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Cliven Bundy, Conservatives, Donald Trump, George W. Bush, GOP, John Boehner, Mitt Romney, Republican, Republicans, Ronald Reagan, Tea Party
President Ronald Reagan: Actor, Cowboy, FBI Informant, Destroyer of Good Government
On January 20, 1981, Ronald Reagan became President. Before he was elected this actor, FBI-informant, dictator-like Governor was a minor figure in national politics. His rise to power came after the collapse of the Republican party in the post-Watergate era. Reagan became the new face for disgraced conservatives. He rose to power by becoming the Great White demigod for Caucasian males.
After Nixon proved the lack of morals of the Republican party, there were two choices. The first choice to would be to humbly accept the failure of ethics within the party and commit to an honest approach to serving our government. The second choice would be to double down and make the party even less ethical than it was before Nixon’s gang of Dirty Tricksters.
The party chose to double down and go for the gullible voter. Conservatives became two-faced. The outward face was a facade of saying anything to suck in the weak and the stupid, and the other face was the hidden face of power and corruption that steered the true agenda of the party.
Conservatives Made Government Corrupt
Federal, State, and local government had brought us out of the depression, created the interstate highway system, and put us in space. Those achievements set the stage for a prosperous country that had a new power infrastructure, 20th century transportation system, and was on the leading edge of technology. In addition, cities and towns had new water and sewer systems, and new schools to elevate the level of education for everyone in the United States.
President John F. Kennedy: Making Big Government Do Great Things
Our country was great, because our government was great.
However, our government also maintained the balance of fairness for all citizens. Our government held corporations to higher standards. If an airline wanted to have a route that was a financial goldmine, they also have to serve a smaller community that wouldn’t have air service under the typical business greed motivation. Conservatives had to make government evil in order to gain public support to destroy it.
Undercutting Government
The first step was to bankrupt the government. That was a job for the Reagan administration. To the public he railed against the size of government and proclaimed that taxes were too high. In 1981, he cut taxes for the lowest wage earners by 3%, (from 14% down to 11%,) but slashed taxes on the super rich by 20%, (from 70% to 50%.) along with slashing estate taxes and corporate taxes for the rich and powerful.
Then in 1986, he slashed taxes again for the super wealthy from 50% to 28%, but INCREASED the taxes on those least able to pay from 11% to 15%. In the end he had increased taxes on the lowest wage earner by 2% and decreased taxes on the super wealthy by 42%.
At the same time, Reagan increased federal spending through massive and wasteful military spending that put the country’s economy on the brink of disaster. This would all be sold to the public as the failure of our government, not the insane policies of a conservative economic madman.
Radicalized Right
Cliven Bundy – Created in Ronald Reagan’s Image (photo credit cnn.com)
With the humiliation of the Nixon presidency, conservatives had to find support in citizens who were susceptible to manipulation, as they had lost the trust of most of the intelligent citizens of our country. They began seeking out false problems that would win favor with the lesser intelligent white person.
Issues like gun ownership, Christian extremism, racism targeting Hispanics, demonizing public education, and laws targeting women, minority voters, and gays became the banner of the conservatives. All of these issues appealed to the least intelligent white male who sought to blame others for their failures.
By raising these false issues, the people who were gullible felt empowered and believed that conservatives had become their voice for issues that existed only in the minds of weak, insecure, racists. The white male and his spouse saw conservatives as angels of a mythical God of white people who would bring back the United States to be something it never was before.
Obstruct, Obstruct, Obstruct: Do Nothing Conservatives
George W. Bush became the final straw in our country to expose the failure of conservatives. He followed the conservative ideology to the letter and when it all failed, conservatives distanced themselves as quickly as possible. By 2008, every idea of conservatives was proven to be a failure and had destroyed our government and our economy.
Still, conservatives refused to accept reality and took the one action left for them. Try to sabotage any program or law that would repair our country. During their reign of terror on the United States they had managed to gerrymander districts across the country to keep a conservative majority in the House of Representatives. That was enough to give conservatives the ability to prevent any effective action to fix our government, which allowed them to promote the myth that our government was broken, even though it was conservatives who were breaking it. Any attempt to circumvent this tactic was declared to be an affront to the Constitution and the separation of powers.
The Product of Conservative’s Lunacy
Trump: The Political Whore of Stupid, White People
Thirty-five years of conservative politics and distilled out all rationality in the Republican party. The party has degenerated to the point that the most successful candidate to win the Republican presidential nomination has to incite the worst elements of our country into believing that we are doomed and that the best course of action is to elect the people who have consistently failed.
Trump is the bastard child of Reagan’s legacy. He is the champion of the citizen with the mentality of a eight-year old boy. He enables stupidity as a way to govern our country. He will give his supporters whatever excites them as long as he doesn’t have to be around them too much. Trump is what happens when an ideology refuses to accept its own failure.