President Ronald Reagan dead at 93
 

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1911-2004... a long long life

Rest in Peace, Ronnie, thanks for all the contributions you made to make the world a better place.

I still remember so vividly the day that he was shot...

Its showing on the news right now...hope he went peacefully...

They totally hijacked the baseball game to inform me of this - great. However, 15 minutes later, they were still going on and on about it. Geez! Ok, the guy died. I can hear about it later. Now get me back to my LIVE baseball game.

RIP Ronney. :(

wow- I just saw a headline on MSN just this morning saying that his health is declining, but i didn't know it so that serious.

RIP

May he rest in peace. A great man and President.

http://www.cnn.com/interactive/allpo...n/06.nancy.jpg

Having fun with Nancy. Say, whats that in your hand Nancy.

Patriot, Capitalist, Hero and Friend to people all over the world who benefited from the vision and conviction that saw us through a time that could have spelled the end of us all.

Thanks Ronnie. I will never forget you.

Nobody seems to mention his role in funding the Nicaragua Contras, which resulted in thousands of civilian deaths.

But whatever.

As Nancy would say... "Just Say No"

A real man who stood by his convictions.

"Whatever else history may say about me when I'm gone, I hope it will record that I appealed to your best hopes, not your worst fears, to your confidence rather than your doubts. My dream is that you will travel the road ahead with liberty's lamp guiding your steps and opportunity's arm steadying your way."

-Ronald Reagan

He was a great American.

RIP Mr. President.

The first president I voted for ........ 24 years later, still happy with that vote ....... wish I had that choice today.

Halx --- how close are you to the Reagan library?

User Name

While I view your comment in bad taste in light of the thread it is in, I find it worse that you would take a quick barb at something that is questionable whether you understand it. Shoot off your mouth and run. Nice trolling in a thread about Reagan dying today.

Supporting people who were fighting for their freedom from the communist backed Sandinistas is pretty evil huh? Well even if it were and truely "resulted in thousands of civilian deaths" (which is questionable since these people would still be fighting for their freedom today without Reagans actions - the Sandinistas fell shortly after Moscow cut off funding.) the precident it set helped end communist rule in Russia. Couple figures for ya - pay attension to the first one:

From Reagan's War by Peter Schweizer
Have some respect for a man that made the world safe for you to troll threads in your spare time.

I am from the former Soviet Union, and while I do not remember what life was like there, my parents do, and they say it was best in the early 1980s. Thank you so much, President Reagan, for fucking up the economy of my homeland. Also, seeing as Reagan gets so much credit for breaking up the USSR, perhaps he should be thanked along with Gorbachev for DECREASING THE STANDARD OF LIVING IN HALF. My parents would have never wanted to leave (though they definitely could, to Israel or the US) if the Soviet Union didn't break up and the economy wasn't in ruins.

While trading arms for hostages is pretty reasonable and humane to me, using the profits from those sales to fund armed rebel groups is not. Reagan wanted to eliminate the Sadinistas because any left-wing government, in his eyes, is evil, causing thousands of deaths.

Thank you President Reagan. I'll join you in hell.

So, it was best in the early '80's when who, exactly was President? Oh yeah, Ronald Reagan. He's the best president we've had in a really, really, long time, and probably for a long time to come.

I was talking about the Soviet Union.

Good thing Bush is carrying on in this fashion.

Rest in Peace Ronald. Though your policies and goals were opposite of mine (I will refrain from bringing any of it up out of respect) , you did injected necessary joviality back into America. That is worth something.

Greatest achievement: Recognizing and dealing well with Gorbachev

A historically significant human being and a great leader of the world's most powerful nation...

RIP Mr. President,

You were ther best President I had the honor of serving under in the Marine Corps. (list includes Carter, Reagan, Bush, Slick Willie, and Bush.

Not only did you repair the American image, you stood for something on the world stage.

The USSR was our enemy, and you dealt with them better than any president ever did.

I will put my blues on tonight and give you the proper salute.

One more time for The Gipper.

http://ia.imdb.com/media/imdb/01/I/00/65/12m.jpg
R.I.P., Ronald Reagan.

