Reagan on the dime? It could happen.

[Alyeska]

Just a minor little nitpick... Only west coast Japanese Americans got interned in large numbers. The program while wrong was mostly done because of public insecurity. The little fact that it wasn't done on the east coast proves this wasn't the racist event that some of you claim FDR was conducting.

And another little fact. FDR trusted Truman, and Truman couldn't stand Stalin and didn't trust him. I don't much see where people are getting at FDR snubbing Churchill while cozying up to Stalin when FDR full well knew the dangers of Stalin. Shit, FDR considered an inassion through Greece just to keep the Reds out of Eastern Europe at one point. And after all the effort FDR put into keeping the British afloat during the early part of the war...

All this FDR bashing is rather odd. He helped defeat two of the worst enemies in the world while making a necessary pact with the devil at the time. Reagan was merely the soldier on duty when the Communist POW died of old age.

[Alyrium Denryle]

And doing more to win the Cold War than any other western leader. Little things like that.

Last time I checked, the soviet block was collapsing anyway...

<snip FDR rant>

Was I defending FDR? No. But rather attacking Reagan's domestic policy. Dont try to change the subject to FDR, I am well aware of the problems with the Roosevelt administation.

[darthdavid]

If it werent for reganomics our current ecomomy wouldn't blow so badly.

[Joe]

And another little fact. FDR trusted Truman, and Truman couldn't stand Stalin and didn't trust him. I don't much see where people are getting at FDR snubbing Churchill while cozying up to Stalin when FDR full well knew the dangers of Stalin. Shit, FDR considered an inassion through Greece just to keep the Reds out of Eastern Europe at one point. And after all the effort FDR put into keeping the British afloat during the early part of the war...

I can deal with Stalin. He is honest, but smart as hell.

It's clear that Truman trusted Stalin a bit much. FDR was worse.

[Joe]

If it werent for reganomics our current ecomomy wouldn't blow so badly.

Well, given that by the time the economy first began to tank Reagonomics had been out of practice for more than 8 years, I don't think you have much of a case.

[Iceberg]

This would be the same Truman who initiated the Truman Doctrine in 1947 to challenge the Soviets around the world and eventually defeat them.

One sentence taken out of context does not define a man.

[Joe]

This would be the same Truman who initiated the Truman Doctrine in 1947 to challenge the Soviets around the world and eventually defeat them.

One sentence taken out of context does not define a man.

Oh, of course he changed, realized the error of his ways, and ended up being adequately tough on Stalin. I'm not denying that; Truman is one of my favorite Presidents. Doesn't change the fact that at one point, he did trust the man.

And how was that quote taken out of context? It was taken from his bloody diary, for god's sake, you can't get a better primary source than that!

[Alyeska]

Truman was once quoted as having said that he would never trust Stalin. This was after Truman met Stalin and before the end of the war.

[Joe]

Truman was once quoted as having said that he would never trust Stalin. This was after Truman met Stalin and before the end of the war.

Yet there it is, right smack-dab in the middle of his diary.

[Vympel]

They're trying to rename a mountain to Reagan as well.

[Ender]

This is a pure power grab, no more, no less. It has nothing to do with honoring Reagan and everything to do with hurting the Democratic party.

I agree. Reagan never really did anything but fuck church and state separation sideways. And increase military spending.

And doing more to win the Cold War than any other western leader. Little things like that.

Because Eisenhower & Truman had absolutly zero to do with it, what with coming up with and implementing the policies that put us in a position where we could outspend them into the ground.

Anyone in the office at that time could have done it. Russia was on it's last legs. Just as neocons love going on about how clinton was lucky because he was in office when reaganomics bore fruit, same is true for the cold war & their hero ronnie.

[Peregrin Toker]

(SNIP)

Can't they just make two different dime designs - one with FDR and one with Reagan? Or would that be too expensive?

[Perinquus]

I agree. Reagan never really did anything but fuck church and state separation sideways. And increase military spending.

