“Dayhoff Westminster Soundtrack:” Kevin Dayhoff – “Soundtrack Division of Old Silent Movies” - https://kevindayhoff.blogspot.com/ combined with “Dayhoff Westminster” – Writer, artist, fire and police chaplain. For art, writing and travel see https://kevindayhoffart.blogspot.com/ Authority Caroline Babylon, Treasurer
Journalist @baltimoresun writer artist runner #amwriting Chaplain PIO #partylikeajournalist
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Showing posts with label Pres 1981 40 Reagan-Ronald. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Pres 1981 40 Reagan-Ronald. Show all posts
It has become conventional wisdom that President Reagan "restored America's confidence," an achievement that became forever encapsulated in political lore by the famous "It's morning again in America" television commercial that preceded his landslide re-election in 1984. But the reality is that Reagan didn't restore something that had been lost, he simply reminded Washington that it had been there all the time. Americans never lost faith in themselves or their capacity to shape better futures for themselves and their children. It was professional politicians inside the Beltway and fuzzy-minded thinkers at places like Harvard and the New York Times who lost sight of the country's boundless possibilities.
Politicians who are principled enough to point out the fraud of Social Security, referring to it as a lie and Ponzi scheme, are under siege. Acknowledgment of Social Security's problems is not the same as calling for the abandonment of its recipients. Instead, it's a call to take actions now, while there's time to avert a disaster. Let's look at it.
Listening to some establishment Republicans grousing about the field of GOP presidential candidates should serve as a warning. Republicans, if they are not careful, are in danger of catching the same virus that infected Democrats in 2008.
A legally frivolous but potentially dangerous lawsuit filed against Catholic University by a crosstown rival has become a national cause celebre for liberal activists who want to shove their notions of college life down the private religious school's throat. At issue is CUA President John Garvey's decision to reinstate same-sex dorms to discourage underage drinking and casual sex among the incoming freshman class, something he has every legal and moral right to do.
Moments after tramping out of my building's swaying stairwell and into the street during August's D.C. earthquake, I checked my phone's Twitter app and got my first good postquake laugh. Salon's Alex Pareene cracked: "I think Chris Christie just jumped into the race."
Well, Florida has done it – and it will explode the whole 2012 election process, as this space has predicted for months. Gov. Rick Scott and his legislative leaders’ special panel has declared that Florida’s presidential primary will be held January 31, 2011, more than a month ahead of schedule and well before the March 6 date that Republican rules set as the earliest date to hold a primary without losing half of their delegate power at the national GOP convention.
Click here for a larger image: http://twitpic.com/11txqk
Today would be President Ronald Reagan's 99th birthday. In honor of this occasion, we post a reading list about Reaganomics with the hope that Democrat leaders in state government will discover tax cuts as an avenue to spur economic growth in Maryland and lead the state out of the recession.
Unfortunately, Maryland has pursued the opposite course. As the state was entering a severe economic recession, General Assembly Democrats allowed Governor Martin O'Malley to foist the most historic, massive tax increase on our citizens.
Businesses already hammered by the recession were crushed by O'Malley's anti-business pursuit of higher sales taxes, personal income taxes, corporate taxes and motor vehicle excise taxes. At the same time, O'Malley was adopting more stringent regulations that have added to the cost of doing business in Maryland.
In three short years, Maryland's ranking as a state favorable for economic development has plummeted from 24th to 45th.
This was the biggest one-year drop ever in the history of the rankings and was based upon the tax hikes initiated by O'Malley: "Maryland's drop from 24th to 45th out of 50 states on the Index is attributable to an increase in most of the state's major taxes for FY 2009.
They raised the corporate income tax rate to 8.25% from 7%, the sales tax rate to 6% from 5%, and the cigarette excise tax to $2.00 from $1.00 per pack. Maryland also created four new income tax brackets, raising taxes on filers earning more than $150,000 per year. The state's top personal income tax rate is now 6.25% (up from 4.75%); that's on top of a weighted average local option rate of 2.98%. Maryland now has by far the worst personal income tax in the country, with a significantly lower score than second-place California."
With these kinds of rankings, it is obvious that Maryland needs a turn-around artist with the talents of President Reagan. In a 1996 study titled "Supply-Side Tax Cuts and the Truth About the Reagan Economic Record" by William A. Niskanen and Stephen Moore, the Reagan economic plan is described as having four key points:
"In 1981 Ronald Reagan entered the White House and immediately implemented a dramatic new economic policy agenda for the country that was dubbed "Reaganomics." Reaganomics consisted of four key elements to reverse the high-inflation, slow-growth economic record of the 1970s: (1) a restrictive monetary policy designed to stabilize the value of the dollar and end runaway inflation; (2) a 25 percent across-the-board tax cut enacted (The Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981) designed to spur savings, investment, work, and economic efficiency; (3) a promise to balance the budget through domestic spending restraint; and (4) an agenda to roll back government regulation."
According to an economic analysis by the Joint Economic Committee of the House of Representatives: "The Reagan tax cuts, like similar measures enacted in the 1920s and 1960s, showed that reducing excessive tax rates stimulates growth, reduces tax avoidance, and can increase the amount and share of tax payments generated by the rich. High top tax rates can induce counterproductive behavior and suppress revenues, factors that are usually missed or understated in government static revenue analysis. Furthermore, the key assumption of static revenue analysis that economic growth is not affected by tax changes is disproved by the experience of previous tax reduction programs."
An economic program for Maryland's future must include a rollback of taxes and government regulations combined with true restraint on government spending in the FY11 budget.
For more on President Ronald Reagan and his successful economic policies, check out the links on our website at www.mdsenategop.com.
For more than half a century, historians, sociologists, journalists, psychologists, political scientists, and philosophers have studied, probed, analyzed, pondered, attacked, lauded, and attempted to explain that force that is American political conservatism. Sometimes this avalanche of books, articles, and op-eds has veered weirdly into the realms of psychobabble (once a group of left-leaning psychiatrists, without ever meeting or talking to him, diagnosed conservative Senator Barry Goldwater, the 1964 Republican nominee for president, as a megalomaniac); at other times books focused on relatively minor pieces of the conservative mosaic, creating straw men against whom they proceeded to rail. Occasionally, conservative insiders have attempted to put their own spin on defining what conservatism is, or at least what it once was.
