31 Comments

• hancock | Feb 10, 2011, 02:32 PM EST

  Dennis you should take some of your own advice. Just because you type a lot doesn't mean you make any sense.

• Monsoonman | Feb 10, 2011, 11:47 AM EST

  "what exactly did he do?"......I believe that Ronald Reagan with help from George Lucas drove the ruskies out of business with Star Wars. They knew their goose was cooked when hollywood got behind space based defense systems. No one could compete with that so they threw in the towel.

• DennisQ | Feb 10, 2011, 04:02 AM EST

  Monsoonman, you're long on claims and short on evidence. When you say Reagan drove the Soviets out of business, it sounds like you are ascribing causality to events that may or may not be related. You'd have to cite specific actions and policies that Reagan used to bring down the Soviet empire.
  
  You derogate ooking at things from the rear view mirror as if there were something wrong with studying history. We need to study the past in order to understand the present.
  
  Make a legitimate argument, Monsoonman. Don't just throw out random accusations that imply both laziness and cowardice. When you say Reagan "drive the USSR out of business," what exactly did he do? Understand that you do not bring down empires with rhetoric. If that's your interpretation of history, you're wrong.

• Monsoonman | Feb 09, 2011, 09:40 PM EST

  Always easy to look at things through the rear view mirror, from the safety and comfort of your living room. If you had lived through those perilous times and spent a good portion of your life underground in your personal bomb shelter, you would know how liberating it was when President (God rest his soul) Reagan drove the USSR out of business.

• DennisQ | Feb 09, 2011, 08:21 PM EST

  Old empires don't continue to expand the way new empires do, and they don't shrink, either - they collapse. Prof. Johnson listed a number of ways that empires fail, which are:

  • it takes constant warfare to maintain them;
  • they exhaust themselves by attempting to regulate too much;
  • they lose credibility because of an excess of lies and secrecy; and
  • they run out of money.
  
  
  The fact that Reagan got up in front of the Berlin Wall and challenged Gorbachev to tear it down suggests that Reagan was simply an opportunist. The Soviet Union was no longer viable by the time Reagan took office, and it's likely that all his Soviet experts predicted its collapse.
  
  Incidentally, Prof. Johnson's book is less of a history book than a prediction of America's future as the American empire wanes for the above-mentioned reasons. We are in decline, and the whole world knows it, especially our enemies.

• hancock | Feb 09, 2011, 11:41 AM EST

  Why don't you ask Lech Walessa and Gorbachev if Reagan had something to do with it.

• Monsoonman | Feb 09, 2011, 11:36 AM EST

  All of the proxy wars around the world at the time were safety valves in order to avoid greater conflicts with nuclear weapons. The world was never faced with the prospect of global obliteration before, so it was either local limited wars, or cold wars, or go all out with Mutally Assured Destruction(MAD). MAD works when you have sane countries who don't want to be wiped off the earth. MAD doesn't mean anything to nuclear armed religious extremists looking forward to their 72 virgins, after they die in their quest to kill infidels.

• CitizenWhy | Feb 09, 2011, 09:14 AM EST

  mmccreedy makes a valid point on Vietnam. The US was so successful in breaking the Tet offensive that North Vietnam sued for Peace. Then Walter Cronkite announced that the US had lost the Tet offensive and the North Vietnamese withdraw their suit for peace. They figured the military would lose the support of the Congress. ... But the real question is, should the US, under Johnson, have taken over the Vietnam fight from the South Vietnam government by sending in massive amounts of troops? Is it wise for the US to make local governments entirely dependent on the US military?

• CitizenWhy | Feb 09, 2011, 09:08 AM EST

  Reagan was not a conservative by today's extremist standards. He raised federal taxes 11 times. When governor of California he raised $1 billion in new taxes on a state budget of $6 billion. He supported gun control legislation. .. As for the collapse of the Soviet Union, Reagan heard from two micro-economists that the Soviet economy was due to collapse on its own economically and politically sometime in the 1990s. Reagan decided to speed up the process by tricking the Soviet Union to overspend on its military. Overspending on military is now what the US does. ... The Pope resisted aligning with the US and Reagan because of the church's distrust of the US brand of capitalism and consumerism.

