What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
Mollie Hemingway, Ed. ·
Sep 9, 2011 at 6:19am
After the debate the other night, a friend posted a link to this video and said "The past is another country." And since then, I keep seeing people post links to this video with a comment about how this 1980 exchange between Reagan and Bush is so revelatory in its difference from politicians these days.
I must be missing something, because I don't quite see how it's so different. Down to the problems some politicians have in articulating a coherent thought or how politicians have problems dealing with the complexity of some problems. Is this really such a great example of how to talk about immigration?
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Jan '11
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
I think if Romney or Perry came out and said what either Bush or Reagan said in this clip, the Tea Party and the seal the border crowd would raise such a stink you'd see the candidates backtracking faster than you could say "amnesty." The fact is that both the leading candidates know they could never say anything like this, so they won't.
May '10
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
Same claptrap, different speakers.
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
But nobody would be trotting out the same platitudes that were sufficient 30-odd years ago. It's not like either GWB or Reagan did a particularly good job on immigration in terms of dealing with the structural problems.
I don't particularly care about the issue but all of my family and friends back West sure do. I'm not sure how impressive this debate -- or what you'll hear in a contemporary debate -- come close to dealing with the issue.
Jun '10
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
Back then, most people didn't take the issue seriously at all. In comedy movies of the era, the hero (as he's being chased by the "bad guys" through a restaurant kitchen) would yell, "la migra !!!" and fifteen restaurant employees would start running in five different directions, helping the hero get away. It was big joke. It was a punch line.
Jan '11
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
I don't think this exchange is necessarily impressive. I think what is interesting about it is that it recognizes some fundamental realities about what drives the immigration problem as well as acknowledging how dumb US immigration policy was/is. GOP candidates aren't even allowed to do that anymore. You're right that neither Reagan nor Bush actually did anything to follow up on the problems or short sightedness of our policy with regards to the issue. But at least they could talk about the realities of the situation without worrying about getting drummed out of the race.
Feb '11
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
The past is another country and this one seems far away from ours.
I watched the video. Nothing in this seems revelatory to me in any way. I see two politicians of significance answering a question that had little to the public of the day, and giving an answer that reflects that. Since then much has happened and much has been learned. Those answers seem as much a part of history as 8-tracks and leisure suits, and every bit as relevant as those for today. That is, not at all.
Too much about the immigration issue has changed.
Jan '11
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
I don't agree. I think what drove workers to come here then is still what drives them today. I also think free market supporters should support a free market in labor as well. These illegal workers are still hard working, family oriented, motivated people, just as Bush was pointing out then. They are still providing work and services at a price the market is willing to pay.
People who pay lip service to letting the market set the price should let the market set the price for unskilled labor. Our policies should recognize and use market forces to our societies advantage, not pretend the market isn't already at work or try to push water uphill and distort the labor market with some futile form of immigration enforcement that doesn't really work nor provide a real benefit to society.
Edited on Sep 9, 2011 at 7:14amMar '11
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
Watching this, I'm amazed that Reagan chose Bush for VP.
Aug '10
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
As someone who lives in the West, I'm with BThompson. Our current system rewards businesses by giving them the market negotiation threat that hey will "report and deport" workers who speak up or don't produce. The wages of "undocumented" workers are suppressed due to a government created inefficiency in the market. Illegal aliens cannot properly negotiate wages with employers.
The only people we should be concerned about border-wise are smugglers, terrorists, and criminals. Families that want to come here and work should be welcomed as competitors in our economy.
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
Favorite line from H.W.: "Part of my family is a Mexican!"
Apr '11
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
The issue of immigration is vastly different now that there is absolutely no relevance to the current campaign. What stuck me was how much better a speaker Reagan was than Bush.
Sep '10
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
I found this unintentionally hilarious as well, like some of my best friends are (insert ethnic epithet) but the really fascinating thing to me is the illustration of Reagan's hedgehog-ishness, to borrow Irving Kristol's phrase. His first concern was the spread of communism from Cuba. No one sees it that way anymore because it isn't necessary to see it that way because of what Reagan did. Do we need a new hedgehog now? I think we do and alas I think his name is Paul Ryan.
Jan '11
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
I never before had realized how much GHWB and Mitt Romney look alike!
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
Well said BThompson! This is one of the reasons I am so frustrated with the GOP, there needs to be a reasonable space to talk about these issues in an educated and humane fashion in order to be able to be productive about these issues.
BThompson
I don't think this exchange is necessarily impressive. I think what is interesting about it is that it recognizes some fundamental realities about what drives the immigration problem as well as acknowledging how dumb US immigration policy was/is. GOP candidates aren't even allowed to do that anymore. You're right that neither Reagan nor Bush actually did anything to follow up on the problems or short sightedness of our policy with regards to the issue. But at least they could talk about the realities of the situation without worrying about getting drummed out of the race. · Sep 9 at 6:47am
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
Well said BThompson! This is one of the reasons I am so frustrated with the GOP, there needs to be a reasonable space to talk about these issues in an educated and humane fashion in order to be able to be productive about these issues.
BThompson
I don't think this exchange is necessarily impressive. I think what is interesting about it is that it recognizes some fundamental realities about what drives the immigration problem as well as acknowledging how dumb US immigration policy was/is. GOP candidates aren't even allowed to do that anymore. You're right that neither Reagan nor Bush actually did anything to follow up on the problems or short sightedness of our policy with regards to the issue. But at least they could talk about the realities of the situation without worrying about getting drummed out of the race. · Sep 9 at 6:47am
Nov '10
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
The past is not a different country -- it exists in a continuum with the present. I don't take issue with the basic sentiments of either speaker. In their time these were appropriate and properly nuanced views.
But listen -- both of these guys had a good run in the driver's seat themselves as President of the United States. If these nice (and basically right) sentiments or the men who held them were sufficient to solve the basic problem then we wouldn't see the far worse problems on the border we've got today.
I don't agree with the notion that the current candidates aren't going as deep, or that the "Tea Party Crowd" is insensitive, shallow, or lacking in comparison. Rather I see some accumulated wisdom based upon where these ideas led, and their failure to solve the problem. I think Herman Cain's approach is a perfectly good common sense one and, amazingly it's been left untried. Enforce the existing laws. Improve the process of legal immigration. You don't need some new, expensive and overbearing intervention. He's not the only one talking sense on that stage, just the clearest.
Oct '10
Re: What's So Great About This 1980 Reagan-Bush Exchange?
One of hte smartest conservative I know is for sealing the borders first as a prerequisite. And one of the most annoying RINO today was/is(?) surprisingly tough on illegal immigration.
Edited on Sep 10, 2011 at 5:32am