Now comes Patrick Allitt. The accepted norm in academia is for praise of conservatism to be left to the practitioners while others, more “objective,’’ more “scholarly,’’ denounce conservatives as morally and intellectually inferior. That’s the game and them’s the rules.
Michael Winship sees an emerging American movement; Obama sets new goals for Afghanistan; Robert B. Reich compares Reagonomics and Obamanomics; John Kerry wants to ratify nuclear test ban treaty; Obama offers help to areas threatened by floods in midwest; the world marks Earth Hour; and more ... Browse our continually updating front page at http://www.truthout.org
t r u t h o u t 03.28
Michael Winship That's No Angry Mob, It's a Movement http://www.truthout.org/032809A Michael Winship, Truthout: "A college friend of mine, after much quaffing from the keg, so to speak, would start singing a faux hymn that began, 'We are sliding into sin - whee!' I've thought of his bleary tune from time to time as we all watched our financial institutions slide from thoughtless, wretched excess into calamity, aided and abetted by deregulation and bailouts, dragging the rest of us along on their speed bump-free ride."
Obama Sets Qaeda Defeat as Top Goal in Afghanistan http://www.truthout.org/032809B Ross Colvin, Reuters: "President Barack Obama unveiled a new war strategy for Afghanistan on Friday with a key goal -- to crush al Qaeda militants there and in Pakistan who he said were plotting new attacks on the United States."
Robert B. Reich Obamanomics Isn't About Big Government http://www.truthout.org/032809C Robert B. Reich, The Wall Street Journal: "Twenty-eight years ago, Ronald Reagan used the severe economic downturn of 1980-82 to implement an economic philosophy that not only gave force and meaning to a wide range of initiatives but also offered a way back to sustained economic growth. Is there a similarly powerful animating idea behind Obamanomics?"
Senator Seeks to Ratify Nuclear Test Ban Pact http://www.truthout.org/032809D Reuters: "The chairman of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, John Kerry, said on Friday he had begun laying the groundwork for Senate ratification of a global pact banning nuclear tests."
Obama Monitors Midwest Flooding, Pledges Help http://www.truthout.org/032809E Liz Sidoti, The Associated Press: "Seeking to avoid a Hurricane Katrina-like leadership failure, President Barack Obama assured the nation Saturday he was keeping close watch on the Midwest floods and putting the government's full weight behind efforts to prevent disaster."
Earth Hour Participants to Turn Off PCs, Smartphones http://www.truthout.org/032809F Nathan Eddy, eWeek.com: "This year's Earth Hour event is expected to draw participants from all seven continents, who will turn off their smartphones, PCs and lights for an hour on Saturday. Major technology companies such as RIM, maker of the BlackBerry, are participating, but an Earth Hour spokesman wants businesses of any size to know they can participate."
20090328 SDOSM Truthout for March 28 2009
Kevin Dayhoff www.kevindayhoff.net http://kevindayhoff.blogspot.com/
William Henry Harrison! James K. Polk! Millard Fillmore! Chester Arthur! Grover Cleveland! Warren Harding! Calvin Coolidge!
It must be Presidents’ Day on NRO.
Below, our contributors select their favorite presidents. Don’t worry: Washington, Lincoln, and Reagan also receive their due.
MARK NEWGENT
The obvious choice for a conservative is Ronald Reagan — if only I had understood his true greatness during his presidency. A liberal-by-default in my youth, I instinctively scorned all things Reagan. As I matured and found myself on the right, however, I returned to Reagan and discovered why so many loved the man and why I’m proud to call myself a conservative now.
Reagan was an autodidact. He did his own research and wrote most of his own speeches. Detractors called him an “amiable dunce” and “unlettered bumpkin.” They underestimated the depth of his intellect. After all, what “dunce” could embarrass Robert F. Kennedy in a debate and hold his own against William F. Buckley Jr.?
More important, Reagan believed in the power of ideas, especially the idea that “this breed called Americans” had the capacity to govern themselves better than distant bureaucrats. In this age of encroaching government, those currently in power may think that idea quaint. I believe it is more powerful than ever.
WASHINGTON -- Barack Obama wants to speak at the Brandenburg Gate. He figures it would be a nice backdrop. The supporting cast -- a cheering audience and a few fainting frauleins -- would be a picturesque way to bolster his foreign policy credentials.
What Obama does not seem to understand is that the Brandenburg Gate is something you earn. President Reagan earned the right to speak there because his relentless pressure had brought the Soviet empire to its knees and he was demanding its final "tear down this wall" liquidation. When President Kennedy visited the Brandenburg Gate on the day of his "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech, he was representing a country that was prepared to go to the brink of nuclear war to defend West Berlin.
Who is Obama representing? And what exactly has he done in his lifetime to merit appropriating the Brandenburg Gate as a campaign prop?
[…]
Does Obama not see the incongruity? It's as if a German pol took a campaign trip to America and demanded the Statue of Liberty as a venue for a campaign speech. (The Germans have now gently nudged Obama into looking at other venues.)
Americans are beginning to notice Obama's elevated opinion of himself.
There's nothing new about narcissism in politics…
[…]
Obama is a three-year senator without a single important legislative achievement to his name, a former Illinois state senator who voted "present" nearly 130 times. As president of the Harvard Law Review, as law professor and as legislator, has he ever produced a single notable piece of scholarship? Written a single memorable article? His most memorable work is a biography of his favorite subject: himself.
[…]
At this point Mr. Krauthammer was just warming up. To read the rest of the column go here: The Audacity of Vanity.
I received this in an e-mail from the Grammy and I thought it worth sharing:
"The truth is, politics and morality are inseparable. And as morality's foundation is religion, religion and politics are necessarily related. We need religion as a guide. We need it because we are imperfect, and our government needs the church, because only those humble enough to admit they're sinners can bring to democracy the tolerance it requires in order to survive. A state is nothing more than a reflection of its citizens: The more decent the citizens, the more decent the state. If you practice a religion, whether you're Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, or guided by some other faith, then your private life will be influenced by a sense of moral obligation, and so, too, will your public life."
