Perhaps because I used to listen regularly to Peggy Noonan’s reading of her memoir, What I Saw at the Revolution: A Political Life in the Reagan Era (when in law school I drove back and forth between Washington and Charlottesville), I was not surprised last night to hear her speak in the voice in which she writes.
Speaking at the Reagan Library, she offered our party sage advice in a distinctly feminine voice, much as the goddess Athena spoke to the Greek heroes.
She began by praising the Gipper, calling him the “last great gentleman,” how he spoke softly and treated his staff like equals and not the help (which, she claimed, they were). And, as I related last night, she praised his lady, saying that Nancy is not “appreciated and celebrated enough.” It’s the thing that strikes you when you read his writings and visit his home, how central his wife was to Ronald Reagan’s life.
Perhaps, we all need a solid source of human affection if we’re to achieve any success in this world. And that we men (even gay men) keenly feel the impact of a nurturing feminine presence in our lives. The most successful of us all do seem to have developed strong friendships with women.
But, I digress.
Peggy believes we conservatives are more fortunate to have the Gipper “to look back to” than the Democrats are in having FDR. That Democrat, she claimed, did not spend a lot of time thinking about his philosophy: “he was in the greatness game; he wanted to run things.” (Sounds like some other Democrats we know.) Reagan, by contrast, spent years developing a philosophy which we all well knew: “You don’t want more government than you need.”
And the Gipper could explain his own candidacy for the highest office in the land far better than could the man he backed in the 1964 presidential contest, Barry Goldwater. (Sounds like another Republican presidential candidate from Arizona.)
For the GOP to rebuild, we must hold “realistically to Reaganesque principles” and apply them to the concerns of the 21st century.She cited health care as example.
Noting the growing consensus for health care reform, she said the GOP needs address the issue by providing reforms consistent with Republicans principles. To that end, I trust she should be pleased with the Alternative to Obamacare that Senators Tom Coburn and Richard Burr have introduced together with Reprsentatives Paul Ryan and Devin Nunes. Let’s hope these good men do a better job promoting their proposal than our party’s nominee did defending his (which offered many of the same reforms they do) in last fall’s campaign.
Peggy also reminded us that the Gipper was also a “practical politician.” He wouldn’t want us to “withdraw into a cocoon, insisting on purism.” An easygoing man, he wanted to expand his conservative coalition, inviting everyone in. “He couldn’t shake his fist in your face because he was [using it]* to shake yours.”
In short, she said, we should be a big tent, a tent held up by a number of poles.
Perhaps, I liked her speech so much because I so delight in her voice (in both sense of the term, its sound and her manner of speaking/writing) and because I agree with her basic point that we need apply Ronald Reagan’s vision, his trust in individuals and his skepticism of government, to contemporary problems. On domestic issues at least, George W. Bush lost sight of such principles and that’s why Ronald Reagan’s party lost power.
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*Busy scribbling notes, I was unable to accurately transcribe this wonderful quote. She may have said that “he couldn’t shake his fast in your face because he was reaching his hand out to you, welcoming you” or something similar.
‘Sage advice,’ eh? Sounds like more of the same to me. The only answer Republicans seem to like hearing when they ask where to go from here is ‘RETURN TO REAGAN.’ It’s good to know that as a party you’re admitting to not being able to find new leadership so you desperately obsess about the good old days. I like to see my political opponents working themselves into a collective mental block.
You guys spent yeas insisting that George Bush was the next Reagan, do you realize this?
Levi, you are a piece of work. Please take all of the space you need to cite the years of quotes where “we guys” or anyone insisted that George Bush was the next Reagan. In fact, lets bet some really important money. OK?
What was the mantra? “George Bush is the next Reagan.” “Gipper Bush, he’s our man, he will be another Reagan, man!” “Another Reagan coming soon, George Bush will make us swoon.”
Oh, how I remember the fawning, adoring crowds and their Obamanaut zeal for “The Man From Crawford.”
Levi, George Bush had more integrity in his little toe than all of Obama and Clinton combined with Michelle and Hillary thrown in for good measure. That is what eats at you. But no one ever said Bush was Reagan redux.
Whatever it is you are not smoking, you should start, because your synapses are starved for connection.
Levi, George Bush had more integrity in his little toe than all of Obama and Clinton combined with Michelle and Hillary thrown in for good measure. That is what eats at you. But no one ever said Bush was Reagan redux.
It happened, though I understand why you’re pretending it didn’t. Additionally, there are few people on this planet that don’t have more integrity than George Bush.
