Conservapedia - User contributions [en]

Talk:Green energy

2012-11-22T04:55:16Z

Keysersoze: Created page with "=change explanation and question= Changed the wording of the description of nuclear energy because referring to nuclear physics as a constant may be confusing to some readers sin..."

=change explanation and question=
Changed the wording of the description of nuclear energy because referring to nuclear physics as a constant may be confusing to some readers since some constants accepted by nuclear physicists are called into question by creationist theory. Why not just word it as I have to keep things clear?
Also, It may, or may not, be appropriate to mention wind turbine syndrom here. Many mainstream media outlets treat this as a sham, but there are some who take this newly characterized seriously. Basically it is a nervous condition brought on by proximity to wind turbines. Information on it, pro and con is easily available on the internet, but i haven't really searched through it to find the most appropriate sources. Just wanted to mention it here in case anyone ever has an interest in adding it.

Green energy

2012-11-22T04:43:32Z

Keysersoze: see talk page for explanation

'''Green energy''' -- often a misnomer -- consists of renewable energy sources such as solar cells and [[windmill|wind turbines]], which may cause more harm to the environment than traditional energy sources or nuclear energy. Sometimes green energy fails when it is particularly needed, as in windmills typically not working on the coldest days in northern areas. The weather is rarely predictable and relying on an unpredictable system for energy is risky at best.

Green energy is almost always less efficient than fossil fuels and nuclear energy, and almost always promoted by liberals despite this inefficiency.

As an example of the idiocy of green energy, a study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences revealed that "Offshore hurricanes could demolish half the [[turbine]]s in proposed [[wind farm]]s just off the [[USA]]'s coastlines."<ref>http://www.usatoday.com/weather/storms/hurricanes/story/2012-02-12/wind-farms-hurricane-danger/53083084/1</ref> On the other hand, offshore oil and gas platforms are becoming more resilient to hurricanes (even though past hurricanes have significantly impacted their operations).<ref>Axtman, Kris. "Science of oil rigs: surviving Gulf storms." July 26, 2005. The Christian Science Monitor. http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0726/p03s01-usgn.html</ref>

In some cases liberals stop promoting certain types of alternative energy once it becomes efficient, which suggests that some of the push for green energy is due to an underlying opposition to life-promoting energy.

This does not hinder liberals from heavily promoting green energy even though some forms of generating green energy (for instance, solar cells) actually cost more energy to produce than they deliver.

Green energy is also less reliable than [[nuclear power]]: solar cells need clear weather to produce energy and wind turbines need wind to produce power. These methods rely on a climatic variable, while nuclear power relies on the nuclear binding energy inherent in atoms.

Green energy technology companies receive billions of dollars in [[government]] [[subsidy|subsidies]], which are arranged by [[liberal]] politicians. Much of this goes toward the development of unproven or ineffective technology. Green energy [[job]]s are generally not permanent, lasting only as long as the subsidies that support them. Some [[Republicans]] may be accused of being in the pocket of Big Oil, but it is clear that [[Democrats]] are in the pocket of Big Green Energy.<ref>The Lonely Conservative. "Big Green Energy is the Real Corporate Welfare Queen." August 25, 2010. http://lonelyconservative.com/2010/08/big-green-energy-is-the-real-corporate-welfare-queen/</ref>

==References==
{{reflist}}

[[category:energy]]

National debt of the United States

2012-03-06T20:07:37Z

Keysersoze: explained how it hasn't always been the case

[[File:Obama deficits 2009-2010.JPG|275px|right|thumb|Under President Obama, the National debt is approaching 100% of [[Gross Domestic Product]] (GDP). The Greek Debt Crisis of 2010 was preciptated when Greek debt reached 115% of GDP.<ref>http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/116xx/doc11659/07-27_Debt_FiscalCrisis_Brief.pdf</ref>]]
The '''National Debt''' is the amount of money the [[United States]] government owes various [[creditors]] due to [[deficit spending]]. The current national debt is approximately $13.7 trillion. <ref>http://www.treasurydirect.gov/NP/BPDLogin?application=np</ref>

==Debt of the US==
In January 20, 2001; the same year of George W. Bush's inauguration into office, the national debt of the United States was 5.7 trillion dollars and by the end of his run in office (January 19, 2009) it was at 10.6 trillion dollars. <ref>http://www.treasurydirect.gov/NP/NPGateway</ref>

==Debt to GDP Ratio==
Instead of measuring an absolute number, the debt to GDP ratio is the measurement of the national debt as a percentage of the gross domestic product. It is a measure of the debt in relation to the economy and of our capacity to carry and repay debt.<ref>[http://www.optimist123.com/optimist/2005/01/national_debt_b.html National Debt burden: Full history] 29-Jan-05 </ref> The US Debt to GDP ''ratio'' is getting larger, as the US economy's debt is growing faster than the GDP.<ref>Steve McGourty [http://www.cedarcomm.com/~stevelm1/usdebt.htm United States National Debt (1938 to Present)]May 6, 2007 </ref> This has not always been the case: During the last 8 presidenial administrations(pre-Obama), the US Debt to GDP ratio was reduced under Johnson, Nixon, Carter, and Clinton; but increased under Ford, Reagan, George H W Bush, and George W Bush.

==Debt Ceiling==
:''Main Article: [[Debt Ceiling]]''

The debt ceiling is a limit imposed on the [[United States Department of the Treasury|Treasury]] by [[Congress]]. The Treasury may not issue debt in excess of this amount to fund government operations. As of the beginning of May 2011, the debt ceiling is $14.294 trillion and was last raised on February 12, 2010.<ref>"H. J. Res. 45:
Statutory Pay-As-You-Go Act of 2010" http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=hj111-45</ref> Raising the debt ceiling is not the same thing as spending more money, since spending is dictated by the Federal Budget, but it does allow the Federal Government to meet any existing financial obligations. It is not certain what would happen if the national debt reaches the debt ceiling without action by Congress. [[Liberal]] politicians and pundits, including Treasury Secretary [[Timothy Geithner]], claim that government would default on its obligations, causing global financial markets to collapse. Many financial market experts and [[conservatives]], especially [[TEA Party|TEA Partiers]] opposed to raising the debt ceiling, see no evidence that a default would occur in such a situation.<ref>Hurlbut, Terry A. "Debt Ceiling Reached, Sky Does Not Fall." May 16, 2011. Conservative News and Views. http://www.conservativenewsandviews.com/2011/05/16/news/debt-ceiling-reached-sky-does-not-fall/</ref> However, in 1983, when Congress was debating whether to raise the debt ceiling, [[Ronald Reagan]] said:
<blockquote>“The full consequences of a default — or even the serious prospect of default — by the United States are impossible to predict and awesome to contemplate. Denigration of the full faith and credit of the United States would have substantial effects on the domestic financial markets and the value of the dollar in exchange markets. The Nation can ill afford to allow such a result. The risks, the costs, the disruptions, and the incalculable damage lead me to but one conclusion: the Senate must pass this legislation before the Congress adjourns.”<ref>"Ronald Reagan on Raising the Debt Ceiling." May 17, 2011. http://www.thepresidentialcandidates.us/ronald-reagan-on-raising-the-debt-ceiling/1520/</ref></blockquote>

==References==
7. Steve McGourty [http://home.cedarcomm.com/~stevelm1/usdebt.htm]|United States National Debt (1938 to Present)May 6, 2007

<references/>

== Further reading ==
* [http://zfacts.com/p/318.html National Debt Graph (2007 Budget data)]
* [http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/ National Debt Clock and links to current articles]
* [http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/RL34712.pdf The Federal Debt: An Analysis of Movements from World War II to the Present,] Mindy R. Levit, Congressional Research Service, September 17, 2010.

[[Category: Economics]][[Category: Finance]]
[[Category: Obama Administration]][[Category: Reagan Era]]

Fritz Lang

2012-03-02T05:18:41Z

Keysersoze:

[[Fritz Lang]] was a famous [[Austrian]]-[[American]] film director. He is best known for his films ''[[Metropolis (film)|Metropolis]]'', ''[[Die Nibelungen (film)|Die Nibelungen]]'', ''[[Dr. Mabuse, the Gambler]]'', and ''[[M (film)|M]]''. Many of his early scripts were written by Thea Von Harbou, his wife, who became an ardent nazi supporter. Lang would later divorce her and flee to the U.S. shortly before the war to continue his career.

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lang, Fritz}}
[[Category: Directors]]

The Coen Brothers

2012-03-02T05:01:44Z

Keysersoze: changed so it won't link to the city

'''The Coen Brothers''' are the collective name for the film makers Joel and Ethan Coen. They have written and directed a number of critically acclaimed movies since their debut ''Blood Simple'' in 1984. Their film ''No Country For Old Men'' won the Academy Award for Best Picture of 2007.

Their movies are noted for their black humor and frequently bloody violence. The Coens are [[Jewish]], and their movies exhibit a typical [[Hollywood]] [[liberal bias]] of celebrating deviancy and disrespect for the military; e.g, The Dude in ''The Big Lebowski'' is a sympathetically drawn 1960s dropout, while his friend Walter, a Jewish Vietnam veteran, is portrayed as belligerent and stupid. Christians are often portrayed as hypocritical and self-serving, although this is true of many of their characters in general. Their 2009 film ''[[A Serious Man]]'' dealt with a [[Jewish]] [[physics]] professor struggling to understand God, the universe, and causality, and can be variously interpreted through [[Judaism|Jewish theology]], [[quantum physics]], and [[relativity]].

Noted collaborators include [[liberals]] [[George Clooney]], [[Brad Pitt]] and [[Tim Robbins]]. Steve Buscemi, John Turturro, John Goodman, and Frances McDormand also make frequent appearances in their films.

== Filmography ==

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! width="33"|Year
! width="225"|Film
! width="175"|Notes
|-
|1984
|''[[Blood Simple]]''
|
|-
|1987
|''[[Raising Arizona]]''
|
|-
|1990
|''[[Miller's Crossing]]''
|
|-
|1991
|''[[Barton Fink]]''
|Winner of the Palme d'Or at the 1991 Cannes Film Festival
|-
|1994
|''[[The Hudsucker Proxy]]''
|
|-
|1996
|''[[Fargo(film)]]''
|Won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay and Best Leading Actress for Frances McDormand.
|-
|1998
|''[[The Big Lebowski]]''
|
|-
|2000
|''[[O Brother, Where Art Thou?]]''
|
|-
|2001
|''[[The Man Who Wasn't There]]''
|
|-
|2003
|''[[Intolerable Cruelty]]''
|
|-
|2004
|''[[The Ladykillers]]''
|
|-
|2007
|''[[No Country for Old Men]]''
|Won four Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Supporting Actor (Javier Bardem) and Best Adapted Screenplay.
|-
|2008
|''[[Burn After Reading]]''
|
|-
|2009
|''[[A Serious Man]]''
|
|-
|2010
|''[[True Grit]]''
|Based on the 1968 Charles Portis novel.
|}

{{DEFAULTSORT: Coen Brothers, The}}
[[Category:Directors]]

Barton Fink

2012-03-02T04:56:31Z

Keysersoze:

'''''Barton Fink''''' is a 1991 American film written, directed, and produced by [[The Coen Brothers]]
It is the story of a self-centered playwrite who comes to Hollywood to work for a major studio, but suffers from writer's block and finds himself involved in a series of murders. The film is not a straitforward drama, but rather a surreal dark comedy.
[[Category:Movies]].

Frankenstein (1931 film)

2012-03-02T04:44:00Z

Keysersoze:

'''Frankenstein''' was a 1931 [[horror film]] starring [[Boris Karloff]], based on the novel ''[[Frankenstein]]'', about a scientist who animates a corpse sewn together from various (stolen) body parts. Due to an error made by his assistant, Fritz, played by character actor Dwight Frye, Victor Frankenstein places a criminal's brain inside the creature, causing it to become a murderous monster. It hangs Fritz and escapes, going on a rampge. The monster later kidnaps Victor and is chased by the local townsfolk into an old windmill. Victor is pushed out the window, but survives because several people caught him after his fall was broken by hitting one of the windmill's blades. The people set the windmill on fire, destroying it and, apparently, the monster inside.

[[category:Horror (Film)]]

Night of the Living Dead

2012-03-02T04:36:11Z

Keysersoze:

'''Night of the Living Dead''' is a 1968 [[American]] horror film, written and directed by [[George A. Romero]]. It was filmed in [[Pennsylvania]] on a very low budget of $100,000, and is now in the [[public domain]], with many video and [[DVD]] releases available.

Though the black-and-white film was made cheaply, it is widely regarded as one of the best horror films. It is also the start of the ''Living Dead'' series of zombie films.

==Synopsis==
A young couple, Johnny and Barbara, go to a cemetery to bring flowers to Barb's dead father's grave. After that, Johnny starts teasing Barb about dead rising from their graves, coming to get her. Then, Johnny points to a man lumbering around some grave stones, claiming that he is one of those "living dead." This becomes true, as the [[zombie]] suddenly kills Johnny, and the frightened Barb then gets away from the zombie in her car.

Barb then takes refuge in a secluded barnhouse, where she meets Ben, a resourceful drifter who advises that the [[cannibalism|cannibalistic]] zombies can only be killed by being shot in the head or bludgeoned on the head. Ben and Barbara watch emergency broadcasts about the zombie outbreak, and find a man and his wife hiding in the basement with their daughterwho has been bitten by a zombie and is very sick, and a young couple. Ben does whatever he can to keep the zombies away, while the remaining people are panicked. However, the young girl soon becomes a zombie herself, and eats her parents. Ben then kills the zombie girl, and locks himself in the basement, because some zombies have broken into the house and have taken Barb.

Ben spends the whole night in the house, and wakes up to find that all the zombies are gone. He looks outside, and sees a posse of civilians and police officers who have been responsible for the zombie killings. Ben, being mistook for a zombie, is shot in the head, and the ending credits play over a [[montage]] of his body being dragged out of the house and burned on a pyre with other zomie bodies.

==Sequels==
A color sequel, ''[[Dawn of the Dead]]'', also directed by Romero, was released in 1978.
This was followed by "[[Day of the Dead]]", and later by remakes of the first two films. However the "[[Return of the Living Dead]]", released in 1985, and its sequels are not the work of George Romero, and he unsucessfully sued the makers of this series for copyright infringement.
[[Category: Horror (Film)]]

Doctor Strangelove, Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

2012-03-02T04:11:11Z

Keysersoze:

'''''Doctor Strangelove, Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb''''' (1964) is a parody on the hawkish advocates of use of the [[atomic bomb]] against the United States' military enemies. It was a successful comedy that continues to have a cult following to this day.

The film was directed by [[Stanley Kubrick]], and starred the [[British]] [[actor]] Peter Sellers, who played three different roles: President Merkin Muffley, Group Captain Mandrake, and the tittle character Dr Strangelove. Sellers was originally hired to play the role of Commander Kong as well, but because of an injury sustained during filming was unable to perform that role, so Slim Pickens was hried to fill in. James Earl Jones' first role in a film was as the B-52 bombardier, Lieutenant Lothar Zogg.
==Plot==
The storyline is about a mentally ill Strategic Air Command General (Jack Ripper) who decides to launch an unauthorized attack on the Soviet Union, and the efforts of the Government to recall the bombers.
==Links==
*[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057012/ Dr. Strangelove] at the Internet Movie Database

[[category:movies]]
[[category:Cold War]]
[[Category:Movies About Nuclear War]]

Lyndon B. Johnson

2012-03-02T03:52:31Z

Keysersoze: added a few details

{{Officeholder
|name=Lyndon B. Johnson
|image=Lyndon johnson.jpg
|party=[[Democratic]]
|spouse=[[Lady Bird Johnson]]
|religion=[[Disciple of Christ]]
|offices=
{{Officeholder/president
|country=the United States
|number=36th
|terms=November 22, 1963 – January 20, 1969
|vp=[[Hubert Humphrey]]
|preceded=[[John F. Kennedy]]
|former=y
|succeeded=[[Richard Nixon]]
}}
{{Officeholder/vice president
|country=the United States
|number=37th
|terms=January 20, 1961 – November 22, 1963
|president=[[John F. Kennedy]]
|preceded=[[Richard Nixon]]
|former=y
|succeeded=[[Hubert Humphrey]]
}}
{{Officeholder/senator
|state=Texas
|terms=January 3, 1949 – January 3, 1961
|preceded=W. Lee O'Daniel
|former=y
|succeeded=[[William Blakley]]
}}
{{Officeholder/representative
|state=Texas
|district=10th
|terms=April 10, 1937 – January 3, 1949
|preceded=[[James P. Buchanan]]
|former=y
|succeeded=[[Homer Thornberry]]
}}
}}
'''Lyndon Baines Johnson''' (1908–1973), often referred to as '''LBJ''', was the 36th [[President of the United States of America]] (1963–1969). After serving in the House and Senate since 1937, Johnson was elected Vice President in 1960, and in November, 1963, he succeeded to the presidency following President [[John F. Kennedy]]'s assassination. Johnson's political persuasion was hard to gauge. In his early years as a Congressman he was considered a liberal [[New Deal|New Dealer]], although when he became a senator he initially aligned himself with the conservative [[Southern Democrats]], although by the time he ascended to Senate Leadership he espoused moderate politics, perhaps in an attempt to bridge both wings of the fractious [[Democratic Party]]. As President however, he seized the leadership of liberalism, moved the [[Democratic Party]] to the left, and pushed through Congress the [[Great Society]], comprising liberal legislation including civil rights laws, Medicare (free health care for the elderly), Medicaid (free health care for the poor), aid to education, and a major "War on Poverty". Simultaneously, he escalated the American involvement in the [[Vietnam War]], from 16,000 American soldiers in 1963 to 550,000 in early 1968.

Johnson won reelection in a landslide in 1964 over conservative leader [[Barry Goldwater]], and in 1965 succeeded in obtaining new liberal legislation, in particular the Voting Rights Act of 1965, over a Southern Filibuster. Johnson's popularity steadily declined after 1966 and his reelection bid in 1968 collapsed as a result of turmoil in his Democratic party over Vietnam, race, and widespread crime and rioting. He withdrew from the race to concentrate on peacemaking. Johnson was renowned for his domineering personality and arm twisting of powerful politicians.