For President Ronald Reagan fans – if you have not been to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Foundation web site – please do so.You will love it…
http://www.reaganfoundation.org/welcome.asp
Welcome to the official web site for the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation. Our goal is to ensure present and future generations will be able to learn first hand about the legacy of the man who came to be known as “the great communicator”. From this site you can access Presidential Papers and Presidential Photographs, learn about the Museum and Air Force One, become a member of the Library, learn about our events, and shop at our online Museum Store.
Seeing it next to the Arizona Memorial really puts its size into perspective.
Notice the respect that they give the Arizona Memorial when passing it.
Here's what it takes to run a ship this size:
When the Bridge pipes "Man the Rail" there is a lot of rail to man on this monster. Shoulder to shoulder around 4+ acres. Her displacement is about 100,000 tons with full complements.
Capability
Top speed exceeds 30 knots
Powered by two nuclear reactors that can operate for more than 20 years without refueling
Expected to operate in the fleet for about 50 years
Carries over 80 combat aircraft
Three arresting cables can stop a 28-ton aircraft going 150 miles per hour in less than 400 feet
Size
Towers 20 stories above the waterline
1092 feet long; nearly as long as the EmpireStateBuilding is tall
Flight deck covers 4.5 acres
4 bronze propellers, each 21 feet across, weighing 66,200 pounds
2 rudders, each 29 by 22 feet and weighing 50 tons
4 high speed aircraft elevators, each over 4,000 square feet
Dates
Dec. 8, 1994 Contract awarded to Newport News Shipbuilding
Feb 12, 1998 Keel laid
Oct 1, 2000 Pre-commissioning Unit established
March 4, 2001 Christened by Mrs. Nancy Reagan
May 5, 2003 First underway
July 12, 2003 Commissioned
July 23, 2004 Arrived at homeport in San Diego, CA
Capacity
Home to about 6,000 Navy personnel
Carries enough food and supplies to operate for 90 days
18,150 meals served daily
Distillation plants provide 400,000 gallons of fresh water from sea water daily, enough for 2000 homes
Nearly 30,000 light fixtures and 1,325 miles of cable and wiring 1,400 telephones, 14,000 pillowcases and 28,000 sheets
Costs the Navy approximately $250,000 per day for pier side operation
Costs the Navy approximately $2.5 million per day for underway operations (Sailor's salaries included).
Remarks by the President Upon the Death of President Ronald Reagan Ambassador's Residence Paris, France
For Immediate Release Office of the Press Secretary June 5, 2004
12:41 A.M. (Local)
THE PRESIDENT: This is a sad hour in the life of America. A great American life has come to an end. I have just spoken to Nancy Reagan. On behalf of our whole nation, Laura and I offered her and the Reagan family our prayers and our condolences.
Ronald Reagan won America's respect with his greatness, and won its love with his goodness. He had the confidence that comes with conviction, the strength that comes with character, the grace that comes with humility, and the humor that comes with wisdom. He leaves behind a nation he restored and a world he helped save.
During the years of President Reagan, America laid to rest an era of division and self-doubt. And because of his leadership, the world laid to rest an era of fear and tyranny. Now, in laying our leader to rest, we say thank you.
He always told us that for America, the best was yet to come. We comfort ourselves in the knowledge that this is true for him, too. His work is done, and now a shining city awaits him. May God bless Ronald Reagan.
1.How do you tell a communist? Well, it's someone who reads Marx and Lenin. And how do you tell an anti-communist? It's someone who understand Marx and Lenin.
2.Those young people [demand] the right to send blood to the enemy in Vietnam. I think they should be allowed to do that--providing they send it in the original container." -- as governor of California on anti-war protestors
3.Depression is when you're out of work. A recession is when your neighbor is out of work. Recovery is when Jimmy Carter's out of work." -- on his opponent in the 1980 presidential campaign
4.I'm not worried about the deficit. It's big enough to take care of itself." -- on the federal budget, 1984
5.The party official asks a farmer how thinks are going, and the farmer replies that the harvest is so bountiful that the potatoes would reach the foot of God if piled on top of one another. 'But this is the Soviet Union,' says the commissar. 'There is no God here.' The farmer replies, 'That's right. There are no potatoes either.' --a favorite joke about the former U.S.S.R.
For President Ronald Reagan fans – if you have not been to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Foundation web site – please do so.You will love it…
http://www.reaganfoundation.org/welcome.asp
Welcome to the official web site for the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation. Our goal is to ensure present and future generations will be able to learn first hand about the legacy of the man who came to be known as “the great communicator”. From this site you can access Presidential Papers and Presidential Photographs, learn about the Museum and Air Force One, become a member of the Library, learn about our events, and shop at our online Museum Store.
West Berlin, Germany
June 12, 1987
This speech was delivered to the people of West Berlin, yet it was also audible on the East side of the Berlin wall. 2,703 words
Thank you very much.
Chancellor Kohl, Governing Mayor Diepgen, ladies and gentlemen: Twenty-four years ago, President John F. Kennedy visited Berlin, speaking to the people of this city and the world at the City Hall. Well, since then two other presidents have come, each in his turn, to Berlin. And today I, myself, make my second visit to your city.
We come to Berlin, we American presidents, because it's our duty to speak, in this place, of freedom. But I must confess, we're drawn here by other things as well: by the feeling of history in this city, more than 500 years older than our own nation; by the beauty of the Grunewald and the Tiergarten; most of all, by your courage and determination. Perhaps the composer Paul Lincke understood something about American presidents. You see, like so many presidents before me, I come here today because wherever I go, whatever I do: Ich hab noch einen Koffer in Berlin. [I still have a suitcase in Berlin.]
Our gathering today is being broadcast throughout Western Europe and North America. I understand that it is being seen and heard as well in the East. To those listening throughout Eastern Europe, a special word: Although I cannot be with you, I address my remarks to you just as surely as to those standing here before me. For I join you, as I join your fellow countrymen in the West, in this firm, this unalterable belief: Es gibt nur ein Berlin. [There is only one Berlin.]