Levi does have a point; see, for example, this link:
http://www.amazon.com/Reagans-Disciple-George-Troubled-Presidential/dp/1586484486
However, either from malice or from indifference, Levi misses the larger issue. George W. Bush won office on a platform of “compassionate conservatism.” In the wake of the 2006 and 2008 election, republicans are debating whether the path forward is to become more compassionate or more conservative.
By looking back to Reagan, Noonan argues for the “more conservative” direction, and GayPatriot agrees with her.
What gives me the skivvies are “Republican” politicians who invoke Reagan, yet totally miss Reagan’s point on some issue or other….the GOP-equivalent of wrapping yourself in the Flag. They use “Reagan” as a mantra without any real political or socio-economic knowledge of the man or his philosphies, nor his innate pragmatism in office.
Personally, I’d prefer if a few of them looked farther back in the Party’s history to T. Roosevelt progressivism, pragmatic conservationism and reviving T. Roosevelt’s Square Deal.
(If you haven’t read his original speech on the Sqaure Deal, it’s worth revisiting.)
Perversely, all I hear is a the thunder of feet rallying around the false-flags of anti-abortionism and ‘christianist’ gay-bashing…like those are the two most pressing issues of our time. **snort**
Levi, if you read the post, you’d know I didn’t say return to Reagan, but to his ideas.
Second, please provide examples where we insisted W was the next Reagan. It might help me refresh my memory because I don’t recall ever doing so.
Thanks.
Levi, if you read the post, you’d know I didn’t say return to Reagan, but to his ideas.
You’re getting awfully pathetic with these whines about me not reading your posts, just to let you know.
As for that joke of a point, what am I supposed to do with that? Okay, you’re not saying that the GOP needs to return to Reagan, but to his ideas. You call that a clarification? Is it possible that you sincerely believed I meant something different, or are you just desperately grasping at semantic straws because you have absolutely nothing else?
Levi,
As a fellow commenter on this blog, can you give me any good reasons why Bruce shouldn’t ban you?
Twice you have been asked, once by heliotrope and once by GPW, to back up your assertion that either Republicans in general, or readers of the site, spent years trumpeting G.W. Bush as the new Reagan. Your only response has been nastiness: I understand why you’re pretending it didn’t; You’re getting awfully pathetic … As for that joke of a point…
You may enjoy being an SOB, but it doesn’t add to conversation here, nor does it help you win friends and influence people. Or, to put it in terms matching the tone of your comments, if you can’t stop talking out of your rear end, then just shut the fuck up.
Levi, your failure to identify any evidence that Bush was touted as the “next Reagan” is noted.
Yes, yes, it is very conservative to have a “plan” for health care. Like we have a government plan for breadmaking (how else could it get made?).
And Noonan thinks O is the best thing since sliced bread–she’s a real deep thinker don’t cha know.
How many of you know anyone (not in the political class) waiting breathlessly for the Government “plan” for healthcare?
So just because Levi said so. What a fraud.
Douchebag.
Put your money where your mouth is.
One citation, two citation, three citation, four,
five citation, six citation, seven citation more.
Icha bacha, soda cracker,
Icha bacha boo.
Icha bacha, soda cracker, out goes Y-O-U!
Heck, forget the seven citations, you can’t cite one. Here, have a soda cracker. Now get back up on your perch squawk some more.
Oh, and how do you pretend something that didn’t happen didn’t happen? Please make me look like a fool. I am so certain and arrogant that I demand you cut me down to size.
Levi, your obsession with Bush is amusing. Reminds me of a guy whose sexual advances I repeatedly rejected. Then, when he returned to his home (in a different town from where we met), if ever he saw me online, he would message me and insult me.
Now, please, you’ve told me that we spent years insisting W was the next Reagan, let me repeat my request that you provide the evidence.
Thanks.
could you please state exactly when and where either Dan or any of us said that???
Before W was elected many of us were wary of his ‘compassionate conservatism’. Until 9/11 we were glad he and not Gore was president, but I don’t recall anyone calling him Reaganesque.
After 9/11 we were all the more grateful he was our leader, most of us felt he handled the war on terror well. But very quickly there was disillusionment with his growing government – even if it was supposedly for homeland security.
That is going a long way to saying he was Reaganesque. Levi, I think you have such a strong need to attack and demean, you simply throw things out there that were never said simply because for some perverse reason it makes you feel good to insult people who disagree with you.
Actually I want to go back to this Peggy as Athena? Not only due I not see that at all but are you sure we need (conservatives of various strips) need to be listening to Athena instead of Tyr these days?
