We’ve seen the moments before in earlier clips, but the RSC puts these together with warnings from Ronald Reagan about the danger to liberty from runaway government and liberal policies. If these seemed trenchant decades ago, they’re equally relevant now:
I was just a kid when Ronald Reagan was President but I remember him well. I’m reminded of that line from the opening theme song of All in The Family: Mister we could use a man like Herbert Hoover Ronald Reagan again…
Lots of other bloggers are weighing in on this atMemeorandum.
Rick Santorum, noted super genius and Ronald Reagan scholar, is optimistic about the GOP’s chances in 2010 but is wary of those wacko libertarians. Way to build that big tent, Rick.
BOCA RATON — Republicans have momentum this year, but potential 2012 presidential candidate Rick Santorum says the GOP won’t capitalize unless it embraces Ronald Reagan conservatism rather than Barry Goldwater libertarianism.
Santorum, for example, supported Kentucky Secretary of State Trey Grayson in last week’s Republican Senate primary in the Bluegrass State.
“I’m for conservatives. I’m not for libertarians who say they’re conservatives,” Santorum said.
Let’s see… Would the Ronald Reagan to whom Mr. Santorum refers, be the same Reagan who was interviewed by Reason Magazine in 1975? That Ronald Reagan had some interesting things to say about libertarianism…
REASON: Governor Reagan, you have been quoted in the press as saying that you’re doing a lot of speaking now on behalf of the philosophy of conservatism and libertarianism. Is there a difference between the two?
REAGAN: If you analyze it I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism. I think conservatism is really a misnomer just as liberalism is a misnomer for the liberals–if we were back in the days of the Revolution, so-called conservatives today would be the Liberals and the liberals would be the Tories. The basis of conservatism is a desire for less government interference or less centralized authority or more individual freedom and this is a pretty general description also of what libertarianism is.
THAT’S a politician who knows how to build a big tent coalition.
Santorum’s attitude smacks of a politician saying something like “Thanks for building up all that enthusiasm tea party people, now get out of the way, we professionals will take it from here.”
It’s this type of coalition fracturing attitude that will cause losses. Santorum is already trying to kick certain people out of the tent – as it’s being assembled – by lots of libertarian minded tea party people.
My advice? Roll up your sleeves and just help build the tent, Rick.
According to a new poll conducted by Suffolk University and Channel 7 of Boston, Scott Brown is now leading Martha Coakley by four points. Brown 50% to Coakley 46%.
Riding a wave of opposition to Democratic health-care reform, GOP upstart Scott Brown is leading in the U.S. Senate race, raising the odds of a historic upset that would reverberate all the way to the White House, a new poll shows.
Although Brown’s 4-point lead over Democrat Martha Coakley is within the Suffolk University/7News survey’s margin of error, the underdog’s position at the top of the results stunned even pollster David Paleologos.
“It’s a Brown-out,” said Paleologos, director of Suffolk’s Political Research Center. “It’s a massive change in the political landscape.”
Change in the political landscape. Hmm.. I seem to remember another writer using those exact words.
Brown’s favorability ratings are also higher than Coakley’s, with 57 percent saying they have a favorable opinion of the state senator and just 19 percent having an unfavorable opinion. Forty-nine percent say they have a favorable opinion of Coakley, while 41 percent have an unfavorable opinion of the attorney general.
Against the backdrop of an election that could possibly play a decisive role in the health care debate—a point both parties have begun to press on their supporters—51 percent said they did not support the health care bill, with 36 percent supported it. Sixty-one percent said they didn’t believe the government could afford such a plan.
A plurality of respondents also believe Brown fared better during the televised debates between the candidates, with 41 percent saying they believed Brown won, compared to just 25 percent for Coakley.
With Mrs. Coakley flagging in the polls and Republican Scott Brown closing fast — one recent polls puts him 2 points ahead — Mr. Obama has decided to keep his fingerprints off a race that would be an embarrassment for Democrats should they lose, given that Mr. Obama won the state in 2008 by a 27 point margin.
Scott Brown can win this election and if he does, get ready to hear the loudest gnashing of teeth from the Democrat political establishment since Reagan turned Massachusetts red in 1980.
Generation X, those of us born somewhere between the Vietnam War and the Iran Hostage Crisis, have spoken truth to power pretty consistently. When Gen X was young and angry, we distrusted the Reagan Administration. Between trips to the video arcade to play Space Invaders or hours long MTV watching marathons, back when MTV played music videos, we grumbled amongst ourselves about the old man running the country who seemed out of touch with us and our interests. It’s only in recent years that many of us have come to realize how well Ronald Reagan was actually looking out for us, our freedom and our safety.
Generation X was suspicious of the George Herbert Walker Bush Administration. Many of us had fathers, uncles, cousins and brothers who were Vietnam Veterans and when George Bush announced Operation Desert Storm, there were those of us who feared a repeat of Vietnam.
Then to DC, came Bubba and his frau. Clinton made an effort to connect to young people, appearing on MTV, wearing sunglasses and playing the saxophone. Lots of Gen Xers bought it but plenty of us didn’t.
Gen X was never a friend to W.
Now we have Obama and I find more and more people of Gen X disillusioned if they voted for him and ever more suspicious if they didn’t.