==Early years==
Johnson was maternally descended from a pioneer Baptist clergyman, George Washington Baines, who pastored numerous small rural churches in Texas, Arkansas, and Louisiana. Baines was also the president of [[Baylor University]] during the [[American Civil War]]. George Baines was the grandfather of Johnson's mother, Rebekah Baines Johnson.

Johnson was born in Stonewall, Texas, in a small farmhouse in a poor farming area along the Pedernales River. His parents, Samuel Ealy Johnson, Jr. and the former Rebekah Baines, had three girls and two boys. The nearby village of Johnson City, Texas, was named after a relative who came from Georgia. In school, Johnson was an awkward, talkative youth and was elected president of his eleventh-grade class.<ref>www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/presidents/36_l_johnson/tguide/l_johnson_dk.html</ref> He graduated from Johnson City High School in 1924.<ref>http://www.lbjlib.utexas.edu/johnson/archives.hom/biographys.hom/lbj_bio.asp</ref>

In 1926, Johnson enrolled in Southwest Texas State Teachers' College (now called Texas State University-San Marcos). He worked his way through school, participated in debate and campus politics, edited the school newspaper, and graduated in 1931. Biographer Robert Caro asserts he was known as "the biggest liar on campus." <ref>Caro, Robert A. The Years of Lyndon Johnson: The Path to Power. New York: Alfred A Knopf, Inc. 1982. p. xx</ref> The college years refined his remarkable skills of persuasion and political organization. One year Johnson taught mostly Mexican American children at the Welhausen School in Cotulla, Texas. When he returned to San Marcos in 1965, after having signed the [[Higher Education Act]], Johnson looked back:
:"''I shall never forget the faces of the boys and the girls in that little Welhausen Mexican School, and I remember even yet the pain of realizing and knowing then that college was closed to practically every one of those children because they were too poor. And I think it was then that I made up my mind that this Nation could never rest while the door to knowledge remained closed to any American''."<ref> see [http://www.lbjlib.utexas.edu/johnson/lbjforkids/edu_whca370-text.shtm "Remarks at Southwest Texas State College Upon Signing the Higher Education Act of 1965"]</ref>

==Early political career==
After graduation, Johnson briefly taught public speaking at Genesee Community College and debate in a Houston high school, then entered politics. Johnson's father had served five terms in the Texas legislature and was a close friend to one of Texas's rising political figures, Congressman [[Sam Rayburn]]. In 1930, Johnson campaigned for Texas state Senator Welly Hopkins in his run for Congress. Hopkins recommended him to Congressman [[Richard M. Kleberg]], who appointed Johnson as Kleberg's legislative secretary. LBJ was elected speaker of the "Little Congress," a group of Congressional aides, where he cultivated Congressmen, newspapermen and lobbyists. Johnson's friends soon included aides to President [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]], as well as fellow Texans such as Vice President [[John Nance Garner]]. He became a surrogate son to Sam Rayburn.

Johnson married Claudia Alta Taylor (already nicknamed "Lady Bird") of Karnack, Texas on November 17, 1934 after she had attended Georgetown University Law School for several months. They had two daughters, Lynda Bird Johnson, born in 1944, and Luci Baines Johnson, born in 1947. Johnson enjoyed giving people and animals his own LBJ initials; his daughters' given names are examples, as was his dog Little Beagle Johnson.

In 1935, he was appointed head of the Texas [[National Youth Administration]] (NYA), which enabled him to use the government to create educational and job opportunities for young people. He resigned two years later to run for Congress. Johnson was a notoriously tough boss throughout his career, often demanding long workdays and work on weekends; he worked as hard as any of them.<ref> Woods, (2006), p. 131 </ref>

==House years==
Johnson resigned from his NYA job in 1937 to run successfully in a special election for a seat in the [[House of Representatives]] representing [[Austin, Texas|Austin]] and the surrounding Hill Country. He ran on a [[New Deal]] platform and was effectively aided by his wife, Lady Bird Johnson.

President Roosevelt found Johnson to be a welcome ally and conduit for information, particularly with regards to issues concerning internal politics in Texas (informally dubbed "Operation Texas") and the machinations of Vice President Garner and House Speaker Sam Rayburn. Johnson was immediately appointed to the powerful Naval Affairs Committee. He worked for rural electrification and other improvements for his district. Johnson steered the projects towards contractors which he personally knew, such as the Brown Brothers, Herman and George, who would finance much of Johnson's future career.<ref>Caro, (1982) is full of details.</ref> In 1941, he ran for the U.S. Senate (while not giving up his House seat) in a special election against the sitting governor, radio personality W. Lee "Pappy" O'Daniel. Johnson was not expected to win against the popular governor, but he ran a strong race and was declared the winner in unofficial returns. He ultimately was defeated by controversial official returns in an election marked by massive fraud on the part of both campaigns.

==Senate years==

In 1948, Johnson ran in another controversial Senate race, this time against former governor Coke Stevenson. After no candidate won a majority of the votes in the election, Johnson defeated Stevenson in a run-off election. The result of this election was highly controversial, most historians, even those sympathetic to Johnson consider Johnson's 87 vote victory over Stevenson to be fraudulent <ref>See eg Robert A Caro Master of the ''Senate Means of Assent''</ref> . After joining the Senate, Johnson established relationships with several senior senators, including [[Richard Russell]]. Johnson was appointed to the powerful [[Armed Services Committee]] in 1950, and became chairman of the Preparedness Subcommittee which brought him into the public spotlight much like [[Harry Truman]] used the "Truman Committee" during the Second World War. He was named minority whip in 1951 under Democratic leader Bob McFarland, and he became the leader of the [[Democratic Party]] in the Senate in 1953. His first major policy, with the support of Russell, was to bypass the Seniority rule in committee assignments, which meant that Senators became reliant on his favour in order to obtain positions on important committees. This move, in combination with his strong personality gave him power of senators that had not been seen before (or since) in Senate History. He is often referred to as the only true "Master of the Senate". Suprisingly, after he bacame majority leader in 1955 he supported many of Eisenhower's proposals despite the partisan resistance of the liberal wing of the Democratic party. This allowed him to bask in the reflected glow of Eisenhower's immense popularity and gain a reputation for working across the aisle and getting things done.

In his capacity as Majority leader of the senate, Johnson was able to ensure the passage of the 1957 Civil Rights Act, the first passed since Reconstruction, by carefully balancing the powerful southern wing of the Democratic party with the liberal northern and Eastern Wing. Johnson sought the Democratic nomination for president prior to the [[United States presidential election, 1960|1960 election]], but accepted the nomination for vice-president following Kennedy's nomination.

==Presidency==
Lyndon B. Johnson was sworn into the [[President of the United States of America|Office of the President]] just hours after John F. Kennedy was assassinated. The [[Oath of Office]] took place aboard [[Air Force One]] (en route to [[Washington DC]] from [[Dallas]]), was administered by [[Sarah T. Hughes]] (one of the first justices to hear and write the decision for [[Roe v. Wade]] in favor of [[abortion]]). <ref>University of North Texas Libraries, Sarah T. Hughes Collection, http://www.library.unt.edu/archives/historical-manuscripts/historical-manuscripts-exhibits/hughes/</ref> Also, since no Bible could be found aboard Air Force One, Johnson recited the oath with his hand on a [[Roman Catholic]] [[missal]] instead.<ref>New York Times, "After a Time of Tragedy, a Beginning Toward the 'Great Society,'" January 1973. Online at http://www.nytimes.com/books/98/04/12/specials/johnson-tragedy.html</ref>

As President, Johnson greatly expanded the federal government with his [[Great Society]] programs. He played a key role in helping the [[civil rights movement]] win legislative victories, pushing for the adoption of the Civil Rights Act (1964), which outlawed segregation, and the Voting Rights Act (1965), which guaranteed African-Americans' right to vote. He also greatly expanded American involvement in [[Vietnam]] (see [[Vietnam War]]). Although Johnson won the 1964 presidential election in a landslide over Republican [[Barry Goldwater]], his popularity plunged as the death toll from the conflict in Vietnam steadily increased. In early 1968, faced with plummeting poll numbers and mounting public opposition to his foreign policy, Johnson announced that he would neither seek nor accept his party's nomination for the presidency in 1968. This decision may have been brought about by his supprisingly narrow victory in the New Hampshire primary over Eugene McCarthy, a liberal anti-war Democrat. It is widely thought that had he run, he would have been trounced in the primaries or in the subsequent general election - eventually won by Republican [[Richard M. Nixon]].

==References==
<references/>

==Bibliography==
===Biographies===
* Caro, Robert A. ''The Years of Lyndon Johnson'' (3 volumes as of 2006): ''The Path to Power'' (1982); ''Means of Ascent'' (1990); ''Master of the Senate: The Years of Lyndon Johnson'' (2002). The most detailed biography, extends to 1960; generally hostile to LBJ; See Dallek and Woods for balanced biographies; [http://www.amazon.com/Path-Power-Years-Lyndon-Johnson/dp/0679729453/ref=sr_1_2/103-4827826-5463040?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1189836030&sr=1-2 vol 1 excerpt and online search from Amazon.com]; [http://www.amazon.com/Means-Ascent-Years-Lyndon-Johnson/dp/067973371X/ref=sr_1_3/103-4827826-5463040?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1189836030&sr=1-3 vol 2 excerpt and online search from Amazon.com]; [http://www.amazon.com/Master-Senate-Lyndon-Johnson-Vintage/dp/0394720954/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-4827826-5463040?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1189836030&sr=1-1 vol 3 excerpt and online search from Amazon.com]
* Dallek, Robert. ''Lone Star Rising: Lyndon Johnson and His Times, 1908–1960'' (1991), [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=59394514 online edition vol 1]; ''Flawed Giant: Lyndon Johnson and His Times, 1961–1973'' (1998) [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=65196503 online edition vol 2]; also: '' Lyndon B. Johnson: Portrait of a President'' (2004). A 400-page abridged version of his 2 volume scholarly biography, [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=103184871 online edition of short version].
* Goodwin, Doris Kearns. ''Lyndon Johnson & the American Dream'' (1977). A character study.
* Schulman, Bruce J. ''Lyndon B. Johnson and American Liberalism: A Brief Biography with Documents'' (1995)
* Woods, Randall. ''LBJ: Architect of American Ambition'' (2006). A highly detailed scholarly biography (1000 pages). [http://www.amazon.com/LBJ-Architect-American-Randall-Woods/dp/0684834588/ref=sr_1_1/103-4827826-5463040?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1189835998&sr=1-1 excerpt and online search from Amazon.com]

===Presidential years===
* Altschuler, Bruce E.; ''LBJ and the Polls'' (1990) [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=37809550 online edition]
* Andrew, John A. ''Lyndon Johnson and the Great Society'' (1999) 224 pp. [http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/1566631858/ref=sib_dp_pt/103-4827826-5463040#reader-link excerpt and online search from Amazon.com]
* Bernstein, Irving. ''Guns or Butter: The Presidency of Lyndon Johnson'' 1994.
* Bornet, Vaughn Davis. ''The Presidency of Lyndon B. Johnson''. 1983
* Branch, Taylor. ''Parting the Waters: America in the King Years 1954-63'' (1989) [http://www.amazon.com/Parting-Waters-America-Years-1954-63/dp/0671687425/ref=sr_1_31?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1208722057&sr=1-31 excerpt and text search]
* Branch, Taylor. ''Pillar of Fire: America in the King Years 1963-65'' (1999) [http://www.amazon.com/Pillar-Fire-America-Years-1963-65/dp/0684848090/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1208722178&sr=1-5 excerpt and text search]
* Branch, Taylor. ''At Canaan's Edge: America in the King Years, 1965-68'' (2007)
* Divine, Robert A., ed. ''The Johnson Years. Vol. 1: Foreign Policy, the Great Society and the White House.'' 1981; essays by scholars
* Divine, Robert A., ed. ''The Johnson Years. Vol. 2: Vietnam, the Environment, and Science.'' 1987; essays by scholars
* Divine, Robert A., ed. ''The Johnson Years. Vol. 3: LBJ at Home and Abroad''. 1994; essays by scholars [http://www.amazon.com/Johnson-Years-Three-Home-Abroad/dp/0700606556/ref=sr_1_5/103-4827826-5463040?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1189836030&sr=1-5 excerpt and online search from Amazon.com]
* Firestone, Bernard J., and Robert C. Vogt, eds. ''Lyndon Baines Johnson and the Uses of Power.'' (1988); essays by scholars [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=23324778 online edition]
* Graham, Hugh Davis. ''The Civil Rights Era: Origins and Development of National Policy, 1960-1972'' (1990)
* Gould, Lewis L. ''Lady Bird Johnson and the Environment.'' 1988.
* Lichtenstein, Nelson, ed. ''Political Profiles: The Johnson Years''. 1976. short biographies of 400+ key politicians
* Mann, Robert. ''The Walls of Jericho: Lyndon Johnson, Hubert Humphrey, Richard Russell, and the Struggle for Civil Rights.'' 1996.
* Milkis, Sidney M. and Jerome M. Mileur, eds. ''The Great Society And The High Tide Of Liberalism'' (2005) 490pp of essays by scholars; [http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/1558494936/ref=sib_dp_pt/103-4827826-5463040#reader-link excerpt and online search from Amazon.com]
* Redford, Emmette S., and Marlan Blissett. ''Organizing the Executive Branch: The Johnson Presidency.'' 1981.
* Shesol, Jeff. ''Mutual Contempt: Lyndon Johnson, Robert Kennedy, and the Feud That Shaped a Decade'' 1997.
* White, Theodore H. ''The Making of the President, 1964'' 1965. [http://www.historyebook.org/ online at ACLS e-books]
* Zarefsky, David. ''President Johnson's War on Poverty'' 1986.

===Vietnam===
* Barrett, David Marshall. ''Advice and Dissent: An Organizational Analysis of the Evolution of Lyndon Johnson's Vietnam Advisory System, 1965–1968.'' (University of Notre Dame, 1990)
* Berman, Larry. ''Lyndon Johnson's War: The Road to Stalemate in Vietnam'' (1991)
* Brands, H. W. ''The Wages of Globalism: Lyndon Johnson and the Limits of American Power '' (1997)
* Casey, Francis Michael. ''The Vietnam Policy of President Lyndon Baines Johnson in Response to the Theory of the Protracted Conflict as Applied in the Politics of Indochina: A Case Study of Threat Perception and Assessment in the Crisis Management Process of a Pluralistic Society.'' (Claremont Graduate School, 1976)
* Cherwitz, Richard Arnold. ''The Rhetoric of the Gulf of Tonkin: A Study of the Crisis Speaking of President Lyndon B. Johnson.'' (University of Iowa, 1978)
* Goodnight, Lisa Jo. ''The Conservative Voice of a Liberal President: An Analysis of Lyndon B. Johnson's Vietnam Rhetoric.'' (Purdue University, 1993)
* Kaiser, David E. ''American tragedy: Kennedy, Johnson, and the origins of the Vietnam War.'' (Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2000) ISBN 0-674-00225-3
* Logevall, Fredrik Bengt Johan. ''Fear to Negotiate: Lyndon Johnson and the Vietnam War, 1963–1965.'' (Yale University, 1993)
* Turner, Kathleen Jane. ''The Effect of Presidential-Press Interaction on Lyndon B. Johnson's Vietnam War Rhetoric.'' (Purdue University, 1978)
* Vandiver, Frank E. ''Shadows of Vietnam: Lyndon Johnson's Wars'' (1997) [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=53311933 online edition]
* Woods, Randall B. "The Politics of Idealism: Lyndon Johnson, Civil Rights, and Vietnam," ''Diplomatic History'' (2007) 31 (1), 1–18. [http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/J.1467-7709.2007.00599.X online at Blackwell-Synergy]]

==Primary sources==
* Barrett David M. ed. "Lyndon B. Johnson's Vietnam Papers: A Documentary Collection" (1997). Documents from LBJ Library and other archives.
* Beschloss Michael R. ed. ''Taking Charge: The Johnson White House Tapes, 1963–1964'' (1997). Transcribed recordings of LBJ's phone calls.
* Beschloss, Michael R. ed. ''Reaching for Glory: Lyndon Johnson's Secret White House Tapes, 1964-1965'' (2002) [http://www.amazon.com/Reaching-Glory-Lyndon-Johnsons-1964-1965/dp/074322714X/ref=sr_1_7/103-4827826-5463040?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1189836030&sr=1-7 excerpt and online search from Amazon.com]
* Califano Joseph A., Jr. ''The Triumph & Tragedy of Lyndon Johnson'' (1991). By a cabinet member.
* [http://fraser.stlouisfed.org/publications/ERP/ Council of Economic Advisors, ''Economic Report of the President'' (annual 1947- )], complete series online; important analysis of current trends and policies, plus statistcial tables
* Gallup, George H. ed. ''The Gallup Poll: Public Opinion, 1935–1971, volume 3: 1959–1971'' (1972). Summary of poll data.
* Johnson Lyndon B. ''The Vantage Point: Perspectives on the Presidency, 1963–1969'' (1971). LBJ's memoirs.
* ''Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Lyndon B. Johnson'' (10 volumes, GPO, 1965-70). All speeches and official statements.
* Reedy, George ''Lyndon B. Johnson: A Memoir'' (1982), ISBN 0-8362-6610-2. A memoir by the press secretary.

{{USPresidents}}
{{USVicePresidents}}
{{DEFAULTSORT: Johnson, Lyndon B.}}

[[Category:Democratic Party]]

Jack Kemp

2012-03-02T03:26:39Z

Keysersoze:

[[File:Dole Kemp RNCphoto.jpg|thumb|Jack Kemp (left) and Robert Dole]]

'''Jack Kemp''' (July 13, 1935 – May 2, 2009) was a congressman from the [[Buffalo]] area who led the movement for tax cuts in the 1980s. His legislation, entitled the "Kemp-Roth" tax cuts, embodied the insight of [[supply-side economics]] that cutting taxes could both help the economy and increase government revenue. A former star quarterback in the fledgling [[American Football League]], Kemp ran unsuccessfully for [[President]] in 1988 and was the unsuccessful [[Republican]] nominee for the [[Vice President of the United States of America|Vice President]] in 1996. He also served for four years as the [[Secretary of Housing and Urban Development]] ([[HUD]]) under President [[George H.W. Bush]]. His supply-side Kemp-Roth bill during the Reagan era enacted a 23% tax cut over three-years and led to what was the most prolonged economic expansion of modern times.