How come when someone dies they become so great? Will Bush be known as a great leader who cared for the people when he dies too? Its just funny that no bad a person did will be remembered when they kick the bucket.

1. I am from the Soviet Union, but not from Russia. The Soviet Union was made up of 15 republics, of which Russia was the largest. I am from Ukraine.
2. I am not a communist. I'm not even a socialist. I am actually a conservative in terms of economic issues. However, I am still against innocent people dying due to political disagreements, and consider Reagan's funding of the Contras deplorable. Please refrain from making innacurate assumtpions.

Finally, someone from the real world. I hate it how everyone becomes perfect once they die. No, Abraham Lincoln never denied the right of due process to defendants. No, Franklin Roosevelt never tried to increase the size of the Supreme Court so that he could gain control of it by appointing the new justices. No, Lyndon Johnson never promised to refrain from sending "American boys to do a job that Asian boys ought to be doing "themselves".

Of course, when George W. Bush dies, everyone will forget the Patriot Act and the baseless war, because he was such a "charismatic" and "compassionate" person, while being able to "connect to Joe Sixpack".

10 minutes, maybe.

I'll tell you my Ronald Reagan story.

The year is 1972, and I am a 16-year-old high school junior in California. It is the second week of summer, and because I did too well at social studies I have been whisked off for a week at Boys State, a program sponsored by the American Legion to train tomorrow's leaders or some damn thing. Anyway, 800 soon-to-be-seniors got trucked off to the Sacramento State campus to play state government for a week. Which we did. 800 16- and 17-year-old boys living in dorms on a college campus for a week, with no privacy and no girls. The horniness factor was at, well, code red.

Reagan was still governor of California, and he came to give the keynote speech to us all in the big college gym as the week drew to a close. He was a big guy, a good talker with a bad dye job -- in those days, the joke was that he was "prematurely orange."

So he tells us how great we are and that we're the hope of tomorrow and all that, standing out there in the middle of the basketball court with his security team. Then he takes a few questions from the audience; and remember, these were mostly student-body politics kids, so there were more than a few smart-asses. One guy asks him his views on contraception. And he says, "Y'know, the very best contraception is just that one little word -- "No." This to a gym full of horny high school guys. What do you think we did? Gave him a mighty roar and a standing ovation for the size of his balls.

And if you do just a little digging on the web, you'll find the place where Reagan is noted as the only future president ever to marry a woman who was already pregnant. I don't think Reagan had a mean or vicious bone in his body, but I do think "Great Bullshitter" is a more accurate term than Great Communicator.

I did get his signature on a Boys State ID card for no good reason, and it may still be around here.

Reagan was hailed as the best president ever long before his death. During his presidency even, he shut down the commies after all.

And while I'm on the subject of the commies, good riddance. Quit your bitching, you were our enemy at the time, User.

Reagan was a good man. He was a strong leader, faithful husband and a great role model. It's a shame what I thought would happen when he passed on has turned out to be the case. There is no political value in demeaning Reagan now, but I knew some of the more immature liberals would do it anyhow.

Knock it off if only for your own sake. You're coming across as spiteful douche's to be frank.

While I could quibble about some of Reagan's policies, I wasn't president, so what do I know? :)

As Thatcher said, Reagan ended the cold war without firing a shot, when both sides had more than enough nuclear weapons to destroy the world.

So, hats off to him, and sympathy to his family for enduring 10 years of Alzheimer's. I'm sure that was hard on them.

First, Russia's government chose to match American military spending. They could have given up. The Russian economy was ruined because it was competing against an economic system that outperformed it. Reagan simply overheated the American economy slightly, and Russia's attempts to match this exploded their economic boiler.

Second, isn't Russia's economy looking up?

Third, the USSR had vowed to overthrow all capitalist economies. Which sort of explains why capitalist countries where, well, rather leery of USSR-backed nation states, and willing to back those who rebel against them. It was more than a bit overdone and ferile, but they really where fighting for survival at the time.

What you describe as a "political disagreement" was only held back from being a shooting war by the existance of nuclear bombs on both sides.

Was Reagan an idiot about many things, possibly a war criminal, and maybe a bit demented before he finished his presidency? I'd guess yes.

But, he brought the world back from the brink of death. That's worth some points.