Ack! due = do
Twice you have been asked, once by heliotrope and once by GPW, to back up your assertion that either Republicans in general, or readers of the site, spent years trumpeting G.W. Bush as the new Reagan. Your only response has been nastiness: I understand why you’re pretending it didn’t; You’re getting awfully pathetic … As for that joke of a point…
You may enjoy being an SOB, but it doesn’t add to conversation here, nor does it help you win friends and influence people. Or, to put it in terms matching the tone of your comments, if you can’t stop talking out of your rear end, then just shut the fuck up.
Thanks for the review, I guess?
Levi, your obsession with Bush is amusing.
What you’d call an ‘obsession,’ I would call a convenient tool to dismiss all Republican claims to intelligence or competence. Elections have consequences. One of the consequences of Bush getting elected will be years and years (maybe decades and decades) of liberals bringing him up to mock or otherwise diminish conservatives. Just get used to it. You guys forced this disaster upon the world, and you’re going to be hearing about it for a long time.
Levi, you’ve been asked to back up a charge you leveled against us and in response all you do is attack Bush.
First, let me assure you that by the end of the summer, most people will have forgotten Bush and Democrats won’t be able to hang him around Republicans’ neck.
Second, how can we believe anything you say when you won’t respond to repeated requests to back up an allegation you made.
Actually, GPW, this is kind of funny to watch.
Levi and his fellow Obama Party members are screaming about Bush for one simple reason — the lies they told on the campaign trail are unraveling, and people are getting upset over the fact that Obama believes in unilaterally taking private property, completely ignoring bankruptcy laws, and imposing crushing new taxes even as he fills his Cabinet with people who refuse to pay taxes.
What they in their ignorance and blind rage don’t realize, though, is that the more they claim that everything that Bush did was wrong, every policy Bush followed was wrong, etc. — the more foolish they look with Obama’s adoption of Bush-administration policies on Guantanamo, extraordinary rendition, enhanced interrogation, military tribunals, DADT, and so forth. Their hypocrisy becomes blatantly obvious as they praise and worship their Obamamessiah for doing exactly that which they revile Bush for doing.
You are most welcome, Levi.
Pity you didn’t heed my advice. To wit:
Still being a bastard. But then the leopard doesn’t change his spots, does he?
It is odd that a leftist like yourself wants to go after a president who prevented terrorists attacks on the US for more than 7 years after Sept 11, 2001 on charges of stupidity and incompetence; It was the Left, after all, that gave us Bill Clinton, the president who let Al Qaeda fester and grow, and his attorney general, Janet Reno, the mastermind of Ruby Ridge and Waco. But if you want to hang yourself on that rope go right ahead.
Fair enough. Many conservatives will doubtless want to mock themselves for tolerating Bush’s conservatism-in-name-only. Lefties like yourself, however, will have to accept being mocked over Oval Office adulterer and perjurer-in-chief Bill Clinton, didn’t-get-what-enhanced-interrogation-techniques-were-for Nancy Pelosi, and insecure, perpetually campaigning, the rest-of-the-world-before-my-own-country Barack Obama. Elections have consequences, after all. 😉
I started, Levi, by asking you if you could provide “any good reasons why Bruce shouldn’t ban you.” You have failed to do so, just as you have failed to support your assertions about Republicans (or conservatives, or Gay Patriot readers) crowing about G.W. Bush as the new Ronald Reagan.
So I’d say you really should be banned (yes, Bruce, that’s a hint).
#21: I disagree that Levi should be banned. Instead, we should all just ignore him like one of those cheap, after-market, twitchy car alarms that go off spontaneously in the middle of the night. Yes, you hear it, yes, it’s annoying as hell, but you certainly don’t respond to it by calling the cops as though there is an actual car theft in progress. Eventually, it silences and that horrible, ugly IROC-Z sputters away.
I fear something not-so-good is going on in Levi’s life. Something’s different. Usually, he can go for days, volleying rapid-fire Leftist talking points and bigoted epithets against religion across the net like an Energizer bunny. Of course, every one of his points are demonstrably untrue, illogical, intellectually dishonest, hypocritical, or fascist (or a combination thereof), but at least there was a back and forth. But lately, something is different. Instead of his usual changing the subject, look-over-there tactics he has been sticking with indefensible positions without abandoning them, even when facing an inescapable (and pathetic) checkmate. Also, in general, Levi has literally and consistently been arguing his way into a corner in two comments or less. In other words, he has been noticeably inartful in his efforts to be a slippery, aggressive, slimeball which is really the only reason to argue with liberals in the first place (to enjoy the fun of making it clear to them what hopeless slimeballs they truly are). So, before, arguing with Levi was only a pointless waste of time. Now, it’s a pointless waste of time, and also a colossal bore.