• mmccreedy | Feb 09, 2011, 06:32 AM EST

  Reagan, Thatcher, & Pope John Paul II helped to bring down the evil Soviet Empire. However, Reagan did more on the military/diplomatic front to help bring this about. Liberals always deny Reagan's role, because they were actively working against him (remember Reagan's support for the Contra's in Nicaragua?). I remember when Reagan gave the Congress a balanced budget, yet the DEMOCRAT controlled Congress refused to consider it. As for Vietnam, Whore Chi Minh was glad to come to the peace table after Nixon took the war to the enemy and ignored the left-wing nut jobs in Congress. He mined Hai-Phong harbor, and rolled out Operation Rolling Thunder. By the way, the Vietnamese NEVER defeated the Americans in any major military action during Vietnam. Ever. The anti-war loons like to credit the media, Jane Fonda (traitor), and other leftists for ending the war, but it was 535 idiots in Washington D.C. who thought they were Commander-In-Chief of the military that ended America's participation in the war.

• DennisQ | Feb 09, 2011, 02:32 AM EST

  Don't be so quick to credit Ronald Reagan for the collapse of the Soviet empire. Empires have limited life spans and tend to collapse of their own dead weight, as Prof. Chalmers Johnson points out in his 2004 book, "The Sorrows of Empire." Johnson notes these aspects of all empires as their decline accelerates:
  
  

  • Endless wars destroy the fabric of society.
  • Imperial overstretch, as the government regulate anything and everything...
  • A rise in official deceit so that nobody trusts the government anymore
  • Bankruptcy. Central government simply runs out of money.
  
  Johnson compares the collapse of the Soviet empire with the collapse of the British empire, the Byzantine empire before that; and the Roman empire before that. He states that we are experiencing the collapse of the American empire for the same reasons that all empires collapse.
  
  Reagan did no more bring down the Soviet empire than Ho Chi Minh defeated the Americans in Viet Nam. Both Reagan and Ho Chi Minh were running the show when the other side simply upped and collapsed. The Vietnam war was unsustainable; and the Soviet empire was unsustainable as well. We are now seeing Obama take the blame for losing the Middle East, but it won't be because of any policy decisions Obama made or will make before his term expires. It's that our policies are uunsustainable and will cause our efforts to collapse next week or next year, but certainly within the next decade. Hey, why not blame Obama? People are blaming Brian Cowen for the collapse of the Irish economy, based as it was on volatile assets.

• mmccreedy | Feb 08, 2011, 10:04 PM EST

  The top five Presidents (my opinion) are as follows: 1. George Washington 2. Thomas Jefferson 3. Andrew Jackson 4. Ronaldus Maximus (Ronald Reagan) 5. John Adams Of course, Richard Nixon was a great President, but he created the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and only got caught at what Presidents from FDR onward had done. So, that does not rank him in the top five.On the plus side, Nixon scared the North Vietnamese enough to bring them to the peace table (thanks to Nixon I volunteered to join the Navy instead of having to sign up for the draft). By the way, HAPPY 100th Gipper!!!!!

• peterson | Feb 08, 2011, 08:56 PM EST

  We need more leaders like Ronald Reagan !!

• hancock | Feb 08, 2011, 07:24 PM EST

  How about driving the USSR out of business?

• Monsoonman | Feb 08, 2011, 06:13 PM EST

  "Pick out a great event at random and tie it to whomever happened to occupy the White House at the time it happened." When Monica Lewinskys blue dress got stained?

• DennisQ | Feb 08, 2011, 05:34 PM EST

  Beware of Irishness that presents itself with a twinkle in its eye. It's not genuine; shure and begorrah it's 19th century stage Irish. Ronald Reagan would know how to act Irish depending on the circumstances. He loved a good yarn, and he welcomed gibes at his own expense.
  
  However, it was his mean-spirited attitude towards the poor that distinguished him from the Irish of actual, lived history. Two of Reagan's dubious achievements contrast with the Irish characteristic empathy for suffering. One is his slander of the poor as fraudulent claimants against the common good of society - the Cadillac-owning "welfare queen" of legend. The other is Reagan's choice of location to declare his presiditential candidadcy - in Philadelphia, Mississippi, notorious as the place where three civil rights workers were murdered. It implemented Nixon's Southern Strategy and appealed to Southern racism.
  
  Reagan can't be considered a great president unless you rework notions of greatness to include being fortunate enough to have been there when great events took place. But that's a fairly accommodating definition. Pick out a great event at random and tie it to whomever happened to occupy the White House at the time it happened.

• hancock | Feb 08, 2011, 02:09 PM EST

  Greatest president in my lifetime, maybe all you Irish whiners should worry about your own leaders.

• MalcomAC | Feb 08, 2011, 11:11 AM EST

  But he raised taxes, increased the size of governments, and walked away from retaliating against Middle Eastern terrorists - negotiated with them, in fact.

• jamieLM | Feb 08, 2011, 09:13 AM EST

  You've got 2 out of 3 right, but I don't agree with you about Reagan. He's definitely not the worst President, but I don't think he deserves to be ranked as the 3rd best President - not even close. I think you should rethink your choice for #3.

