George H. W. Bush voting for Clinton

[Mountain Man]

Early-30s, yet you argue like a first-semester college freshman.

Wow...

[Starlight]

Early-30s, yet you argue like a first-semester college freshman.

If I found out you were 13, or 90, I wouldn't be surprised given how you argue.

[Mountain Man]

If I found out you were 13, or 90, I wouldn't be surprised given how you argue.

Either way, my age exceeds your IQ.

[Tassman]

If it weren't for camp Hillary originally pushing the birther story in the first place there never would have been anything for Trump to glom onto.

Indeed, but he did didn't he? This is the point. Trump latched onto a discredited notion raised by a Hillary supporter in 2008 and ran with it for years without a shred of evidence. This is what he does. Innuendo and lies are his stock-in-trade.

[Starlight]

Either way, my age exceeds your IQ.

Are you really that insecure about your IQ?

[Mountain Man]

Are you really that insecure about your IQ?

Are you projecting?

[Sparko]

Starlight, go research some polls on presidential popularity. Reagan consistently rates at or near the top of the rankings.

for example:

Gallup poll 2011:
http://www.gallup.com/poll/146183/Am...President.aspx
Americans Say Reagan Is the Greatest U.S. President
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[Mountain Man]

Starlight, go research some polls on presidential popularity. Reagan consistently rates at or near the top of the rankings.

Dimbulb: "Oh yeah? Well... well... according to Political Compass...!"

[rogue06]

Indeed, but he did didn't he? This is the point. Trump latched onto a discredited notion raised by a Hillary supporter in 2008 and ran with it for years without a shred of evidence. This is what he does. Innuendo and lies are his stock-in-trade.

Nobody is denying that Trump was the standard bearer for the birther movement for several years but now many liberals and the MSM have been busy pretending that the Clinton campaign wasn't the one who initially popularized the birther movement (based on lies and innuendo) in spite of the overwhelming evidence to the contrary and if it hadn't been for that there wouldn't have a birther question for Trump to have latched onto in the first place

[robrecht]

Nobody is denying that Trump was the standard bearer for the birther movement for several years but now many liberals and the MSM have been busy pretending that the Clinton campaign wasn't the one who initially popularized the birther movement (based on lies and innuendo) in spite of the overwhelming evidence to the contrary and if it hadn't been for that there wouldn't have a birther question for Trump to have latched onto in the first place

I suspect it is an exaggeration to say that they popularized the birther movement. It did not gather any real steam until later. While some did plant some seeds of doubt or encourage the press to look into it, I do not recall it ever becoming a popular movement until later on.

[shunyadragon]

A lot of liberals hate Reagan. He introduced Reaganomics / neoliberalism, and did a lot of other terrible things (e.g. Iran-Contra etc). I've seen liberals put him on par with Nixon because the Reagan administration had a huge number of scandals, and more administration officials were investigated and indicted than in any other administration in US history.

I reserve 'hate' for a higher standard. I did not support Reagan when he was elected, nor do I support his actions as the President, nor do I consider him a great president in history.

[seer]

I reserve 'hate' for a higher standard. I did not support Reagan when he was elected, nor do I support his actions as the President, nor do I consider him a great president in history.

Who do you consider a great president in recent times?

[seanD]

I suspect it is an exaggeration to say that they popularized the birther movement. It did not gather any real steam until later. While some did plant some seeds of doubt or encourage the press to look into it, I do not recall it ever becoming a popular movement until later on.

Keeping it covert might be worse though. The fact that Trump latched onto the rumor shows his nature as a showman and attention-grabber. Maybe he didn't even really believe it, maybe he just liked the attention. The fact that the Hillary camp kept it covert means they really truly believed it and were attempting to take down a black president by using what they suspected at the time.

[seanD]

Keeping it covert might be worse though. The fact that Trump latched onto the rumor shows his nature as a showman and attention-grabber. Maybe he didn't even really believe it, maybe he just liked the attention. The fact that the Hillary camp kept it covert means they really truly believed it and were attempting to take down a black president by using what they suspected at the time.

Correction: should have said black presidential candidate. A conspiracy to expose a potential conspiracy, if you will.

[Starlight]

Starlight, go research some polls on presidential popularity.

I have quite often in the past looked at the many rankings here.

People are very split as to how they view Reagan. Conservatives idolize him simply because people like Rush Limbaugh have talked him up constantly. Whereas liberals range from apathy to hatred.

Reagan consistently rates at or near the top of the rankings.

Not of any rankings done by serious historians (e.g. two surveys of historians done in 1996 rank Reagan as the 25th and 26th best president in US history, a different poll of scholars in 2010 put him at 18th). According to almost every single analysis by scholars the top 3 US presidents are FDR, Lincoln, and Washington.

However if you survey random people in the US and ask them about the best president, lots and lots of conservatives mindlessly say Reagan, while more sensible people are split between FDR, Lincoln, Washington and others. What you're essentially measuring by such a survey is the level of conservative brainwashing occurring in the general populace.

The original topic of my discussion was how liberals view Reagan, which is not something a poll that mixes liberals and conservatives can tell you. If you look further down the page of your own link they split the votes out by party, and you can see that Reagan wasn't in the top 5 for people who regard themselves as Democrat. You can also see that a lot of people interpret the question as meaning best president in their lifetimes and give someone fairly recent as an answer.

If you want to see what some liberals think of Reagan, here is a brief video from Cenk Uygur on MSNBC discussing Reagan, and here is a longer one from progressive Thom Hartmann.