This episode, the (tentatively) final in the series A History of Economic Tyranny, exposes how Reagan dismantled the New Deal, busted unions, exploded the deficit, and built the foundations of mass incarceration and extreme inequality that still haunts us today.
From the PATCO strike to the War on Drugs, from deregulation to the Savings & Loan crisis, Reagan's neoliberal project wasn't just policy: it was a political realignment. Both parties absorbed his philosophy, and for forty years America has lived in the house Reagan built.
Today's homelessness crisis, stagnant wages, racialized mass incarceration, climate inaction, and billionaire dominance are not accidents. They are Reagan's legacy. He didn't just win two elections. He won the next forty years and cursed us for several generations.
This is the story of the man who sold the world.font>
Ronald Reagan, who was “affectionately” known as ‘The Old Gipper’ was, given the perspective of time, a man who was full of BS. Just like his sister across the Pond, Margaret Thatcher. We were all taken in by their bullshit. If ‘The Old Gipper’ was the man who sold the world, then Margaret Thatcher was the woman who sold the United Kingdom TO the world! She sold off ALL our ASSETS. (And we are still, to this day, paying a very high price for her MISTAKES and her FOLLY.) — © Mark Alexander
