Changing the Trajectory of America
During the 2008 DNC primary, Barak Obama said that he admired Ronald Reagan for "changing the trajectory of America." His opponent quickly pounced on that statement and Obama was forced to explain what most logical human beings knew he meant. Specifically, that although Obama hated Reagan's policies, Reagan was able to alter the course of American history and Obama wanted to do the same thing, only towards the opposite end of the political spectrum.
Where was America when Ronald Reagan was first elected to the Presidency?
It had just undergone 20 years of turbulence and strife dating back to the late 60's. One President was forced to resign, while another pardoned him. These two sandwiched in between the last important liberal - LBJ and what I regard as the first progressive leader - Jimmy Carter. Carter, some may recall campaigned as a moderate and ruled as the progressive who placed ideals over practicality. When he came to office, after narrowly defeating Gerry Ford, Carter had democratic majorities in both houses of congress.
Right from the beginning the path that Carter chose was clear. After a campaign promise to restrain the federal budget, Carter allowed it to skyrocket from $40 billion in 1979 to $74 billion in 1980. In his time in office he launched no less than seven major economic programs, all disasters and many of which contradicted one another. His foreign policy was an equal disaster. In particular was his abandonment of a key American ally in the middle east - Iran! By 1979, Iran's leader, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi (AKA the shar) was facing a revolution waged by radical extremists. Carter didn't lift a finger to help a proven ally which had been a stabilizing force in the region. To compound the problem for Carter & the US, American hostages were taken once the regime was toppled.
Another memorable feature of the Carter Presidency was the energy crisis. What did our progressive leader do about that? He delivered his now infamous "malaise" speech, in which he asked Americans to drive slower, set thermostats lower and do without a few things which we (spoiled Americans that we are) took for granted.
Most emblematic of his progressive tenure was the appointment of Andrew Young as UN Ambassador. I'll bet many Americans don't remember Young. Young caused controversy when, during a July 1978 interview with a French newspaper discussing Soviet political prisoners, he said, "We still have hundreds of people that I would categorize as political prisoners in our prisons!" Eventually Carter would have to ask for Young's resignation.
By the time the 1980 election rolled around, the nation had an inflation rate of 14.5% and a mortgage interest rate of 21.5%. The Soviet Union was again on the move, invading Afghanistan with Carter responding by pulling the US out of the summer Olympics. The hostages were still held by Iran after a tragic half-baked rescue mission amid growing pessimism about America's future & disdain for it's past!
Enter Ronald Reagan
Reagan's supply-side approach to the economy was like a breathe of fresh air. By 1983 the economy expanded by 3.5% and in 1984 by 6.8% (after inflation). As Reagan put it "I knew the program was working when they stopped calling it Reaganomics!"
Then he restored American security by rebuilding the military and instituting the "Star Wars" program. The Soviet Union tried to keep up and went right into insolvency. The Russians came to talk and the world began to change. It is sometimes said that Reagan's foreign policy defined his Presidency. Nope, I think Obama had it right. Ronald Reagan didn't just create a 20 year boom and bring down the Soviet Union, more importantly he changed the way Americans were thinking about themselves. Americans were not inherently bad, to the contrary, Americans were a unique people. Truly blessed, decent hard working folks, who made a troubled world better.
The Obama experiment
In 1980 Barak Obama had a campaign slogan - "hope & change" with the accent on the change. Like Carter, the other progressive President, Obama found himself with a democratic majority in both houses of congress. All Americans had hopes for the new President. He had, after all to deal with an economic recession (which helped get him elected), thus came The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. The Act would pump $831 billion into the economy between 2009 and 2019. It was based on the Keynesian idea of government putting in to the economy what the private sector was losing. What was the real effect of this? For those who were lucky enough to be working, their real hourly wages fell 1% in 2011 and another 1% in 2012. In a Pew research survey (2015), 72% said that the governments policies did little to help the middle class.
Then there was health care. With democratic majorities in both houses and a super majority in the Senate, Obama just couldn't pass up on pushing through a national health care program. The cost & effectiveness of the ACA has yet to be determined, but one thing we know - If you like your health care plan, you may be getting a cancellation notice in the mail. By the midterms, democrats paid heavily for those first two years by losing both houses of congress in one of the most stunning defeats in history.
Do I really need to go into the Obama foreign policy? I believe former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said it best in 2014 - "For the first four years, and the time I spent there, I thought he was a strong leader on security issues...but these last two years I think he kind of lost his way".
Worst of all were his radical policies, politicizing & weaponizing government agencies and his deeply race based views, which have led to the bitter division in this country.
The final assessment of the two Obama terms has to be that he left the nation divided and in decline, but (and this is the big caveat), due to the election results of 2016 his dream of transforming America has failed!
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To be filed under "dreams of a radical"
Amen to that. I served 20 years in the military that ran from Nixon to Clinton. The only one that really gave a damn about national security, the military, it's equipment, and it's personnel was Ronald Reagan.
and then his fundamental change of our country was denied.
thank god for that.
cheers
Food for thought....
Reagan's actions were those of a Keynesian. He exploded government spending to rebuild military infrastructure and boost the economy. It worked. He then raised taxes to recoup the expenditures. This is the very type of behavior liberals love when one of their own is doing it.
Obama was actually the "trickle down" guy. Trillions of dollars pumped into the US economy, nearly all of it going to stabilize and then enrich the financial sector. It also worked, BTW. Trump's economy is strong because it is built on Obama's foundations.
My conservative friends never seem to want to talk about the real Reagan. The real Reagan did a bunch of very smart things that are considered absolute heresy according to the conservative ideology of today. He raised taxes often. He gave amnesty to illegal aliens. He passed sweeping worker rights laws. In doing so...he ripped the weapons of the left straight from their hands.