Behind me stands a wall that encircles the free sectors of this city, part of a vast system of barriers that divides the entire continent of Europe. From the Baltic, south, those barriers cut across Germany in a gash of barbed wire, concrete, dog runs, and guard towers. Farther south, there may be no visible, no obvious wall. But there remain armed guards and checkpoints all the same--still a restriction on the right to travel, still an instrument to impose upon ordinary men and women the will of a totalitarian state. Yet it is here in Berlin where the wall emerges most clearly; here, cutting across your city, where the news photo and the television screen have imprinted this brutal division of a continent upon the mind of the world. Standing before the Brandenburg Gate, every man is a German, separated from his fellow men. Every man is a Berliner, forced to look upon a scar.
President von Weizsacker has said, "The German question is open as long as the Brandenburg Gate is closed." Today I say: As long as the gate is closed, as long as this scar of a wall is permitted to stand, it is not the German question alone that remains open, but the question of freedom for all mankind. Yet I do not come here to lament. For I find in Berlin a message of hope, even in the shadow of this wall, a message of triumph.
In this season of spring in 1945, the people of Berlin emerged from their air-raid shelters to find devastation. Thousands of miles away, the people of the United States reached out to help. And in 1947 Secretary of State--as you've been told--George Marshall announced the creation of what would become known as the Marshall Plan. Speaking precisely 40 years ago this month, he said: "Our policy is directed not against any country or doctrine, but against hunger, poverty, desperation, and chaos."
In the Reichstag a few moments ago, I saw a display commemorating this 40th anniversary of the Marshall Plan. I was struck by the sign on a burnt-out, gutted structure that was being rebuilt. I understand that Berliners of my own generation can remember seeing signs like it dotted throughout the western sectors of the city. The sign read simply: "The Marshall Plan is helping here to strengthen the free world." A strong, free world in the West, that dream became real. Japan rose from ruin to become an economic giant. Italy, France, Belgium--virtually every nation in Western Europe saw political and economic rebirth; the European Community was founded.
In West Germany and here in Berlin, there took place an economic miracle, the Wirtschaftswunder. Adenauer, Erhard, Reuter, and other leaders understood the practical importance of liberty--that just as truth can flourish only when the journalist is given freedom of speech, so prosperity can come about only when the farmer and businessman enjoy economic freedom. The German leaders reduced tariffs, expanded free trade, lowered taxes. From 1950 to 1960 alone, the standard of living in West Germany and Berlin doubled.
Where four decades ago there was rubble, today in West Berlin there is the greatest industrial output of any city in Germany--busy office blocks, fine homes and apartments, proud avenues, and the spreading lawns of parkland. Where a city's culture seemed to have been destroyed, today there are two great universities, orchestras and an opera, countless theaters, and museums. Where there was want, today there's abundance--food, clothing, automobiles--the wonderful goods of the Ku'damm. From devastation, from utter ruin, you Berliners have, in freedom, rebuilt a city that once again ranks as one of the greatest on earth. The Soviets may have had other plans. But my friends, there were a few things the Soviets didn't count on--Berliner Herz, Berliner Humor, ja, und Berliner Schnauze. [Berliner heart, Berliner humor, yes, and a Berliner Schnauze.]
In the 1950s, Khrushchev predicted: "We will bury you." But in the West today, we see a free world that has achieved a level of prosperity and well-being unprecedented in all human history. In the Communist world, we see failure, technological backwardness, declining standards of health, even want of the most basic kind--too little food. Even today, the Soviet Union still cannot feed itself. After these four decades, then, there stands before the entire world one great and inescapable conclusion: Freedom leads to prosperity. Freedom replaces the ancient hatreds among the nations with comity and peace. Freedom is the victor.
And now the Soviets themselves may, in a limited way, be coming to understand the importance of freedom. We hear much from Moscow about a new policy of reform and openness. Some political prisoners have been released. Certain foreign news broadcasts are no longer being jammed. Some economic enterprises have been permitted to operate with greater freedom from state control.
Are these the beginnings of profound changes in the Soviet state? Or are they token gestures, intended to raise false hopes in the West, or to strengthen the Soviet system without changing it? We welcome change and openness; for we believe that freedom and security go together, that the advance of human liberty can only strengthen the cause of world peace. There is one sign the Soviets can make that would be unmistakable, that would advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace.
General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!
I understand the fear of war and the pain of division that afflict this continent-- and I pledge to you my country's efforts to help overcome these burdens. To be sure, we in the West must resist Soviet expansion. So we must maintain defenses of unassailable strength. Yet we seek peace; so we must strive to reduce arms on both sides.
Beginning 10 years ago, the Soviets challenged the Western alliance with a grave new threat, hundreds of new and more deadly SS-20 nuclear missiles, capable of striking every capital in Europe. The Western alliance responded by committing itself to a counter-deployment unless the Soviets agreed to negotiate a better solution; namely, the elimination of such weapons on both sides. For many months, the Soviets refused to bargain in earnestness. As the alliance, in turn, prepared to go forward with its counter-deployment, there were difficult days--days of protests like those during my 1982 visit to this city--and the Soviets later walked away from the table.
But through it all, the alliance held firm. And I invite those who protested then-- I invite those who protest today--to mark this fact: Because we remained strong, the Soviets came back to the table. And because we remained strong, today we have within reach the possibility, not merely of limiting the growth of arms, but of eliminating, for the first time, an entire class of nuclear weapons from the face of the earth.
As I speak, NATO ministers are meeting in Iceland to review the progress of our proposals for eliminating these weapons. At the talks in Geneva, we have also proposed deep cuts in strategic offensive weapons. And the Western allies have likewise made far-reaching proposals to reduce the danger of conventional war and to place a total ban on chemical weapons.
While we pursue these arms reductions, I pledge to you that we will maintain the capacity to deter Soviet aggression at any level at which it might occur. And in cooperation with many of our allies, the United States is pursuing the Strategic Defense Initiative--research to base deterrence not on the threat of offensive retaliation, but on defenses that truly defend; on systems, in short, that will not target populations, but shield them. By these means we seek to increase the safety of Europe and all the world. But we must remember a crucial fact: East and West do not mistrust each other because we are armed; we are armed because we mistrust each other. And our differences are not about weapons but about liberty. When President Kennedy spoke at the City Hall those 24 years ago, freedom was encircled, Berlin was under siege. And today, despite all the pressures upon this city, Berlin stands secure in its liberty. And freedom itself is transforming the globe.