Solidly [[conservative]] as a [[congressman]] and candidate for higher office, Kemp continued to help [[conservative]] candidates and causes. But in March 2006 he co-chaired a project with [[liberal]] [[Democrat]] [[John Edwards]] for the [[Council on Foreign Relations]] on the topic of [[Russia]]'s future and what the [[United States]] "can and should do."<ref>http://www.cfr.org/publication/9997/</ref>

== Death ==
Upon his death, the Kemp family released a statement:
{{Cquote|'''Jack Kemp passed peacefully into the presence of the Lord shortly after 6 o’clock this evening, surrounded by the love of his family and pastor, and believing with Isaiah, ''“My strength and my courage is the Lord.”'' During the treatment of his cancer, Jack expressed his gratitude for the thoughts and prayers of so many friends, a gratitude which the Kemp family shares.'''}}

== Quotes ==
* "Democracy without morality is impossible" <ref>[http://www.quotes-museum.com/quote/51092 Jack Kemp Quotes] Quotes Museum</ref>
* "Every time in this century we've lowered the tax rates across the board, on employment, on saving, investment and risk-taking in this economy, revenues went up, not down."
* “Pro football gave me a good perspective. When I entered the political arena, I had already been booed, cheered, cut, sold, traded, and hung in effigy.”
* “Winning is like shaving -- you do it every day or you wind up looking like a bum.”

== References ==
<references/>

== External Links ==
* [http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124139616039181855.html Jack Kemp in His Own Words]

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kemp, Jack}}

[[Category:Former United States Representatives]]
[[Category:Football Players]]
[[Category:Reagan Era]]
[[Category:Fiscal Conservatives]]
[[Category:Republican Party]]
{{conservatism}}

Jack Kemp

2012-03-02T03:24:35Z

Keysersoze:

[[File:Dole Kemp RNCphoto.jpg|thumb|Jack Kemp (left) and Robert Dole]]

'''Jack Kemp''' (July 13, 1935 – May 2, 2009) was a congressman from the [[Buffalo]] area who led the movement for tax cuts in the 1980s. His legislation, entitled the "Kemp-Roth" tax cuts, embodied the insight of [[supply-side economics]] that cutting taxes could both help the economy and increase government revenue. A former star football player in the fledgling [[American Football League]], Kemp ran unsuccessfully for [[President]] in 1988 and was the unsuccessful [[Republican]] nominee for the [[Vice President of the United States of America|Vice President]] in 1996. He also served for four years as the [[Secretary of Housing and Urban Development]] ([[HUD]]) under President [[George H.W. Bush]]. His supply-side Kemp-Roth bill during the Reagan era enacted a 23% tax cut over three-years and led to what was the most prolonged economic expansion of modern times.

Solidly [[conservative]] as a [[congressman]] and candidate for higher office, Kemp continued to help [[conservative]] candidates and causes. But in March 2006 he co-chaired a project with [[liberal]] [[Democrat]] [[John Edwards]] for the [[Council on Foreign Relations]] on the topic of [[Russia]]'s future and what the [[United States]] "can and should do."<ref>http://www.cfr.org/publication/9997/</ref>

== Death ==
Upon his death, the Kemp family released a statement:
{{Cquote|'''Jack Kemp passed peacefully into the presence of the Lord shortly after 6 o’clock this evening, surrounded by the love of his family and pastor, and believing with Isaiah, ''“My strength and my courage is the Lord.”'' During the treatment of his cancer, Jack expressed his gratitude for the thoughts and prayers of so many friends, a gratitude which the Kemp family shares.'''}}

== Quotes ==
* "Democracy without morality is impossible" <ref>[http://www.quotes-museum.com/quote/51092 Jack Kemp Quotes] Quotes Museum</ref>
* "Every time in this century we've lowered the tax rates across the board, on employment, on saving, investment and risk-taking in this economy, revenues went up, not down."
* “Pro football gave me a good perspective. When I entered the political arena, I had already been booed, cheered, cut, sold, traded, and hung in effigy.”
* “Winning is like shaving -- you do it every day or you wind up looking like a bum.”

== References ==
<references/>

== External Links ==
* [http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124139616039181855.html Jack Kemp in His Own Words]

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kemp, Jack}}

[[Category:Former United States Representatives]]
[[Category:Football Players]]
[[Category:Reagan Era]]
[[Category:Fiscal Conservatives]]
[[Category:Republican Party]]
{{conservatism}}

Jack Kemp

2012-03-02T03:17:47Z

Keysersoze:

[[File:Dole Kemp RNCphoto.jpg|thumb|Jack Kemp (left) and Robert Dole]]

'''Jack Kemp''' (July 13, 1935 – May 2, 2009) was a congressman from the [[Buffalo]] area who led the movement for tax cuts in the 1980s. His legislation, entitled the "Kemp-Roth" tax cuts, embodied the insight of [[supply-side economics]] that cutting taxes could both help the economy and increase government revenue. A former star football player in the fledgling [[American Football League]], Kemp ran unsuccessfully for [[President]] in 1988 and was the unsuccessful [[Republican]] nominee for the [[Vice President of the United States of America|Vice President]] in 1996. He also served for four years as the [[Secretary of Housing and Urban Development]] ([[HUD]]) under President [[George H.W. Bush]]. His supply-side Kemp-Roth bill during the Reagan era enacted a 30% tax cut over three-years and led to what was the most prolonged economic expansion of modern times.

Solidly [[conservative]] as a [[congressman]] and candidate for higher office, Kemp continued to help [[conservative]] candidates and causes. But in March 2006 he co-chaired a project with [[liberal]] [[Democrat]] [[John Edwards]] for the [[Council on Foreign Relations]] on the topic of [[Russia]]'s future and what the [[United States]] "can and should do."<ref>http://www.cfr.org/publication/9997/</ref>

== Death ==
Upon his death, the Kemp family released a statement:
{{Cquote|'''Jack Kemp passed peacefully into the presence of the Lord shortly after 6 o’clock this evening, surrounded by the love of his family and pastor, and believing with Isaiah, ''“My strength and my courage is the Lord.”'' During the treatment of his cancer, Jack expressed his gratitude for the thoughts and prayers of so many friends, a gratitude which the Kemp family shares.'''}}

== Quotes ==
* "Democracy without morality is impossible" <ref>[http://www.quotes-museum.com/quote/51092 Jack Kemp Quotes] Quotes Museum</ref>
* "Every time in this century we've lowered the tax rates across the board, on employment, on saving, investment and risk-taking in this economy, revenues went up, not down."
* “Pro football gave me a good perspective. When I entered the political arena, I had already been booed, cheered, cut, sold, traded, and hung in effigy.”
* “Winning is like shaving -- you do it every day or you wind up looking like a bum.”

== References ==
<references/>

== External Links ==
* [http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124139616039181855.html Jack Kemp in His Own Words]

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kemp, Jack}}

[[Category:Former United States Representatives]]
[[Category:Football Players]]
[[Category:Reagan Era]]
[[Category:Fiscal Conservatives]]
[[Category:Republican Party]]
{{conservatism}}

Corvette (car)

2011-11-30T02:36:20Z

Keysersoze:

The Corvette is a high-end Sports car that has been produced by [[GM]] since 1953. The car was designed by Harley Earl and named after the fast attack [[Corvette|ship]]. However the first Corvettes produced gave somewhat lackluster performance due to their 'stovebolt' 6-cylinder engines. V-8 powerplants were soon introduced and the car rapidly gained in popularity. An unusual design feature for it's time was an all-fiberglass body. The Corvette is available in 2-door sports coupe and convertible models, and a 4-door sedan model has been considered by the GM development team. The Corvette has such name recognition that it is actually sold under its own marquee in Europe and Japan.

[[Category:Cars]]

Aston Martin

2011-11-30T02:29:34Z

Keysersoze:

'''Aston Martin''' is a [[British]] sports car manufacturer, famous for Vantage and DB9 models. Aston-Martin refused to quote horsepower figures for their cars for decades. Their immensely powerful double overhead cam hemi powerplants were described, in a typical show of British understatement, as, "adequate".

==References==

*http://www.astonmartin.com/home
*http://www.motortrend.com/new_cars/01/aston_martin/index.html

[[Category:Cars]]

Talk:Jack Kemp

2011-11-30T02:15:03Z

Keysersoze: Pathetic errors in article. There's just no excuse for this kind of ignorance.

==30%?==
The tax bill in question did not produce a tax cut of 30%. It was a 23% tax-cut. (The original 10-10-10 proposal was diluted to 10-8-5).[[User:Keysersoze|Keysersoze]] 21:15, 29 November 2011 (EST)

==17 year expansion?==
There was no 17 year expansion. The economy was tipped into recession in 1982 by the economic actions of the new administration(Their 'push-pull' hypothesis); and as Dave Stockman explains in his autobiography, the recession would have been much worse if Kemp and the gold-bugs had had their way. Furthermore, there was another major recession during the George HW Bush administration, less than a decade after that of '82.[[User:Keysersoze|Keysersoze]] 21:15, 29 November 2011 (EST)

Richard Nixon

2011-11-22T05:11:36Z

Keysersoze:

{{Officeholder
|name=Richard Nixon
|image=Nixon 30-0316a.jpg
|party=[[Republican]]
|spouse=Thelma Catherine "Pat" Ryan
|religion=[[Quaker]]
|offices=
{{Officeholder/president
|country=the United States
|number=37th
|terms=January 20, 1969 – August 9, 1974
|vp=[[Spiro Agnew]] [[Gerald Ford]]
|preceded=[[Lyndon Johnson]]
|former=y
|succeeded=[[Gerald Ford]]
}}
{{Officeholder/vice president
|country=the United States
|number=36th
|terms=January 20, 1953 – January 20, 1961
|president=[[Dwight Eisenhower]]
|preceded=[[Alben W. Barkley]]
|former=y
|succeeded=[[Lyndon Johnson]]
}}
{{Officeholder/senator
|state=California
|terms=December 4, 1950 – January 1, 1953
|preceded=[[Sheridan Downey]]
|former=y
|succeeded=[[Thomas Kuchel]]
}}
{{Officeholder/representative
|state=California
|district=12th
|terms=January 3, 1947 – December 1, 1950
|preceded=Jerry Voorhis
|former=y
|succeeded=Patrick J. Hillings
}}
}}
'''Richard Milhous Nixon''' was the 37th [[President of the United States of America]], serving from 1969 to 1974. He was the only U. S. Republican President to resign the office. He also served as the 36th [[Vice President of the United States]] of America under President [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]] from 1953 to 1961.

In 1946, he was elected as a [[U.S. Representative]]. As a Congressman from [[California]], and as a member of the [[House Committee on Un-American Activities]], he investigated Communists and instigated the successful prosecution of [[Alger Hiss]] for spying for the Soviet Union during [[World War II]].

After two terms in the House, he was elected to the U.S. Senate in November of 1950.

After losing his first presidential race to [[John F. Kennedy]] by a narrow margin in 1960, he unsuccessfully ran for Governor of California in 1962, losing to incumbent Edmund G Brown.

In 1968 he was elected president, and was reelected in 1972 by a landslide, but resigned the presidency on August 9, 1974 due to a threat of impeachment by Congress for the [[Watergate Affair]]. The main impeachment charge was that Nixon obstructed justice by telling employees to mislead FBI investigators about the Watergate burglary.

==Early Life==
Richard Milhous Nixon was born in [[Yorba Linda, California]], on January 9, 1913. Soon after, his family moved to Whittier, California. Nixon's childhood years were not unusual for someone growing up in two small towns near Los Angeles. His parents, Frank and Hannah Nixon, were devout [[Quakers]]. Nixon had four siblings and saw two of his brothers die from [[tuberculosis]]. Nixon grew up relatively poor, as his father earned a modest income from his gas station and grocery store. But due to these hard times, he established a quality of determination and strong work ethic. A good student and a hard worker, Nixon excelled scholastically at both Whittier High School and Whittier College.

Nixon attended Fullerton High School and Whittier High School. He graduated second in his class from Whittier with honor in the study of [[Shakespeare]] and [[Latin]]. He was awarded scholarships to [[Harvard]] and [[Yale]] University, but declined due to his family's financial condition. He instead enrolled at [[Whittier College]], a local [[Quaker]] school, where he co-founded the "Orthogonian Society", a new organzation to the campus geared towards working-class students. At Whittier, Nixon, a formidable debater, was elected freshman class president, and served as student body vice president in his junior year and president in his senior year. While at Whittier, he taught Sunday school at [[East Whittier Friends Church]] and remained a member all his life.

A lifelong football fan, Nixon practiced with the team, but played little. In 1934, he graduated second in his class from Whittier, and went on to [[Duke University|Duke University School of Law]], where he received a full scholarship, was elected president of the Duke Bar Association, and graduated third in his class.

In 1942 Nixon became a lawyer for the Office of Price Administration, the wartime liberal [[New Deal]] program that regulated all prices and rationed basic commodities.

During World War II, Nixon served in the [[Navy]] as a reserve officer, serving in the supply corps on several islands in the South Pacific, commanding cargo handling units in the SCAT. There he was known as "Nick" and for his exceptional poker-playing skills, banking a large sum of money that helped finance his first campaign for Congress. He rose to the rank of Lieutenant commander and resigned in March, 1946.

==Congressional Career==
:''See related article : [[Legacy of Alger Hiss]]
After service in the Navy he entered an entirely unstructured California political environment-- parties hardly existed there in the 1940s, and many voters were recent arrivals. As a result Nixon never built a secure base in California (or anywhere else). In 1946 he defeated five-term Democrat Representative Jerry Voorhis, a leading liberal. Two years later, Nixon ran for reelection in both the Republican and Democrat primaries and won endorsement of both parties in the general election. <ref>Only California allowed this sort of "cross filing," and they later dropped it and went to normal intra-party primaries. Richard Matthew Pious, ''The Presidents,'' pg. 515</ref> Nixon took typical positions for a California Republican: he was hostile to [[Communism]], internationalist in outlook, and middle-of-the road in economic and social issues.

Nixon's first major breakthrough came in Congress, where his dogged investigation broke the impasse of the [[Alger Hiss]] spy case in 1948. The idea that Hiss--a former senior adviser to President [[Franklin Roosevelt]]-- was a Soviet spy alarmed the nation, and won the lifelong hatred of the left, whose veneer of patriotism was dissolved. [[Image:Eisenhower_Nixon.jpg|left|thumb|275px|Eisenhower and Nixon on a 1952 Campaign Stop.]]
In 1950 Nixon was elected to the [[United States Senate]] by defeating a leading Hollywood liberal, Helen Gahagan Douglas using tough campaign tactics that emphasized her votes with the far left.

==Vice Presidency==

Because of his membership of the California delegation at the 1952 [[Republican National Convention]], his strong anti-[[communist]] credentials, and his appeal to the [[west]]ern part of the [[United States]], Nixon was named as [[General]] [[Dwight Eisenhower]]'s [[Vice President of the United States of America|vice presidential]] [[running mate]].

In the midst of the campaign questions arose about a group of seventy-six [[business]]man from southern California who had contributed to a secret slush fund for Richard Nixon, being paid $900 a month (totaling $18,168 up to that point). There was talk on Nixon dropping off the ticket. Nixon claimed that money was used for office expenses only. On September 23, 1952 he gave the now infamous "Checkers Speech" in which he said that he and his wife, [[Patrica Nixon|Pat Nixon]] do not live lavishly, saying that his wife had not even owned a fur coat but only "a respectable Republican cloth coat." He went on to bring up a gift someone gave his [[child]]ren, a "little cocker spaniel [[dog]]" named Checkers, and said defiantly, "regardless of what they about it, we're going to keep it." The speech was meet with overwhelming public approval. In November, Eisenhower and Nixon swept their way in office, winning 55 percent of the vote, to 44 percent for Democrat opponent [[Adlai Stevenson]].

As Vice President Richard Nixon occasionally presided over the Senate and chaired the President's Commission on [[Government]] Contracts, which dealt with radical discrimination by government contractors, and the Cabinet Committee on Price Stability for Economic growth (although Nixon had little influence over it). Nixon also chaired the National Security Council. However, in a [[press]] conference President Eisenhower was asked to give an example of Richard Nixon's contributions as Vice President, to which Eisenhower replied, "If you give me a week, I might think of one."

Nixon did, however, have an influential role in [[White House]] political operations. He campaigned for Republican members of Congress in 1954 and 1958. Nixon positioned himself as Presidential and his famous 1959 "Kitchen debate" in [[Moscow]] with [[Soviet Union]] President [[Nikita Khrushchev]] boosted his public appeal. By the end of the Eisenhower administration Nixon had become the top contender to be the Republican nomination for the 1960 Presidential election.

[[Image:Johnfkennedyrichardnixon.jpg|left|thumb|275px|Vice President Nixon and Senator Kennedy in their 1960 Presidential Debate.]]

==1960 Presidential Campaign==

''Main Article: [[United States presidential election, 1960]]''

Nixon easily won the Republican nomination for the presidency, but ran a poor campaign in the general election. Despite division over the modern [[civil rights]] movement, the country was enjoying a period of relative prosperity.

The most prominent issues were the [[Cold War]] and the new assumption of power of [[dictator]] [[Fidel Castro]] of [[Cuba]]. Public opinion polls showed that the country trusted Nixon more on [[foreign policy]] issues while Democrat opponent [[John F. Kennedy]] was favored on domestic issues. 1960 marked the first presidential election in which televised debates were used. Kennedy won the debates, which resulted in him defeating Nixon by a razor-thin margin of 49.7 percent of the vote to 49.5 percent. Nixon believed that there was voter fraud in Cook County, [[Illinois]] which resulted in him losing that state, however Nixon chose not to contest the results. Kennedy's lead in the electoral college was such that he still would have been elected even if he had lost Illinois.

