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Ronald Reagan: Cut-and-Runner?
The Nation ^ | 08/11/06

Posted on 08/11/2006 1:42:39 PM PDT by presidio9

In a recent speech, Vice President Dick Cheney trotted out the Republicans' ugly, low-road campaign tactic of positioning themselves as strong and the Democrats as weak on national security. Nothing new there.

But what was really worth noting is that Cheney essentially called Ronald Reagan a cut-and-runner, who had emboldened the extremists with his withdrawal from Beirut in 1983. Hardball's Chris Mathews kept re-running this quote two evenings ago, and did not even understand the political significance that Cheney was calling the hero of the conservative movement an appeaser of Islamic fascism.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Foreign Affairs; Government; Politics/Elections; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: tallhappyangryloser
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1 posted on 08/11/2006 1:42:40 PM PDT by presidio9
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To: presidio9
Cheney essentially called Ronald Reagan a cut-and-runner

Perhaps, but even Reagan noted the Beirut situation as the worst thing he did while president.

2 posted on 08/11/2006 1:43:38 PM PDT by krb (If you're not outraged, people probably like having you around.)
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To: presidio9
So you are aligning yourself with the demagoguery of the Nation?
3 posted on 08/11/2006 1:44:42 PM PDT by tallhappy (Juntos Podemos!)
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To: presidio9
In a recent speech, Vice President Dick Cheney trotted out the Republicans' ugly, low-road campaign tactic of positioning themselves as strong and the Democrats as weak on national security.

Are you gonna cry about it?

4 posted on 08/11/2006 1:45:00 PM PDT by Sir Gawain
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To: presidio9

Well, there are plenty of us that remember he did cut and run; but on the whole did a great more good for our country and is rightly remembered as a hero. Alexander Haig just last weekend stated in an interview the pull-out from Beruit was a huge mistake and the reason he left the administration.


5 posted on 08/11/2006 1:45:49 PM PDT by WilliamWallace1999
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To: presidio9

The difference is, we were there in the role of peacekeepers, mistakingly, not to directly confront the terrorists as is part of our stated mission in Iraq. If we flee from that imperative now, the terrorists will see it as our being unable to fufill our mission and that they beat us. In Beruit 1983, we left with the recognition the US was not in a position to fufill its mission of keeping peace an in environment with so much hostility to Americans and that we were just going to be drawn into an unwanted war there. The mission in Iraq is entirely different and cannot and should not be retreated from because we have stated we are these to take on and destroy the terrorists.


6 posted on 08/11/2006 1:46:12 PM PDT by MikeA (Not voting out of anger in November is a vote for Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House)
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To: tallhappy; sully777
So you are aligning yourself with the demagoguery of the Nation?

Yes, that's exactly what I am doing. I only post articles that I am in 100% agreement with, because FR is just so much more fun when a thread gets hundreds of responses saying "This author is completely on the money and I am so glad I read this article."

(twit)

7 posted on 08/11/2006 1:48:06 PM PDT by presidio9 (“The term ‘civilians’ does not exist in Islamic religious law.”)
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To: MikeA

it was also the Cold War, and the dynamic was totally different.


8 posted on 08/11/2006 1:48:46 PM PDT by avital2
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To: presidio9
(twit)

Yes you are.

9 posted on 08/11/2006 1:50:33 PM PDT by tallhappy (Juntos Podemos!)
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To: presidio9

There is no depth the Nation, the magazine that hated and continues to hate Ronald Reagan, will stoop to.

First, they complain about Dick Cheney being an evil, meanie, partisan who for political gain criticizes only Democrats.

Next, they complain about him being bipartisan by criticizing Republicans as well as Democrats.

I'd like to say, make up your !@%&* mind...if I thought the writers of the Nation had minds.


10 posted on 08/11/2006 1:51:38 PM PDT by mjolnir ("All great change in America begins at the dinner table.")
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To: presidio9

Too bad Reagan was busy RIDDING THE WORLD OF COMMUNISM AND BEING FOUGHT TOOTH AND NAIL DOING THAT! MAYBE IF HE WASN'T BEING TORN DOWN FROM WITHIN HIS OWN COUNTRY HE COULD HAVE FOUGHT MORE BAD GUYS.

And like the dems would have went along with that then. * snort *

Much like Bush now is being fought tooth and nail trying to fight islamofascism.


11 posted on 08/11/2006 1:51:40 PM PDT by eyespysomething (There is no such thing as global warming. Chuck Norris was cold, so he turned the sun up.)
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To: tallhappy

I'm not the one posting asinine questions my friend.


12 posted on 08/11/2006 1:51:52 PM PDT by presidio9 (“The term ‘civilians’ does not exist in Islamic religious law.”)
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To: krb
There was a post within the last week that Reagan wanted retaliatory air strikes after the Beirut bombing but Weinberger opposed it (perhaps insubordinately). I don't remember the original source but is was someone in Reagan's administration.
13 posted on 08/11/2006 1:54:07 PM PDT by BigBobber
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To: krb
Ronald Reagan made his biggest mistake by buying into the liberal "peacekeeper" crap and sending the Marines in as noncombatants in the first place. He learned fast the futility of such a ridiculous charade and pulled our men out of a true no-win situation.