In the Philippines, in South and Central America, democracy has been given a rebirth. Throughout the Pacific, free markets are working miracle after miracle of economic growth. In the industrialized nations, a technological revolution is taking place--a revolution marked by rapid, dramatic advances in computers and telecommunications.
In Europe, only one nation and those it controls refuse to join the community of freedom. Yet in this age of redoubled economic growth, of information and innovation, the Soviet Union faces a choice: It must make fundamental changes, or it will become obsolete.
Today thus represents a moment of hope. We in the West stand ready to cooperate with the East to promote true openness, to break down barriers that separate people, to create a safe, freer world. And surely there is no better place than Berlin, the meeting place of East and West, to make a start. Free people of Berlin: Today, as in the past, the United States stands for the strict observance and full implementation of all parts of the Four Power Agreement of 1971. Let us use this occasion, the 750th anniversary of this city, to usher in a new era, to seek a still fuller, richer life for the Berlin of the future. Together, let us maintain and develop the ties between the FederalRepublic and the Western sectors of Berlin, which is permitted by the 1971 agreement.
And I invite Mr. Gorbachev: Let us work to bring the Eastern and Western parts of the city closer together, so that all the inhabitants of all Berlin can enjoy the benefits that come with life in one of the great cities of the world.
To open Berlin still further to all Europe, East and West, let us expand the vital air access to this city, finding ways of making commercial air service to Berlin more convenient, more comfortable, and more economical. We look to the day when West Berlin can become one of the chief aviation hubs in all central Europe.
With our French and British partners, the United States is prepared to help bring international meetings to Berlin. It would be only fitting for Berlin to serve as the site of United Nations meetings, or world conferences on human rights and arms control or other issues that call for international cooperation.
There is no better way to establish hope for the future than to enlighten young minds, and we would be honored to sponsor summer youth exchanges, cultural events, and other programs for young Berliners from the East. Our French and British friends, I'm certain, will do the same. And it's my hope that an authority can be found in East Berlin to sponsor visits from young people of the Western sectors.
One final proposal, one close to my heart: Sport represents a source of enjoyment and ennoblement, and you may have noted that the Republic of Korea--South Korea--has offered to permit certain events of the 1988 Olympics to take place in the North. International sports competitions of all kinds could take place in both parts of this city. And what better way to demonstrate to the world the openness of this city than to offer in some future year to hold the Olympic games here in Berlin, East and West? In these four decades, as I have said, you Berliners have built a great city. You've done so in spite of threats--the Soviet attempts to impose the East-mark, the blockade. Today the city thrives in spite of the challenges implicit in the very presence of this wall. What keeps you here? Certainly there's a great deal to be said for your fortitude, for your defiant courage. But I believe there's something deeper, something that involves Berlin's whole look and feel and way of life--not mere sentiment. No one could live long in Berlin without being completely disabused of illusions. Something instead, that has seen the difficulties of life in Berlin but chose to accept them, that continues to build this good and proud city in contrast to a surrounding totalitarian presence that refuses to release human energies or aspirations. Something that speaks with a powerful voice of affirmation, that says yes to this city, yes to the future, yes to freedom. In a word, I would submit that what keeps you in Berlin is love--love both profound and abiding.
Perhaps this gets to the root of the matter, to the most fundamental distinction of all between East and West. The totalitarian world produces backwardness because it does such violence to the spirit, thwarting the human impulse to create, to enjoy, to worship. The totalitarian world finds even symbols of love and of worship an affront. Years ago, before the East Germans began rebuilding their churches, they erected a secular structure: the television tower at Alexander Platz. Virtually ever since, the authorities have been working to correct what they view as the tower's one major flaw, treating the glass sphere at the top with paints and chemicals of every kind. Yet even today when the sun strikes that sphere--that sphere that towers over all Berlin--the light makes the sign of the cross. There in Berlin, like the city itself, symbols of love, symbols of worship, cannot be suppressed.
As I looked out a moment ago from the Reichstag, that embodiment of German unity, I noticed words crudely spray-painted upon the wall, perhaps by a young Berliner: "This wall will fall. Beliefs become reality." Yes, across Europe, this wall will fall. For it cannot withstand faith; it cannot withstand truth. The wall cannot withstand freedom.
And I would like, before I close, to say one word. I have read, and I have been questioned since I've been here about certain demonstrations against my coming. And I would like to say just one thing, and to those who demonstrate so. I wonder if they have ever asked themselves that if they should have the kind of government they apparently seek, no one would ever be able to do what they're doing again.
Thank you and God bless you all.
Note: The President spoke at 2:20 p.m. at the Brandenburg Gate. In his opening remarks, he referred to West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl. Prior to his remarks, President Reagan met with West German President Richard von Weizsacker and the Governing Mayor of West Berlin Eberhard Diepgen at Schloss Bellevue, President Weizsacker's official residence in West Berlin. Following the meeting, President Reagan went to the Reichstag, where he viewed the Berlin Wall from the East Balcony.
19800717 Reagan Acceptance Speech at the 1980 Republican Convention
Acceptance Speech at the 1980 Republican Convention
by Ronald Reagan
July 17, 1980
The Republican Party met to nominate a presidential and vice-presidential candidate in Detroit in 1980 and chose Governor Ronald Reagan and Amb. George H.W. Bush as their nominees. This is Governor Reagan's acceptance of the presidential nomination.
Mr. Chairman, Mr. Vice President to be, this convention, my fellow citizens of this great nation:
With a deep awareness of the responsibility conferred by your trust, I accept your nomination for the presidency of the United States. I do so with deep gratitude, and I think also I might interject on behalf of all of us, our thanks to Detroit and the people of Michigan and to this city for the warm hospitality they have shown. And I thank you for your wholehearted response to my recommendation in regard to George Bush as a candidate for vice president.
I am very proud of our party tonight. This convention has shown to all America a party united, with positive programs for solving the nation's problems; a party ready to build a new consensus with all those across the land who share a community of values embodied in these words: family, work, neighborhood, peace and freedom.
I know we have had a quarrel or two, but only as to the method of attaining a goal. There was no argument about the goal. As president, I will establish a liaison with the 50 governors to encourage them to eliminate, where it exists, discrimination against women. I will monitor federal laws to insure their implementation and to add statutes if they are needed.
