Posted on 11/03/2003 9:54:01 AM PST by fight_truth_decay
TRUTH ALERT:
October 30, 2003
What's all this fuss about Barbra Streisand's involvement in the upcoming CBS biopic about Ronald and Nancy Reagan? The Republican spin machine would like you to believe that Ms. Streisand, a well-known liberal activist, was intimately connected to the making of this film. The Drudge Report even said that she spent weeks on the set!
The truth? Ms. Streisand was on the set of The Reagans for a total of only 4 hours of one day. Any one of hundreds of people involved in its making could have told Mr. Drudge this truth, if he had only bothered to ask.
Furthermore, Ms. Streisand has never even read the script! She has also never seen the film, which stars her husband James Brolin. Mr. Brolin, as an actor in the movie, himself was not responsible for what is depicted in it - that was left up to the screenwriter, producers and director involved in the movie's production. Saying that Mr. Brolin's marriage to Ms. Streisand would have affected his performance is as ludicrous as the complaints about the way President and Nancy Reagan are depicted in the film.
What is going on instead is that the Republicans, who deify President Reagan, cannot stand that some of the more unpleasant truths about his character and presidency might be depicted in the movie, along with his positive actions. In fact, the film, we're told, presents a balanced portrait of a complicated man who said, when confronted with the AIDS crisis, "Maybe the lord brought down this plague because illicit sex is against the ten commandments." This has been changed in the film to, "Those who live in sin shall die by sin," but clearly the sentiment behind that statement is the same. No less a source than the World Health Organization recently said that Reagan was slow in responding to AIDS as a public health crisis, and could have even stopped the epidemic if he had taken it more seriously. Public records and multiple sources show that everything in the film, including his controversial statement about AIDS, is based on irrefutable facts.
Reagan is glorified by conservatives because what other Republican leader of recent history are they going to point towards? Richard Nixon? George H.W. Bush? Newt Gingrich? Are these men worthy of exalt? Conservatives love to boast of the 16 million jobs Reagan's economic policies generated. What they are more reluctant to mention, however, is that by cutting taxes and raising military spending, Reagan also created record budget deficits, increased inequality and tripled the national debt. Judged on their own terms, Reagan proponents would have to admit that Bill Clinton, who generated 23 million new jobs in the same amount of time in office and also turned a major deficit into the largest surplus ever, was a more successful president.
Speaking of Clinton, can you imagine what a biopic of Clinton would include? Of course, Clinton fans understand and accept the truth about the former president. They know that although he was a great president in many ways, overseeing economic prosperity and making great strides in creating a more peaceful world, he was also flawed. They don't try to prevent depictions of the truth from getting out there. Similarly, it is accepted by Democrats that portrayals of the Kennedy Family often include scandals. We must all understand that every human being embodies the good and the bad. There is no one out there who is perfect, not even our most prominent leaders ... and we must be honest in the way we portray them.
But this is what the Right Wing does when they are faced with a truth that is not 100% positive for their side - they spread vicious lies and attacks and scream and yell until they get their way. Instead of boycotting and trying to have the movie changed, why don't they all just wait to see the film when it airs like the rest of us.
Hopefully, the public will tune in to CBS on November 16th, and 18th to see the truth behind all this nonsense*, and to watch what is sure to be a very interesting and well-made movie.
... overseeing economic prosperity and making great strides in creating a more peaceful world...
Reagan ended the Cold War.
Clintoon bombed an aspirin factory.
Bush (SR. & JR.) defended Kuwait and liberated the Iraqi people.
Clintoon...ummm...wait what was it again...*cough cough* KOSOVO *cough cough*
What was that about libs creating a more peaceful world? Last I saw, liberal foreign policy consisted of "bend over and take it like you're in prison"
But then, I'm no politician...
They put this statement in quotes? They have proof that he actually said this?
They put this statement in quotes? They have proof that he actually said this?
They heard from someone who heard from their neighbor's housekeeper who heard from the busdriver who heard an office cleaner who overheard the... no, wait... they heard from someone whose aunt heard at the hairdresser from someone whose babysitter heard from someone on the bus....
oh, nevermind. What's important is that they know someone said it!
In a related story, Brolin has never heard the song "Send in the Clowns."
I would love to see what Ronald Reagan could have done to stop the spread of AIDS in Africa.
Sure it was, all Babs had to do to make him think she was ugly was to take her mask off.
It was these activists who were most responsible for the epidemic, not Ronald Reagan. The late Gary Shilts chronicled this horror of politics over health in And The Band Played On, wherein his sharpest barbs are reserved for these guys.
Being a political activist is never having to say you're sorry, and the story now has shifted to point the finger where it doesn't belong.
Yep, that's why Ethel Kennedy got Roone Arledge to spike a 20/20 news story revealing that the Kennedy men had affairs!
Similarly, it is accepted by Democrats that portrayals of the Kennedy Family often include scandals.
Yes, they often include a bit of drinking and hints of adultery.
They very rarely include the multitude of rapes and sexual assaults, the forced lobotomy, the child rape of the 14-year-old babysitter, the murders (by car or golf club), the drug abuse (by both JFK and that one who turned up dead with testicles injected full of heroin), JFK banging a Soviet spy while in office, the tax evasion, drunken boating, physical assault of a waitress or a female airport security guard, rum-running, Nazi support, oh… I could go on all day.
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