==1962 Gubernatorial Campaign==

After the election Nixon returned to California and ran for [[Governor]] in 1962 against incumbent [[Pat Brown]]. Brown defeated Nixon with 52 percent of the vote to 46 percent. In a post-election press conference Nixon announced the end of his political career and said to the press "you won't have Richard Nixon to kick around with anymore."

Nixon continued to campaign for Republican congressional candidates and traveled the world, sharpening his knowledge of foreign issues.

==1968 Presidential Campaign==

''Main Article: [[United States presidential election, 1968]]''

By 1967 Nixon's financial backers were raising funds to bankroll another bid for the White House. In the Republican primaries and caucuses moderates and liberals supported [[Michigan]] Governor [[George Romney]] and later [[New York]] Governor [[Nelson Rockefeller]], while [[conservative]]s supported [[California]] Governor [[Ronald Reagan]]. Nixon was able to win support from southern conservatives and pass Reagan in the polls, eventually winning the nomination. In Nixon's second attempt for the Presidency the United States was in the midst of the [[Vietnam War]], with Democrats associated with the violence. With President [[Lyndon Johnson]] losing [[credibility]] because of the increasingly unpopular [[war]], he declined to run for another term. [[Vice President of the United States of America|Vice President]] [[Hubert Humphrey]] narrowly won the Democrat nomination. [[Alabama]] Governor [[George Wallace]], a strong segregationist, entered the race as a third party candidate. Nixon promised to end the bombing in [[Vietnam]], unify the nation and restore law and order to the country.

President Johnson helped Humphrey after he announced that bombing in North Vietnam would be halted and that a cease-fire would follow, however his announcement was too late. On election day, Nixon defeated Humphrey by over 100 electoral votes, although he won the election with only 43 percent of the vote to 42 percent, partly because Wallace took 13 percent.

==1972 Reelection Campaign==

''Main Article: [[United States presidential election, 1972]]''

President Nixon's reelection campaign got underway in 1972. He had high approval ratings for his handling with China and the Soviet Union. Nixon's Democrat opponent, [[South Dakota]] Senator [[George McGovern]] was viewed too [[liberal]] by many Americans. However, there was still concern in the Nixon camp because of his close victory in 1968 and the United States' continued involvement in the Vietnam War. He chose to engage in tactics that included an effort to steal information in the Democrat Party's headquarters. Five Nixon supporters broke into the party's office at the Watergate complex in [[Washington, D.C.]] on June 17, 1972. This however did not become an issue in the campaign, with President Nixon trumping McGovern in 49 out of 50 states.

==Presidency (1969-1974)==

===Administration===

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Office
! Name
! Term
|-
| [[President]]
| Richard Nixon
| 1969-1974
|-
| [[Vice President of the United States of America|Vice President]]
| [[Spiro Agnew]]
| 1969-1973
|-
|
| [[Gerald Ford]]
| 1973-1974
|-
| [[Secretary of State]]
| [[William P. Rogers]]
| 1969-1973
|-
|
| [[Henry Kissinger]]
| 1973-1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Treasury]]
| [[David M. Kennedy]]
| 1969-1971
|-
|
| [[John Connally]]
| 1971-1972
|-
|
| [[George Shultz]]
| 1972-1974
|-
|
| [[William Simon]]
| 1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Defense]]
| [[Melvin R. Laird]]
| 1969-1973
|-
|
| [[Elliot Richardson]]
| 1973
|-
|
| [[James Schlesinger]]
| 1973-1974
|-
| [[Attorney General]]
| [[John N. Mitchell]]
| 1969-1972
|-
|
| [[Richard Kleindienst]]
| 1972-1973
|-
|
| [[Elliot Richardson]]
| 1973-1974
|-
|
| [[William B. Saxbe]]
| 1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Interior]]
| [[Walter Joseph Hickel]]
| 1969-1971
|-
|
| [[Rogers Morton]]
| 1971-1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Agriculture]]
| [[Clifford M. Hardin]]
| 1969–1971
|-
|
| [[Earl Butz]]
| 1971–1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Commerce]]
| [[Maurice Stans]]
| 1969–1972
|-
|
| [[Peter Peterson]]
| 1972–1973
|-
|
| [[Frederick B. Dent]]
| 1973-1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Labor]]
| [[George Shultz]]
| 1969–1970
|-
|
| [[James D. Hodgson]]
| 1970–1973
|-
|
| [[Peter J. Brennan]]
| 1973–1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare]]
| [[Robert Finch]]
| 1969–1970
|-
|
| [[Elliot Richardson]]
| 1970–1973
|-
|
| [[Caspar Weinberger]]
| 1973–1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Housing and Urban Development]]
| [[George Romney]]
| 1969–1973
|-
|
| [[James Thomas Lynn]]
| 1973-1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Transportation]]
| [[John A. Volpe]]
| 1969–1973
|-
|
| [[Claude Brinegar]]
| 1973-1974
|-
|}

=== Vietnam War ===

[[Image:PresidentNixon.jpg|left|thumb|275px|President Nixon points out the NVA sanctuaries along the Cambodian border in his speech to the American people announcing the Cambodian incursion, 04/30/70]] Two months after coming into office American deaths in Vietnam reached thirty-six hundred. Nixon appointed [[Harvard]] Professor [[Henry Kissinger]] as National Security Adviser, who had secret peace talks with the North Vietnamese. Peace negations dragged on throughout Nixon's first term. His Vietnam strategies included "Vietnamization," a policy aimed at reducing U.S. casualties and troops, while also convincing the American public that the Vietnamese people could assume the primary responsibility of waging war. To win support for the war among the [["silent majority,"]] Nixon pursued the [["politics of polarization."]] Instrumental to this cause was Nixon's first vice president [[Spiro T. Agnew]], who criticized opponents of the war as "nattering nabobs of negativism," and an "effete corps of impudent snobs." Nixon also sought to instill in the North Vietnamese the belief that he was volatile and unstable, and willing to use nuclear weapons in the war, a strategy known as the "madman scenario."

On April 30, 1970, ten days after announcing that 150,000 American troops would be withdrawn from Vietnam in the following year, Nixon announced that U.S. troops had invaded Cambodia. This announcement brought widespread protests and college and university campuses across the nation. Four students were shot by National Guardsmen at [[Kent State University]] in Ohio and two died at [[Jackson State University]] in Mississippi. Many campuses shut down, some for the remainder of the academic year. The [[Paris Peace Accords]] were signed on January 27, 1973, signaling the beginning of the peace process that ended with the evacuation of the last American personnel two years later on April 30, 1975. Pictures of the last U.S. Marines evacuating the American Embassy by helicopter while civilians, many of which were employed by the Americans during the war, attempted to climb aboard, has become a symbol of the U.S. defeat in Vietnam.

=== Policy of Detente ===

[[Image:Leonid_Brezhnev_and_Richard_Nixon.jpg‎|right|thumb|275px|Richard M. Nixon and Leonid Brezhnev, 05/19/73.]] Nixon worked to establish a friendlier relationship with the Soviet Union and [[China]]. The Soviets were not pleased of Nixon, a man who spent his career attacking communism, had become President. Although still a strong anti-communist, Nixon understood the growing role of China and Western Europe, realizing that he had to be more diplomatic. With the help of National Security Adviser [[Henry Kissinger]], Nixon created an approach called Detente, which was relaxed tensions between the United States and its two major communist rivals, the Soviet Union and China. Nixon began the policy of detente by lifting trade and travel restrictions.

After a long series of highly secret negations between Kissinger and Chinese leaders, Nixon announced that he would visit China in February 1972. During the historic trip, the leaders of both nations agreed to have more normal relationships. Nixon told the Chinese during a banquet toast, "Let us start a long march together, not in lockstep, but on different roads leading to the same goal, the goal of building world structure of peace and justice." In taking the trip, Nixon hoped to both strengthen ties with China but also believed it would encourage the Soviet Union to be more diplomatic. He proved to be correct. Shortly after the public learned about China, the Soviets proposed an American-Soviet summit, a high level diplomatic meeting that was held in May 1972. President Nixon flew to Moscow for a week long summit, thus becoming the first American President since [[World War 2]] to visit the Soviet Union.

The two superpowers signed the first Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty, or SALT 1, a plan to limit nuclear arms that the two nations had been working on for years. Nixon and Soviet President [[Leonid Brezhnev]] also agreed to increase trade and exchange scientific information. President Nixon had made a significant mark on the world stage with major foreign policy triumphs.

=== Watergate ===

The event that ended the Nixon presidency began on June 17, 1972, when five men, all employees of Nixon's reelection campaign (CREEP), were caught breaking into rival Democratic headquarters at the Watergate complex in Washington, DC. The intruders and two other accomplices were convicted of burglary and wiretapping in Jan. 1973. The [[Watergate affair]] ultimately caused Nixon to resign on August 9, 1974. On September 9, 1974, his successor Gerald Ford granted him "a full, free, and absolute pardon." This effectively ended investigation into the depth of Nixon's involvement in the break-in at [[Democratic National Committee]] headquarters in the Watergate hotel, or any other criminal activities. Former White House Counsel John Dean testified to a Congressional investigating committee of Nixon's involvement in the cover-up.

[[Image:NixonFarewell.jpg|left|thumb|275px|President Nixon delivers his Farewell Remarks to the White House Staff in the East Room, with his family looking on, 08/09/74]] The Congressional hearings revealed Nixon had tape recorded conversations and telephone calls in his office. These recordings reveal that Nixon's role in the cover-up began as early as six days after the break-in. The tapes also reveal an immense scope of crimes and abuses that predate the Watergate break-in. These include campaign fraud, political espionage and sabotage, illegal break-ins, improper tax audits, illegal wiretapping on a massive scale, and a secret slush fund laundered in Mexico to pay those who conducted these operations. The president, citing [[Executive Privilege]], refused to turn the tapes over to the committee. In October 1973 Nixon ordered Elliot Richardson, the attorney general, to fire Archibald Cox, the special prosecutor who had subpoenaed the tapes, but Richardson resigned in protest. Richardson's assistant, William Ruckelshaus, also refused to fire Cox and was fired by Nixon. Finally, Solicitor General Robert Bork fired Cox. The incident, which was trumped in the press as the "Saturday Night Massacre", led to widespread calls for Nixon's impeachment.

The White House released edited transcripts of the tapes in April 1974, and eventually the tapes themselves, after the Supreme Court rejected Nixon's claim to executive privilege. The House Judiciary Committee issued three articles of impeachment on July 30, 1974.

"In all of this," the articles of impeachment summarize, "Richard M. Nixon has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as President and subversive of constitutional government, to the great prejudice of the cause of law and justice, and to the manifest injury of the people of the United States." After conferring with Republican Senators Nixon resigned on August 9, 1974. Nixon was succeeded in office the same day by [[Gerald Ford]]. Ford later pardoned Nixon.

The Nixon White House was also involved in [[Henry_Kissinger#Latin_America| controversies in Latin America]], which included [[Henry_Kissinger#The_Schneider_Affair| an alleged assassination attempt]] in [[Chile]], among [[Henry_Kissinger#Major_Controversies| other questionable activities]].

==Family==

Nixon married Thelma Catherine Ryan, known as "Pat", in 1940. They had two children: Patricia (b. 1946) and Julie (b. 1948).

[[File:Pat nixon.jpg|300px|center]]

==References==
<References/>

==Further reading==

* Aitken, Jonathan. ''Nixon: A Life'' (1993).
* Ambrose, Stephen. ''Nixon'' (3v 1987-1991), the standard scholarly biography [http://www.amazon.com/Nixon-I-Stephen-E-Ambrose/dp/0671657224/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203808418&sr=8-2 excerpt and text search vol 1]; hostile to RN
* Black, Conrad. ''Richard M. Nixon: A Life in Full'' (2007) 1150pp; by a conservative; friendly to RN
* Bundy, William. ''A Tangled Web: The Making of Foreign Policy in the Nixon Presidency'' (1998). [http://www.amazon.com/Tangled-Web-Making-Foreign-Presidency/dp/B000C4SRCW/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203808485&sr=8-1 excerpt and text search]
* Congressional Quarterly. ''Congress and the Nation, 1968-1972'' (1973). Detailed coverage of all the official actions in Washington
* Dallek, Robert. ''Nixon and Kissinger: Partners in Power'' (2007) [http://www.amazon.com/Nixon-Kissinger-Partners-Robert-Dallek/dp/0060722312/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1200450337&sr=1-2 excerpt and text search]
* Frick, Daniel. ''Reinventing Richard Nixon: A Cultural History of an American Obsession''. (2008). 344 pages
* Greenberg, David. ''Nixon's Shadow: The History of the Image'' (2004), influential study of his changing reputation [http://www.amazon.com/Nixons-Shadow-History-David-Greenberg/dp/0393326160/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1200450337&sr=1-9 excerpt and text search]
* Hoff, Joan. ''Nixon without Watergate'' (1994) a favorable estimate of the presidential years; also titled ''Nixon Reconsidered''; [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=99580185 online edition]
* Kutler, Stanley I. ''Wars of Watergate: The Last Crisis of Richard Nixon'' (1992), strongly hostile [http://www.amazon.com/Wars-Watergate-Crisis-Richard-Nixon/dp/0393308278/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1200450532&sr=1-2 excerpt and text search]
* MacMillan, Margaret. ''Nixon and Mao: The Week That Changed the World'' (2007)
* Matusow, Allen J. ''Nixon's Economy: Booms, Busts, Dollars, and Votes'' (1998) [http://www.amazon.com/Nixons-Economy-Booms-Busts-Dollars/dp/0700608885/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203808547&sr=8-1 excerpt and text search]
* Nixon, Richard. ''RN: Memoirs'' (1978),a primary source; one of the most important presidential autobiographies [http://www.amazon.com/RN-Memoirs-Richard-Nixon/dp/0671707418/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203808583&sr=8-1 excerpt and text search]
* Pietrusza, David ''1960: LBJ vs. JFK vs. Nixon: The Epic Campaign that Forged Three Presidencies'' New York: Union Square Press, 2008
* Reeves, Richard. ''President Nixon: Alone in the White House'' (2002). well-received study of the White House years (2002) [http://www.amazon.com/President-Nixon-Alone-White-House/dp/B000066TQ0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1200450725&sr=1-1 excerpt and text search]
* Schoenebaum, Eleanora, ed. ''Political Profiles: The Nixon/Ford Years'' (1979), biographies of all the main political figures
* Small, Melvin. ''The Presidency of Richard Nixon'' (1999) [http://www.amazon.com/Presidency-Richard-Nixon-American/dp/0700612556/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1200450643&sr=1-1 excerpt and text search]; hostile
* Suri, Jeremi. ''Henry Kissinger and the American Century'' (2007)

==Primary Sources by Nixon==

*Victory Without War, New York, NY: Pocket Books, 1989.
*Beyond Peace, New York, NY: Random House, 1994.
*Four Great Americans: Tributes Delivered by President Richard Nixon. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1973.
*In the Arena: A Memoir of Victory, Defeat, and Renewal, New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1990.
*Leaders New York, NY: Warner Books, 1982.
*Nixon in Retrospect, 1946-1962: Selected Quotations. Silver Spring, MD: Research Data Publishers, 1973.
*No More Vietnams, New York, NY: Arbor House, 1985.
*Real Peace. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1990.
*RN: The Memoirs of Richard Nixon, New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1990.
*Seize the Moment: America’s Challenge in a One- SuperpowerWorld. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1992.
*Setting the Course; The First Year, New York, NY: Funk & Wagnalls, 1970.
*Six Crises. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1990.
*Summons to Greatness: A Collage of Inspirational Thought and Practical Ideas from the Messages and Addresses of Richard Nixon, Thirty-Seventh President of the United States, Washington, D.C.: Friends of President Nixon, 1972.
*The Real War, New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1980.

==External Links==

* [http://www.nixonfoundation.org Nixon Birthplace & Library], in Yorba Linda, California
* [http://genealogy.wikia.com/wiki/Richard_Nixon_(1913) Genealogy Wiki] Nixon Family History
* [http://www.californiaresortlife.com/orange/yorba_linda.htm Birthplace Tour]

http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/presidents/

http://www.nixonfoundation.org/

http://www.nixonlibrary.org/

{{DEFAULTSORT:Nixon, Richard}}

{{USPresidents}}
{{USVicePresidents}}
[[Category:United States History]]
[[Category:Republican Party]]
[[Category:Diplomacy]]
[[Category:Cold War]]
[[Category:1960s]]
[[Category:New Deal]]
[[Category:Conservatives]]
[[Category:United States Veterans]]

Richard Nixon

2011-11-22T05:07:08Z

Keysersoze:

{{Officeholder
|name=Richard Nixon
|image=Nixon 30-0316a.jpg
|party=[[Republican]]
|spouse=Thelma Catherine "Pat" Ryan
|religion=[[Quaker]]
|offices=
{{Officeholder/president
|country=the United States
|number=37th
|terms=January 20, 1969 – August 9, 1974
|vp=[[Spiro Agnew]] [[Gerald Ford]]
|preceded=[[Lyndon Johnson]]
|former=y
|succeeded=[[Gerald Ford]]
}}
{{Officeholder/vice president
|country=the United States
|number=36th
|terms=January 20, 1953 – January 20, 1961
|president=[[Dwight Eisenhower]]
|preceded=[[Alben W. Barkley]]
|former=y
|succeeded=[[Lyndon Johnson]]
}}
{{Officeholder/senator
|state=California
|terms=December 4, 1950 – January 1, 1953
|preceded=[[Sheridan Downey]]
|former=y
|succeeded=[[Thomas Kuchel]]
}}
{{Officeholder/representative
|state=California
|district=12th
|terms=January 3, 1947 – December 1, 1950
|preceded=Jerry Voorhis
|former=y
|succeeded=Patrick J. Hillings
}}
}}
'''Richard Milhous Nixon''' was the 37th [[President of the United States of America]], serving from 1969 to 1974. He was the only U. S. Republican President to resign the office. He also served as the 36th [[Vice President of the United States]] of America under President [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]] from 1953 to 1961.

In 1946, he was elected as a [[U.S. Representative]]. As a Congressman from [[California]], and as a member of the [[House Committee on Un-American Activities]], he investigated Communists and instigated the successful prosecution of [[Alger Hiss]] for spying for the Soviet Union during [[World War II]].