And doing more to win the Cold War than any other western leader. Little things like that.

Because Eisenhower & Truman had absolutly zero to do with it, what with coming up with and implementing the policies that put us in a position where we could outspend them into the ground.

Anyone in the office at that time could have done it. Russia was on it's last legs. Just as neocons love going on about how clinton was lucky because he was in office when reaganomics bore fruit, same is true for the cold war & their hero ronnie.

Quite wrong. No one else did do it. No one else was willing to do it. No one else really thought it would work. On March 26, 1982 Ronal Reagan made the following entry in his diary: "Briefing on the Soviet economy. They are in very bad shape, and if we can cut off their credit they'll have to yell 'Uncle' or starve".

Previous politicians, even Truman and Eisenhower, viewed the Cold War as a complex struggle between two more or less evenly matched superpowers. Reagan saw it as a totally uneven contest between two systems, one of which was infinitely superior economically (and morally).

What is really significant is that other western leaders simply did not share this confidence in the captilist system and did not really appreciate or even believe that all we needed to do was increase defense spending, and the Russians would feel compelled to try and match us. And they would spend themselves right into insolvency trying.

George Bush Sr. was among those who thought Reagan was being naive. historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. summed it up when he said, in 1982, that: "Those in the U.S. who think the Soviet Union is on the verge of economic and social collapse, ready with one small push to go over the brink, are... only kidding themselves". Of course, less than ten years later, the Soviet Union was a dead letter. But Schlesinger was not the only one to share this view. Richard Nixon told Time magazine's Strobe Talbott:

We've got to make [the Soviets] understand that we're not out to get them. I know there's a school of thought that iif we can fence them in with sanctions, their whole rotten system will come tumbling down. Ther's a school of thought that hard-line policies on our part will induce change for the better on their part. I wish that were the case, but it's just not going to happen.

Robert McFarlane, Reagan's own national security adviser thought Reagan's strategy ill-conceived, as did many others. And you may remember (I do) how many people were howling that Reagan was an intransigent, hard-line war-monger when he walked out of the summit meeting in Reykjavik in September 1986. The U.S. had gotten an unprecedented series of concessions, such as a Soviet commitment to reduce all strategic forces by 50% within five years, and to destroy all ballistic missiles within ten years. Then Gorbachev made the U.S. abandoning SDI a condition of this, and Reagan simply declared the meeting was over when it became clear that Gorbachev wouldn't budge from his position, and walked out.

According to Henry Kissinger:

Reagan responded in a a way that no foreign policy professional would have advised: he simply got up and left the room. Years later, when I asked a senior Gorbachev adviser why the Soviets had not settled for what the United States has already accepted, he replied: 'We had thought of everything except that Reagan might leave the room.'

The failure of Reykjavik, as Margaret Thatcher said:

... was widely portrayed as the result of the foolish intransigence of an elderly American president, obsessed with an unrealizable dream. In fact, President Reagan's resusal to trade away SDI for the apparent near fulfillment of his dream of a nuclear-free world was crucial to the victory over communism. He called the Soviet's bluff. The Russians may have scored an immediate propaganda victory when the talks broke down. But they had lost the game, and I have no doubt they knew it.

No other U.S. president ever envisioned Reagan's strategy. From Truman to Eisenhower to Kennedy to Johnson to Nixon to Ford to Carter, they all thought that the U.S.S.R. was more or less evenly matched to the U.S. and the best we could hope to do was contain it, according to the Truman Doctrine. Only Reagan saw the Soviet Union as on the ropes, and just needing us to ratchet up the pressure to make them drop. At the time Reagan was widely criticized as being an intransigent hawk, out of touch with reality, and as pissing away great opportunities for detente with his anti-communist crusade. No one thought Reagan's strategy would work. But he stuck with it and it did work. And just a couple of years after he left office, the Soviet Union collapsed, just as Reagan knew it would, and just as everyone thought he was nuts for thinking.

So no, I am afraid it is simply no the case that "Anyone in the office at that time could have done it." No one else thought that strategy had a chance of success, so no one else would have perservered with it.

