Say Anything Blog

PLEASE STOP THIS MOVIE! WHERE HAS THIS COUNTRY COME TO? PRESIDENT REAGAN WAS ONE OF THE BEST PRESIDENTS THIS COUNTRY HAS EVER HAD. HE GOT RID OF COMMUNISM AND HELPED A LOT OF PEOPLE. HELPED OUR COUNTRY GET A RESPECTFUL POSITION IN THE WORLD AND HELP OUR PEOPLE REMEMBER THE LOVE FOR COUNTRY.
PLEASE STOP THIS MOVIE!
PLEASE TELL ME WHAT TO DO AND I WILL DO IT!
MAY GOD ALWAYS BLESS PRESIDENT REAGAN AND HIS FAMILY

You all are crazy.  As public figures, the Reagans, just like the Clintons, the Nixons, the Johnsons, the Kennedys, Adolph Hitler, Jesus, Moses, et al., are “public domain.” Sorry it offends your brittle, control freak, sensibilities, but it’s true.  The only people who need to be warned that the Reagan movie is fictionalized are your ilk.  The rest of us are grown-up and realize this.  Of course, whether or not President Reagan uttered comments similar to the “let them die in sin” remark quoted as part of the movie is of little consequence as opposed to the facts that he ignored the AIDS epidemic in this country and other parts of the world for YEARS.  So is that homophobia; dementia; seeing only what one wants to see and hoping if it can be ignored, it’ll go away; or just good, old American christian fundamentalist “if you’re not like us you’re damned” values ? ? ?  It never ceases to amaze me that the fundamental founding principals of this country, the various freedoms sought in the Declaration of Independence and declared in the Bill of Rights, are blatantly overlooked by so many American religious zealots and instead you create a fictitious christian, theist central core for our founding.

Don’t accuse me of being a religious fanatic.  I have no religious beliefs what so ever.

Also, Ronald Reagan is not public domain.  Making false statements in any sort of broadcast is typically considered libel and was held up as so by the Supreme Court.

I’ve recently posted regarding the legality issue here:

In the Supreme Court decision regarding New York Times Co. vs. Sullivan it is upheld that the constitution requires “a federal rule that prohibits a public official from recovering damages for a defamatory falsehood relating to his official conduct unless he proves that the statement was made with ‘actual malice.’” The Court defined actual malice as “knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.” In my humble opinion The Reagans movie more then meets that criteria. Striesand is quick to point out that the production was not meant to be a documentary, but the law does not provide for such distinctions.

The CBS series goes beyond mere “fair comment� with regard to Nancy and Ronald Reagan. The lines spoken in the series come from a script, written by Elizabeth Egloff. If broadcast, the law would consider defamatory statements libel. The most egregious libel, but not the only libel, is a scene in which the Ronald Reagan character, referring to AIDS patients, states, “they that live in sin shall die in sin.� Ms. Egloff has acknowledged that there exists no evidence Mr. Reagan ever spoke those words or any substantially similar words. Thus, CBS certainly has knowledge of the falsity of the aforementioned statements, sufficient to show actual malice. Therefore, if CBS were to go ahead and broadcast the program, CBS would be guilty of libel.

When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.

-- Thomas Jefferson

Rob’s recently listened-to songs:

Ronald Reagan and his advisors were one of the most corrupt regimes in American history—read the records! Under Reagan’s “leadership”, the country engaged in a number of innoble practices, such as: selling off federal lands to be strip-mined, having a cozy relationship with South Africa instead of condemning Apartheid, increasing the military budget manyfold while labelling Ketchup as a Vegetable for school meals… the list goes on and on. Reagan and his ilk were morally reprehensible. Perhaps you might want to follow up on the Iran/Contra hearings, and how Reagan
1) vowed never to deal with terrorists
2) SOLD weapons to terrorists in order to clear the release of US hostages held in Iran
3) used money from the weapons sales to fund a secret and illegal war against the popularly elected governments of Nicaragua and El Salvadore
4) which put US soldiers in danger without having first given them representation to vote on the matter through Congress and the Senate, because it was a secret and illegal war.