After two terms in the House, he was elected to the U.S. Senate in November of 1950.

After losing his first presidential race to [[John F. Kennedy]] by a narrow margin in 1960, he unsuccessfully ran for Governor of California in 1962, losing to incumbent Edmund G Brown.

In 1968 he was elected president, and was reelected in 1972 by a landslide, but resigned the presidency on August 9, 1974 due to a threat of impeachment by Congress for the [[Watergate Affair]]. The main impeachment charge was that Nixon obstructed justice by telling employees to mislead FBI investigators about the Watergate burglary.

==Early Life==
Richard Milhous Nixon was born in [[Yorba Linda, California]], on January 9, 1913. Soon after, his family moved to Whittier, California. Nixon's childhood years were not unusual for someone growing up in two small towns near Los Angeles. His parents, Frank and Hannah Nixon, were devout [[Quakers]]. Nixon had four siblings and saw two of his brothers die from [[tuberculosis]]. Nixon grew up relatively poor, as his father earned a modest income from his gas station and grocery store. But due to these hard times, he established a quality of determination and strong work ethic. A good student and a hard worker, Nixon excelled scholastically at both Whittier High School and Whittier College.

Nixon attended Fullerton High School and Whittier High School. He graduated second in his class from Whittier with honor in the study of [[Shakespeare]] and [[Latin]]. He was awarded scholarships to [[Harvard]] and [[Yale]] University, but declined due to his family's financial condition. He instead enrolled at [[Whittier College]], a local [[Quaker]] school, where he co-founded the "Orthogonian Society", a new organzation to the campus geared towards working-class students. At Whittier, Nixon, a formidable debater, was elected freshman class president, and served as student body vice president in his junior year and president in his senior year. While at Whittier, he taught Sunday school at [[East Whittier Friends Church]] and remained a member all his life.

A lifelong football fan, Nixon practiced with the team, but played little. In 1934, he graduated second in his class from Whittier, and went on to [[Duke University|Duke University School of Law]], where he received a full scholarship, was elected president of the Duke Bar Association, and graduated third in his class.

In 1942 Nixon became a lawyer for the Office of Price Administration, the wartime liberal [[New Deal]] program that regulated all prices and rationed basic commodities.

During World War II, Nixon served in the [[Navy]] as a reserve officer, serving in the supply corps on several islands in the South Pacific, commanding cargo handling units in the SCAT. There he was known as "Nick" and for his exceptional poker-playing skills, banking a large sum of money that helped finance his first campaign for Congress. He rose to the rank of Lieutenant commander and resigned in March, 1946.

==Congressional Career==
:''See related article : [[Legacy of Alger Hiss]]
After service in the Navy he entered an entirely unstructured California political environment-- parties hardly existed there in the 1940s, and many voters were recent arrivals. As a result Nixon never built a secure base in California (or anywhere else). In 1946 he defeated five-term Democrat Representative Jerry Voorhis, a leading liberal. Two years later, Nixon ran for reelection in both the Republican and Democrat primaries and won endorsement of both parties in the general election. <ref>Only California allowed this sort of "cross filing," and they later dropped it and went to normal intra-party primaries. Richard Matthew Pious, ''The Presidents,'' pg. 515</ref> Nixon took typical positions for a California Republican: he was hostile to [[Communism]], internationalist in outlook, and middle-of-the road in economic and social issues.

Nixon's first major breakthrough came in Congress, where his dogged investigation broke the impasse of the [[Alger Hiss]] spy case in 1948. The idea that Hiss--a former senior adviser to President [[Franklin Roosevelt]]-- was a Soviet spy alarmed the nation, and won the lifelong hatred of the left, whose veneer of patriotism was dissolved. [[Image:Eisenhower_Nixon.jpg|left|thumb|275px|Eisenhower and Nixon on a 1952 Campaign Stop.]]
In 1950 Nixon was elected to the [[United States Senate]] by defeating a leading Hollywood liberal, Helen Gahagan Douglas using tough campaign tactics that emphasized her votes with the far left.

==Vice Presidency==

Because of his membership of the California delegation at the 1952 [[Republican National Convention]], his strong anti-[[communist]] credentials, and his appeal to the [[west]]ern part of the [[United States]], Nixon was named as [[General]] [[Dwight Eisenhower]]'s [[Vice President of the United States of America|vice presidential]] [[running mate]].

In the midst of the campaign questions arose about a group of seventy-six [[business]]man from southern California who had contributed to a secret slush fund for Richard Nixon, being paid $900 a month (totaling $18,168 up to that point). There was talk on Nixon dropping off the ticket. Nixon claimed that money was used for office expenses only. On September 23, 1952 he gave the now infamous "Checkers Speech" in which he said that he and his wife, [[Patrica Nixon|Pat Nixon]] do not live lavishly, saying that his wife had not even owned a fur coat but only "a respectable Republican cloth coat." He went on to bring up a gift someone gave his [[child]]ren, a "little cocker spaniel [[dog]]" named Checkers, and said defiantly, "regardless of what they about it, we're going to keep it." The speech was meet with overwhelming public approval. In November, Eisenhower and Nixon swept their way in office, winning 55 percent of the vote, to 44 percent for Democrat opponent [[Adlai Stevenson]].

As Vice President Richard Nixon occasionally presided over the Senate and chaired the President's Commission on [[Government]] Contracts, which dealt with radical discrimination by government contractors, and the Cabinet Committee on Price Stability for Economic growth (although Nixon had little influence over it). Nixon also chaired the National Security Council. However, in a [[press]] conference President Eisenhower was asked to give an example of Richard Nixon's contributions as Vice President, to which Eisenhower replied, "If you give me a week, I might think of one."

Nixon did, however, have an influential role in [[White House]] political operations. He campaigned for Republican members of Congress in 1954 and 1958. Nixon positioned himself as Presidential and his famous 1959 "Kitchen debate" in [[Moscow]] with [[Soviet Union]] President [[Nikita Khrushchev]] boosted his public appeal. By the end of the Eisenhower administration Nixon had become the top contender to be the Republican nomination for the 1960 Presidential election.

[[Image:Johnfkennedyrichardnixon.jpg|left|thumb|275px|Vice President Nixon and Senator Kennedy in their 1960 Presidential Debate.]]

==1960 Presidential Campaign==

''Main Article: [[United States presidential election, 1960]]''

Nixon easily won the Republican nomination for the presidency, but ran a poor campaign in the general election. Despite division over the modern [[civil rights]] movement, the country was enjoying a period of relative prosperity.

The most prominent issues were the [[Cold War]] and the new assumption of power of [[dictator]] [[Fidel Castro]] of [[Cuba]]. Public opinion polls showed that the country trusted Nixon more on [[foreign policy]] issues while Democrat opponent [[John F. Kennedy]] was favored on domestic issues. 1960 marked the first presidential election in which televised debates were used. Kennedy won the debates, which resulted in him defeating Nixon by a razor-thin margin of 49.7 percent of the vote to 49.5 percent. Nixon believed that there was voter fraud in Cook County, [[Illinois]] which resulted in him losing that state, however Nixon chose not to contest the results.

==1962 Gubernatorial Campaign==

After the election Nixon returned to California and ran for [[Governor]] in 1962 against incumbent [[Pat Brown]]. Brown defeated Nixon with 52 percent of the vote to 46 percent. In a post-election press conference Nixon announced the end of his political career and said to the press "you won't have Richard Nixon to kick around with anymore."

Nixon continued to campaign for Republican congressional candidates and traveled the world, sharpening his knowledge of foreign issues.

==1968 Presidential Campaign==

''Main Article: [[United States presidential election, 1968]]''

By 1967 Nixon's financial backers were raising funds to bankroll another bid for the White House. In the Republican primaries and caucuses moderates and liberals supported [[Michigan]] Governor [[George Romney]] and later [[New York]] Governor [[Nelson Rockefeller]], while [[conservative]]s supported [[California]] Governor [[Ronald Reagan]]. Nixon was able to win support from southern conservatives and pass Reagan in the polls, eventually winning the nomination. In Nixon's second attempt for the Presidency the United States was in the midst of the [[Vietnam War]], with Democrats associated with the violence. With President [[Lyndon Johnson]] losing [[credibility]] because of the increasingly unpopular [[war]], he declined to run for another term. [[Vice President of the United States of America|Vice President]] [[Hubert Humphrey]] narrowly won the Democrat nomination. [[Alabama]] Governor [[George Wallace]], a strong segregationist, entered the race as a third party candidate. Nixon promised to end the bombing in [[Vietnam]], unify the nation and restore law and order to the country.

President Johnson helped Humphrey after he announced that bombing in North Vietnam would be halted and that a cease-fire would follow, however his announcement was too late. On election day, Nixon defeated Humphrey by over 100 electoral votes, although he won the election with only 43 percent of the vote to 42 percent, partly because Wallace took 13 percent.

==1972 Reelection Campaign==

''Main Article: [[United States presidential election, 1972]]''

President Nixon's reelection campaign got underway in 1972. He had high approval ratings for his handling with China and the Soviet Union. Nixon's Democrat opponent, [[South Dakota]] Senator [[George McGovern]] was viewed too [[liberal]] by many Americans. However, there was still concern in the Nixon camp because of his close victory in 1968 and the United States' continued involvement in the Vietnam War. He chose to engage in tactics that included an effort to steal information in the Democrat Party's headquarters. Five Nixon supporters broke into the party's office at the Watergate complex in [[Washington, D.C.]] on June 17, 1972. This however did not become an issue in the campaign, with President Nixon trumping McGovern in 49 out of 50 states.

==Presidency (1969-1974)==

===Administration===

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Office
! Name
! Term
|-
| [[President]]
| Richard Nixon
| 1969-1974
|-
| [[Vice President of the United States of America|Vice President]]
| [[Spiro Agnew]]
| 1969-1973
|-
|
| [[Gerald Ford]]
| 1973-1974
|-
| [[Secretary of State]]
| [[William P. Rogers]]
| 1969-1973
|-
|
| [[Henry Kissinger]]
| 1973-1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Treasury]]
| [[David M. Kennedy]]
| 1969-1971
|-
|
| [[John Connally]]
| 1971-1972
|-
|
| [[George Shultz]]
| 1972-1974
|-
|
| [[William Simon]]
| 1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Defense]]
| [[Melvin R. Laird]]
| 1969-1973
|-
|
| [[Elliot Richardson]]
| 1973
|-
|
| [[James Schlesinger]]
| 1973-1974
|-
| [[Attorney General]]
| [[John N. Mitchell]]
| 1969-1972
|-
|
| [[Richard Kleindienst]]
| 1972-1973
|-
|
| [[Elliot Richardson]]
| 1973-1974
|-
|
| [[William B. Saxbe]]
| 1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Interior]]
| [[Walter Joseph Hickel]]
| 1969-1971
|-
|
| [[Rogers Morton]]
| 1971-1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Agriculture]]
| [[Clifford M. Hardin]]
| 1969–1971
|-
|
| [[Earl Butz]]
| 1971–1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Commerce]]
| [[Maurice Stans]]
| 1969–1972
|-
|
| [[Peter Peterson]]
| 1972–1973
|-
|
| [[Frederick B. Dent]]
| 1973-1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Labor]]
| [[George Shultz]]
| 1969–1970
|-
|
| [[James D. Hodgson]]
| 1970–1973
|-
|
| [[Peter J. Brennan]]
| 1973–1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare]]
| [[Robert Finch]]
| 1969–1970
|-
|
| [[Elliot Richardson]]
| 1970–1973
|-
|
| [[Caspar Weinberger]]
| 1973–1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Housing and Urban Development]]
| [[George Romney]]
| 1969–1973
|-
|
| [[James Thomas Lynn]]
| 1973-1974
|-
| [[Secretary of Transportation]]
| [[John A. Volpe]]
| 1969–1973
|-
|
| [[Claude Brinegar]]
| 1973-1974
|-
|}

=== Vietnam War ===

[[Image:PresidentNixon.jpg|left|thumb|275px|President Nixon points out the NVA sanctuaries along the Cambodian border in his speech to the American people announcing the Cambodian incursion, 04/30/70]] Two months after coming into office American deaths in Vietnam reached thirty-six hundred. Nixon appointed [[Harvard]] Professor [[Henry Kissinger]] as National Security Adviser, who had secret peace talks with the North Vietnamese. Peace negations dragged on throughout Nixon's first term. His Vietnam strategies included "Vietnamization," a policy aimed at reducing U.S. casualties and troops, while also convincing the American public that the Vietnamese people could assume the primary responsibility of waging war. To win support for the war among the [["silent majority,"]] Nixon pursued the [["politics of polarization."]] Instrumental to this cause was Nixon's first vice president [[Spiro T. Agnew]], who criticized opponents of the war as "nattering nabobs of negativism," and an "effete corps of impudent snobs." Nixon also sought to instill in the North Vietnamese the belief that he was volatile and unstable, and willing to use nuclear weapons in the war, a strategy known as the "madman scenario."

On April 30, 1970, ten days after announcing that 150,000 American troops would be withdrawn from Vietnam in the following year, Nixon announced that U.S. troops had invaded Cambodia. This announcement brought widespread protests and college and university campuses across the nation. Four students were shot by National Guardsmen at [[Kent State University]] in Ohio and two died at [[Jackson State University]] in Mississippi. Many campuses shut down, some for the remainder of the academic year. The [[Paris Peace Accords]] were signed on January 27, 1973, signaling the beginning of the peace process that ended with the evacuation of the last American personnel two years later on April 30, 1975. Pictures of the last U.S. Marines evacuating the American Embassy by helicopter while civilians, many of which were employed by the Americans during the war, attempted to climb aboard, has become a symbol of the U.S. defeat in Vietnam.

=== Policy of Detente ===

[[Image:Leonid_Brezhnev_and_Richard_Nixon.jpg‎|right|thumb|275px|Richard M. Nixon and Leonid Brezhnev, 05/19/73.]] Nixon worked to establish a friendlier relationship with the Soviet Union and [[China]]. The Soviets were not pleased of Nixon, a man who spent his career attacking communism, had become President. Although still a strong anti-communist, Nixon understood the growing role of China and Western Europe, realizing that he had to be more diplomatic. With the help of National Security Adviser [[Henry Kissinger]], Nixon created an approach called Detente, which was relaxed tensions between the United States and its two major communist rivals, the Soviet Union and China. Nixon began the policy of detente by lifting trade and travel restrictions.

After a long series of highly secret negations between Kissinger and Chinese leaders, Nixon announced that he would visit China in February 1972. During the historic trip, the leaders of both nations agreed to have more normal relationships. Nixon told the Chinese during a banquet toast, "Let us start a long march together, not in lockstep, but on different roads leading to the same goal, the goal of building world structure of peace and justice." In taking the trip, Nixon hoped to both strengthen ties with China but also believed it would encourage the Soviet Union to be more diplomatic. He proved to be correct. Shortly after the public learned about China, the Soviets proposed an American-Soviet summit, a high level diplomatic meeting that was held in May 1972. President Nixon flew to Moscow for a week long summit, thus becoming the first American President since [[World War 2]] to visit the Soviet Union.

The two superpowers signed the first Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty, or SALT 1, a plan to limit nuclear arms that the two nations had been working on for years. Nixon and Soviet President [[Leonid Brezhnev]] also agreed to increase trade and exchange scientific information. President Nixon had made a significant mark on the world stage with major foreign policy triumphs.

=== Watergate ===

The event that ended the Nixon presidency began on June 17, 1972, when five men, all employees of Nixon's reelection campaign (CREEP), were caught breaking into rival Democratic headquarters at the Watergate complex in Washington, DC. The intruders and two other accomplices were convicted of burglary and wiretapping in Jan. 1973. The [[Watergate affair]] ultimately caused Nixon to resign on August 9, 1974. On September 9, 1974, his successor Gerald Ford granted him "a full, free, and absolute pardon." This effectively ended investigation into the depth of Nixon's involvement in the break-in at [[Democratic National Committee]] headquarters in the Watergate hotel, or any other criminal activities. Former White House Counsel John Dean testified to a Congressional investigating committee of Nixon's involvement in the cover-up.

[[Image:NixonFarewell.jpg|left|thumb|275px|President Nixon delivers his Farewell Remarks to the White House Staff in the East Room, with his family looking on, 08/09/74]] The Congressional hearings revealed Nixon had tape recorded conversations and telephone calls in his office. These recordings reveal that Nixon's role in the cover-up began as early as six days after the break-in. The tapes also reveal an immense scope of crimes and abuses that predate the Watergate break-in. These include campaign fraud, political espionage and sabotage, illegal break-ins, improper tax audits, illegal wiretapping on a massive scale, and a secret slush fund laundered in Mexico to pay those who conducted these operations. The president, citing [[Executive Privilege]], refused to turn the tapes over to the committee. In October 1973 Nixon ordered Elliot Richardson, the attorney general, to fire Archibald Cox, the special prosecutor who had subpoenaed the tapes, but Richardson resigned in protest. Richardson's assistant, William Ruckelshaus, also refused to fire Cox and was fired by Nixon. Finally, Solicitor General Robert Bork fired Cox. The incident, which was trumped in the press as the "Saturday Night Massacre", led to widespread calls for Nixon's impeachment.

The White House released edited transcripts of the tapes in April 1974, and eventually the tapes themselves, after the Supreme Court rejected Nixon's claim to executive privilege. The House Judiciary Committee issued three articles of impeachment on July 30, 1974.

"In all of this," the articles of impeachment summarize, "Richard M. Nixon has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as President and subversive of constitutional government, to the great prejudice of the cause of law and justice, and to the manifest injury of the people of the United States." After conferring with Republican Senators Nixon resigned on August 9, 1974. Nixon was succeeded in office the same day by [[Gerald Ford]]. Ford later pardoned Nixon.

The Nixon White House was also involved in [[Henry_Kissinger#Latin_America| controversies in Latin America]], which included [[Henry_Kissinger#The_Schneider_Affair| an alleged assassination attempt]] in [[Chile]], among [[Henry_Kissinger#Major_Controversies| other questionable activities]].

