Making minor deities disappear in a puff of logic since 1972
Thu, 14 Aug 2008
Wasn't Ronald Reagan A Celebrity?
No matter what you think of Ronald Reagan, it's clear that John McCain adores him. The best part of this two minute video I found was this quote:
"I am confident that the reason why I hold a lot of the philosophical views that I have are an inspiration of Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan, there's no doubt about it."See it for yourself:
Yet, if you watch John McCain's "Celebrity" ad, where McCain displays Obama next to Paris Hilton and Britney Spears, calls him a "celebrity" and questions his ability to lead, McCain's criticism is clear:
"Higher taxes, more foreign oil, that's the real Obama."See it for yourself:
Of course, the irony is that Paris Hilton's parents are contributors to John McCain's campaign, and called the ads "a total waste". Then the McCain camp put out another "celebrity" video, with a slightly different criticism:
Higher taxes, more government spending, so, fewer jobs.See it for yourself:
But how does John McCain's hero, Ronald Reagan, compare on these accounts?
- Higher taxes? Check.
- "Faced with looming deficits, Reagan raised taxes again in 1983 with a gasoline tax and once more in 1984, this time by $50 billion over three years, mainly through closing tax loopholes for business. Despite the fact that such increases were anathema to conservatives--and probably cost Reagan's successor, George H.W. Bush, reelection--Reagan raised taxes a grand total of four times just between 1982-84." (source)
- More foreign oil? Check.
- During Reagan's term, between 1981 and 1989, oil imports increased on average of nearly 4% year over year. (source)
- More government spending? Check.
- "[In 1983] Reagan made one of the greatest ideological about-faces in the history of the presidency, agreeing to a $165 billion bailout of Social Security. In almost every way, the bailout flew in the face of conservative ideology. It dramatically increased payroll taxes on employees and employers, brought a whole new class of recipients--new federal workers--into the system, and, for the first time, taxed Social Security benefits, and did so in the most liberal way: only those of upper-income recipients. (As an added affront to conservatives, the tax wasn't indexed to inflation, meaning that more and more people have gradually had to pay it over time.)" (source)
- Fewer jobs? Check.
- "Unemployment swelled to more than 10 percent of the workforce. Over the eight years of the Reagan administration unemployment averaged more than 7.5 percent - a full percentage point above the average of the previous administration." (source)
The simple answer is that John McCain is pandering to a conservative base who has a selectively positive memory of Reagan's term. But it bears pointing out that the doubts he is casting upon an Obama presidency are no worse than the reality of what was the Reagan presidency.
Note to the McCain campaign: Next time you throw stones, make sure you're not lobbing them from the glass house of your ideological hero.
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Comments are closed for this story
vaitkadamas -www.keithvaitkus.com- writes:
Everyone has a selective memory. That appears to be the way human memory actually works. But your larger point is that facts have no place in elections because elections are largely emotional decisions. I suspect most decisions in American life are emotional rather than fact-based. What is surprising is how little this has changed despite the great increase of available information. The Internets and The Google allow us to get access to more information and facts than humans ever in history - yet the abundance of data has not had any measurable impact on the quality of our decisions. Global warming, mass transit, the civilian forces in Iraq, foreign oil, taxes, government spending, even personal finances. Take almost any major issue and I suspect you will find people have strong opinions and almost no facts at all. Even in the Information Age, emotion rules the political debate and anyone who tries to have a rational, data-based discussion will be quickly sabotaged by emotional arguments. Fox has proven this emotion over fact style can make a ton of money.
Khan -- writes:
Of course, you're right. Even those of us who tend to make decisions in a computer-like fashion are susceptible to emotional (and other) bias. However, making arguments, having debates and using the art of persuasion (including advertising, political or not) are able to sway the closed-minded, the weak-minded, the open-minded, and intellectual alike. While any particular technique may or may not work with all of the groups above, my hope is that the readers of this blog tend to fall into the latter half, and that my arguments either resonate, are insightful, or are at least thought provoking. :)
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