Win one more for the Gipper.

—President Ronald Wilson Reagan, June 6th, 1984

As an aside, if Bush pulls it off, if he manages to start a wave of freedom and democracy in the middle east, I'd forgive him Patriot, I'd forgive him Ashcroft, I'd forgive him Cheney, I'd forgive him for fiscial idiocy. I'd even forgive him for G.Bay.

Reagan has been my inspiration and my hero for a very long time. While sometimes people are so afraid to talk bad about the dead that they become saints in death, at least for me, this is not at all the case. At the MondKastle, the flags are flying at half mast and we are reflecting on Ronnie's life right now.

As for User Name, you continue to be a thread troll in a clearly inappropriate way. Either way - you are reacting without facts. Here is a thought. The Sandinistas lost power how? When they could no longer hold power through force (bought by the Soviets) there were free elections. Your heros who ran the country were voted out. That's right - it was the evils of free will again.

The Iran-Contra affair questioned the methods used when the administration went outside the normal checks and balances found in our governmental system. What really was not debated was the goal. It came down to another way to pressure the Soviets to commit their scarce resources. It suceeded in that goal acording to the Soviets themselves after the cold was was over.

As far as your heritage. Do some reading and talk to some of your relatives. The standard of living in Russia is what it is because of corruption plain and simple. The very few ruled the very many. Decisions on what was best for your family were being made far away from where you were and after being filtered through many levels of people - all with their hand out taking a portion of the hard work that people were doing. It is no surprise that in the historical short term, the standard of living went into the toilet. Instead of quoting Reagan here - I will go with Ben Franklin:

Were your bread lines a little longer after Communism crashed? Yep. Can you now stand in the street and protest the bread lines without being sent to Siberia? Yep. You decide what is better. There is a lot of corruption still back in your homeland with "private" enterprise being controlled by underworld figures who got their power from the former regime. Maybe you can go back there and help to clean things up someday instead of being a troll and acting in innappropriate ways. This thread is not the first time you have acted this way on the TFP and I think as you mature a little, hopefully you will not be so hateful. I would think that you could learn some lessons from your parents. Sit down and talk to them about their ability to practice their choosen religion and see how their experience compares to today in the United States. I don't even believe in god, but I do believe in the freedoms that allow me to choose when and how to follow my beliefs.

Try and channel the anger you have for others instead toward a search for knowledge and see where that takes you. At the very least, you will have the facts to debate in a knowledgeable manner. Maybe in the process you will find the respect to use the back button when people are mourning or the forsight to bring this up a week or more ago.

I only wish I had been old enough to vote for him because I would have dome it both times. He stood for what a true Republican really is (unlike the phonies nowadays) and did more good for the world than the next 10 presidents after him probably will.

Rest in peace, Gipper.

http://www.foxnews.com/images/23364/...onald_1932.jpg

Maybe this is a good thread to start in politics on its own. "History writes about GWB. "

Once again, Russia is being ignorantly equated to the Soviet Union.

Ukraine is a country of over 40,000,000 people in Eastern Europe. In terms of area, it is the largest country located entirely in Europe (the Russian part of Europe is bigger than Ukraine). Geographical ignorance is one of my biggest pet peeves.

And no, Ukraine's economy is not looking up. The average household income is around $4,000, and the distribution is even worse, as many of those contributing to the rise in average income are the corrupt businessmen.

I realize that this is a divergence from the topic at hand, but this mistake occurs entirely too often.

Please do not equate Russia with the Soviet Union.

With that being said, there was always enough to eat after about 1950, when recovery from WW2 was in progress. Maybe we didn't eat caviar on crackers, but we had enough enough to survive. My father worked at a bread factory (albeit after the breakup, so my family's bread line wasn't too long, as you can imagine). And protests? We wouldn't protest even here in the United States. The only reason Ukrainians can't be sent to prison in Siberia now is that Siberia is in a WHOLE OTHER COUNTRY! Maybe we here in America have grown too accustomed to outsourcing, but no, the Ukrainian government, fucked up as it might be, is not planning to outsource its prisons anytime soon. Human rights are still shit, Communism or no Communism, and corruption runs rampant. At least we were better off economically.