==Family==

Nixon married Thelma Catherine Ryan, known as "Pat", in 1940. They had two children: Patricia (b. 1946) and Julie (b. 1948).

[[File:Pat nixon.jpg|300px|center]]

==References==
<References/>

==Further reading==

* Aitken, Jonathan. ''Nixon: A Life'' (1993).
* Ambrose, Stephen. ''Nixon'' (3v 1987-1991), the standard scholarly biography [http://www.amazon.com/Nixon-I-Stephen-E-Ambrose/dp/0671657224/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203808418&sr=8-2 excerpt and text search vol 1]; hostile to RN
* Black, Conrad. ''Richard M. Nixon: A Life in Full'' (2007) 1150pp; by a conservative; friendly to RN
* Bundy, William. ''A Tangled Web: The Making of Foreign Policy in the Nixon Presidency'' (1998). [http://www.amazon.com/Tangled-Web-Making-Foreign-Presidency/dp/B000C4SRCW/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203808485&sr=8-1 excerpt and text search]
* Congressional Quarterly. ''Congress and the Nation, 1968-1972'' (1973). Detailed coverage of all the official actions in Washington
* Dallek, Robert. ''Nixon and Kissinger: Partners in Power'' (2007) [http://www.amazon.com/Nixon-Kissinger-Partners-Robert-Dallek/dp/0060722312/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1200450337&sr=1-2 excerpt and text search]
* Frick, Daniel. ''Reinventing Richard Nixon: A Cultural History of an American Obsession''. (2008). 344 pages
* Greenberg, David. ''Nixon's Shadow: The History of the Image'' (2004), influential study of his changing reputation [http://www.amazon.com/Nixons-Shadow-History-David-Greenberg/dp/0393326160/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1200450337&sr=1-9 excerpt and text search]
* Hoff, Joan. ''Nixon without Watergate'' (1994) a favorable estimate of the presidential years; also titled ''Nixon Reconsidered''; [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=99580185 online edition]
* Kutler, Stanley I. ''Wars of Watergate: The Last Crisis of Richard Nixon'' (1992), strongly hostile [http://www.amazon.com/Wars-Watergate-Crisis-Richard-Nixon/dp/0393308278/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1200450532&sr=1-2 excerpt and text search]
* MacMillan, Margaret. ''Nixon and Mao: The Week That Changed the World'' (2007)
* Matusow, Allen J. ''Nixon's Economy: Booms, Busts, Dollars, and Votes'' (1998) [http://www.amazon.com/Nixons-Economy-Booms-Busts-Dollars/dp/0700608885/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203808547&sr=8-1 excerpt and text search]
* Nixon, Richard. ''RN: Memoirs'' (1978),a primary source; one of the most important presidential autobiographies [http://www.amazon.com/RN-Memoirs-Richard-Nixon/dp/0671707418/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203808583&sr=8-1 excerpt and text search]
* Pietrusza, David ''1960: LBJ vs. JFK vs. Nixon: The Epic Campaign that Forged Three Presidencies'' New York: Union Square Press, 2008
* Reeves, Richard. ''President Nixon: Alone in the White House'' (2002). well-received study of the White House years (2002) [http://www.amazon.com/President-Nixon-Alone-White-House/dp/B000066TQ0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1200450725&sr=1-1 excerpt and text search]
* Schoenebaum, Eleanora, ed. ''Political Profiles: The Nixon/Ford Years'' (1979), biographies of all the main political figures
* Small, Melvin. ''The Presidency of Richard Nixon'' (1999) [http://www.amazon.com/Presidency-Richard-Nixon-American/dp/0700612556/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1200450643&sr=1-1 excerpt and text search]; hostile
* Suri, Jeremi. ''Henry Kissinger and the American Century'' (2007)

==Primary Sources by Nixon==

*Victory Without War, New York, NY: Pocket Books, 1989.
*Beyond Peace, New York, NY: Random House, 1994.
*Four Great Americans: Tributes Delivered by President Richard Nixon. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1973.
*In the Arena: A Memoir of Victory, Defeat, and Renewal, New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1990.
*Leaders New York, NY: Warner Books, 1982.
*Nixon in Retrospect, 1946-1962: Selected Quotations. Silver Spring, MD: Research Data Publishers, 1973.
*No More Vietnams, New York, NY: Arbor House, 1985.
*Real Peace. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1990.
*RN: The Memoirs of Richard Nixon, New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1990.
*Seize the Moment: America’s Challenge in a One- SuperpowerWorld. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1992.
*Setting the Course; The First Year, New York, NY: Funk & Wagnalls, 1970.
*Six Crises. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1990.
*Summons to Greatness: A Collage of Inspirational Thought and Practical Ideas from the Messages and Addresses of Richard Nixon, Thirty-Seventh President of the United States, Washington, D.C.: Friends of President Nixon, 1972.
*The Real War, New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1980.

==External Links==

* [http://www.nixonfoundation.org Nixon Birthplace & Library], in Yorba Linda, California
* [http://genealogy.wikia.com/wiki/Richard_Nixon_(1913) Genealogy Wiki] Nixon Family History
* [http://www.californiaresortlife.com/orange/yorba_linda.htm Birthplace Tour]

http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/presidents/

http://www.nixonfoundation.org/

http://www.nixonlibrary.org/

{{DEFAULTSORT:Nixon, Richard}}

{{USPresidents}}
{{USVicePresidents}}
[[Category:United States History]]
[[Category:Republican Party]]
[[Category:Diplomacy]]
[[Category:Cold War]]
[[Category:1960s]]
[[Category:New Deal]]
[[Category:Conservatives]]
[[Category:United States Veterans]]

Talk:Mental Health and Homosexuality

2011-11-22T05:01:24Z

Keysersoze:

==George rekers==
Glad to see you've used George Rekers as a reference in this article. After all, when it comes to the psychology of homosexuality, he's a real expert.[[User:Keysersoze|Keysersoze]] 00:01, 22 November 2011 (EST)

Talk:Mental Health and Homosexuality

2011-11-22T05:01:02Z

Keysersoze: Created page with "==George rekers== Glad to see you've used George Rekers as a reference in this article. After all, why it comes to the psychology of homosexuality, he's a real expert.~~~~"

==George rekers==
Glad to see you've used George Rekers as a reference in this article. After all, why it comes to the psychology of homosexuality, he's a real expert.[[User:Keysersoze|Keysersoze]] 00:01, 22 November 2011 (EST)

Talk:Ronald Wilson Reagan

2011-11-22T04:30:09Z

Keysersoze:

== Photo ==

'''If someone is there who has had luck uploading image files here, please replace that unviewable picture with the following, please? Thanks!''' --~ [[User:TK|TerryK]] [[User_talk:TK|Talk2Me!]] 01:29, 24 March 2007 (EDT)

http://www.nndb.com/people/359/000022293/reagan.jpg

:Done. I can't upload it though, as the page is protected. [[User:Vossy|Vossy]] [[User_talk:Vossy|speak]] 05:55, 24 March 2007 (EDT)

----

I'm a little confused. I see why many of Undelia's edits were removed, but why the part about Reagan opposing government aid to the poor? Isn't that a component of opposing big government, trying to cut welfare programs that would benefit the poor? I don't think that all of Undelia's edits should have been removed wholesale, since some of what was added seems factually accurate.

== Why do you dislike my references? ==

Why were my edits unceremoniously and completely undone? Most of the edits were adding book citations so that claims were supported by some sort of sources. Does Conservapedia dislike facts and evidence? Or does it just dislike citations to viewpoints that don't harmonize with its own narrow agenda?

The question of whom to credit for the end of communism is a major one for historians and scholars. And there are a lot of scholars (I would say it's an accurate characterization to say most scholars) who disagree with those who credit Ronald Reagan for the end of the Cold War. I would've thought Conservapedia of all places would've appreciated trying to teach the controversy in a fairly even-handed way. Providing references to the "other side" in this debate doesn't strike me as contrary to Conservapedia's purportedly educational mission.

Obviously Conservapedia has its own conservative bias, which it is proud to wear on its sleeve. However, where I'm "biased" is that I'm not satisfied with assertions lacking grounding in sources. But it seems like Conservapedia is undermining its own objective of being "educational" by eschewing sound scholarly practices of documentation, references and -- gasp! -- presenting multiple sides of an issue, all so it can engage in unsubstantiated opinion. Wikipedia, for all its faults, likely would not arbitrarily remove several references and citations. One of their major flags, after all, is for articles with unsourced statements. Such articles appear endemic to Conservapedia, which one could attribute simply to it being so new and experiencing rapid growth, but given the way this particular entry has been butchered by administrators, it looks like unsourced statements might simply be official policy.

You do a great disservice to potential users by not only tolerating but encouraging such slipshod methods of scholarship. More than anything else, this will cause large numbers of people to reject the information in Conservapedia ''prima facie,'' and will lead more people to trust Wikipedia because it at least appears to uphold more rigorous standards. While I haven't prevented students explicitly from using Wikipedia (though I've strongly discouraged its use and urged them to consider its problems as a source), you have me leaning toward banning the use of Conservapedia outright, because the standards appear so low as to not even warrant further discussion.

Also, in simply removing my edits wholesale, I should point out that you removed several minor changes that had no business being expunged. For instance, adding "was born" in the sentence about how "Reagan was born and raised in Illinois ..." Also, I corrected the capitalization of "American president," since "president" (like other titles) should only be capitalized when used as an appositive before a proper name (e.g. President Lincoln, but Lincoln was elected president). See a style guide (Strunk and White, Chicago, etc.) for more on that.

: Please sign your comments if you can, using the signature button, so we know with whom we're speaking. Thanks.

: I did revert this entry because it tried to take credit away for Reagan for the fall of communism. I apologize if other edits were also removed in the reversion (rollback), but such is the nature of the Wiki software.

: We welcome well-supported facts here. We don't censor alternative views. But an entry is going to give credit to conservatives or Christianity or American where credit is due. If you want to insert a liberal view that attempts to deny credit to Reagan for the fall of communism, then it should be well-supported and near the end, after the credit is fully given. It can't be inserted in a manner suggesting that the issue is unresolved, or that we have no way of knowing whether Reagan deserves credit. He obviously does.--[[User:Aschlafly|Aschlafly]] 14:18, 10 March 2007 (EST)
::So what you're saying is that you don't censor alternative views, as long as they acknowledge that you're right? [[User:Underscoreb|Underscoreb]] 23:24, 12 March 2008 (EDT)

==Rekjavik, the Freeze, and the fall of Communism==

:: Well, no. It isn't obvious that Reagan deserves credit. One hypothesis is that Reagans presence in the White House played a significant role in the eventual fall of the Soviet Union. But you would have to test that against a counter hypothesis that the Soviet Union would have ended roughly at the same time and in the same manner if Reagan had not been president. Of course we can't revert history and control for that factor so any argument regarding causation is tenuous at best. However, there is a whole body of research looking at multiple explanations for the end of the Cold War and most of this research looks at mult-causal explanations. Social scientists generally are wary of monocausal explanations and especially monocausal explanations that single out any one individual. It is for this reason that the Reagan hypothesis is largely rejected--it has little to do with Reagan himself, but mostly to do with the complex nature of large-scale political processes. That isn't to say that Reagan and his policies weren't an important variable, it is just not certain whether he holds the most explanatory power.--[[User:Jack|Jack]] 03:47, 19 March 2007 (EDT)

:::Well Jack, we have cites to demonstrate Reagans Defense spending in the early 80s virtually spent the Soviet Union out of existence, because they could not keep up. Gorbachav has virtually admitted as much. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 11:39, 19 March 2007 (EDT)

::::I have cites that say Reagan's spending extended the length of the Soviet Union's existence, I have cites that say internal social movements in the Eastern Bloc ended the Soviet Union, I have cites that the Peace movement in the United States was what brought about the changes in Reagan's attitude change that led to his willingness to open up negotiation space. However, I wouldn't make the claim that any of these provide the strongest explanatory power. Having cites doesn't confirm or disconfirm anything, it only provides one plausible explanation for an event. Selective citing is just as biased as no citing at all and, in fact, is more academically dishonest.--[[User:Jack|Jack]] 00:15, 20 March 2007 (EDT)

:::::Well, when I say I have cites, I don't mean it in the common Wikipedia sense of WP:V that any lie anybody told somewhere so long as it got in print is a valid citation. Not at all. I'm refering to a credible witness who has been properly vetted to stand up against cross examination. And I wouldn't make the reference if it were not so. Junk science, for example, does not qualify as a cite. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 00:26, 20 March 2007 (EDT)

::::::Neither do passing observations. And people who are directly involved in an event will sometimes hold the most biased explanation for how that event happened. (By the way how does someone virtually admit as much?) Especially when you are talking about huge sociopolitical changes. Behavior is complicated, especially political behavior and, like I said before, monocausal explanations are generally weak.--[[User:Jack|Jack]] 00:40, 20 March 2007 (EDT)

:::::::That Soviet Communism was pathologically ill and doomed to an end sooner or later there's no question; indeeed, Ronald Reagan may have been the only guy in America who saw that & believed it in 1980. And he certainly hastened it's demise. What's more, many who opposed him, actively sought to prop up the existing status quo. And here the Nuke Freeze Movement suspects we can cite in particular. If they had their way, the Soviet Union would still exist and all the Nuclear weapons would still be '''frozen''', intact. They cannot pretend now that they did not take those positions, or hold those views, then. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 01:19, 20 March 2007 (EDT)

::::::::: I think you would enjoy reading the book the Reagan Reversal by Betsey Lamb (I think). It is very favorable to Reagan but does a good job breaking through some of the myths about him that are propogated by both the left and the right. BTW, Ronald Reagan wasn't the only one to recognize that in 1980 and his policies after 1983 were in many ways more in line with the Freeze movement than it was with the Arms hawks.--[[User:Jack|Jack]] 12:45, 20 March 2007 (EDT)

:::::::::: On that question, the Reykjavik summit is key; while widely reported as a failure, it really was the beginning of the end of the Soviet Union, and the begining of the cooperative agreements that came later. Gorby basically was begging for an opportunity for Soviet institutions to survive through perestroika, and when he walked out, he knew it was the end of the Soviet Union. The Jackson Hole signing between Baker & Shevardnadze was the death warrant. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 14:04, 20 March 2007 (EDT)

*I will find you the sourcing, Rob...but Reykjavik was a calculated gamble, quite deliberate on Reagan's part. Besides, he said when home, he had a terrible sinus and was testy. ;-) --~ [[User:TK|TerryK]] [[User_talk:TK|Talk2Me!]] 19:12, 21 March 2007 (EDT)

:Gorby came to Reykjavik holding absolutely no cards. Unlike Khurschev's bravado, all Gorby could do was plead for time to let Perestroika work, cause everyone knew if 100% of the Soviet economy had been shifted to defense spending, it ''still'' could not compete with Reagans defense build-up and next genreation Stars Wars etc. When Gorby walked out, he knew it was the end of the Soviet Union. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 19:30, 21 March 2007 (EDT)

== Where's your evidence? ==

An interesting approach to documentation and sourcing. You accept a hypothesis (in this case that Ronald Reagan ended the Cold War), then refuse to tolerate any alternative explanations, no matter how well grounded. You claim that such "liberal" views require substantiation, and yet, when substantiation for them is offered, you excise the substantiation altogether. I'll note that no documentation whatsoever is offered in support of the hypothesis that Reagan brought the end of communism in Eastern Europe.

I should add that "liberal" is a very misleading and damning characterization of these views, since the thesis that Reagan wasn't responsible for the fall of communism derives more from any number of factors in which Reagan had no bearing whatsoever. The references provided and then unceremoniously removed without explanation explain these in more detail.
For instance, Jan Kubik's work on the emergence of civil society and Solidarity in Poland shows how important the Catholic Church and especially the election of a Polish pope, John Paul II, helped to galvanize opposition in Poland. The pope's first visit to Poland in June 1979 provided a major source of inspiration and rehearsal for the opposition and the blossoming of civil society. The fruits of that emerged in the summer of 1980, when a wave of strikes gave birth to Solidarity, the independent trade union that played a major role in undermining Communist authority in Poland, and also in fostering opposition in other parts of Eastern Europe. You'll note that John Paul II became pope in 1978 and Solidarity emerged in August 1979, both of which occurred long before Reagan became president. Moreover, the work of Solidarity had little support from the United States, or from outside of Poland in general. Much of the limited American support lent to Solidarity (and I place emphasis on the idea that it was limited and had little bearing on Solidarity) actually came from the AFL-CIO, which provided some funding and supplies (things like printing presses). Even though Solidarity was forced underground when Poland came under martial law in December 1981, it continued to exist and function as an illegal organization, and civil society continued to develop beyond it. The reemergence of Solidarity in early 1989 came not as the product of external factors, but rather from a recurrence of the persistent economic problems that dogged the Communist regime throughout its existence. The regime reached out to Solidarity. To the extent that pressures from without even played a role, these would've been marginal, and would have emanated mainly from the Kremlin. But, in truth, even that was negligible, since Moscow did little more than to tell the Polish regime that it was on its own.

Similarly, works by Timothy Garton Ash, Gale Stokes and Vladimir Tismaneanu point to the systemic weaknesses of communism within Poland. Some of the important factors they cite are economic weaknesses and a growing crisis of legitimacy that prevented Communist regimes from persisting in hardline methods of repression. At the same time, these factors also led to the genesis of opposition movements within Eastern Europe (groups like Solidarity in Poland, Charter 77 in Czechoslovakia, the Prayers for Peace in East Germany).

The United States and Ronald Reagan don't receive credit in these explanations not due to pervasive "liberal bias," but rather because these factors that are seen as more important (and I should add as someone who has read widely in the scholarship, these are the most commonly cited explanations for the collapse of communism) and the role of the United States or of Ronald Reagan could only have been peripheral at best. It was limited largely to symbolic acts (such as Reagan's speech at the Berlin Wall), but even these symbolic acts were directed more at the West and American constituents than at the people living in Communist countries.

I believe this very point was made in one of the edits that an administrator purged.

