We are already paying for those who are uninsured by picking up the tab for the ER visits or by the loss of Hospitals that cannot withstand serving areas that have a uninsured populace. I do thin that we have a moral obligation to care for someone who is DYING, to turn them away because they can’t pay is a moral issue.

It’s very hard for me to take any policies from Reagan when he declared that the words that scare him the most is “I’m from the Government and I’m here to help you.” We will have a fundamental difference in opinion, especially when it comes to Carter, who was only in office for four years and inherited the cost of the Vietnam war that we had to finally pay for. In 1977 Carter said that we had to stop driving so much, look for alternative fuel sources, he was right then! I’m tired of Carter being blamed for the fiscal legacy of the Vietnam war and the previous Presidents before him.

In the end we will most certainly disagree, I think the free market is fine when it comes to getting my carpet cleaned, but for profit insurance companies who withhold benefits rather than letting the doctor and patient decide the course of treatment because of the bottom line, it’s time to ask why we still have this sytem. It’s not working.

If you watch ‘Commanding Heights’ (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/commandingheights/hi/index.html) you’ll have a much better understanding of the economic situation Mr. Carter’s policies left us and the reality Mr. Regan inherited.

I do understand that you firmly believe you have the right to bill me for that which you feel you are entitled to (health care, heat in winter, etc..) and your politics reflect as much. I’m not trying to change your mind or attack that. I just feel that ‘Commanding Heights’ did such a fantastic job illustrating the world economy and Mr. Regan’s contribution to it that it is well worth everyone’s time to watch it.

Thank you for your regard,

This idea though that Reagan began the demise of the middle class is mythology. For all Reagan’s awfulness, the end of the middle class did not begin with him. A better candidate is the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade in 1947, under the presidency of that Cold Warrior Democrat Harry S. Truman. The weakening of the middle class takes up steam in the 1960s and early 1970s when American corporations first failed to invest in innovations in say steel technology and then simply started rolling forward with a ever more rapid process of deindustrialization. Both parties presided over this process. Noam Chomsky called Nixon the last liberal president. In some ways he was. And in some ways Carter was the first president of the evangelical movement–when they were still married to the Democratic party as good Southerners. When they abandoned Carter we got the New Right of Ronald Reagan in 1980. But the middle class didn’t need Reagan in order to discover its decline. In fact the Reagan Democrat often voted Republican because of the sense of decline.

It’s a damaging remark. Strikes me as a desperate move–like McCain going to Robertson territory in 2000 to declare evangelicals agents of intolerance.

I guess Obama knows Clinton is winning the party faithful?

As for my posts, this is the only second “negative” post and I think it’s a fair question. Just a question about what Obama has said on the campaign trail. It’s fair game, it’s open to debate and I was quite fair. This is the primaries, this is when we get to ask the tough questions. I have not turned it into something many other bloggers have, I don’t think that Obama says he admires Reagan (Although he did in his book) I just think it’s fair to point out that Regan won by using tactics that were not right, history has shown us this.

Not us moving to the middle, but moving them to middle. Thats the point.

I agree that yes, Obama is doing the right thing in the respect that he is attempting to understand all the people in this country, but his characterization of Reagan being for optimism when he really won through fear.

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I think people, he just tapped into what people were already feeling, which was we want clarity we want optimism, we want a return to that sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship that had been missing.

Since he’s running for office, that’s quite definitely possible. If he wasn’t running for office, though, and he said such a thing one might think he was simply trying to relate to people with different views.

Like most of the rest of us I’m a Democrat in Orange County. As such, and in order to keep friends and sanity I try to get some kind of understanding of where conservatives are “coming from.” Sometimes, as in the case of understanding the Reagan admiration, I fail utterly. In other cases I think I do grasp what the other side thinks. I don’t necessarily agree, but I see their point.

Dubya, AKA The Great Divider, has never seen the point of view of people like me or anyone who disagrees with him. Nor have Rove, Cheney, or most of the rest of Dubya’s administration. I think that’s one of the biggest things I dislike about him.

The POTUS, contrary to Dubya’s opinion and actions, is the President of all the American people, not just the folks who voted for him or her. Whatever s/he does, I believe s/he is obligated to attempt to get inside of the heads of people who don’t agree with him/her. If Obama is signaling that he intends to do that, I say “hurrah.”