So, I say it’s time for everyone to pretend he just doesn’t exist. If he can’t deal with that, all he has to do is concede that his “the GOP thinks W = Reagan” bs was, well, complete bs. OR, produce legitimate evidence that its NOT bs. Without one or the other, I say he’s dead to me.
Not only due I not see that at all but are you sure we need (conservatives of various strips) need to be listening to Athena instead of Tyr these days?
Athena didn’t wear an aegis and helmet and carry a spear for accessory purposes. 🙂 Remember, Ares was the god of war, but Athena was the goddess of military prowess and strategy. We conservatives would do well to be playing the role of Odysseus or Theseus today instead of Achilles or Heracles.
I fear something not-so-good is going on in Levi’s life. Something’s different. Usually, he can go for days, volleying rapid-fire Leftist talking points and bigoted epithets against religion across the net like an Energizer bunny. Of course, every one of his points are demonstrably untrue, illogical, intellectually dishonest, hypocritical, or fascist (or a combination thereof), but at least there was a back and forth. But lately, something is different. Instead of his usual changing the subject, look-over-there tactics he has been sticking with indefensible positions without abandoning them, even when facing an inescapable (and pathetic) checkmate. Also, in general, Levi has literally and consistently been arguing his way into a corner in two comments or less. In other words, he has been noticeably inartful in his efforts to be a slippery, aggressive, slimeball which is really the only reason to argue with liberals in the first place (to enjoy the fun of making it clear to them what hopeless slimeballs they truly are). So, before, arguing with Levi was only a pointless waste of time. Now, it’s a pointless waste of time, and also a colossal bore.
lol
Sean A (#22),
I would be inclined to agree with you if only experience hadn’t taught me that most leftists aren’t as tolerant as Bruce is.
In my comment at left-wing blogs, I have been placed on permanent moderation on one for daring to raise questions they don’t want asked, and have seen the webmaster of another tell everyone to ignore me (much as you recommend with Levi) — also for daring to ask questions he didn’t like.
Furthermore, leftists have called me things like racist and fascist. (Ironic, I know.) I am simply no longer in any mode to tolerate leftist bullshit of the sort that Levi dished out here.
If Levi wants to be a complete asshole let him do it on his own site.
Sean A (#22),
I would be inclined to agree with you if only experience hadn’t taught me that most leftists aren’t as tolerant as Bruce is.
In my comment at left-wing blogs, I have been placed on permanent moderation on one for daring to raise questions they don’t want asked, and have seen the webmaster of another tell everyone to ignore me (much as you recommend with Levi) — also for daring to ask questions he didn’t like.
Furthermore, leftists have called me things like racist and fascist. (Ironic, I know.) I am simply no longer in any mode to tolerate leftist bullshit of the sort that Levi dished out here.
If Levi wants to be a complete asshole let him do it on his own site.
Daring to raise questions they don’t want asked…. yeah right. In my experience, the people that start asking for other people to be banned (this would be you) are the weakest debaters. So weak, in fact, that they prefer to not debate at all, and instead focus on driving out intruders so they can stand among their crowd nodding in agreement with what everyone else is saying. Have fun with that!
Jesus Christ! What is that awful racket?! It sounds like a swarm of killer bees attacking a chain saw inside a phone booth filled with 25 cats. Does anyone else hear that? Hopefully it will go away soon.
Levi, while claiming that those who would have you banned “prefer to not debate at all,” yet have not yet to back up the charge you leveled against us, even thought you have been asked to do so, multiple times.
If you want to debate, back up your points with facts. And actually adress the point of the post instead of smearing conservatives. Once again, like all too many on the left, you’d rather insult than debate.
Sean A at #27:
That’s the sound of a Leftist proving he doesn’t deserve the privilege of discourse here. I too would like it to go away — permanently.
Levi at #26:
Yes, right. That’s exactly what I did, and the consequence were exactly as I described.
I won’t bother with any further attempt to defend myself on this point; I don’t have to justify myself to you, Levi. You’re the one who jumped into the conversation with the behavior of a jackass, not I.
My comments here on Gay Patriot can speak for my debating skills. As for your attempting to criticize another person’s powers of debate, that is surely a pot calling a kettle black: You have done nothing here but throw stones at others. You have certainly made no attempt to debate anything.
As for calling for a ban another commenter, I have never done so before on any web log. I was moved to do so for the first time here by your stupid and despicable behavior.
As Dan said above, you prefer to insult those whose political thinking you don’t like than to offer anything approaching a useful criticism. It’s Bruce’s decision whether or not you can continue with such behavior, not mine. (Perhaps Bruce likes having you around as an example of leftist idiocy.)
For the sake of those who have to deal with you face-to-face, I only hope you aren’t this stupid and nasty in person.