Obama’s Ronald Reagan Moment - Democratic Underground

McCamy Taylor

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Wed Mar-03-10 12:30 PM
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Obama’s Ronald Reagan Moment

Remember when candidate Obama said

I think Ronald Reaganchanged the trajectory of America in a way that Richard Nixon did not and in a way that Bill Clinton did not. He put us on a fundamentally different path because the country was ready for it. I think they felt like with all the excesses of the 1960s and 1970s and government had grown and grown but there wasn't much sense of accountability in terms of how it was operating. I think people, he just tapped into what people were already feeling, which was we want clarity we want optimism, we want a return to that sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship that had been missing.

http://www.openleft.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=3263

You thought he was kidding, right? You thought he was courting moderate Republicans? Or maybe seeking to distance himself from Rev. Jeremiah Wright, who had said such incendiary things as

"In spite of being in a world torn by war, in spite of being on a world destroyed by hate and decimated by distrust, in spite of being on a world where famine and greed are uneasy bed partners, in spite of being on a world where apartheid and apathy feed the fires of racism and hatred, in spite of being on a world where nuclear nightmare draws closer with each second, in spite of being on a ticking time bomb, with her clothes in rags, her body scarred and bruised and bleeding, her harp all but destroyed and with only one string left, she had the audacity to make music and praise God."

How many folks thought that Obama meant what he said about being a crowd pleasing, entrepreneur fostering president…like Ronald Reagan? That few. I am sometimes surprised at what a loyal following he had, with so many people convinced that he was not telling the truth about Afghanistan, about nuclear energy, about warrantless wiretaps----and about Reagan.

Reagan did not actually do a whole lot of anything. He let Bush run his foreign policy, with all his covert wars and under the table arms deals with our enemies. He let his cabinet secretaries pretty much run wild. But there is one thing he is remembered for, one instance in which he was more than just the nation’s generic white Dad.

On August 3, 1981 nearly 13,000 of the 17,500 members of the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATCO) walked off the job, hoping to disrupt the nation's transportation system to the extent that the federal government would accede to its demands for higher wages, a shorter work week, and better retirement benefits. At a press conference in the White House Rose Garden that same day, President Reagan responded with a stern ultimatum: The strikers were to return to work within 48 hours or face termination. As federal employees the controllers were violating the no-strike clause of their employment contracts. In 1955 Congress had made such strikes a crime punishable by a fine or one year of incarceration -- a law upheld by the Supreme Court in 1971. Nevertheless, 22 unauthorized strikes had occurred in recent years -- by postal workers, Government Printing Office and Library of Congress employees, and by air traffic controllers who staged "sick-outs" in 1969 and 1970

Reagan’s decision was an easy one. For

There wasnt much support for the PATCO strikers. The public sided with the government and exhibited little sympathy for individuals whose earnings were already well above the national average.

The result?

According to journalist Haynes Johnson, the decisive manner in which Reagan handled the PATCO strike convinced many Americans that he was "the kind of leader the country longed for and thought it had lost: a strong president"

http://eightiesclub.tripod.com/id296.htm

Another president, another recession, more striking public employees who make more than the average local wage in the poorest city in their state.

Teacher salaries at the high school average $72-78k. Apparently 50% of the students at the school are failing all of their classes, and the graduation rate is also under 50%. In an effort to turn the school around, the superintendent requested some changes be made whereby the school day would be slightly extended, teachers would perform some extra tutoring, etc.

The union balked and refused the terms, so now she is firing the entire teaching staff of the high school and replacing them. This is yet another example of unions digging their own graves by refusing to negotiate or accept reasonable terms. Sentiment is on the side of the superintendent, at least among the folks I have discussed the issue with.

http://www.businessinsider.com/henry-blodget-unionized-rhode-island-teachers-refuse-to-work-25-minutes-more-per-day-so-town-fires-all-of-them-2010-2

Now, this was not exactly a Ronald Reagan moment. These were not federal employees and therefore they were not under the President’s jurisdiction. But Obama saw opportunity knocking.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan has "applauded" the move to fire every teacher at Rhode Island's Central Falls High School, the Providence Journal reports.

Snip

But Duncan says that education officials are "showing courage and doing the right thing for kids

Hmm. So I guess it was Education Secretary Duncan who saw opportunity knocking and who seized it. But at least the press gave Obama the headline as in

Obama Official Applauds Rhode Island Teacher Firings

http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2010/02/24/politics/politicalhotsheet/entry6239681.shtml

And Obama certainly seized the day---a week later—in a most Ronald Reaganesque manner.

A long-troubled Rhode Island high school that fired all its educators last week is an example of the need for accountability over student performance, President Barack Obama said Monday during an address in Washington.
Obama cited a decision last week to fire 93 teachers, administrators and other support staff by the end of the year at Central Falls High School as an example of school reform. No more than half of those teachers could be hired back under federal rules.

http://www.thebostonchannel.com/education/22713048/detail.html

So now, if you Google “Obama Reagan teachers fired”, you get 50,000 hits.

And that is how a Ronald Reagan moment is created! Because it is so much easier to blame the teachers than to blame society which made Central Falls the poorest city in the state of Rhode Island.

Capital must protect itself in every way...Debts must be collected and loans and mortgages foreclosed as soon as possible. When through a process of law the common people have lost their homes, they will be more tractable and more easily governed by the strong arm of the law applied by the central power of leading financiers. People without homes will not quarrel with their leaders. This is well known among our principle men now engaged in forming an imperialism of capitalism to govern the world. By dividing the people we can get them to expend their energies in fighting over questions of no importance to us except as teachers of the common herd.
-J.P. Morgan

And that, my fellow Democrats, is how a Divide and Conquer moment is created. And if corporate America is lucky, no one worth mentioning will ask how a town in Rhode Island comes to be so poor when the state is the 17th richest in the country.