tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5724595763985149011.post3208331615605385167..comments2023-04-04T03:36:39.078-05:00Comments on Coach Sal: Fight Fair... Please!Coach Salhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13942541698409058923noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5724595763985149011.post-42522745675688339212008-01-11T22:09:00.000-05:002008-01-11T22:09:00.000-05:00For as long as I've been teaching, I think "Pagean...For as long as I've been teaching, I think "Pageant" has been the standard, at least in public schools in SC. I teach middle school history (modern USA, 1865 to the present).Coach Salhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13942541698409058923noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5724595763985149011.post-90079125624455431092008-01-11T20:59:00.000-05:002008-01-11T20:59:00.000-05:00I did take AP, in fact. Is "Pageant" really that ...I did take AP, in fact. Is "Pageant" really that universal of an AP text? Regardless, I love that book. It made me love US History. Which definitely helped on the exam, along with the practice of starting all essays with the word "although." Do you teach AP? If so, you should pass that little tip along to your students. My teacher was a big believer in it, and it works!:)Greghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03369241753045956644noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5724595763985149011.post-36465737688104402922008-01-11T16:03:00.000-05:002008-01-11T16:03:00.000-05:00And Mike, although certainly social security is br...And Mike, although certainly social security is broke and needs an overhaul, it was in the 1930s and remains an important part of our social safety-net. I would argue that it's in a far different category than LBJ's Great Society welfare programs, which is why most of the New Deal is part of what I, as a conservative, don't mind conserving. As for WWII, I'm a huge Churchill fan, and there's no doubt that he is THE MAN. But FDR was far more than "the other guy," and the war wouldn't have been won without us Yanks. I think there's more than enough credit to go around. Similarly, I've heard folks who don't like Reagan try to give credit for the end of the cold war to Gorbachev, Maggie Thatcher, and Pope JP II... anybody but Ron, in any combination. I'm glad to share the credit, but the leader of the free world has to get some, in both cases.Coach Salhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13942541698409058923noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5724595763985149011.post-44172640566756224502008-01-11T15:54:00.000-05:002008-01-11T15:54:00.000-05:00Hi, Kim. If you have "Pageant," that means you mu...Hi, Kim. If you have "Pageant," that means you must have taken AP! Sad, what they pass off as history--that should be on an editorial page. They neglect to mention that (1) Revenue really did rise, (2) much of that spending was forced by the Democrat-controlled congress; (3) that the deficits of the Reagan years and associated military spending contributed to the end of the USSR--if you had offered exactly that deal in 1947 to Truman or 1961 to JFK, they would have said, "where do I sign up for a deficit?" and (4) The old line that Reagan ran the "biggest debt of all time" is disingenuous, at best. That's like the guys who tell you that George W. Bush got the most votes of any president. Of course he did... and also the most votes against him, because the country was BIGGER in 2000 than ever before. Today's debt is even worse, and the one under Obama or whoever is next will be even worse, because it keeps going up and inflation is constant. Anyway, the idea that "Reaganomics" was a "failure" is nuts.Coach Salhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13942541698409058923noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5724595763985149011.post-20323499667651865762008-01-11T15:39:00.000-05:002008-01-11T15:39:00.000-05:00So I was reading about Reagan the other day in my ...So I was reading about Reagan the other day in my history textbook, The American Pageant. I was checking him out b/c I know virtually nothing about him, and I'd heard such widely divergent viewpoints. The book praised Reagan's amazing effectiveness in accomplishing his goals, yet ultimately had some harsher words: "But a balanced budget remained grotesquely out of reach. Supply-side economic theory had promised that lower taxes would actually increase government revenue b/c they would so stimulate the economy as a whole. But in fact the combination of tax reduction and huge increases in military spending opened a vast "revenue hole" of $200 billion annual deficits. In his eight years in office, Reagan added well over a trillion dollars to the national debt--more than all his predecessors combined...The staggering deficits of the Reagan years assuredly constituted a great economic failure...<BR/>the deficits virtually guaranteed that future generations of Americans would either have to work harder than their parents, lower their standard of living, or both, to pay their foreign creditors when the bills came due."<BR/>So was this written by a bunch of lefties or what?:) <BR/>--Kim KirbyGreghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03369241753045956644noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5724595763985149011.post-15352670867349938182008-01-11T09:44:00.000-05:002008-01-11T09:44:00.000-05:00I think FDR did the best he could given all the ob...I think FDR did the best he could given all the obstacles he faced. I do wonder if he truly understood what Social Security would turn into. (I despise most of what it has turned into.)<BR/>I cannot put "FDR won WW II" in my mouth, though. I think Churchill had at least as much to do with that as anyone. I give FDR credit, but the government took over A LOT of the economy in the process, too much of which has (regrettably) never been undone. I also think that FDR enabled LBJ. Ugh.MichaelPoluttahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17323419529329808450noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5724595763985149011.post-73012919574604223242008-01-11T08:13:00.000-05:002008-01-11T08:13:00.000-05:00Bekster you beat me to it. I have never heard that...Bekster you beat me to it. I have never heard that saying. I assumed it was a southern thing ( I am from New York) but I guess not. Lori told Sean last night that he was "Actin a fool". once again I've never heard that one before and needed some explanation. I thought I had been down here long enough to have learned everything I needed to but I guess I was wrong.super Hubbyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05436268507691700639noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5724595763985149011.post-35320453381882321952008-01-11T02:32:00.000-05:002008-01-11T02:32:00.000-05:00I was anti Reagan when i was 10... because my teac...I was anti Reagan when i was 10... because my teachers were anti-Reagan. Then I was Anti Bush because everyone was Anti Bush in school... <BR/><BR/>truth of the matter is, I didn't know what policies were nor what difference they made. Now, I would consider myself very pro-reagan... especially after going thru Alan Greenspan's book. As Mike said, he also makes Clinton seem very economically adept. <BR/><BR/>My uncle, on the other hand, said something that was rather alarming (especially for a good ole conservative CofC-er)... Basically he implied that character could be removed from the person serving in office. I found it odd that I (30 years his minor) pointed out how that had been tried before... But at that time, it was King Saul. <BR/><BR/>Blessed is the nation whose G_d is the Lord. Character only barely exists outside the absence of knowing and being in relationship with the Father. <BR/><BR/>well, my politics leans hard to a Benevolent Dictatorship... but that won't happen 'til it's all over.Goode Designhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12722749588441207715noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5724595763985149011.post-1017275300834427212008-01-10T22:56:00.000-05:002008-01-10T22:56:00.000-05:00AMEN BROTHER!!!AMEN BROTHER!!!C. S. Foxhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13100284597852626105noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5724595763985149011.post-61468943664780843222008-01-10T16:07:00.000-05:002008-01-10T16:07:00.000-05:00"nonsense on stilts" lol :)"nonsense on stilts" lol :)beksterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15724637942561747185noreply@blogger.com