Now here is the last of the great Republican Presidents!
Pat
2012/08/18 02:47:23
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Top Opinion
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Muriel 2012/08/18 19:48:59No, Dwight D. Eisenhower was not the last great Republican President.
'Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron.'
Dwight D. Eisenhower, From a speech before the American Society of Newspaper Editors, April 16, 1953
"National Socialism and religion cannot exist together.... The heaviest blow that ever struck humanity was the coming of Christianity. Bolshevism is Christianity's illegitimate child. Both are inventions of the Jew. The deliberate lie in the matter of religion was introduced into the world by Christianity.... Let it not be said that Christianity brought man the life of the soul, for that evolution was in the natural order of things." (p 6 & 7)--Adolf Hitler
As for St. Ronny, I did not vote for him the first time around. I did vote for him the second time around and I can remember standing in City Hall Plaza in Boston cheering him on.....Now looking back, I think he's responsible for the beginning of the mess we're in now. And the two Bushes finished the job.
I'm really not looking for a response from anyone. I just wish I could go back to the 50's when we felt safe (despite the red scare), people had jobs, people were nicer, the pace was not so frantic all the time and summer vacations seemed to last almost forever.
I do agree with you about Dwight D though. Good call there.
So, despite his playing 1000+ rounds of golf over his two terms he's now been re-rated upward as a good to near great President. So, now you know the facts about that.
You ARE correct that he accepted too many of Monty's plans such as Operations Goodwood and Market Garden however he was also pressured by his need to balance out what our British allies wanted to do and what Churchilll pushed him to do. His was a very political position. Another strategic mistake and perhaps the greatest one that he made was the battle of the Huertgen forrest which was an absolute meat grinding, battle of attrition that happened just prior to the Battle of the Bulge and therefore received little attention.
Senior officers rarely make good presidents, Grant is probably the worst, Jackson another. Washington was a reluctant president and was trusted by the other Founding Fathers because he didn't want to be a politician.
The two quotes employed are simply dinosaurs of the era. You may as well quote a man a century before defending slavery. The Cold War era was a time when the US had to face down the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact nations. It was Reagan's determination to force the issue that pushed the Communists houses of cards over, by flexing the muscles of Capitalism.
Eisenhower's second quote is purely political- The mythical status of Roosevelt was still fresh and the American people too naive to question the long-term consequences of Keynesian economics. In fact, most politicians today have no understanding of the failure of Keynesian policies in place.
Economically, the Eisenhower economy was considered stagnant.
If somebody wants to deify Eisenhower over two quotes because they agree with their content, that is their choice.
Nixon ended the Vietnam War, ended the Draft, enacted Civil Rights legi...
Senior officers rarely make good presidents, Grant is probably the worst, Jackson another. Washington was a reluctant president and was trusted by the other Founding Fathers because he didn't want to be a politician.
The two quotes employed are simply dinosaurs of the era. You may as well quote a man a century before defending slavery. The Cold War era was a time when the US had to face down the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact nations. It was Reagan's determination to force the issue that pushed the Communists houses of cards over, by flexing the muscles of Capitalism.
Eisenhower's second quote is purely political- The mythical status of Roosevelt was still fresh and the American people too naive to question the long-term consequences of Keynesian economics. In fact, most politicians today have no understanding of the failure of Keynesian policies in place.
Economically, the Eisenhower economy was considered stagnant.
If somebody wants to deify Eisenhower over two quotes because they agree with their content, that is their choice.
Nixon ended the Vietnam War, ended the Draft, enacted Civil Rights legislation and was the first to push for energy independence. He would rank as the second greatest Republican after Reagan, not for what he said but what he accomplished.
You neglected to mention that your disgraced hero Nixon ran on getting us out of Vietnam and won two elections doing it. I.E. He took much too long to get us out as we lost 58,000 men there an merely postponed the inevitable. His signature achievement is generally thought to be him going off to China and Russia like a Democrat and opening up trade internationally despite making his initial impact politically as Joe McCarthy's young , anti-commie lieutenant, Congressman in the late 40's.
As for negatives there were many. He had numerous Atty Generals indicted (Michell and Kleindienst to name but two) not to mention Spiro Agnew and various scandals attendent to his administration such as the ATT scandal, the grain deal, the milk deal, him using the IRS to target his political enemies and him having the most insular two terms since W. It's important to note that he only resigned because he was going to get impeached had he not.
As for Reagan, you somehow neglected to mention the Iran-contra scandal and how lucky he was to survive that.
Senator McCarthy has been vindicated -Even the Soviets admitted that the investigations shut down their operations in the US government but too late to prevent many nuclear research secrets from being stolen.
Nixon was brave enough to step down so Clinton earned the title of the second president to be impeached. Like Clinton, the current Fraud is using the IRS to persecute opposition.
The contrived Iran-Contra "scandal" had no truth and no teeth. The worst Reagan could be accused of is not consulting Congress in doing his job.
Perhaps you need a refresher course in basic civics. While a president often serves as a lightning rod for negative news or the hero when the news is good, a president that allows Congress to call the shots is just a figurehead. Eisenhower was a figurehead who made a point to avoid rocking the boat instead of leading the country.
Eisenhower was described as a "dime-store new-dealer" a politician afraid to eliminate the programs started by FDR which are on life support today because they are failed programs.
Eisenhower was best know as having a "hands off" domestic policy, hence the economic boom brought on by the draw-down of the post WW2 military.
The highway system was built primarily to facilitate military convoys and were based upon Hitler's Autobahn system, used to transport the Nazi war machine from one border to another. At least he learned something while in Europe.
Eisenhower: Raise Taxes
Eisenhower: Create public sector jobs
Eisenhower: Institute Public Works Programs to decrease unemployment
Eisenhower: Promoted the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956 - The largest Public Works Program in US History.
Eisenhower: Cut spending commensurate with increasing revenue.
Eisenhower: Believed that taxes could not be cut until the budget was balanced.
Eisenhower: Allowed recessions to occur, to wring out inflation.
Eisenhower: Overrode governors to protect Civil Rights (Little Rock Nine)
Eisenhower: Protected Egypt from Britain, France and Israel.
Eisenhower: Dispatched troops to Viet Nam offering military, economic, and technical assistance.
Eisenhower: Sent troops to Lebanon promoting the creation of the Baghdad Pact between Iraq, Turkey, Pakistan, and Iran.
Eisenhower: Utilized covert actions.
Eisenhower: Opened relations with Fascist Spain and leader Generalissimo Francisco Franco building a trade and military alliance with the Fascist Nation.
Ford wasn't too bad, but I wouldn't call him great.
That was the last problem to be solved, or even improved upon by either party.