• Menu
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Before Header

  • About Us
  • Lexicon
  • Contact Us
  • Our Store
  • ↑
  • ↓
  • ←
  • →

Balloon Juice

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand.

She burned that motherfucker down, and I am so here for it. Thank you, Caroline Kennedy.

Cancel the cowardly Times and Post and set up an equivalent monthly donation to ProPublica.

Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?

If you can’t control your emotions, someone else will.

Giving in to doom is how authoritarians win.

“In this country American means white. everybody else has to hyphenate.”

We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.

Beware of advice from anyone for whom Democrats are “they” and not “we.”

If ‘weird’ was the finish line, they ran through the tape and kept running.

It’s all just conspiracy shit beamed down from the mothership.

There are no moderate republicans – only extremists and cowards.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires Republicans to act in good faith.

Of course you can have champagne before noon. That’s why orange juice was invented.

They don’t have outfits that big. nor codpieces that small.

The republican speaker is a slippery little devil.

SCOTUS: It’s not “bribery” unless it comes from the Bribery region of France. Otherwise, it’s merely “sparkling malfeasance”.

Quote tweet friends, screenshot enemies.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.

Bad people in a position to do bad things will do bad things because they are bad people. End of story.

Dear media: perhaps we ought to let Donald Trump speak for himself!

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

Mobile Menu

  • Seattle Meet-up Post
  • 2025 Activism
  • Targeted Political Fundraising
  • Donate with Venmo, Zelle & PayPal
  • Site Feedback
  • War in Ukraine
  • Submit Photos to On the Road
  • Politics
  • On The Road
  • Open Threads
  • Topics
  • COVID-19
  • Authors
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Lexicon
  • Our Store
  • Politics
  • Open Threads
  • 2025 Activism
  • Garden Chats
  • On The Road
  • Targeted Fundraising!
You are here: Home / Reagan’s Last Gift

Reagan’s Last Gift

by John Cole|  June 13, 20047:09 pm| 7 Comments

This post is in: Democratic Stupidity

FacebookTweetEmail

Below, I wrote about Reagan’s last gift to the GOP, which was to highlight the venom of the left. There were the usual protests from the usual suspects, but this comment really stated what I meant best:

I think it is right and proper to honor a dead President. It is a ceremony we carry into our personal lives: we eulogize the dead as an occassion to celebrate the life of that individual. This doesn’t necessitate erasing any of the bad from our memory, but rather it is our last opportunity to offer final respect.

In Reagan’s death, this process was accompanied by an immediate reaction by those who disagreed with Reagan’s policies to remind us all that they did disagree, although the pains to put criticism out there often took the form of vitriolic ad hominem attacks.

Why the urge to indemnify Reagan upon his death? I think we can all agree that all the criticisms made during Reagan’s death have already been asserted. There was an urgency to reiterate them, lest Reagan’s detractors be forgotten. There’s a certain impropriety to it all, like a child witnessing another playing with a toy and swiping it from him because it’s making him happy.

I think a serious examination of Reagan’s policies is always a good thing, if only to learn from history, but I haven’t seen that examination at all. Rather, I’ve seen a rush to shout insults about a dead man, lest his admirers feel to much comfort in his praise.

Exactly. We all know you have to take the good with the bad, but the attempts by those on the left were not to provide a balanced outlook of the man’s legacy. Indeed, there was no balance at all, but rather nothing but insults, jeers, and attacks. There was no constructive effort by liberal bloggers to show the good with the bad, all that was done was attempts to highlight why Reagan sucked.

After a day or two, it really started to approach the absurd. Not only was the left not content to merely focus on the ngeatives repeat mantras about Iran/Contra and AIDS, by midweek we were learning that there was no Reagan boom, that Reagan had absolutely nothing to do with the fall of the Soviet Union, and that Reagan really didn’t lower taxes, and that he was the least popular president ever. In fact, the only praise that could be found of Reagan from the usual suspects came in the form of backhanded compliments (best typified by this Drum piece), which took the form of ‘Reagan sucked, but he was harmless compared to Bush.’

Bill Clinton wailed about the politics of personal destruction. Too bad his party has mastered it.

FacebookTweetEmail
Previous Post: « Cease and Desist
Next Post: The PoorMan Cometh »

Reader Interactions

7Comments

  1. 1.

    shark

    June 13, 2004 at 8:42 pm

    Doesn’t matter. I think it’s safe to say that the intellectually inferior people who inhabit those useless states in flyover country know what the deal is, and the poison message fell on deaf ears…

  2. 2.