Being an atheist myself, I would have no problem with not being allowed to worship my imaginary best friend. My parents and grandparents, while believing, have absolutely no interest in stepping into a synagogue even in the "land of the free".

I'm not saying the Soviet Union was any sort of utopia, but life there was certainly bearable for the majority of people. The effect of its breakup was more economic than anything else, and the standard of living took a steep turn for the worse. Since Reagan is given so much credit for breaking up the USSR by conservatives, which he does not necessarily deserve, then I suppose it is valid to blame him for the negative effects of the breakup, as well as the positive ones (of which there weren't many).

As for going back, Ukraine can go and fuck itself. Thankfully, all of my relatives have left since independence, and I could care less about what goes on in there. A visit, maybe someday. Having any dealings with it, business or otherwise, HELL NO.

Mondak-this thread is named only ...Reagan dead... as such it is a place where people can respond to that fact positively or negatively without being accused of "trolling."

I find it hard to believe that Reagan is so revered here given that he worked so hard to make much of what is available on the TFP illegal. Read up on Reagan's Meese Commision some time. Check out his work as head of the Screen Actor's Guild when he ratted out members as being communists (always falsely) and had them blacklisted. The man was almost never seen speaking without a script, certainly not ever without his handlers' setting up every aspect of his appearance. It's too bad that he probably spent the last 16 years of his life confused, demented, and unaware who his children and wife were. The man was an actor his whole life, he played the part of a politician but never was one. R.I.P. to the Great Thespian.

About fucking time. One of the worst presidents ever.

User Name

Regardless of your willingness to worship Yeshua or not, you CAN do so here if you want. That is what matters. The ability of a free people to express their ideas is the point. . . not whether you misread what I wrote about being sent to Siberia. I am sure that if the Ukraine were still a communist country, they could find somewhere to send people that they did not agree with even if it were not in the Soviet Union any more.

You being willing to give up your essential liberty for a little bit of safety only makes you a good cow. . . or maybe good at following others into a boxcar or an oven. It can happen. Those who want to control the ones who they rule have a vested interest in making things "bearable" and not much beyond that.

Draw your own conclusions, but try to do so through fact. Reagan's convictions were developed at an early point in his career and he stuck to them. How about a quote from October 1964:



Thinking long term about what is truely important may help you to deal with your anger and stop being a child. My hope is that the free exchange of information and ideas can help to save you and many like you from your own anger, ignorance and yourself in general.

I'm sure the lazy poor are all shedding a single tear.

While a lot of what you said is apocryphal (scripts, handlers, etc.), I feel a stong connection to Reagan and would like to take the time to respond even if the flame-bait is not deserving.

As SAG President, Reagan opposed blacklists. He felt that the threat offered by communism was not the idea but the tactics. From an article that Reagan wrote in 1951 called "How do you fight communism?":



In 1947 he was brought before congress to testfy in front of the Un-American Activities Committee of the US Congress ( funny how years have passed and the same reactionary jerks are still our congressmen . . . ) Reagan:



In 1951 he also commented on McCarthy's tactics:

interesting that some of this can apply to things like the "Patriot Act" today. Another example of how transcendent a man he really was.

Check out the dates from those quotes. This is not something he came up with right before he ran for President. Your jab at his sickness and proposing that he was nothing more than an actor his whole life could not be further from the truth. He had deep seeded convictions that he stuck to until his task was complete.

Perhaps you don't like him because he was a polarizing figure. Take some time today as a memorial to a leader of our nation to examine which of your beliefs come from fact and which ones come from what your peers or the media told you about him. Maybe you can see beyond what you have been told to believe is black or white and see some value in a man that certainly believed in America and all of us who make up this country.

As a side note, maybe this is the very reason I identify with him so much. People tend to love me or hate me - that simple. Reagan was the same way. While I operate on a far smaller scale than trying to defeat communism, his ability to see his vision through is something that I can only hope to emmulate.

Well, RIP, but as User Name said, he was responsible for tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of deaths in his terrorist war against Nicaragua.