The point is, with Gen X our suspicion has never been tersely left or right as much as it was a general distrust of government. A natural predisposition to Libertarianism which is itself a member of Gen X, since the Libertarian Party was born in 1971.
Generation Y is doomed.
Generation Y is marching in lockstep with Obama. They voted for him, they like him, they want what he wants and they’re working to help him pass his agenda. They are naive and if they don’t figure out how grandly they’re shooting themselves in the foot and placing the handcuffs on themselves they will live to regret it.
For Gen X, rock and roll is about being anti-establishment. For Gen Y, rock and roll is about being part of the herd, celebrating the head of our government on the cover of Rolling Stone and clinging to Bush hatred even though Bush has not uttered a single word since Obama took office.
Gen Y somehow thinks they are anti-establishment. They actually believe they are anti-establishment as they nod their heads, donate money and work for Obama – The establishment! No one has clued them in that W. is no longer “the man” who is taking away their liberties and crushing their idealistic dreams.
Gen Y is gullible and way too trusting of the new “man” in DC. It’s embarrassing to watch. In cases like the video below where MTV hipster types “pledge” to Obama, I become sick to my stomach. In fact, I couldn’t even make it through this entire video.
I look forward to the day when Gen Y figures out what they so eagerly signed up for. Many of them will be living in their first home, working in their first good-salary job, maybe raising their first kid. Suddenly, they’ll start noticing what a nuisance it is when the government can tell them what to do and how much of their money they can keep.
It’ll be like a bunch of kids who sat down for a large meal at a fancy restaurant and then go into an angry panic when the bill comes and they realize they should have just gone to Wendy’s.
I suspect there will be hell to pay. Unfortunately for them, their name will be the only one on the tab.
I was truly puzzled as to why Steve-Chapman-the-libertarian has such a problem with Sarah Palin but then I checked his bio at Reason.com and suddenly it all made sense.
“Anderson resident Brock Glaze clutched two copies of Palin’s book, hoping to get one signed for himself, and one for a co-worker. Although he considers himself a Libertarian, Glaze said Palin is an exemplary Republican. “I think she’s absolutely brilliant. She’s the only one with the guts to say what needs to be said. Her gender has absolutely nothing to do with it. She has more guts than most of the men in her party. I think she’s not afraid to stand up for her conservatism, her Christianity,for pretty much everything that’s necessary for a free nation.”
What a stark contrast between that quote and the words of Steve Chapman, who one might presume to be a libertarian since he writes for Reason.com. Chapman isn’t buying Palin’s libertarian appeal one bit. In fact, he thinks it’s a great big sham. In an article titled “Sarah Palin and the Decline of Conservatism” he asks “What happened to the party of Goldwater and Reagan?”
“Who needs policy? In her world—and the world of legions of conservatives who revere her—the persona is the policy. Palin is beloved because she’s (supposedly) just like ordinary people, which (supposedly) gives her a profound understanding of their needs.”
“That attitude used to be associated with the left, which claimed to speak for the ordinary folks who get shafted by the system. Logic and evidence about policy, to many liberals, were less important than empathy and good intentions. Now it’s conservatives who think we should be guided by our guts, not our brains.”
Chapman then does his best to disassociate Sarah Palin from the memory of Ronald Reagan.
“When Oprah asked if she had felt any doubts about her readiness to be vice president—which requires the readiness to be president—Palin replied breezily, “No, no—I didn’t blink. … I felt quite confident in my abilities and my executive experience and I knew that this is an executive administrative job.” (The audience tittered.)”
“Contrast that with Reagan, who after learning of his victory on Election Night 1980 told his supporters, “There’s never been a more humbling moment in my life.” Palin doesn’t do humble.”
Funny. Ronald Reagan’s son, Michael Reagan, had a completely different take on Sarah Palin in September of 2008 when he wrote a piece about her called “Welcome Back, Dad.”
“I’ve been trying to convince my fellow conservatives that they have been wasting their time in a fruitless quest for a new Ronald Reagan to emerge and lead our party and our nation. I insisted that we’d never see his like again because he was one of a kind.”
“I was wrong!”
“Wednesday night I watched the Republican National Convention on television and there, before my very eyes, I saw my Dad reborn; only this time he’s a she.”
“And what a she!”
“Like Ronald Reagan, Sarah Palin is one of us. She knows how most of us live because that’s the way she lives. She shares our homespun values and our beliefs, and she glories in her status as a small-town woman who put her shoulder to the wheel and made life better for her neighbors.”
“Welcome back, Dad, even if you’re wearing a dress and bearing children this time around.”
I was truly puzzled as to why Steve-Chapman-the-libertarian has such a problem with Sarah Palin but then I checked his bio at Reason.com and suddenly it all made sense.
This is actually an audio recording Reagan made in 1961. In it, he talks about the nightmare that is government run healthcare. More importantly, he points out that this has nothing to do with humanitarian ideals or the provision of better care.
It is about politics, power and the loss of liberty, plain and simple. What a genius Reagan was. This recording is as important today as it was almost 50 years ago.
According to a new poll conducted by Suffolk University and Channel 7 of Boston, Scott Brown is now leading Martha Coakley by four points. Brown 50% to Coakley 46%.