To give primary credit to Ronald Reagan or the United States for the end of the Cold War would to engage in staggering ignorance of the domestic and systemic factors that undermined Communist regimes, and to marginalize unfairly the many ordinary people and dissidents in Eastern Europe who helped to bring down communism from within. In addition, Reagan in particular deserves little credit for these developments because he was relatively late to the scene. The systemic factors, and in many cases the opposition movements as well, long predated Reagan's presidency, which had little bearing on them.

Now, call me biased, but I think that offers a very well-developed and -substantiated account of other explanations for the end of communism. Nothing in that strikes me as excessively "liberal." Indeed, the only "liberal" thing about it is that it doesn't engage in the same sort of pooh-poohing of Reagan that blindly credits him without offering substantiation.

If someone cares to offer more substantive reasons (citing references for this explanation would be a welcome change) for why Reagan deserves credit, then this entry and discussion can go somewhere.

But simply asserting that Reagan ended communism because you said so, then placing the onus on critics of this position to refute it using evidence, and then suppressing evidence that contradicts the ''a priori'' thesis/assertion: this doesn't exactly give Conservapedia's entry the ring of truth, or much in the way of credibility for that matter.

It would seem, based on the actions taken with respect to edits on this entry, that Conservapedia's "educational" mission would be more accurately described as disseminating conservative propaganda rather than presenting facts and seeking "truth."

You may castigate me for propagating a "liberal" viewpoint, but my true "bias" is that I like some sort of substantiation for sweeping generalizations and disputed claims. I merely attempted to present the alternate explanations that are mostly widely accepted among experts and scholars. You can criticize those groups for "liberal bias," but as I've made clear, there's nothing inherently liberal in these approaches. Moreover, a better response would be to offer your own facts and sources to support your claims, rather than engaging in knee-jerk censorship of someone who deigns to cite references and offer substantiation.

And your request for a signature is laughable. It has echoes of "Big Brother," and given the fascistic censorship witnessed in this article, I'd rather not risk being unceremoniously blocked for not blindly toeing the party line. The truth may not be determined democratically, but the authoritarian methods on display in Conservapedia have proven no more reliable.

-- "Karol Wojtyla"
::: None of us are perfect, probably all of us have overlooked signing our edits or our discussion at some time or another. But it is common procedure and helpful in discussion. Even months later, it is helpful in reading through a discussion to see who is making what points in what sequence. [[User:Terryeo|Terryeo]] 23:49, 12 March 2007 (EDT)

: I made the edits turning "most" into "some" and "other". The reason being is that it is more accurate to say that than to claim "most historians". There is plenty of literature that supports the claim that Reagan's willingness to meet the Soviets expansion-by-proxy and military buildup forced the Soviets into an arms race that they could ill-afford, and that this helped to break an already-faltering Soviet economy. There is also plenty of personal commentary from citizens of the former Soviet client-states who say that Reagan's opposition to the Communists gave them hope.

Your entry wasn't expunged; your points are still there. Personally, I think they '''are''' valid ones and that you simply overstated the level of agreement amongst historians.

I hope this helps you to understand why I made what I considered to be minor edits. --[[User:Dave3172|Dave3172]] 15:41, 10 March 2007 (EST)

Agreed, although I'd still like to see some references for the literature that credits Reagan's policies. But I would add that there's substantial agreement, at least among historians who study the Eastern bloc, on the question of whether Reagan's role was that important. Reagan appears very little in that literature, so I'm wondering where the sources/references are that give him so much credit. After all, the Second Commandment says sources must always be credited and cited. We can continue to debate those sources on the discussion page, but I think the bigger point is that there's no widely accepted monocausal explanation for the end of communism, so it would be more appropriate to provide sources for the different theses, and to also expound on those interpretations. In other words, rather than simply saying "Reagan ended the Cold War," someone needs to elaborate on the reasoning behind that. Otherwise, it violates the Sixth Commandment (don't give personal opinions in entries).

:I agree with your central contention - there is no monocausal explanation for the fall of Communism. There were several separate forces that converged to break a flawed system. In fairness, though, I think that if you re-read this article you'll see it is more even-handed than you give it credit for. Most every single acclamation given to Reagan is qualified. And, as I pointed out before, your alternate sources were not deleted.

:I would go so far as to say that, for a Conservative site, it is close to the most balanced article on the site. Perhaps you would like to write an article on the Fall of Communism that explores the other causes? --[[User:Dave3172|Dave3172]] 16:13, 10 March 2007 (EST)

My apologies to Dave3172. I wasn't accusing you of censorship. Rather, it was an earlier iteration of this page [[http://www.conservapedia.com/index.php?title=Ronald_Reagan&oldid=22986]], which user Aschlafly rolled back wholesale. In that iteration, there were several references to texts supporting some of the alternative explanations for the fall of communism. While Dave3172 is right to note that the fall of communism would warrant an entry unto itself, what seemed more inappropriate was Aschlafly's decision to expunge many book citations (the earlier version was even more substantiated than the current version), with his stated reason:

"But an entry is going to give credit to conservatives or Christianity or American where credit is due. If you want to insert a liberal view that attempts to deny credit to Reagan for the fall of communism, then it should be well-supported and near the end, after the credit is fully given. It can't be inserted in a manner suggesting that the issue is unresolved, or that we have no way of knowing whether Reagan deserves credit. He obviously does."

User Aschlafly refuses to accept that, contrary to his personal opinion, the question of Reagan's credit for the end of communism is, in fact, unresolved. As other users have also tried to indicate, there are a wealth of alternative explanations that don't lend support to the "credit Reagan" thesis. And, at least in scholarly circles, it could be argued that there is substantial agreement that Reagan was not the primary or even a significant factor.

What I think is lacking for this entry, and would be worthy of inclusion on a separate entry for the fall of communism as well, would be some substantiation for the argument that Reagan deserves credit. As the article currently stands, and at least in the various iterations I've seen previously, it hasn't provided any support for this argument, aside from the anecdotal evidence of Reagan's speech in front of the Berlin Wall, the importance of which, I might add, seemed more to bolster Reagan's standing as a Cold Warrior and anticommunist in the West, rather than to make any significant impact on developments on the other side of the Iron Curtain (a point I recall seeing in an earlier, since censored version of this entry).

I'm not the one to provide such documentation. Frankly, in my studies of this question (and it was a subfield for one of my M.A. exams, so I've read in the scholarly literature quite extensively) I'm yet to encounter anyone who has presented a very extensive or, in my opinion, compelling argument for crediting Reagan. I am generally familiar with some of the reasons conservatives have given in support of the "credit Reagan" thesis, which user Dave3172 recounted above. But I have not encountered and cannot think offhand of what sorts of books, articles and other sources might lay out this argument at greater length. I would strongly encourage someone -- anyone -- to present those reasons more lucidly. As a teacher, I want to present my students with as many different interpretations as possible, and with the reasoning behind such arguments, so I can teach them to evaluate claims and sources more effectively. It would only be appropriate to include such material in Conservapedia, and I would think that especially on Conservapedia there would be contributors better able to provide that dimension of the debate.

As it stands, I do agree with user Dave3172 that the Reagan entry is rather even-handed and balanced. And in general I think the two of us are on the same page in terms of what we'd like to see.

But as a matter of course, I think it's always better to have too many references rather than too few. This is especially true for encyclopedias. In my mind, an encyclopedia should serve as a quick reference for basic facts, but also as a mere starting point for finding more extensive treatments of various issues and questions. Even if an editor happens to doubt the credibility of a source, it's better to allow users to know what sources are being used and to enable users to access those sources and make assessments of their credibility for themselves. If only more people learned those skills and the ability to read critically, and with a healthy skepticism, my job as an educator would be infinitely easier.

The real source of my aggravation lies in user Aschlafly's cavalier attitude toward sources and evidence that don't support his personal opinions. And while such attitudes are bound to be endemic on any wiki (whether Wikipedia or Conservapedia), which was part of the stated reason for the launch of Conservapedia, I find it troubling that Aschlafly of all users, as a founder or administrator of Conservapedia (if I understand correctly) is engaging in precisely the same behaviors that Conservapedia's founders deemed so troubling and problematic in Wikipedia. It just strikes me as highly hypocritical for user Aschlafly to be just as guilty of censoring viewpoints with which he disagrees.

-- "KW"

== Evidence that Reagan helped to end the Cold War. ==

I assume this stuff is copyrighted, so I'll just give names and page numbers. These aren't historians, mind you - they're witnesses to history.

Margaret Thatcher on Reagan's impact with ending the Cold War "Statecraft" p. 10-11.
Also included in this passage is testimony from the last Soviet Foreign Minister Alexandr Bessemertnykh.

A quote from Lech Walesa, leader of Solidiarity on the back of Peter Schweinzer's book, "Reagan's War."

I can provide more evidence, if necessary.

By the way, when the Soviet Union imposed martial law on Poland because of Solidarity, Reagan did take crucial action, and the results can not be underestimated. He revoked Poland's most favored nation trading status, which meant Polish goods faced a high tariffs on exports to the US. Most importantly, he banned the sale of oil and gas technologies to the USSR. Both of these actions put tremendous pressure on the Soviets to settle the strike on terms favorable to the Americans.

You got that last part absolutely wrong. The Soviet government didn't impose martial law on Poland. The Polish regime of Gen. Wojciech Jaruzelski declared it because the alternative was to watch its own collapse and allow Poland to descend into complete chaos. The Soviets were not a factor -- repeat: not a factor -- in the end to the Solidarity crisis. In fact, we now know based on documents in archives in Warsaw and Moscow that have become available since the fall of communism that the Kremlin was prepared to allow Poland to "go its own way" in 1981. This was not Moscow's preference, for obvious reasons, but after Soviet leaders assessed the likely outcome of a crackdown (a la Hungary in 1956, Czechoslovakia in 1968 or Afghanistan in 1979), they ruled out the military option. Some of the reasoning behind this was that Soviet leaders feared the repercussions of intervention, which they surmised would have brought an end to detente. However, equally important was their conviction that the Poles would fight back, and that the Polish Army could not be trusted to remain loyal to the Communist regime in the event of a Soviet invasion. The decision to crack down on Solidarity was left entirely to the Polish leadership. (For more elaboration on this, see Vojtech Mastny's article "The Soviet Non-Invasion of Poland in 1980-1981 and the End of the Cold War," and Matthew Ouimet's "The Rise and Fall of the Brezhnev Doctrine in Soviet Foreign Policy.")

The irony, of course, was that the West widely believed (rather erroneously, as we now know) that Moscow had been calling the shots in Poland. So, despite the fact that it hadn't ordered the crackdown and resigned itself to the possibility of a non-Communist Poland, the Kremlin still faced the loss of benefits that had come with detente.

I'm also perplexed by your claim that the end of the legal Solidarity movement (and it's much more accurately characterized as an independent trade union and opposition movement than a strike, since hundreds of strikes occurred in this period in Poland) saw the Soviets "settle the strike on terms favorable to the Americans." Martial law was about the last thing the Reagan White House would've wanted. Or perhaps the next-to-last thing, since only a direct Soviet invasion of Poland could have been worse from an American standpoint.

However, even if you point to the end of detente and the economic hardships this brought to the Soviet Union as a major causal factor in the fall of communism, it's still debatable how much credit Reagan deserves for that. Many of the moves in that direction, such as the end of American food relief to the Soviet Union, had been initiated by Jimmy Carter following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and prior to Reagan's presidency. Under Reagan those policies may have been pursued to an even greater degree, though it is likely that, had he won a second term in office, Carter would have followed much the same course (especially if you recall that his national security adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski, was a Pole). Much of the basis for crediting Reagan with the collapse of communism seems to dwell on his outspoken opposition to communism, and to having been in the right place at the right time. Given the array of systemic weaknesses, the developing opposition movements and the long-brewing crises that culminated in East-Central Europe in 1989, and in the Soviet Union over the following two years, it is highly probable that communism would have collapsed roughly when it did regardless of who lived in the White House in the 1980s.

Furthermore, I'd be interested in seeing the verbatim quote from Walesa. A professor said that Walesa gave a talk in Seattle some years ago where one of the audience members asked him if he thought Reagan or Gorbachev deserved the most credit for the collapse of communism. Walesa replied, "No, it was the Holy Father!" by which he meant Pope John Paul II (since Catholics refer to the pontiff as the Holy Father). So from the perspective on someone who obviously "witnessed" (and also shaped) history, you can see what people on the ground thought.

-- "KW"

==McCarthy reference==
Reagan tesitified in 1947 before the HUAC -- even before the Hiss & White episodes; McCarthy didn't produce his list til 1950, and was a Senate Committee. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 18:03, 12 March 2007 (EDT)

Flipping through some of the history pages, I see that PraiseTheLard mentioned Reagan's role as head of SAG in blacklisting supposed Hollywood Communists. However, I notice that this was repeatedly removed by other editors.

My question: why? This really happened, and I don't think the facts are in dispute. Thus, shouldn't it be included in an entry on Reagan, especially as it was one of the more notable (or notorious, depending on one's perspective) things he did in the years before he became governor*, and it can be seen as a stepping stone to politics, as well as an early sign of his zealotry as a Cold Warrior.

* Unless, of course, you consider the classic Reagan film "Bedtime for Bonzo" (1951) to meet these criteria. But it's already in the entry under miscellanea.

:Why? Yes, Reagan did testify in 1947 regarding subversive communist influence in SAG; Joe McCarthy started his investigations in 1950 of government employees and contractors doing business with government. Now, unlike Wikipedia, we can't fit a square peg in a round hole. For example, for several months I was in dispute resolution over things like people who died in 1948, 2 years before McCarthy, who nevertheless were victims of McCarthyism. Or all the atomic physicists who ended up on the Hollywood Blacklist. Or McCarthy, who never served in the House, sat on the House Un-America Activities Committee. Now these are quite simply facts any child has access to, nonetheless, it is the policy of Wikipedia not to allow some of this information into the sum total of human knowledge. So unless you can somehow prove that 1947 = 1950, Ronald Reagan in no way shape or form can be said to have any conection with "McCarthyism". [[User:RobS|RobS]] 23:42, 12 March 2007 (EDT)

* If you read my comment on the removal more carefully, you'd notice that I never mentioned McCarthy or McCarthyism (I had nothing to do with the edits that included and removed that information, which is why I was questioning the actions of those involved). What I was trying to call attention to (and clearly failed to do so) was why information on Reagan's anticommunist activities, such as his role in blacklisting people in Hollywood for alleged Communist sympathies, was removed. What I suggested ought to have happened was that the incorrect information linking Reagan to McCarthyism could have been removed, but the other information outlining his anticommunist activities in conjunction with SAG and the Hollywood Blacklist should have been retained. Something about not throwing out the baby with the bathwater. -- "KW"

:KW, Thanks for the clarification. There is much confusion regarding the so-called Hollywood blacklist. What you find is (A) deliberate efforts to cite HUAC as the source of the blacklist (B) deliberate efforts and distortions to cite McCarthy as serving on HUAC at the time.

:The simple fact of the matter is (A) the "blacklisted" actors and writers were blacklisted by the MPAA (the same group that issues movie ratings and the Oscars); (B) the US government '''did not''' blacklist the Hollywood actors; (C) McCarthy's Committee, which had nothing to do with the blacklist in the first place, would not possess legal authority to investigate anyway. McCarthy's Committee only had legal jurisdiction to investigate the US Government or government contractors.

:Now, it is argued that some Hollywood films had business relationships with the US Government in the making of films in WWII. Yes, this is true. To that extent, if there were a pretext to investigate Hollywood studios, screenwriters, and actors who were acting as government contractors, why ''didn't'' McCarthy investigate them.

:Needless to say, unravelling the a half century of deliberate distortions and deceptions is messy indeed. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 18:19, 13 March 2007 (EDT)

:''P.S. Reagans credentials as an anti-Communist aren't really something we need to speculate about; attempts to "link" Reagan to some of the unpleasant aspects of "McCarthyism" is something we need to be concerned about.''

*'''Something our younger members might want to keep in mind, it is totally ''revisionist thinking'' to view the House Un-American Activities Committee, its investigations and Congressman McCarthy as evil. I think the genocide of the Soviet Communist Party, and its leaders are very well documented. So are the hundreds of spies sent to the U.S. It is a proven fact that many true-believers, as opposed to those who were easily mislead or naive, did actively get jobs in the film industry. What you know today as "transparency" didn't exist in the 50's and 60's. Nuclear bombs were new to us, the leader of the Soviet Union announced on TV that they would "bury" us. These are things you need to take into consideration when examining the period.''' --[[User:TK|TK]] 19:35, 17 March 2007 (EDT)

== Can we limit the speculation and the removal of facts/sources to include unsubstantiated opinion? ==

Someone earlier today inserted a line at the end of the survey of various interpretations of the end of communism to the effect of "Nevertheless, Reagan was the personal driving force behind the fall of communism." Given the multitude of other interpretations presented in this article and elsewhere on the talk page, it seemed inappropriate to add that line as a way of denying the existence of controversy in this debate and asserting a personal opinion as manifest fact. As it stands, and as I reverted it, the article never claimed that any single interpretation was "right." Instead, the main idea (and what I would hope would be more important for an encyclopedia) is that the issue is not clear cut, and to present the basic contours of the debate.

Similarly, I noticed that a user changed the section on the presidential legacy regarding SDI/Star Wars, removing the information about how the principle of atmospheric-based missile defense (the foundation of SDI) has never been tested successfully. Moreover, the same user changed the line that said (and I paraphrase from memory), "Even though many conservatives claim SDI gave the U.S. considerable leverage vis-a-vis the Soviet Union, most analysts of Soviet policy note that such considerations were of minor concern and that internal considerations played the paramount role in Soviet policymaking." In its place, the new line (again, I paraphrase) said simply that "SDI gave the U.S. considerable leverage against the Soviet Union." Any notion that the existence of leverage is disputed was summarily excised.

While I understand that many (most?) of the users of Conservapedia likely believe Reagan to have been the driving force behind the end of the Cold War, and to have though that SDI brought the Soviet Union to its knees and spurred the collapse of communism, I underline that these are only individual opinions. They may be based on certain sources, but they remain interpretations and not cut-and-dry facts. At the very least, there should be documentation and evidence to support these sorts of assertions. But I also think that, given the level of contention over these questions in academic and political debates, a better approach for Conservapedia, or any encyclopedia for that matter, is to present the controversy and the various sides, rather than unilaterally presenting one perspective as absolute fact.