Here is his Wikipedia article:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Reagan

Okay people... this is your official last warning. discussion is one thing. petty squabbles are another. if you want to continue discourse, go right ahead. namecalling and vindictive back-and-forth arguments will get this thread closed. keep it civil.

how about this thread goes back on track as a thread to remember a man who died, not a politician, but a leader, an actor, a husband, a father.

I give a moment of silence.

i have no opinion on Reagan, the politician.

i'm sure he had his good and bad points; and i'm sure that some of his decisions as President of the USA both harmed countless people, and benefitted others.

as someone who grew up during his tenure, far, far away from the good ole USA, my only impression of Reagan was a funny voiced face on the TV... oh, and i seem to remember Carl Sagon 'commenting' on the 'Star Wars' idea.

What i do care about, however, is that he was afflicted with Alzheimers.

i certainly hope that with his death comes further publicising of this disease and prompts people to donate generously to Alzheimers research foundations.

It's unfortunate that he died and all, but I really hope that this isn't all I hear about for the next few days. The media becomes VERY irritating in these situations.. hovering over the story for DAYS as if there's some kind of follow up when really the information that's being said today (and will be said tomorrow and the day after) is no different than the first time they reported it.

The man was 93 and had Alzheimer's, so it's not like this comes as a surprise.

regardless of your political affiliations, wheter you thought he did good or bad, he set the stage for where we are today.

RIP.

He was a great Roosevelt Democrat back in the day when he opposed Blacklistings and McCarthy wasn't he?

I don't think he held those views when he did a 180 on political philosophy later in life though.

I think this is a good reason to listen to his wife though. She is calling for more stem cell research. A good goal and a good legacy for Ronald to leave behind if she can manage to persuade the right people.
Let's hope she does.

Time to eat a plate of ketchup in rememberance. See you around, Mr. President. You were in charge for some heavy shit, and we got through it.

What do you expect when this is linked from the politics board?

Are we not supposed to mention that Reagan saddled my generation with insurmountable debt? Or that he squandered our resources on an arms race of ludicris proportions (how many times over do we need to be able to eradicate all human life on the planet?)? Or that he thought ketchup was a vegetable? Or that he began and poured money into the Star Wars program (still 0% success rate!)? Or that he laid a wreath on a Nazi memorial? Or that he didn't know Hawaii was a state?

BTW it's not "apocryphal" to say he was handled during his entire presidency, every appearance, it's a fact. I've heard from people that saw him during his state government days without the handlers and scripts, that he would utter embarassing howler after howler.

also BTW I wasn't jabbing him for his illness, it's a truely sad way to go, having the mind unravel like that. Maybe Nancy will be able to convince the Evangelicals in power now that stem-cell research isn't "killing babies" before we lose another technological advance.

A great man brought down by alzheimers(SP?) No matter what any one says about him, I hold him in the highest regards. He shaped the world, brought peace between super powers, and was a genuine human, and a true American. He has shaped me as well into many of the beliefs I have.

I threw one back today for the Commander-In-Chief. RIP

Those of you who are badmouthing Regan: he deserves respect because he was a President of the United States, regardless of what your opinion is of him. So shut up and give the man the respect he deserves for being the President.

I for one, am going to miss him, I was born during the Regan Administration. He was a great guy, a good president, a wonderful husband and father. May he rest in peace.

In addition to the fact that you don't know what you are talking about Locobot, you could have brought any of this up weeks, months or even years ago if you felt so stong about it. You also had the option of waiting a week (or in your case a few hours or at least until his body was cold) to voice your "opinions".

Instead you are just trying piss people off and be disrespectful by shoveling out more smack with no back up. Have fun with that.

Maybe in the future try to look at others feelings on loss or at least be informed on the things you are trying to start fights on.

that sux

the thread is closed. you people need to pick your battles better. this is not the time or the place to be disuccing points that were brought up in this thread.

No one really addressed this, which is the only reason i'm leaving it up here...

I usually am of this type of opinion, especially when the subject lead a very mediocre existence... but when I DO make a remark about it, I usually provide substance or solid evidence that my bitching is deserved. I didn't really see anything like that here, except for some people randomly pulling stories (not numbers, not facts, but stories) out of their asses about what they think they remembered happening.

I'm not huge on the guy, but have something to back it up when you drop your balls on the thread from now on please.