The difference between Reagan and Obama is that Reagan told Americans they could do it themselves and Obama tells Americans that government can solve their problems.
My parents expressed the sentiment of most parents of the time. How's that "new normal" working out for us?
If the documentary is any good, they'll talk about the many paradoxes surrounding Reagan. For example, in the late 1970s, he was a vocal opponent of the ERA (Equal Rights Amendment). Then his first appointee to the Supreme Court was a woman, Sandra Day O'Connor. Or the rabid anti-communism talk and beliefs that made up the core of his beliefs and then he went on to nearly negotiate away 100% of ours and Russian nukes a couple years later (and the fall of the USSR). And mook, if you don't believe that the sheer personal magnetism of a man doesn't have a lot to do with things, Reagan basically kicked out all the interpreters and staffers at Reykjavík and had a one-on-one with Gorby, the result was a fairly long string of treaties through the Bush, Clinton, Bush, and now Obama presidencies eliminating about 90% of the nuclear weapons stockpiles of both countries.
Closer to the truth than we realized at the time. http://www.hulu.com/watch/4174/saturday-night-live-president-reagan-mastermind
I see the impact all the time of personal magnetism. I lack enough of it that those who do have it stand out nicely in contrast to me. Some people are definitely better at convincing people of all sorts of things. What they aren't able to do, though, is to make people overall more happy or optimistic about their lot in life. At least not with a few good speeches, which is all most Americans hear (at most) from their president every year. They can with well-formed policy, but not with a couple of speeches. Not in a lasting way. I don't dispute that Reagan was a popular president or an effective negotiator. He definitely got stuff done. I just think a lot of people romanticize his personal magnetism into being this powerful force that compelled a nation into being happy. Which wasn't really the case.
You are your parents, Denny. Pessimistic. Me, I think things are fine, looking up. I'm optimistic. New normal is ok by me. barfo
I'm actually getting kind of optimistic too. My wife's business had a stunningly record month in December. I mean insanely good. January was nice and February is shaping up pretty nicely too. So good that we're going to contract out more work, creating jobs for a warehouse company in Tennessee. She's starting a second business this year, which also looks promising. Three families I know are buying houses within the next 3 or so months, so at least anecdotaly it seems like housing is starting to relax. The company I work for hired several engineers and corporate-types recently, and they have some nice manufacturing deals lined up. A couple of friends I've know who were unemployed forever finally found work. For the first time I feel like there's going to be some progress on improving the affordability of health care. Lots of people here will disagree with me on this point, but I see the current system through my wife's British eyes all the time, and she thinks our system is, in her words, "bloody insane." Detroit is finally out of the Hummer mindset, and GM made a profit in 2010. The middle east, for the first time in my memory, seems to be making lasting political progress. Housing prices are finally getting in line with people's real-world income, at least in my area. A lot of people still have it bad, and I suppose there's a downside to each one of my points. But I'm not nearly as pessimistic as I was two years ago. Hmmm. Maybe it's all just because Obama. Maybe it's more a matter of the mind than of policy. He made us feel proud to be Americans again. Life under Bush felt like how life felt under Carter: We're defeated, deflated, have little hope for the future and our enemies (China, radical Islam) are on the march. Obama snapped us out of that mindset. lol. No, it doesn't work that way.
Yeah, 1985-89 were awful years for this country. I never voted for Reagan, but he was among our very best presidents, and a damn sight better than Walter Mondale would have been.
I didn't say those were bad years. I just said a lot of people had it pretty damned bad right up until the re-election of Reagan. You said my post was proof of me having my expectations so beaten down that these shitty times actually gave me some hope, and how pathetic that is. I pointed out that if that's true, it's also proof that America's expectations around 1983 were so beaten down that they voted for Reagan again.
Because of the decisive action taken by Reagan and Volcker in 1981, by 1983, we were roaring. 1982 was the worst year, when GDP was -2.0%. In 1983 GDP growth roared back to a 4.3% increase; in 1984 is was an astounding 7.3% increase. What I wouldn't give for those numbers now. There's a reason Reagan took 49 states in 1984.
During Carter's term, it was the highest since WW II, too. Anyhow, the new normal. http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/housing/2011-02-04-under-water-chart_N.htm At least half of homeowners with a mortgage owe more than their homes are worth in 17 of 386 U.S. counties.
