Nancy Reagan, a Stylish and Influential First Lady, Dies at 94

[Surfcrest]

http://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/us/nancy-reagan-a-stylish-and-influential-first-lady-dies-at-94/ar-BBqpxzE?ocid=spartanntp


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTl_SvmdTQc

[fountainhall]

No one can doubt that theirs was one of the great enduring romances of all time. Amidst all the schmaltz at her passing, though, let us never forget that behind that warm, sweet exterior was a steel interior, and that in many ways she helped shape her husband's policies. Let's never forget that what became known as the HIV virus and the terrible epidemic of AIDS first appeared in medical journals in the year Reagan took office - 1981. Reagan and presumably his wife were publicly homophobic despite their having friends who were clearly closet homosexuals. The Reagans never mentioned HIV or AIDS once as the disease took its terrible toll not just in the USA but around the world. Even after their close friend Rock Hudson died of AIDS in mid 1985, not a word was mentioned. The following year, his administration reduced AIDS funding from $95 million to $85.5 million. It was only on 31 May 1987 that Reagan, no doubt having consulted his wife, mentioned AIDS in public for the first time. By then 21, 000 Americans had died and 36,000 more were infected. AIDS had also spread to 113 countries.

Repeatedly Reagan's administration had refused desperate requests from the Centre for Disease Control for increased funding. The CDC Task Force Executive, Dr. James Curran, advised staffers to delete the word "homosexual" from its Reports to ensure there was even some chance of obtaining more funding. One author has condemned Reagan saying that the refusal to grant more than mere token funding actually resulted in the far greater spread of the epidemic. And failure of his administration to move on recommendations resulted in the blood supply remaining contaminated for much longer than his experts at the CDC begged.

Of course, the "Moral Majority" and the right-wingers who packed his administration deserve a great deal of the blame. But the buck stopped with Reagan and also with his wife with her determination and her hold over her husband. 40 million are now dead. Their loved ones and friends will not be in mourning today.

[Khor tose]

Today we have 70 million cases of AIDS worldwide, and yes Fountainhall you are perfectly correct to place the responsibility at the door of Ronald Reagan. I had to put up with this SOB both as Governor of California and as President. Nothing makes me madder than knowing this bastard has an airport, aircraft carrier, schools, etc. named after him. It is my hope that one day the real legacy of death, that can be laid at his doorstep, will put him in the same category as the some of the other mass murderers of history. Furthermore, not only didn't Nancy Reagan help with the AIDS crisis, but she totally failed to advance women's rights. Yes, I am sure they had a deep and lasting love affair with each other, but I only wish they had some modicum of compassion for others, including the sick and the poor.

[fountainhall]

Interesting article in today's Guardian newspaper about another recent death related to the early AIDS political controversies, this time of Dr. Myron Schultz. It was Schultz' collection of data on a cluster of pneumonia cases at the start of the 1980s that assisted public health officials identify the new disease that was eventually named AIDS. The first point of note is that allegedly Nancy Reagan refused her long-time friend Rock Hudson's plea for access to what was then experimental treatment.

The article highlights the obstructionist Christian advisers surrounding Reagan. One was the arch-conservative William Bennett who had “an almost Victorian sense that we shouldn’t mention sex at all, because just mentioning sex could incite the passions of teens.” On the other hand, Reagan's Surgeon General, another evangelical conservative C. Everett Koop went almost out on a limb to ensure that the facts about HIV and AIDS were made known to every household in the land.

Near the end the author says this -


Reagan’s death made me think of her husband’s lack of leadership on Aids, and how scholars like (author Anthony) Petro and Jenny Brier (http://www.amazon.com/Infectious-Ideas-Political-Responses-Crisis/dp/0807872113) have shown how a few conservatives inside his White House had to fight for even modest action. It made me think, as Sam Smith made painfully obviously (http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/mar/01/sam-smith-oscar-lgbt-history) at the Oscars, how we don’t know our gay history as a society. How scientists in the CDC, like epidemiologist Schutlz (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/06/health/dr-myron-g-schultz-who-helped-identify-aids-crisis-dies-at-81.html?action=click&contentCollection=us&module=NextInCollection&region=Footer&pgtype=article&version=spotlight&rref=collection%2Fspotlight%2Fnewsmakers&_r=0), had to ingeniously investigate what was happening to people already on the fringes who few cared about. How, as historian and novelist Sarah Schulman pointed out (http://www.wnyc.org/story/reagan-legacy-aids-crisis-leaves-bitter-taste-lgbt-community/), “had there been full attention by the US government and the pharmaceutical industries,” after Schultz and others identified what was happening, “we would not have the global pandemic we have today.” How ACT-UP (http://www.actuporalhistory.org/) had to fight almost everyone to try to get drugs into bodies before an entire generation of gay men was wiped out.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/mar/08/nancy-reagan-myron-schultz-and-aids-in-america

[Khor tose]

Today Ms. Clinton says she misspoke when she credited Nancy Reagan with starting the conversation about AIDS. To me and everyone else who lost friends to AIDS, this is an unbelievable mistake. Truly, I think her "mistake" was an attempt to appeal to Reagan democrats, and firms up my support for Sanders. If she wins the nomination, I will support her, but only because she will be the lessor of two evils. She is definitely a typical opportunistic politician, and not much better then the republicans she is running against.

[homeseeker]

It ought to be well known that Reagan and his "Nancy" can be blamed and held at least morally responsible for the wretched way the gays were left to die because the Reagans attitude towards us and towards AIDS/HIV etc. That hideous couple were and are enemies of our community. I find it almost unforgivable the way Mrs Clinton "mis-spoke"; Is she so stupid not to know the Reagans hated the gays?!