It is amazing to me how people get a selective memory when speaking about those that have passed away. Case in point, President Reagan. He passed away this week, and from news reports, you would think that the man was Mother Teresa. I’ll concede the fact that he’s responsible for scaring the bejesus out of Gorbachev and ending the cold war, and he was a good public speaker, but he wasn’t a saint! Since it seems that the media outlets and the Republican spin machine will continue talking about the “good” of Reagan, let’s talk a little about the bad and the ugly, shall we? The Bad: Reaganomics. This so-called economic concept of Ronald Reagan was that if you cut taxes you would increase Federal Revenues since economic activity would increase. The increase in economic activity would bring with it increased Federal tax revenues. In other words the tax cut would be self liquidating and self paying since any lost revenues for the moment would almost immediately be made up by increased revenues in the future. It didn’t cost anything, therefore, to lower taxes and the economy would be stimulated to new heights. In truth, Reaganomics was a smoke screen for a hidden agenda. Taxes were cut, only in the first year of his presidency, to keep the American public happy while a plan to increase the national debt by $2.5 trillion was being concocted. What for? The United States systematically overspent on national defense to crush the Soviet Union since it was obvious they couldn’t keep up. It took Reaganomics only 8 years to increase the national debt from $1 trillion to about $3.5 trillion! Reaganomics Key Points:
So, feel free to give Reagan props for ending the Cold War, but don’t perpetuate the myth of fabulous Reaganomics. The end of the Cold War came with a $2.5 trillion price tag attached to it, don’t try and tell us that it was free! The Ugly: the closing of mental health hospitals in California and across the United States. Is it any wonder that California seems to have all of the crazy homeless people? State mental hospitals were taken away by Governor Reagan in the seventies, and federal mental health programs were later taken away by President Reagan in the eighties. When Ronald Reagan was governor of California he systematically began closing down mental hospitals, later as president he would cut aid for federally-funded community mental health programs. It is not a coincidence that the homeless populations in the state of California grew in the seventies and eighties. The people were put out on the street when mental hospitals started to close all over the state. Seeing an increase in crime, and brutal murders by Herb Mullin, a mental hospital patient, the state legislature passed a law that would stop Reagan from closing even more state-funded mental health hospitals. But Reagan would not be outdone. In 1980, congress proposed new legislation (PL 96-398) called the community mental health systems act (crafted by Ted Kennedy), but the program was killed by newly-elected President Ronald Reagan. This action ended the federal community mental health centers (see timeline on this link) program and its funding. In closing, the next time you pass by a homeless person in downtown San Francisco screaming to themselves at the top of their lungs, remember Reagan. And if your kids need to go out and get jobs at age 9 to pay down the national debt, be sure to tell them that they can thank Ronald Reagan, and now President Bush, for their misfortune. |
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Also see, “Reagan: man of contradictions?”
#1 by Fabian — June 8, 2004 @ 5:07 am
I’m waiting to see how the conservatives deal with Nancy Reagan’s push for stem cell research.
#2 by Meerenai — June 8, 2004 @ 9:36 am
You imply that Reagan closed down the state mental hospitals as though he was callous and didn’t care. Before he did this, there 37,000 patints in 11 stae hospitals. The ACLU was suing on behalf of patients being involuntarily committed. the Lanterman-Petris-Short act replaced the large state hospitals with county operated mental health care systems and provided a legal basis for institutionalizing patients. Thanks to the ACLU pressure, involuntary treatment caused the mental heath population to rapidly decline. There are still 5 state hospitals today. Please stop perpetuating this liberal myth.
#3 by Alan Hagedorn — July 25, 2004 @ 8:45 am
To close or not to close the mental hospitals is on the contrary an elitist invention since the beginning of asylums’. Read Deviance and Medicalization
From Badness to Sickness by Peter Conrad and Joseph W. Schneider and do your homework. Please stop perpetuating conservative ignorance.
#4 by Jean — September 21, 2004 @ 3:31 am
Yes but “Involuntary treatment” is made for the mentally ill, many of whom were incapable of making their own discision. Surely it would have been better to reform mental health service rather than just close all the available facilities.
#5 by Alf — November 10, 2004 @ 11:51 am
Thank you for reminding folks of the heinous acts of the former Governor and President Reagan. Recently I saw a President Reagan stamp on correspondence from a homeless shelter to which I donate and felt physically ill. If Reagan hadn’t shut down all of those mental hospitals I wonder how many of the people that use that shelter would be getting treatment and hopefully getting better instead of living on the streets endangering themselves and possibly others. Sometimes I am really embarrassed to be an American; all this wealth and we still can’t spare a little extra to help out our own citizens who really need it. Thanks again for giving me faith that some of my fellow citizens have their priorities in line with good, instead of greed.
#6 by Tara McKenzie — November 18, 2007 @ 11:53 am
In answer to Tara’s comment, all of this wealth in the United States is concentrated in the upper one percent and they don’t care. They have guard gated communities and live in fairy tail worlds while the rest of us grovel for the crumbs. You have to wonder how many people have been killed by mentally ill people who would have been helped if Reagan hadn’t cut mental health care in this nation.
#7 by Hannah Stevens — April 4, 2009 @ 6:28 am
Reagan cut funding to a mental health facility that was holding a violent criminal that, when he was released, raped my wife and damaged her forever.
Reagan was also shot by a mentally ill man.
You would think that the shooting would have changed his mind, but no. Reagan had no soul. He was pure evil and I hope he rots in hell.
