credit because you sympathize? Come on CCR. Yes, it's unfortunate he died a bad way. Perhaps it would have been better for him, and all of us, if he had died 25 years earlier. The guy lived a long life, great. But by making a causal judgment based on sympathy is pretty damn shallow a view of history.
The fact that the guy died a terrible death does not give him sole credit for a historical event that evolved over 40 years, when domestic problems were the primary causes. Did Reagan matter? Maybe. Perhaps as a catalyst. But would the Soviets had fallen anyway, yes.
Welsh, would you talk about how X took you're girlfriend in the spring of 93 after he died of huntingstons? I don't think so. I respect Reagen imminsely, dispite his flaws, and I don't want to talk bad about him right after he died such a terrible death.
I also think it's absurd you dare suggest the guy deserved to die, like Hitler or Stalin or Mao or Lenin......he was'nt responsible for the deaths of millions......hell, I hate Kennedy, and I won't say he deserved that.
Lots of speculation there. By the early 1980s the Soviets were in big trouble and were falling terribly behind. What the Chinese have that the Soviets didn't was a national state. China is unified by common language, history and culture. The provinces of China are firstly Chinese, secondly provincials. Also the Chinese began their reforms a long time before the Russians and by 1988 were undertaking massive reforms. I know, I was there in 1988.
The Russians didn't have that option. Why? Because they had a huge empire that they had trouble controlling. Even the stretch to the Pacific was barely controlled. They had failed to develop sufficient infrastructure of rule and had not legitimized their rule over provinces. Georgians were Georgians first and Russians second.
In that sense Russia was an empire, China had made it to national state. The Chinese had also gone through the Cultural Revolution, the trial of the Gang of Four and the death of Cho En Lai- major shakes to the system and large questions about the propriety of the Maoist regime, that Deng was able to take advantage of. Using the communisty party as a bourgeoisie, they were able to undertake reform at the grassroots. But in Russia despotic rule had failed nor had they created the political infrastructure necessary to undertake those kinds of reform.
China is'nt a nation state. Don't forget that. The old saying that a language is a dialect with an army is entirely true here- Cantonese has less in common with Mandarin then French with Romanian; alot more actually. I'd probably compare it to a medival Lithuanian trying to talk to someone in Urdu, or Middle Persian. Not to mention the Mongols, the Koreans in the north East. Sinkhang had been independant for a while, and Tibet had not been a part of China for more then half a millenia. In fact I could argue that it was much less of a nation state, as the Russians always hovered around 50% of the population.
Yes, you do have a point about Deng Ziao-Ping, but I think it's fair to say that Russia in 1980 had quite a bit more oppertunities then China. Mao was IMHO worse then Stalin in that no Industrialization happened (actually it became less industrialized), and everyone killed under him was meaningless.
Though for the most part I think you have a point here, but Gorbachev could have become alot more Ziao-Ping like IMHO without Reagen.
First Poland goes, then the Baltic states want to go. When Gorbachev decides not to intervene into Poland to stop that country's transitions, it means the Brezhnev Doctrine (we will intervene to preserve communist states) has been abandoned. Then people are willing to go. When Gorbachev doesn't go into the Baltic states it means that he is restrained on the use of force. Those are probably the key moves of the end of the Cold War.
Yeah, it was. But how it came to that point, and why Gorbachev (who certainly intervened in Afghanistan to help a communist regiem) are largely Reagen's influence.
Perhaps. I think you are giving a lot of credit to an individual leader when historical changes were moving faster than the leaders would have liked them.
Yeah.
Not yet but that would be fucking great. And he was elected because of Florida shennagins- thanks to his brother. So yes, he's an insult. He has taken the US from a position of leadership, from a time it was embraced as a leader to a point where our allies are looking the other way. He has led us to war based on false premises and has led to the death of hundreds of Americans. He had fucked us in domestic policies.
For example- he has cut programs for urban kids for jobs in the summer, after-school programs and has forced larger classrooms. He did so because "there's just not enough money". Yet he is trying to maintain tax cuts to the rich, capital gains and the estate tax so that rich kids can inherit from their dead parents without paying taxes (unearned income by virtue of birthright).
The guy is fucking our country. That's why he insults me. I want a President I can be proud of. Not one who wanted to call McDonald's a manufacturing Job. Not one who wears a military uniform (like Sadam) and declares a war over last May so that more of our guys die in peace.
Completely Off-topic.
And you're just fucking lying about job growth.
Oh so we should give every leader a break because they suffer an illness or handicap. Before I made an argument about the New Deal that you ignored. Well are you going to give FDR a lot of love because he was in a wheel chair or because it actually did something important for the country.
I did'nt say that Roosevelt's New Deal sucked because Roosevelt could'nt run a marathon. You said Bush sucked because he could'nt pronounce things. They're entirely diffirent.
Fuck it CC. Bush was born into wealth. A Texan (born in that dusty town of New Haven, Connecticutt) he is making sure that the weath stay wealthy and the rest of us get fucked. I thinkl that makes up more than enough for his Dyslexia.
As opposed to John Kerry, man of the people ( who are born into incredible wealth and married to a millionare).
Bush Jr has dyslexia? Is that a fact or just an excuse for being slow?
Even so, it’s not a very good one.
He mispronounces words that alot of dyslexic people mispronounce (nuclear, for instance), and his entire family does it. Either he and all of his brothers suffer from the same low-level IQ, or they all share an LD.
All the people I've seen about it agree. He just has'nt said it. Then again, Kennedy did'nt talk about how great Marylin Monroe was in bed, but that does'nt mean he did'nt fuck her.
A large quantity of people, like myself, have certain degrees of dyslexia. That doesn’t make them idiots. And it certainly is not an excuse! If he was brain dead… well, that would be a good excuse, but then he wouldn’t be President in the first place, or would he?
Charlamange could'nt read because he was dyslexic. He could'nt read at all. Does that make him an idiot?
Far from it, there's some very smart people on that list:
# Alexander Graham Bell.
# Thomas Edison.
# Albert Einstein.
# Michael Faraday.
Most of the most brilliant people of the past two millinea where Dyslexic. Baisically, it just means you think in images rather then words.
Hm, I'm beggining to like some of this Kerry fellow's quotes.
Shame there isn't a "Writhe in hell, you worthless sack of lying, murderous shit" one.
Learn more about him and it's impossible not to hate him.