• mayoman | Feb 08, 2011, 01:46 AM EST

  Ah yes, Ronald Reagan. The man that recklessly set off a massive arms build up against the Soviets that we are all very fortunate did not end in nuclear war. The man that broke the PATCO union, firing thousands of essential air-traffic controllers. Ronald Reagan; the man who illegally masterminded the Iran-Contra Affair, and who should have been impeached for his actions. (Instead Admiral Poindexter fell on his sword for his Chief.) Ronald Reagan is the man that is remembered by legions of adoring, but uninformed right wingers for lowering taxes, (which he did in 1981), only to raise them several times before he left office. Ronald Reagan; the man that attacked Grenada under the pretext that the American medical students on the island were under threat from Cuban forces, but who were under no such threat until Reagan's attack. Ronald Reagan is our greatest president? You must be delusional, Mr. Farnan. Very delusional.

• GeorgeDillon | Feb 08, 2011, 12:16 AM EST

  I guess Reagan's greatest military achievement was attacking and occupying the island of Grenada. It was a feat on a par with Iwo Jima or Shiloh. Population of Grenada is what, 80.000? Less than Newark NJ. In fact less than a few blocks in Newark NJ.

• hancock | Feb 07, 2011, 10:38 PM EST

  I guess you Irish lefties didn't live here when he was president.

• jmchrystal | Feb 07, 2011, 05:20 PM EST

  NO, NO, NO! Ronnie, the ACTING President, is one of the top three Presidents only if the destruction of America is you criteria. His "let them eat crumbs" voodoo economic policies, carried on since his Presidency in a variety of forms, is precisely the root of out economic melt down of today. Under Ronnie, NO one counted for anything unless they were the super rich!

• CaptainTom | Feb 07, 2011, 12:04 PM EST

  I thought the so-called "great communicater" was a better actor than he was given credit for. He was also a major league windbag who was good at delivering his lines if he could remember them. The "Gipper", I prefered Gaper, was the worst thing since the Civil War until "W" came along.

• Monsoonman | Feb 07, 2011, 11:14 AM EST

  Pre-Reagan we were under the yoke of james earl carter, probably the worst leader our country has experienced, present occupant of the whitehouse excluded. Interest rates were 19%, we had fuel shortages, Iran was given to muslim extremists, all over the world cuba and russia were conducting wars of "liberation" and were threatening our very existence with nuclear war. Under Reagan everyone in America who wanted a job could work, loans were affordable and the private sector boomed, the soviet empire collapsed, there was no need for massive amounts of nuclear weapons, our friends trusted us and our enemies feared us...a total turn around from carter when we were on the brink. What more can one man do? He gave us peace and a great economy, it was up to us to preserve it.

• BigGuns | Feb 07, 2011, 11:13 AM EST

  Based on the Liberal comments, he must have been the greatest.

• lawyer4 | Feb 07, 2011, 10:57 AM EST

  Reagan was a dangerously simplistic and hypocritical "thinker", a mediocre actor who was good at soundbites, hyped by his controllers as a champion of democracy, who probably did more to harm the world's respect for the USA than anyone who ever held the office until the Bushes.

• TheOldPerfessor | Feb 07, 2011, 10:24 AM EST

  As president he talked about smaller government, but the federal government did not shrink on his watch. He gave amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants and bragged that this would solve the problem for all time. It didn't. He dismantled government oversight of business, leading to the Savings and Loan crisis, and, ultimately to the market crash of 1987. His union busting helped lead us into the current Walmart economy where millions of people make enough to avoid unemployment but not enough to live. He made us feel better about ourselves. That's nice.

• JTravis | Feb 07, 2011, 10:24 AM EST

  You've got to be kidding, or is this an early April Fool joke? Reagen ranks right up there with Millard Fillmore and James Buchanan.

• diannerae | Feb 07, 2011, 09:57 AM EST

  I have never been able to figure out why people think Ronald Regan was a great president. I think he was just an actor and not even good at that.

• hollabackgurl | Feb 07, 2011, 08:39 AM EST

  President Ronald Reagan refused to even utter the word AIDS until 36,058 Americans had been diagnosed and 20,849 had died. It’s impossible to think of another stigmatized social group in America who would have had to die in those kinds of numbers before a sitting President even acknowledged their plight. There was so much Reagan could have done. He could have stemmed the homophobic rhetoric that flowed easily from so many in his own administration. Countless lives could have been saved had he responded quickly and compassionately with public health and educational programs instead of judgmental silence or outright contempt. He did nothing. He looked the other way. History will remember that.