#8 by Christian Rudolph — September 3, 2009 @ 11:26 pm
Also, Reagan was not in any way responsible for the Soviet Union collapsing economically.
The collapse was caused by the Saudis, who got into a price war by flooding the market with cheap oil, destroying the Russian market and causing the nation to collapse economically and then politically.
Read about it in the book _The End of Oil_.
Reagan took credit, but he had nothing to do with it.
He lied about everything, especially this.
Stop crediting this evil man with this. He had not the power to destroy Soviet Russia. They did that themselves by not diversifying their markets, and having a failed economic system.
#9 by Christian Rudolph — September 3, 2009 @ 11:31 pm
People with serious mental illness (SMI) do not perpetrate more violence against others than those without SMI. In fact, people with SMI are more likely than members of the general public to be victims of violence themselves.
However, partly because we have a horribly inadequate mental health care system in this country, people with SMI are more likely to have substance abuse problems than members of the general public. And substance abuse is associated with an increase in violent behavior towards others.
So let’s not scapegoat people with SMI without foundation here.
Source:
http://www.macarthur.virginia.edu/violence.html
#10 by derrp — March 8, 2010 @ 7:53 am
As the result of cuts in mental health treatment, many are placed in group homes and are neglected. Group homes are for profit organizations. Many times they are understaffed or have poorly trained staff. I can attest to this because I have worked at Saint Elizabeths in Washington, DC and was responsible for treating the chronically mental ill in the community.
#11 by joan turner — March 4, 2011 @ 4:34 pm
All these many years and still the machinations of this man can get people riled! There is something to be said for karma considering how he spent his last years!
#12 by FM Henderson — April 16, 2011 @ 8:59 pm
I am non partisan, therefore, my opinion is based on what I saw and had to put up with for 20 yrs. while living in San Fransicko. I had to put up with the crazies day in and day out. I am referring to very sick, aggressive, filthy, crazy people who stab you, assault you, verbally abuse you, and hit you for no reason at all. It is a known fact that the men rape the crazy/homeless women. These people were let out of the mental hospitals for the poor, they couldn’t/can’t pay for their hospitalizations, Rx, care, etc. I remember Mr. Reagan saying that he was saving money by not funding this institutions anymore and that their families should take care of them. In principle this sounds o.k. but in reality it is very hard for families who are not trained, don’t have the means, are uneducated, have to work overtime, and leave the sick person alone at home by themselves because you never know what they will do when you are away. Also, the crazies have more rights than you and me. I know all this because most of the time I had to work until after 10pm and it was frightening to walk the streets in the San Francisco “Financial District”, wait for the bus on Market St. to get home. I saw a lot of stuff and being a woman it was scary.
#13 by Only Me — May 25, 2011 @ 1:58 pm
Ronald Reagan was the best president in the history of this country. It took a incompetent leftist boob like Jimmy Carter to almost destroy this country to get him. We now have an even less competent radical Marxist in the Whitehouse who no one knew but now has a horrible record to run on. Let’s hope we get another Reagan like conservative to stop and begin to reverse the damage that has been done to this country since the end of the Reagan boom. (2007)
#14 by mike reagan — July 4, 2011 @ 11:09 am
Amazing that something so huge can be hidden from the people. Also that most have forgotten that this is the reason our ecomony sucks, inherited DEBT. Let’s also not forget that Reagan was merely a puppet, GHWBush is truly to blame!!
#15 by Freddie Ward — August 13, 2011 @ 6:36 pm
I keep reminding people of this, amazing how so many aren’t aware.
#16 by anne louise — December 28, 2011 @ 9:21 am
Just like liberal “alternate lifestyles”. (and Alternate reality.) You can’t show any respect for anybody unless they are a liberal sh!t stupid. If the thing about the mental hospitals is true,and Reagan systematically began closing down mental hospitals.then that explains what must have happened to the liberals. You folks have made “The Twilight Zone” a constant reality in the lives of healthy people. …and So…It is true what Mr. Reagan said; “Well, the trouble with our liberal friends is not that they are ignorant, but that they know so much that isn’t so.” President Reagan was always good enough to suggest liberals as and relate to them as friends. It is clear that he was far to nice to them all.
#17 by RandyLeanear — January 26, 2012 @ 5:09 am
Randy and others above…..you have bashed liberals and quoted Reagan’s friendly condescentions….what purpose does that serve. I wish people would promote education and not ignorance and wasting time and space. It doesn’t matter whether you are liberal or conservative…many are siding differently depending upon issues. Looking at the facts and having lived through the Reagan Era, I respectfully find the deceased president nothing more than a person of ignorance. It was amazing to me to watch him bumble his way through speeches and not have a clue on the issues. I could never understand how someone could cast a vote for him or the Bushes either. But, look at the facts and you see that he demolished the working class, increased homelessness, demolished (not just carefully revised) social programs, and of course provided the division of wealth that has largely remained intact today (other than some gap closure by Clinton’s years that now has been reverted again in a large fashion). Stereotypical invasive, illegal foreign policy which was twisted to give him credit for ending the Cold War, asa stated in other comments were things that he had little impact on and took credit for all the while (like Bush) participating in and supporting illegal activities in foreign lands abusing others and our tax money, arming the Iranians and Saddam Hussein as well (there were so many other ridiculous decisions he made). To me the list of moronic moves by his 8 years will fill books for all time to come, and yet so many seem to think he should be listed and respected highly….are you kidding me?????
#18 by Reggie — February 7, 2012 @ 9:25 am