Slamming Reagan

[HARDCORE]

?CHEAP SHOTS? are the only two words that I can conjure up to describe the hatchet-job movie that was slated for the tube about former President Ronald Reagan!

The movie itself interjected more fiction, I am told, than fact into the life of former actor, turned governor, turned president, than actual facts and figures! Naturally, a writer is going to let his mind get the best of him at times, but to harpoon a former president, and an ill and aged one at that, for no other reason than to make money and/or cause grief, is crass and ill-conceived!

And for the record, although I may not agree that Reagan was the best president in the last 100 years, as was touted by at least one media icon, he certainly held his own. We have, after all, had a helluva lot worse Chief Executives than the ?Gipper!? The man certainly was presidential and an American before all other things!

Being as independent as they come, I may often look at things a bit differently than a bought and paid for party-ite, but as far as I am concerned, this movie was aimed at causing injury to a political party, by inflicting slanderous pain upon a single individual!

A man (any man) has to be judged on his own merit, and Ronald Reagan, the man and the President, certainly had that merit and deserved far better than the tripe that he was gifted with in this vicious flick [opinion]!!

VERITAS

[phuloi]

Kudos to everyone involved in making CBS buckle under on this one.

[Jerry D]

agreed Griz a lot of us signed the AFA Petition to boycott the miniseries and it seemed to work Now I wonder how many
Viewers will watch it on Showtime ?

[MM38084]

My graduation into the world came during the Jimmy Carter administration. It was not a good time for America.

For several months, I stood in a weekly line in Wayne that wrapped twice around the unemployment office on Michigan Avenue, part of the rubble left when the economy was bombed by the Arab oil embargo. With me were many of my high school classmates, who had followed their fathers into the auto plants a few years before and were now holding layoff slips.

High unemployment joined high inflation and high interest rates as the triple economic ravages that made "malaise" the most common word in the national vocabulary. People were losing hope, asking the question posed by singer Merle Haggard, "Are the good times really over for good?"

Those my age wondered whether they'd ever live as well as their parents. There was a growing belief that the country's best days were behind it and that the future would be a slide down an arc of declining prosperity. Carter was the high priest of the doctrine of a lesser America. He preached that we'd have to demand less, accept less. Dream smaller dreams. Lower expectations to match the nation's weakened ability to deliver. And speak with a quieter voice in the world. He almost had us convinced. And then came Ronald Reagan. Reagan was of Hollywood's Golden Era and saw America in Capra frames.

A lot about Reagan was hokum, a Pollyannish optimism that Americans could accomplish anything they set their minds to, could overcome any obstacle, meet any challenge. It was a rollicking sermon, intended to jerk the country out of self-pity and set it to work.

Critics who felt America was simply getting its comeuppance after decades of greed and over-consumption scoffed that Reagan's enthusiasm was irrational. But it was also infectious. Americans started reaching for the turkey leg again. And the decade-and-a-half that followed his presidency were the most productive, the most prosperous years the nation has ever known.

Reagan's conservative disciples worry that the upcoming movie about his life, starring Barbra Streisand's husband James Brolin as the Gipper, will wallow in his failings -- things like the Iran-contra scandal and the soaring budget deficit.

They fear a portrayal of, as some biographers suggest, a genial bumbler already in the early stages of the Alzheimer's disease that now controls him, easily manipulated by his wife's astrologers and his own inner circle schemers.

Who cares? Everyone understands that the Hollywood that produced Reagan is gone, replaced by an entertainment industry obsessed with cynicism, gossip and scandal. This movie won't decide Reagan's place in history. That's already settled. He's called the Great Communicator for good reason. He was a prize talker.

But it wasn't all spin. Reagan didn't just tell Americans what he wanted them to hear; he told them what they needed to hear. That they were still special, still could tap into the nation's vast potential for greatness. That they would not only survive, but thrive again.

For those of us who couldn't buy Carter's bleak vision, Reagan's shining city on a hill was exactly the place we were looking for.

[BLUEHAWK]

Nicely said MM -

[MORTARDUDE]

The man is still alive and cannot even defend himself. Disgusting. It shouldn't even be shown on Showtime, except maybe as a "fantasy series".

Larry

[SuperScout]

As if it were only yesterday, I remember the sad state of morale in the military, not to mention the nonavailability of fuel, ammo, spare parts and vanishing leadership during the Carter years. We didn't have the necessary stuff to leave the motor pool for tank gunnery; annual individual weapons familiarization was suspended, let alone qualification, due to a shortage of .45 ammo. (The only comparison of sad morale was in the Clinton years; fuel and ammo was available, but the NCO ranks were being depleted by mass resignations.) The new spirit that Reagan brought, his enthusiasm, positive attitude, and a boatload of cash to replace the draconian cuts we had endured under the Peanut Farmer, were welcomed as a summer shower on a hot July afternoon.

And the soaring deficits: go back and review who was behind the spending excesses like profiligate sons after the will is probated. It was the feel-good programs that got most of the cash. Much of the current technology in the military, Abrams, Bradleys and other weaponry, was the direct result of Reagan's demand that the military get first-rate equipment. Equipment we sorely needed.

Part of the continuing myth, vicious as it is, is that Reagan's mental state started deteriorating prior to his departure from the White House. Utter horseshit designed to defame the record of an outstanding President. His legacy towers over whatever pitifully small pile that Carter and Clinton together could amass.

If a TV producer wants to create a film in which Reagan's policies are debated, I'll support it, but to defame a man, irrespective of his current physical condition, with outright lies, manufactured quotes, and bogus scenarios is cheap, unacceptable, and transparently indicative of the contempt of the leftists. They can't stand the fact that they are losers, and want to pull us all down into the slime that they habitually inhabit.

[melody1181]

What makes me mad about the whole mess is that Reagon has no way to speak up for himself. Its like that a-hole(forgot his name) that interviewed Heston. Just people doing things lke those at a time where the people involved can't grip very well or at all. I had two grandparents that died with alzheimers and it makes me mad when anyone does anything to alzheimers victims. Its like a slap to the face of them and there families.

[Keith_Hixson]

Unethical,
Chicken
Disgusting.

Since he is still alive I believe the family could have sued for slander and I believe that is one reason to put the movie on hold or a movie channel.

Just pure disgusting behavior.

Keith

[Seascamp]

I?m wondering if that mess will even show on the cable channel. CBS pitched that hot potato right out the window and will probably have to eat the $16 Meg production costs. Now I see the Hollywood elite are hollering about censorship, oh boo hoo. I?d say their time would be better spent taking Business Ethics 101 and see what that concept is all about.

Scamp