More than anything else, I want my candidacy to unify our country; to renew the American spirit and sense of purpose. I want to carry our message to every American, regardless of party affiliation, who is a member of this community of shared values.
Never before in our history have Americans been called upon to face three grave threats to our very existence, any one of which could destroy us. We face a disintegrating economy, a weakened defense and an energy policy based on the sharing of scarcity.
The major issue of this campaign is the direct political, personal and moral responsibility of Democratic Party leadership --i n the White House and in Congress -- for this unprecedented calamity which has befallen us. They tell us they have done the most that humanly could be done. They say that the United States has had its day in the sun; that our nation has passed its zenith. They expect you to tell your children that the American people no longer have the will to cope with their problems; that the future will be one of sacrifice and few opportunities.
My fellow citizens, I utterly reject that view. The American people, the most generous on earth, who created the highest standard of living, are not going to accept the notion that we can only make a better world for others by moving backwards ourselves. Those who believe we can have no business leading the nation.
I will not stand by and watch this great country destroy itself under mediocre leadership that drifts from one crisis to the next, eroding our national will and purpose. We have come together here because the American people deserve better from those to whom they entrust our nation's highest offices, and we stand united in our resolve to do something about it.
We need rebirth of the American tradition of leadership at every level of government and in private life as well. The United States of America is unique in world history because it has a genius for leaders -- many leaders -- on many levels. But, back in 1976, Mr. Carter said, "Trust me." And a lot of people did. Now, many of those people are out of work. Many have seen their savings eaten away by inflation. Many others on fixed incomes, especially the elderly, have watched helplessly as the cruel tax of inflation wasted away their purchasing power. And, today, a great many who trusted Mr. Carter wonder if we can survive the Carter policies of national defense.
"Trust me" government asks that we concentrate our hopes and dreams on one man; that we trust him to do what's best for us. My view of government places trust not in one person or one party, but in those values that transcend persons and parties. The trust is where it belongs--in the people. The responsibility to live up to that trust is where it belongs, in their elected leaders. That kind of relationship, between the people and their elected leaders, is a special kind of compact.
Three hundred and sixty years ago, in 1620, a group of families dared to cross a mighty ocean to build a future for themselves in a new world. When they arrived at Plymouth, Massachusetts, they formed what they called a "compact"; an agreement among themselves to build a community and abide by its laws.
The single act--the voluntary binding together of free people to live under the law--set the pattern for what was to come.
A century and a half later, the descendants of those people pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor to found this nation. Some forfeited their fortunes and their lives; none sacrificed honor.
Four score and seven years later, Abraham Lincoln called upon the people of all America to renew their dedication and their commitment to a government of, for and by the people.
Isn't it once again time to renew our compact of freedom; to pledge to each other all that is best in our lives; all that gives meaning to them--for the sake of this, our beloved and blessed land?
Together, let us make this a new beginning. Let us make a commitment to care for the needy; to teach our children the values and the virtues handed down to us by our families; to have the courage to defend those values and the willingness to sacrifice for them.
Let us pledge to restore, in our time, the American spirit of voluntary service, of cooperation, of private and community initiative; a spirit that flows like a deep and mighty river through the history of our nation.
As your nominee, I pledge to restore to the federal government the capacity to do the people's work without dominating their lives. I pledge to you a government that will not only work well, but wisely; its ability to act tempered by prudence and its willingness to do good balanced by the knowledge that government is never more dangerous than when our desire to have it help us blinds us to its great power to harm us.
The first Republican president once said, "While the people retain their virtue and their vigilance, no administration by any extreme of wickedness or folly can seriously injure the government in the short space of four years."
If Mr. Lincoln could see what's happened in these last three-and-a-half years, he might hedge a little on that statement. But, with the virtues that our legacy as a free people and with the vigilance that sustains liberty, we still have time to use our renewed compact to overcome the injuries that have been done to America these past three-and-a-half years.
First, we must overcome something the present administration has cooked up: a new and altogether indigestible economic stew, one part inflation, one part high unemployment, one part recession, one part runaway taxes, one party deficit spending and seasoned by an energy crisis. It's an economic stew that has turned the national stomach.
Ours are not problems of abstract economic theory. Those are problems of flesh and blood; problems that cause pain and destroy the moral fiber of real people who should not suffer the further indignity of being told by the government that it is all somehow their fault. We do not have inflation because -- as Mr. Carter says -- we have lived too well.
The head of a government which has utterly refused to live within its means and which has, in the last few days, told us that this year's deficit will be $60 billion, dares to point the finger of blame at business and labor, both of which have been engaged in a losing struggle just trying to stay even.
High taxes, we are told, are somehow good for us, as if, when government spends our money it isn't inflationary, but when we spend it, it is.
Those who preside over the worst energy shortage in our history tell us to use less, so that we will run out of oil, gasoline, and natural gas a little more slowly. Conservation is desirable, of course, for we must not waste energy. But conservation is not the sole answer to our energy needs.
America must get to work producing more energy. The Republican program for solving economic problems is based on growth and productivity.
Large amounts of oil and natural gas lay beneath our land and off our shores, untouched because the present administration seems to believe the American people would rather see more regulation, taxes and controls than more energy.
Coal offers great potential. So does nuclear energy produced under rigorous safety standards. It could supply electricity for thousands of industries and millions of jobs and homes. It must not be thwarted by a tiny minority opposed to economic growth which often finds friendly ears in regulatory agencies for its obstructionist campaigns.
Make no mistake. We will not permit the safety of our people or our environment heritage to be jeopardized, but we are going to reaffirm that the economic prosperity of our people is a fundamental part of our environment.
Our problems are both acute and chronic, yet all we hear from those in positions of leadership are the same tired proposals for more government tinkering, more meddling and more control -- all of which led us to this state in the first place.
Can anyone look at the record of this administration and say, "Well done?" Can anyone compare the state of our economy when the Carter Administration took office with where we are today and say, "Keep up the good work?" Can anyone look at our reduced standing in the world today and say, "Let's have four more years of this?"
I believe the American people are going to answer these questions the first week of November and their answer will be, "No--we've had enough." And, then it will be up to us -- beginning next January 20th -- to offer an administration and congressional leadership of competence and more than a little courage.