Pulling the Marines out of Beirut in 1983 was a correction of a liberal impulse which he wisely never gave in to again. But one certainly would never expect toilet paper like The Nation to tell that part of the whole truth.

14 posted on 08/11/2006 1:54:39 PM PDT by hinckley buzzard
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To: presidio9
As I stated in a previous thread today concerning that situation, we weren't actually in a war footing, but in a ridiculous 'peacekeeping' mode. Reagan removed the Marines from that absurd 'position', and if anyone wants to call it a 'cut and run' that is their right, but it does not accurately describe the situation.

We should have stayed out of it and let Israel cleanse Lebanon at the time, IMO.

Fortunately, Reagan display a backbone of steel over the long haul, both removing the communist infestation from Grenada (a first, as in the first time a communist 'invasion' was wholly removed), and later bombing the shi'ite out of Libya.

To point at the root problem of our so called 'weakness' in the eyes of muslims, you need look no further than Carter and his bungling of the hostage crisis, IMO.

Cheney is right in a sense, but it would have been better if he would have listed the shortcomings of all our administrations concerning the ME starting with Mr. Malaise himself, Jimmy Carter.
15 posted on 08/11/2006 1:55:09 PM PDT by Pox (If it's a Coward you are searching for, you need look no further than the Democrats.)
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To: krb

He did make a mistake. A big mistake. One of many mistakes and oversights over many decades that let the terrorist problem festor and come to fruition. That doesn't change the fact that I see RWR as the best President of my lifetime and one of the true greats.


16 posted on 08/11/2006 1:55:38 PM PDT by SmoothTalker
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To: presidio9
You are the one posting excerpts from and links to asinine magazines.

You think that what you are showing is how this Nation magazine is off base? Wow. What brilliant insight.

Did you just learn of this magazine?

Come on, you are a moron and a buffoon. You waste your time reading leftist drivel and then posting it here.

If you believe it then your actions make sense.

Otherwise you are an idiot in many ways.

17 posted on 08/11/2006 1:56:09 PM PDT by tallhappy (Juntos Podemos!)
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To: presidio9

Leftist scumbags don't care a bit about Beirut 1983 except to try to smear the great President Reagan. It was a grave mistake to withdraw without kicking the crap out of Syria and Hezbollah, BUT..... Reagan was gravely constrained by a majority-Demagogue Congress led by Tip O'Neill pushing for capitulation. Even the best president can't do much with the kind of weasel Congress we had in 1983..... also, that was in the context of the huge pressure of the Cold War and early in the Islamo-fascist jihad against the West, so there was much more justification for focusing upon US-Soviet issues over terrorism issues. NOW, however, there is absolutely no excuse any longer for not making world jihad terrorism the #1 issue, and leftist weasel scumbags at The Nation are merely using this issue in the most disingenuous way since all they care about is capitulating to terrorists as fast as possible.


18 posted on 08/11/2006 1:56:31 PM PDT by Enchante (There are 3 kinds of lies: Lies, Damned Lies, and Mainstream Journalism)
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To: tallhappy
Come on, you are a moron and a buffoon. You waste your time reading leftist drivel and then posting it here.

Actually, the more accurate root of the problem seems to be your inability to simply ignore articles that you don't want to read. It's easy. You should try it some time. Meanwhile, literally hundreds of people here on FR somehow seem to LIKE rebutting viewpoints that they disagree with. I know it seems counter-intuitive to low-IQ types such as yourself, but the numbers back me up.

19 posted on 08/11/2006 1:59:16 PM PDT by presidio9 (“The term ‘civilians’ does not exist in Islamic religious law.”)
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To: presidio9
There's a small problem with the statement that Reagan can be accused "cut and run" in Lebanon back in the 80s. Yes, leaving Beirut after the Marines was killed was a mistake, however, the situation is completely different from Iraq today and the response to the suicide truck bombing made much more sense in context.

We were in Beirut to protect the "Palestinian" Muslim Arabs from the Lebanese Christians whose country the PLO had been trying to seize. When another Muslim Arab group (Hezbollah) blew up our Marine barracks it no longer made sense to stay there and protect the other Muslim Arabs. "Screw 'em" was the universal. There were plenty of folks at the time who believe that the Maronite Christians would wipe out both the PLO and the tiny nutball group Hezbollah. The problem was the Syria moved in after we were gone. By then we couldn't go back in realistically.

In Iraq we invaded and deposed the sitting government. Despite what the DBM says, there are plenty of Iraqis, I would argue the vast majority, who welcomed us and our removal of Saddam, and they want a chance to form a free and democratic society. We owe them that chance. We owed the PLO nothing.

Now, you can argue that we owed the Maronite Christians, but we didn't realize that we were needed to protect them at the time. They and their Israeli allies were in a relatively good position at the time and if we stopped holding them back they should have been able to get the job done.

Hindsight is 20/20, but it was not 'cut and run' in the same sense as today and Iraq.

By they way, this "low road" and "dirty trick" line appears to be the latest faxed talking point. David Corn has an article with exactly the same tone (or is this it?)
20 posted on 08/11/2006 2:01:31 PM PDT by Phsstpok (Often wrong, but never in doubt)
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