Reagan shouldn’t be slandered in a movie. He should have been tried and convicted for TREASON, impeached, publicly humiliated and sentenced to death. Allowing Reagan to serve out a quiet retirement and pardoning those involved with the matter should have put Bush I at risk for impeachment and incarceration. Get the facts straight.

Wow Jeff, those are some pretty strong allegations.

Lets look at them a little closer:

1) Doesn’t deal with terrorists.

Does our government ever deal with terrorists?  I don’t think so, nor should we.  We must always put out the message that people can not get their way by engaging in terrorist activities.

2) Iran Contra

Ok, this was ugly.  The whole thing was a mistake, but they did have good intentions.  They were trying to free hostages.  Also, Ronald Reagans participation in it is debatable.

3) Illegal Wars/Soldiers Voting For War

It seems to me that the President has all the right to declare war on whoever he wants, for a limited amount of time, before it has to be approved by anyone.  If you don’t agree with that setup maybe you should contact your congressman to get it changed.  And I don’t know what you mean about soldiers getting to vote on going to war.  Has anybody in our country ever gotten to vote on a war?

4) Reagan Put To Death For Treason

C’mon now, you’re just being silly.  Reagan did a lot of good for this country.  Sure he made some mistakes but you’re flying off the handle here.  I, for one, would say that Reagan wasn’t anywhere near as corrupt as say Clinton, who handed out pardons for cash in the twilight of his administration.  It doesn’t get more corrupt than that.

Ok,

“Does our government ever deal with terrorists? I don’t think so, nor should we. We must always put out the message that people can not get their way by engaging in terrorist activities.”

That is exactly what they did. We funded terrorism under Nixon as well Reagan/Bush all over the place. It was ok until it bites us on the ass then all of the sudden we get outraged.
Reagan traded arms to kidnappers to get them released. That sends what message?

“Ok, this was ugly. The whole thing was a mistake, but they did have good intentions.”

Good intentions? Ha. Very droll. Good for whom? Anyway, Good intentions or not. It was still treason. Iran was the enemy. The Iranian government, not mere individuals, were holding hostages. Giving aid to the enemy is treason. For any reason. Period.

“It seems to me that the President has all the right to declare war on whoever he wants, for a limited amount of time, before it has to be approved by anyone.”

Untrue in this instance. Congress had already strictly forbidden the president to send weapons to the contras or allow troops to train and assist them.
By doing so the president deliberately calculated to break the the law. As to his participation being debatable. If all this happened by rogue branches of the military then why was the president not more outraged? Why did he feel the need to apologise instead? Hmmmm...Debatable? Not at all. He and Bush broke the law. Period.

Treason...yes. High Treason. The worst kind.

Hey Tom, why don’t you take your tinfoil hat and go peddle crazy somewhere else, we’re all stocked up here.

When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.

-- Thomas Jefferson

Rob’s recently listened-to songs:

if freeing the hostages were that important, reagan/bush would have done it immediately. instead, they made a deal with the Iranian hostage takers NOT to release US citizens in their custody until AFTER the election. that’s dirty, and well-documented. recall the phrase “october surprise?”

reagan presided over a cabinet with more indictments than any other in US history. his entire regime was corrupt, and folks like you don’t want to look at the facts. that’s fine for you, because you’re not the hostage who was stuck in iran for extra time while your next president was hanging out on the golf course, knocking back martinis.

dirty corporate interests rule washington, and i’m frustrated that we don’t have much of a say. i’m still at a loss to come up with one good thing reagan did. let’s see,

1) preside over the largest growth in national debt until W took office, due to unrestricted spending on an irrational and unneccessary military buildup.

2) employ health policies which let AIDS spread rapidly, instead of treating it as the epidemic it was

3) waste valuable resources (time, money, people) fighting a war on drugs whose sole accomplishment was raising drug costs thus making dealers more rich

the list goes on and on. the 12 years of reagan/bush did very little to help the average american, and W has pushed us back into the sinkhole.