    Kimmitt

    June 14, 2004 at 12:54 am

    And yet, the message from Democratic lawmakers and candidates was overwhelmingly positive.

  3. 3.

    Chris P

    June 14, 2004 at 8:06 am

    I just hope that when Clinton passes on, I have the maturity, common courtesy and decency to give him the respect that a dead President rightly deserves. I didn’t agree with his policies and I found his personal character to be highly flawed. But the bottom line is that he led this country for 8 years and for that his memory deserves to be treated with respect. Don’t get me wrong, I was happy to see him out of the White House…I only wish it had happened 4 years sooner. I just don’t get my jollies by tarnishing the memory of a fellow human being who was admired and respected by so many, regardles of my personal opinion of him.

  4. 4.

    bg

    June 14, 2004 at 6:41 pm

    I agree with Chris from the left and wonder: if commentators on the right had attempted a balanced portrayl of Reagan instead of just professing their love for him, would the left have gotten so caught up in reiterating their denouncement of him?

    Not that it’s their fault that some on the left got nasty. Hitchens easily wrote one of the most revolting things I’ve read in a while and I’ll remember it.

  5. 5.

    Kimmitt

    June 14, 2004 at 11:04 pm

    Hitchens thinks it’s his job to write revolting things. Once you’ve established a niche (the man trash-talked Mother Theresa, for goodness’ sake), people have the grain of salt along and so it’s just not nearly as offensive.

  6. 6.

    Chris P

    June 15, 2004 at 7:16 am

    Kimmit,

    Even the most aromatic spice cannot hide the taste and odor of putrescence. A grain of salt only goes so far. Hitchens does not deserve the apology you generously provide for him.

  7. 7.

    Kimmitt

    June 15, 2004 at 3:42 pm

    I’m just saying; the man practically has a disclaimer at the top of his page: “I am a contrarian; I’m just saying stuff to shock you.”

Comments are closed.

Primary Sidebar

On The Road - BarcaChicago  - Off the Gunflint Trail/Boundary Waters 8
Image by BarcaChicago (7/11/25)

World Central Kitchen

Donate

Recent Comments

  • Wilson Heath on Friday Afternoon Distraction Open Thread: Get the Passport Stamped with All the Right Signals… (Jul 11, 2025 @ 5:25pm)
  • rikyrah on Friday Afternoon Distraction Open Thread: Get the Passport Stamped with All the Right Signals… (Jul 11, 2025 @ 5:25pm)
  • Suzanne on Friday Afternoon Distraction Open Thread: Get the Passport Stamped with All the Right Signals… (Jul 11, 2025 @ 5:25pm)
  • Chetan Murthy on Friday Afternoon Distraction Open Thread: Get the Passport Stamped with All the Right Signals… (Jul 11, 2025 @ 5:16pm)
  • JoyceH on Friday Afternoon Distraction Open Thread: Get the Passport Stamped with All the Right Signals… (Jul 11, 2025 @ 5:16pm)

Balloon Juice Posts

View by Topic
View by Author
View by Month & Year
View by Past Author

Featuring

Medium Cool
Artists in Our Midst
Authors in Our Midst
No Kings Protests June 14 2025

🎈Keep Balloon Juice Ad Free

Become a Balloon Juice Patreon
Donate with Venmo, Zelle or PayPal

Calling All Jackals

Site Feedback
Nominate a Rotating Tag
Submit Photos to On the Road
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Links)
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Posts)
Fix Nyms with Apostrophes

Social Media

Balloon Juice
WaterGirl
TaMara
John Cole
DougJ (aka NYT Pitchbot)
Betty Cracker
Tom Levenson
David Anderson
Major Major Major Major
DougJ NYT Pitchbot
mistermix

Keeping Track

Legal Challenges (Lawfare)
Republicans Fleeing Town Halls (TPM)
21 Letters (to Borrow or Steal)
Search Donations from a Brand

Feeling Defeated?  If We Give Up, It's Game Over

Site Footer

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Comment Policy
  • Our Authors
  • Blogroll
  • Our Artists
  • Privacy Policy

Copyright © 2025 Dev Balloon Juice · All Rights Reserved · Powered by BizBudding Inc

Share this ArticleLike this article? Email it to a friend!

Email sent!