We must have the clarity of vision to see the difference between what is essential and what is merely desirable, and then the courage to bring our government back under control and make it acceptable to the people.
It is essential that we maintain both the forward momentum of economic growth and the strength of the safety net beneath those in society who need help. We also believe it is essential that the integrity of all aspects of Social Security are preserved.
Beyond these essentials, I believe it is clear our federal government is overgrown and overweight. Indeed, it is time for our government to go on a diet. Therefore, my first act as chief executive will be to impose an immediate and thorough freeze on federal hiring. Then, we are going to enlist the very best minds from business, labor and whatever quarter to conduct a detailed review of every department, bureau and agency that lives by federal appropriations. We are also going to enlist the help and ideas of many dedicated and hard working government employees at all levels who want a more efficient government as much as the rest of us do. I know that many are demoralized by the confusion and waste they confront in their work as a result of failed and failing policies.
Our instructions to the groups we enlist will be simple and direct. We will remind them that government programs exist at the sufferance of the American taxpayer and are paid for with money earned by working men and women. Any program that represents a waste of their money -- a theft from their pocketbooks--must have that waste eliminated or the program must go -- by executive order where possible; by congressional action where necessary. Everything that can be run more effectively by state and local government we shall turn over to state and local government, along with the funding sources to pay for it. We are going to put an end to the money merry-go-round where our money becomes Washington's money, to be spent by the states and cities exactly the way the federal bureaucrats tell them to.
I will not accept the excuse that the federal government has grown so big and powerful that it is beyond the control of any president, any administration or Congress. We are going to put an end to the notion that the American taxpayer exists to fund the federal government. The federal government exists to serve the American people. On January 20th, we are going to re-establish that truth.
Also on that date we are going to initiate action to get substantial relief for our taxpaying citizens and action to put people back to work. None of this will be based on any new form of monetary tinkering or fiscal sleight-of-hand. We will simply apply to government the common sense we all use in our daily lives.
Work and family are at the center of our lives; the foundation of our dignity as a free people. When we deprive people of what they have earned, or take away their jobs, we destroy their dignity and undermine their families. We cannot support our families unless there are jobs; and we cannot have jobs unless people have both money to invest and the faith to invest it.
There are concepts that stem from an economic system that for more than 200 years has helped us master a continent, create a previously undreamed of prosperity for our people and has fed millions of others around the globe. That system will continue to serve us in the future if our government will stop ignoring the basic values on which it was built and stop betraying the trust and good will of the American workers who keep it going.
The American people are carrying the heaviest peacetime tax burden in our nation's history -- and it will grow even heavier, under present law, next January. We are taxing ourselves into economic exhaustion and stagnation, crushing our ability and incentive to save, invest and produce.
This must stop. We must halt this fiscal self-destruction and restore sanity to our economic system.
I have long advocated a 30 percent reduction in income tax rates over a period of three years. This phased tax reduction would begin with a 10 percent "down payment" tax cut in 1981, which the Republicans and Congress and I have already proposed.
A phased reduction of tax rates would go a long way toward easing the heavy burden on the American people. But, we should not stop here.
Within the context of economic conditions and appropriate budget priorities during each fiscal year of my presidency, I would strive to go further. This would include improvement in business depreciation taxes so we can stimulate investment in order to get plants and equipment replaced, put more Americans back to work and put our nation back on the road to being competitive in world commerce. We will also work to reduce the cost of government as a percentage of our gross national product.
The first task of national leadership is to set honest and realistic priorities in our policies and our budget and I pledge that my administration will do that.
When I talk of tax cuts, I am reminded that every major tax cut in this century has strengthened the economy, generated renewed productivity and ended up yielding new revenues for the government by creating new investment, new jobs and more commerce among our people.
The present administration has been forced by us Republicans to play follow-the-leader with regard to a tax cut. But, in this election year we must take with the proverbial "grain of salt" any tax cut proposed by those who have given us the greatest tax increase in our history. When those in leadership give us tax increases and tell us we must also do with less, have they thought about those who have always had less -- especially the minorities? This is like telling them that just as they step on the first rung of the ladder of opportunity, the ladder is being pulled out from under them. That may be the Democratic leadership's message to the minorities, but it won't be ours. Our message will be: we have to move ahead, but we're not going to leave anyone behind. Thanks to the economic policies of the Democratic Party, millions of Americans find themselves out of work. Millions more have never even had a fair chance to learn new skills, hold a decent job, or secure for themselves and their families a share in the prosperity of this nation.
It is time to put America back to work; to make our cities and towns resound with the confident voices of men and women of all races, nationalities and faiths bringing home to their families a decent paycheck they can cash for honest money.
For those without skills, we'll find a way to help them get skills.
For those without job opportunities, we'll stimulate new opportunities, particularly in the inner cities where they live.
For those who have abandoned hope, we'll restore hope and we'll welcome them into a great national crusade to make America great again!
When we move from domestic affairs and cast our eyes abroad, we see an equally sorry chapter on the record of the present administration.
- As Soviet combat brigade trains in Cuba, just 90 miles from our shores.
- A Soviet army of invasion occupies Afghanistan, further threatening our vital interests in the Middle East.
- America's defense strength is at its lowest ebb in a generation, while the Soviet Union is vastly outspending us in both strategic and conventional arms.
- Our European allies, looking nervously at the growing menace from the East, turn to us for leadership and fail to find it.
- And, incredibly more than 50 of our fellow Americans have been held captive for over eight months by a dictatorial foreign power that holds us up to ridicule before the world.
Adversaries large and small test our will and seek to confound our resolve, but we are given weakness when we need strength; vacillation when the times demand firmness.
The Carter Administration lives in the world of make-believe. Every day, drawing up a response to that day's problems, troubles, regardless of what happened yesterday and what will happen tomorrow.
The rest of us, however, live in the real world. It is here that disasters are overtaking our nation without any real response from Washington.
This is make-believe, self-deceit and -- above all -- transparent hypocrisy.
