The Reagan Legacy

Whether or not Reagan - or anyone else - really knew how bad AIDS was going to get is beside the point. They were faced with a choice: do something, or condemn and walk away. They chose the latter.This from the Sarawak Tribune:

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Reagan legacy a bitter pill for gay community

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Jun 9, 2004

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NEW YORK — The death of Ronald Reagan has gone largely unmourned by America’s gay community, which still harbours bitter memories of the former president’s indifference to the emerging AIDs epidemic in the 1980s. Even as the eulogies poured in at home and around the world, gay activists offered a sharply divergent verdict on the Reagan presidency, which they see as tainted with the blood of thousands of victims of the HIV scourge.

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It wasn’t just that he ignored the AIDS crisis, said Mark Milano, an HIV treatment educator who has been living with the virus since 1981. What was so unconscionable was that he and members of his administration actually took a pro-active decision to do nothing about it.

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Initial public awareness of AIDS (Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome) dates back to the early days of Reagan’s first term, with the publication of a New York Times article in 1981 that detailed a rare cancer being seen in the homosexual community.
The acronym AIDS was first used in 1982 when more than 1,500 Americans were diagnosed with the disease. Reagan, as gay activists still angrily point out, never mentioned the word in public until 1987, by which time some 60,000 cases had been diagnosed, of whom half had died.

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The lack of major federal funding to combat AIDS as the disease took hold is cited by many as a major factor behind its dramatic spread. In the critical years of 1984 and 1985, according to his White House physician, Reagan thought of AIDS as though it was measles and would go away. Lou Cannon, one of the most respected of Reagan biographers, wrote in his authoritative President Reagan, that the president’s response to the epidemic was halting and ineffective. — AFP

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Commenting on another of Custards claims:

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Of course not; but we are one of the richest countries in the world. Even at our lowest levels people have bedrooms, bathrooms, cable TV, access to all and any kind of food they will ever need, some of the best health care available for emergency services (and if you think you need insurance to get emergency services, in many states you don't if you go to the emergency room), computers, VCRs, DVD players, stereos, cars, jewelry, you name it.

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This is clearly false, as the US still has high degree so poverty and homelessness; its difficult to understand how one can own a DVD player when you are living out of a Ryder truck migrating across the country in search of work.As for health care, the US situation is pretty grim, wityh lower levels of output than most OECD countries for substantially higher inputs. All in all the American health care system must be considered infeeicient and expensive, overburdened as it is with mulitplied bureacracy [quote] In addition to that, you are as upwardly mobile as you choose to be -within reason, you may want to be the next Bill Gates, but that is so much more than desire and dedication.[quote] Thats purely a propaganda position and undemonstrable.This message has been edited by contracycle, 06-17-2004 10:17 AM

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Actually, that is the point. Much like America's decision to enter WWII. Is FDR to be held responsible for not doing more or acting sooner to save the Jews extirminated in camps because now, in 2004, we know how bad it was in 1940?

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Well as a lot of Brits remarked in recent times, the Yanks were so late coming to the last war that they came to this one early. So rightly or wrongly, yes that feeling exists.Criticism of both FDR and Reagan is entirely valid on these grounds. They were the incumbent; the buck stopped on their desk. This does not have to imply a great deal of FAULT, you understand... but they were respectively responsible.Now, while I may not attribute to much fault despite his responsibility in the case of FDR, under the circumstances, I do attribute much more fault to Reagan. He turned a blind eye becuase of pandering to the religious right. At the very best case, that he underestimated the impact quite honestly, he was still willing to resort to moral condemnation as an excuse to leave his citizens to die. He carries the can.

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Really? Care to present your data showing how many people live out of Ryder trucks? Obviously the absolute dregs of those in the poverty bucket (as opposed to middle-class and rich buckets) will have nothing. You choose to ignore that I am not singling out the worst of the worst; I am speaking of 'the poor,' I refer to the entire group of individuals below the poverty line

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Actually, you wrote that "Even at our lowest levels" people have these things. That is indeed false as I claimed, and demonstrably so, as you admit. It was a rhetrical flourish, wasn't it?

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While my personal experience is not a statistically valid sample set, it does demonstrate that there are people who do live below the poverty line yet have a standard of living vastly superior to the majority of the world's poor.

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Oh, that I don't challenge.... much. Lets say I think the poor in America often command a lower proportion of national wealth than the poor in the third world do. But yes I agree that the material standard of living in the US for the very poor is usually higher than that of most of the world. But then, thats not surprising, considering how much of the worlds wealth is hoovered up by the US. The poor of the world are subsidising the poor of the US.

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Actually it is demonstratable; it is demonstrated every single day.

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LOL. To those with patriotism-tinted spectacles, perhaps.

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Anyone, barring severe disabilities, can obtain a cheap or even free education in this country and use it to go on to achieve greater things.

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How is that different to any OECD country? In fact, the very increasing disparity you mentioned previously indicates that the idea that "anyone" can simply make a success of themselves is not actually happening in practice; in practice, wealth begets wealth. Thats why I said talk of "anyone" being Bill Gates is undemonstrable and propagandist; to the extent that its true, its true of all the western democracies, but the extent to which is is true is Not Much.This message has been edited by contracycle, 06-18-2004 10:14 AMThis message has been edited by contracycle, 06-18-2004 10:20 AM