[CaptainChewbacca]

There isn't actually room on Mt. Rushmore for another President, the remaining rock is too fractured to be carved without knocking pieces out of the other Presidents.

[Perinquus]

There isn't actually room on Mt. Rushmore for another President, the remaining rock is too fractured to be carved without knocking pieces out of the other Presidents.

Much as I am an admirer or Reagan's, I would hate to see any changes made to Mt. Rushmore. It is fine the way it is.

[Andrew J.]

Reagan was lucky that his strategy worked. He might have started World War III, and if the USSR hadn't been run by hard-liners like Andropov throughout the early to mid 80s the Russians wouldn't have spent as much, and there might not have been such a strong liberal backlash in the form of Gorbachev and perestroika.

Another risk of the "make them spend too much on defense" strategy is that you eventually wind up with a poor, desperate nation with a gigantic military. Again, Reagan was lucky that the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan turned into such a failure, otherwise the USSR's government might have been less hesitant in using their military.

Indeed, Reagan was a gambler, and it paid off, but the containment policies of Truman, Eisenhower, et al were much more...what's the word I'm looking for...oh right, conservative.

[Tsyroc]

I'm not in favore of replacing FDR with Reagon on the dime nor am I in favor of there being multiple dimes or dimes with multiple heads. Instead why don't they put Reagon on something else.

US Coins & Bills

There appear to be a couple of bills that are no longer in circulation. Why not stick Reagon on the $500 bill and bring it back as in limited quantities like the $2 bill that Jefferson is on?

[Iceberg]

Sorry, Reaganites:

The law prohibits portraits of living persons from appearing on Government Securities.

[Tsyroc]

Sorry, Reaganites:

The law prohibits portraits of living persons from appearing on Government Securities.

Ooop, I guess he just gets a stamp.

[Iceberg]

Sorry, Reaganites:

The law prohibits portraits of living persons from appearing on Government Securities.

Ooop, I guess he just gets a stamp.

"Most people, sir, do not spit on THAT side of the stamp."

[Stormbringer]

Sorry, Reaganites:

The law prohibits portraits of living persons from appearing on Government Securities.

Didn't stop them from naming a carrier after him. I measly little coin should be no problem.

"Most people, sir, do not spit on THAT side of the stamp."

Jeez, they can't even work a stamp and they want us to trust them with the country.

[Iceberg]

Sorry, Reaganites:

The law prohibits portraits of living persons from appearing on Government Securities.

Didn't stop them from naming a carrier after him. I measly little coin should be no problem.

I blame the guy who named the USS Arleigh Burke after a then-living person. It's even less acceptable with the USS George H.W. Bush, because he's not only still alive but fully in possession of his faculties.

[Tsyroc]

I think there have been more that a few ships that have been at least christened with the names of living people. They haven't gotten carried away to the extent that it's common practice but it's not like it's never heard of.


On the money front I think that it might be a good idea to stick Reagan on the $500 bill (or higher). That way he'll mostly be seen by the Republicans.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Now that, I can live with... I really dont want Reagan saying "In god we trust" on a form of currency I wll actually use.

Just remember, "If you want to live like a republican, you have to vote democrat"

[Iceberg]

I think there have been more that a few ships that have been at least christened with the names of living people. They haven't gotten carried away to the extent that it's common practice but it's not like it's never heard of.

The US Navy has been the most profligrate abuser of that practice:

USS Carl Vinson (CVN 70)
USS Arleigh Burke (DDG 51)
USS Hyman G. Rickover (SSN 709)
USNS Bob Hope (T-AKR 300)
USS Jimmy Carter (SSN 23)
USS Ronald Reagan (CVN 76)
USS George H.W. Bush (CVN 77) (it was rumored that CVN 77 was to be named for Strom Thurmond, a rumor that proved thankfully false)
(and for a time it was also widely rumored that LHD 8 USS Makin Island would be named USS Trent Lott)