For example, Mr. Carter says he supports the volunteer army, but he lets military pay and benefits slip so low that many of our enlisted personnel are actually eligible for food stamps. Re-enlistment rates drop and, just recently, after he fought all week against a proposal to increase the pay of our men and women in uniform, he helicoptered to our carrier, the U.S.S. Nimitz, which was returning from long months of duty. He told the crew that he advocated better pay for them and their comrades! Where does he really stand, now that he's back on shore?
I'll tell you where I stand. I do not favor a peacetime draft or registration, but I do favor pay and benefit levels that will attract and keep highly motivated men and women in our volunteer forces and an active reserve trained and ready for an instant call in case of an emergency.
There may be a sailor at the helm of the ship of state, but the ship has no rudder. Critical decisions are made at times almost in comic fashion, but who can laugh? Who was not embarrassed when the administration handed a major propaganda victory in the United Nations to the enemies of Israel, our staunch Middle East ally for three decades, and them claim that the American vote was a "mistake," the result of a "failure of communication" between the president, his secretary of state, and his U.N. ambassador?
Who does not feel a growing sense of unease as our allies, facing repeated instances of an amateurish and confused administration, reluctantly conclude that America is unwilling or unable to fulfill its obligations as the leader of the free world?
Who does not feel rising alarm when the question in any discussion of foreign policy is no longer, "Should we do something?", but "Do we have the capacity to do anything?"
The administration which has brought us to this state is seeking your endorsement for four more years of weakness, indecision, mediocrity and incompetence. No American should vote until he or she has asked, is the United States stronger and more respected now than it was three-and-a-half years ago? Is the world today a safer place in which to live?
It is the responsibility of the president of the United States, in working for peace, to insure that the safety of our people cannot successfully be threatened by a hostile foreign power. As president, fulfilling that responsibility will be my number one priority.
We are not a warlike people. Quite the opposite. We always seek to live in peace. We resort to force infrequently and with great reluctance--and only after we have determined that it is absolutely necessary. We are awed--and rightly so--by the forces of destruction at loose in the world in this nuclear era. But neither can we be naive or foolish. Four times in my lifetime America has gone to war, bleeding the lives of its young men into the sands of beachheads, the fields of Europe and the jungles and rice paddies of Asia. We know only too well that war comes not when the forces of freedom are strong, but when they are weak. It is then that tyrants are tempted.
We simply cannot learn these lessons the hard way again without risking our destruction.
Of all the objectives we seek, first and foremost is the establishment of lasting world peace. We must always stand ready to negotiate in good faith, ready to pursue any reasonable avenue that holds forth the promise of lessening tensions and furthering the prospects of peace. But let our friends and those who may wish us ill take note: the United States has an obligation to its citizens and to the people of the world never to let those who would destroy freedom dictate the future course of human life on this planet. I would regard my election as proof that we have renewed our resolve to preserve world peace and freedom. This nation will once again be strong enough to do that.
This evening marks the last step--save one--of a campaign that has taken Nancy and me from one end of this great land to the other, over many months and thousands of miles. There are those who question the way we choose a president; who say that our process imposes difficult and exhausting burdens on those who seek the office. I have not found it so.
It is impossible to capture in words the splendor of this vast continent which God has granted as our portion of this creation. There are no words to express the extraordinary strength and character of this breed of people we call Americans.
Everywhere we have met thousands of Democrats, Independents, and Republicans from all economic conditions and walks of life bound together in that community of shared values of family, work, neighborhood, peace and freedom. They are concerned, yes, but they are not frightened. They are disturbed, but not dismayed. They are the kind of men and women Tom Paine had in mind when he wrote--during the darkest days of the American Revolution--"We have it in our power to begin the world over again."
Nearly 150 years after Tom Paine wrote those words, an American president told the generation of the Great Depression that it had a "rendezvous with destiny." I believe that this generation of Americans today has a rendezvous with destiny.
Tonight, let us dedicate ourselves to renewing the American compact. I ask you not simply to "Trust me," but to trust your values--our values--and to hold me responsible for living up to them. I ask you to trust that American spirit which knows no ethnic, religious, social, political, regional, or economic boundaries; the spirit that burned with zeal in the hearts of millions of immigrants from every corner of the Earth who came here in search of freedom.
Some say that spirit no longer exists. But I have seen it -- I have felt it -- all across the land; in the big cities, the small towns and in rural America. The American spirit is still there, ready to blaze into life if you and I are willing to do what has to be done; the practical, down-to-earth things that will stimulate our economy, increase productivity and put America back to work. The time is now to resolve that the basis of a firm and principled foreign policy is one that takes the world as it is and seeks to change it by leadership and example; not by harangue, harassment or wishful thinking.
The time is now to say that while we shall seek new friendships and expand and improve others, we shall not do so by breaking our word or casting aside old friends and allies.
And, the time is now to redeem promises once made to the American people by another candidate, in another time and another place. He said, "For three long years I have been going up and down this country preaching that government--federal, state, and local--costs too much. I shall not stop that preaching. As an immediate program of action, we must abolish useless offices. We must eliminate unnecessary functions of government...we must consolidate subdivisions of government and, like the private citizen, give up luxuries which we can no longer afford."
"I propose to you, my friends, and through you that government of all kinds, big and little be made solvent and that the example be set by the president of the UnitedState and his Cabinet."
So said Franklin Delano Roosevelt in his acceptance speech to the Democratic National Convention in July 1932.
The time is now, my fellow Americans, to recapture our destiny, to take it into our own hands. But, to do this will take many of us, working together. I ask you tonight to volunteer your help in this cause so we can carry our message throughout the land.
Yes, isn't now the time that we, the people, carried out these unkempt promises? Let us pledge to each other and to all Americaon this July day 48 years later, we intend to do just that.
I have thought of something that is not part of my speech and I'm worried over whether I should do it.
Can we doubt that only a Divine Providence placed this land, this island of freedom, here as a refuge for all those people in the world who yearn to breathe freely: Jews and Christians enduring persecution behind the Iron Curtain, the boat people of Southeast Asia, of Cuba and Haiti, the victims of drought and famine in Africa, the freedom fighters of Afghanistan and our own countrymen held in savage captivity.
I'll confess that I've been a little afraid to suggest what I'm going to suggest -- I'm more afraid not to -- that we begin our crusade joined together in a moment of silent prayer. God bless America.
