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Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Dayuhan who wrote (58825)	10/12/1999 9:15:00 PM
From: Constant Reader	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 108807

I see. On the one hand, Ronald Reagan had the personal power and influence to single-handedly keep Marcos in power, but on the other hand he had absolutely no power or influence over his departure. This is oddly reminiscent of almost all arguments about Ronald Reagan. His detractors simultaneously paint him as an evil cunning manipulating felon bent on the destruction of the human race, and as a distant disoriented amiable buffoon incapable of uttering a coherent unscripted sentence much less walk and chew gum at the same time. It seems to me that you overestimate Reagan's personal interest in both the Philippines in general and Marcos in particular and thus overstate his ability to personally influence the direction of both the country and the ruler. Once again, you appear to be arguing that the United States maintained a singularly harmful activist interventionist foreign policy at the same time it was guilty of not unilaterally acting to correct all of the wrongs committed in an independent nation governed by its own constitution and rule of law. You appear to discount the record compiled by those who engaged in the conversations and made the decisions by recounting hearsay and talk among your circle of acquaintances. One could argue that Marcos lost control because the power elite (people who benefited by his rule) within the Philippines had reached the point that they were less afraid of potential anarchy and collapse of the state than the continuation of an obviously corrupt and increasingly ineffective regime.

To: Dayuhan who wrote (58825)	10/12/1999 10:39:00 PM
From: Ilaine	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

I can't argue with a man who was there, BUT my understanding is that what was at stake, what was ALWAYS at stake, was Clark and Subic. Reagan's personal relationship with Marcos, whatever that was, had to be subordinate to the United States' interests in maintaining those bases. If keeping Marcos meant keeping Clark and Subic, so be it. If keeping Marcos meant losing Clark and Subic, bye bye Marcos.

To: Dayuhan who wrote (58825)	10/13/1999 11:00:00 AM
From: Zoltan!	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

>>I do wonder, though, that you seem so acute in discerning the role of the Schlesingers as hagiographers, yet so willing to accept the judgements of Reagan's hagiographers. Both Schlesingers were partisans. Both were "Court Historians". Both, I believe were on the payroll. Jr definitely was and worked on JFK's campaign. Lou Cannon a hagiographer? What a joke. You know not of what you speak - Cannon was anti-Reagan from the start and is a liberal Dem. Cannon began his anti-Reagan career "at the beginning" as a CA reporter. His first two books on Reagan were very anti, his last one less so. But that was only after a successful Presidency which more or less defeated the purpose of the first two books. During Reagan's two terms Cannon wrote a weekly column in the Washington Post which criticized whatever Reagan had done the past week. Cannon is no hagiographer and fails as a historian because he has no objectivity - he hated the guy from the start. I read Cannon to see what the Reagan-haters think and I quoted from him about Marcos to show that what I said is true re: the US angle. As for Marcos, you make many leaps of faith. It is just as obvious that you refuse to give Reagan any credit for what he eventually did: Reagan eased Marcos out of office and avoided the Carter example re: the Shah and Somoza. The record makes it clear that there was a strong probability that Marcos would have stayed and fought had he not been offered asylum. Marcos doubtlessly had Carter and "his good friend" the Shah example on his mind. Certainly more people would have died.