It's my understanding that this was a major motivation for creating Conservapedia as an alternative to Wikipedia, to include viewpoints that were being summarily removed on Wikipedia. I'm all for presenting alternative viewpoints, but I think what's essential to give Conservapedia any broad credibility is to not provide '''only''' the viewpoints lacking on Wikipedia, but to present all the viewpoints. If you only want to present certain viewpoints, well, it is called Conservapedia, but you should probably stop claiming to be encyclopedic in nature.

'''**Reagan, while President of SAG, opposed Communist infilteration of the guilds in Hollywood, however he was also instrumental in fighting for actors who were painted by McCarthy's broad brush, and got their names removed. He did just that in helping a young actress, Nancy Davis, who he eventually married.''' --[[User:TK|TK]] 21:07, 13 March 2007 (EDT)

:Good observations. With reference to,
::''"Even though many conservatives claim SDI gave the U.S. considerable leverage vis-a-vis the Soviet Union, most analysts of Soviet policy note that such considerations were of minor concern and that internal considerations played the paramount role in Soviet policymaking."''
:the subtle thing said here is trying to separate "conservatives" from "most analysts", i.e. moderate or manistream. Facts are so-called "conservative analysts" are very mainstream given the subject under discussion. The so-called "moderate analysts", or others this referes to, are journalists and opinion makers, not defense policy analysts. This sort of subtlety needs to be watched for. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 22:47, 13 March 2007 (EDT)

:: But I think you're falsely interpreting a statement that says "many conservatives" to exclude conservatives from or the "mainstream." Perhaps the issue was in the paraphrase I believe the exact language said something to the effect of "many political scientists and historians," or "scholars," or something a bit more specific. But when I said "analysts," I meant this merely as a shorthand for a variety of groups, which included many relevant scholars, and did not mean it in the narrow sense of defense policy analysts. I certainly don't think defense analysts had a monopoly on wisdom or insight regarding Soviet policymaking. We know from documents and materials available after the fact that as much as analysts and observers got right, they also got many things wrong. And this assessment applies equally to academics, scholars, journalists, politicians and opinion makers as it does to defense experts, policy analysts, etc. Likewise, I meant policymaking in a broad sense for the Soviet case, having in mind domestic political and economic policies as much as military and foreign policies. --[[User:SmithHall|SmithHall]] 01:03, 14 March 2007 (EDT)

:: In fact, here is the verbatim passage: "While supporters of Reagan claim SDI gave the United States a large amount of leverage in its standoff with the Soviet Union, most political scientists and historians note that Star Wars played a fairly minor role in the calculus of Soviet policy-making, where internal structural problems were paramount."

:: I think you'll agree that the language here is much less problematic. And while there are undoubtedly Reagan supporters in the ranks of political scientists and historians, I think it's accurate to suggest that more of them aren't Reagan supporters than are.

::Anyway, my apologies for having been lazy and not citing the exact passage earlier, which I think was a source of much confusion. --[[User:SmithHall|SmithHall]] 01:08, 14 March 2007 (EDT)

::::''most political scientists and historians note that...."
:::How about, ''many [or some] political scientists and historians are of the opinion that ...'' [[User:RobS|RobS]] 16:53, 14 March 2007 (EDT)

I am somewhat skeptical of citizens from another country being able to tell fact from fiction, when quoting Soviet citizens, who were or are a part of that government, being as their vested interest is in denigrating any accomplishments by Reagan. Likewise the part about military service, which I removed, was completely inaccurate, in that it failed to mention that he did indeed enlist, was an officer, and contributed to the raising of millions of 1940's Dollars on behalf of the war effort. Likewise his fighting of the black lists, which his own future wife, Nancy Davis was put on. Cannot the Sysops here block this highly inaccurate and troubling information being listed? It troubles me users cannot contact anyone about this, in a easily identified manner. Someone put up these web pages, it belongs to someone. Someone is ultimately responsible, no? If not, perhaps I need to refer all this BS to the likes of Ed Meese or Mike Deever, for rebuttal. --[[User:TK|TK]] 23:29, 13 March 2007 (EDT)

:Reagan actually served ''two'' non-contiguous active military stints, if I recall. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 16:53, 14 March 2007 (EDT)

::Reagan entered military service in 1942 and served for three years in the U.S. Army, for which he made training films, and he was discharged with the rank of captain. [http://ap.grolier.com/article?assetid=0329270-00] --[[User:TK|TK]] 10:47, 16 March 2007 (EDT)

:::Reagan states in his 1965 autobiography [http://www.biblio.com/books/28287897.html] he served in the Cavalry, confirmed here [http://www.armchairgeneral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=25513&page=51 Ronald Reagan, Cavalry Lt/USAAF Capt, FMPU; personnel officer 9th AF]; Peggy Noonan likeqwise cites it. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 13:19, 16 March 2007 (EDT)

Explain to me what was "inaccurate" or "troubling" in saying that Reagan, as head of SAG, was involved in naming members of the film industry on the Hollywood Blacklist? He was involved. He answered questions in HUAC hearings and kept the FBI informed about "disloyal" members of his union. These are facts.[http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/50s/blacklist.html] I can't assess the veracity of the statement that Reagan also tried to shield actors victimized by McCarthy, which would certainly make Reagan's a complex and difficult-to-read character.

But the main points to make are 1) nothing in the statement that Reagan played at least a contributing role (by testifying before HUAC, informing the FBI, etc.) in the Hollywood Blacklist is factually inaccurate; 2) if Reagan ''did'' try to clear the names of actors caught up by McCarthyism, including Nancy Davis, then it needs to be cited (see the Conservapedia commandment if you're unclear on the reason why); 3) whatever role Reagan may have played in vindicating those unjustly accused by McCarthy, it still doesn't make it any less true to note that earlier he played a part in the anticommunist persecution of individuals who wound up blacklisted in Hollywood.

Also, I find it maddeningly ignorant and offensive to make such a blanket statement as to claim broad skepticism regarding the ability of "citizens from another country being able to tell fact from fiction," whether quoting Soviet citizens, or in any other context. First, I don't know why the whole "immediately distrust foreigners" is even relevant to this discussion, or to the edits on the Reagan article. Second, ignorance, like wisdom, knows no national boundaries. Americans hold a monopoly on neither. You can love this country and think it's the greatest in the world, but that doesn't preclude you from recognizing the intelligence of non-Americans, or the ignorance of many Americans. Rather than making such a blanket condemnation, try to point to specific examples of bias, ignorance or what have you, instead of speaking in such vague generalizations. -- "KW"

::Ok, so by Reagan giving testimony to HUAC, then a separate non-governmental entity, the Motion Picture Association of America blacklists actors, that makes Reagan "involved". Whereas in fact, the actual involvement of the MPAA is suspect, because it appears to be coincidental that the members of MPAA are the ones who refused to extend contracts, not the MPAA itself.
:::''Reagan did try to clear the names of actors caught up by McCarthyism, including Nancy Davis...''
::I beleive you may be misusing the term "McCarthyism here; and can you provide a cite for the specific reference. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 16:53, 14 March 2007 (EDT)

*By the way, HUAC stands for "House Un-American Activities Committee" '''which was an official body of the United States Congress'''. It was Chaired by Congressman Joesph McCarthy, of Wisconson. As for extending contracts, the motion picture studios are the true villians here, in caving into pressure from the Congress. Not excusing Congress's actions but it wasn't the Government refusing the contracts.--[[User:TK|TK]] 15:40, 15 March 2007 (EDT)

:You make my point for me. It is ignorant, in the extreme, to give half-answers as "fact" like about Reagan's testimony before the HUAC, without explaining further, his other actions. To ignore, or leave them out is bias indeed. It proves my point, because most anyone from the Untited States, politically involved, knows the story about how Ronald Reagan met Nancy Davis!! You are using clearly liberal, left of center sourcing material, and passing it off as fact, just because you provided a source. Go to moveon.org, and you can get those types of "facts". You have a very revisionist view, imo, almost of someone too young to remember, prersonally, the period. It was not considered heinous at that time, to oppose Communist infiltration of the entertainment industry, and while most people did not agree with McCarthy's tactics, they did not oppose the goal. --[[User:TK|TK]] 01:30, 14 March 2007 (EDT)

:: My omission of the story about how Ronald met Nancy was based on ignorance, yes. I didn't know the story behind it, but that doesn't reflect willful or malicious neglect on my part. I couldn't tell you how any president met his wife, which is more a product of my priorities, or "bias," as you term it: I simply don't care much for personal gossip of any sort. There, you know my personal "bias" regarding the matter at hand.

::But, again, if I made an omission, then the correct move on your part is to correct it by '''adding the missing fact, not expunging other facts that don't tell the story you like.''' That's all I requested. I don't profess omniscience, and I'm certainly not an expert on the intricacies of the Reagans' courtship. But since you apparently have knowledge of that and consider it so essential to the story of his involvement with HUAC, then add that to the entry and share your particular wisdom with everyone. Balance is a good thing, and that's what I was trying to urge you to provide. Obviously I want as complete a picture as possible, but I also don't know every side of the story, and I know I don't know.

::And you're right that I don't have personal recollections of the period. However, my age or experience make my contributions no less valid. I don't discount the very real sense of fear and terror that pervaded the era. But while you might consider this a hindrance or claim this forces me into "revisionism," I can respond by saying that your personal experiences and recollections dooms you to your own "bias," in that you evidently feel like you have a stake in the matter, whereas I didn't have anything to gain or lose based on its outcome. Neither approach is necessarily "wrong" or more "objective." It's just a way of noting that no one is immune from bias, and that bias takes a number of forms. This, among many other reasons, is why I place such emphasis on including as many different dimensions as possible. Clearly you have a perspective that I don't, but your perspective might cause you to focus on certain things to the exclusion of other factors that seem noteworthy to me. Why not use our different perspectives to mutual advantage? -- "KW"

:::I think you confuse this place for Wikipedia. This is the Conservative version. Therefore like values are tensed more than those which oppose, otherwise what is this place for? I also think you mistake personal things for purely historical ones. I am not making you, personally less valid, however this place is the place for debating your personal ideas, and the failure to go the extra mile and inform the people who will use this as a resource, of the whole story, not a fragment of it. You are using, in my opinion, the same tired liberal sources those of us in the States have grown to mistrust. --[[User:TK|TK]] 03:11, 14 March 2007 (EDT)

:::: Evidently I confused this place for an encyclopedia interested in facts. I see you arbitrarily removed the information about how Honecker could and did ignore Gorbachev's entreaties for reform. The fact that several Soviet troops were stationed in East Berlin was quite ancillary to the issue at question, namely the status of the Berlin Wall. Were, as you (or whoever added the line about the Soviet troops) suggested, Gorbachev to have exercised military pressure on Honecker to reform, he would've ceased to be a reformer. You can't force through those sorts of liberalizing measures through violent and oppressive measures. The French Revolution attempted that, and in ended in the Reign of Terror and, later, with military rule under Napoleon. Your decision to willy-nilly ignore the realities of internal dynamics, both within the Eastern bloc and within individual countries of the bloc, makes your own ''opinion'' regarding the importance of Gorbachev (and what he potentially could have done) to the fall of the Berlin Wall exceedingly groundless and unsubstantiated. Even though the first incarnation of the Berlin Wall was erected in 1961 with Soviet assistance, this was what the East German government at the time wanted as well, in order to triage the massive population loss and brain drain of East Germans who went to West Berlin and from there to the West. Those desires held true into 1989, and it was only when popular pressures began to mount within East German for opening the borders that things began to change. Moreover, the fall of the Wall itself was not the product of deliberate policy on anyone's part; on November 9, 1989, the party head in Berlin read (or perhaps misread, as scholars have debated) an announcement on television in somewhat unclear language (if you see a clip of the broadcast, you can even see him looking a bit surprised and what he thought he was reading) to the effect that the border would be opened for private trips abroad, which the East Germans watching on television interpreted to mean the complete opening of the border, prompting thousands to storm the checkpoints and begin tearing down the Wall. In the end, not Gorbachev nor Honecker nor Reagan, for that matter, played a key role in tearing down the Wall. Credit a bureaucrat's vague words and the initiative of the thousands of East Germans who made it so.

::::And I don't know why you keep making thinly veiled illusions suggesting that I'm some sort of foreigner. You keep using that canard to try to discredit me, but it only reflects poorly on you because 1) I'm an American, born and raised, and 2) your implication that anyone who bothers to learn about the other side of an issue (or in this case to pay attention to what was actually happening on the other side of the Iron Curtain rather than accepting a bunch of poorly supported opinions as the gospel truth) must not be American suggests that anyone who's American is also ignorant with respect to the rest of the world. -- "KW"
:::::KW, these are all good points you make above and well researched. However you may be argueing the substance on the page. Let's find somewhere to put all that research in. How about [[German Democratic Republic|East Germany]]? [[User:RobS|RobS]] 17:01, 14 March 2007 (EDT)
:::::: Done. It's a fragmentary entry, by necessity, but at least there's the beginnings of an entry. -- "KW"

== Citations from Wikipedia.... ==

Since the Conservapedia is billed as an alternative to Wikipedia, which is deemed by the Founders as culturally, religiously and politically biased, why in God's name are editors using information from that source to substantiate their information/edits here?

Many of us start from the premise Wikipedia is a suspect source. Please find alternative source information, otherwise there isn't really a point to this "alternative" is there?

*'''You're right. Wikipedia is NOT an acceptable source or authority. Please edit the offending pages and alert the contributors. The mistakes could have been innocent, of course.--Aschlafly 19:32, 15 March 2007 (EDT)'''

== Edits ==

I think the reorder is somewhat cumbersome, and not putting most of the information at the top, perhaps? --[[User:TK|TK]] 23:41, 15 March 2007 (EDT)

Check out this link: http://www.conservapedia.com/User_talk:Aschlafly --[[User:TK|TK]] 03:10, 16 March 2007 (EDT)

==Iran/Contra==
For this edit,
:''although the U.S. government under Reagan gave direct support to Iraq during the war. President Ronald Reagan stated that the United States "could not afford to allow Iraq to lose the war to Iran", and that the United States "would do whatever was necessary and legal to prevent Iraq from losing the war with Iran."''
we need (a) a date; (b) source. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 10:31, 16 March 2007 (EDT)
----
A report by a presidential commission, released in February 1987, depicted Reagan as uninformed, and concluded that his relaxed "personal management style" had prevented him from controlling his subordinates. House and Senate committees, conducting joint hearings, heard testimony that Reagan did not know of the diversion of funds. Most committee members signed a majority report in November 1987 asserting that although Reagan's role in the affair could not be determined precisely, he had clearly failed to "take care that the laws be faithfully executed." Poindexter, North, and others were indicted in the affair in 1988. [http://ap.grolier.com/article?assetid=0329270-00] --[[User:TK|TK]] 11:03, 16 March 2007 (EDT)

----
The U.S. restored formal relations with Iraq in November 1984, but the U.S. had begun, several years earlier, to provide it with intelligence and military support (in secret and contrary to this country's official neutrality) in accordance with policy directives from President Ronald Reagan. These were prepared pursuant to his March 1982 National Security Study Memorandum (NSSM 4-82) asking for a review of U.S. policy toward the Middle East. One of these directives from Reagan, National Security Decision Directive (NSDD) 99, signed on July 12, 1983, is available only in a highly redacted version [Document 21]. It reviews U.S. regional interests in the Middle East and South Asia, and U.S. objectives, including peace between Israel and the Arabs, resolution of other regional conflicts, and economic and military improvements, "to strengthen regional stability." It deals with threats to the U.S., strategic planning, cooperation with other countries, including the Arab states, and plans for action. An interdepartmental review of the implications of shifting policy in favor of Iraq was conducted following promulgation of the directive.

On April 5, 1984, Ronald Reagan issued another presidential directive (NSDD 139), emphasizing the U.S. objective of ensuring access to military facilities in the Gulf region, and instructing the director of central intelligence and the secretary of defense to upgrade U.S. intelligence gathering capabilities. It codified U.S. determination to develop plans "to avert an Iraqi collapse." Reagan's directive said that U.S. policy required "unambiguous" condemnation of chemical warfare (without naming Iraq), while including the caveat that the U.S. should "place equal stress on the urgent need to dissuade Iran from continuing the ruthless and inhumane tactics which have characterized recent offensives." [http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/] --[[User:TK|TK]] 11:03, 16 March 2007 (EDT)

:Thank you. Good research. Now as to specifics, your language "''depicted Reagan as uninformed''" is stated perhaps more precisely as "Members of the National Securirty Council staff, along with CIA Director William Casey, persuaded Reagan...".

*: '''Rob, "uninformed" in government parlance, is not what you think. It means the subordinates did not inform him. Those are raw quotes, which would need re-phrasing. I sent you an email, did you get it? There are lot of things most sane people wouldn't feel comfortable posting about themselves on public pages.''' --[[User:TK|Terry]] 23:28, 16 March 2007 (EDT)
::Got it. Yes a private discussion can help facilitate where we wish to go with this and save time. I responded, did you get it? [[User:RobS|RobS]] 11:20, 17 March 2007 (EDT)

:*'''No, Rob..I haven't reveived anything from you. Did you send it via email through this board? I'll email you, with my IM info.'''

:The two NSDD cited deserves treatment in context, however after Reagan's reelection (and the reestablishment of relations with Iraq) the overture to Iran to sell weapons from Israel was given more focus, as the Tower Commission Report clearly gives detail. Also, feelers were sent prior to the second term regarding contact between Teheran and the hostage takers in Lebenon.

:The language "''dissuade Iran from continuing the ruthless and inhumane tactics''" referes to the use of the Iranian [[Mahatma Ghandi]] and proginator of [[Human Rights]] reforms in Iran, the [[Ayatollah Khomeini]], use of children to clear minefields.

:A proposal: lets complete a good review of the Iran/Contra affair here, in the Reagan artcle, which then perhaps could be spun off into its separate article with only a summary left behind. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 14:04, 16 March 2007 (EDT)

:: Not from me, Rob! I put up material here, someone takes it, re-compiles it, slaps it back up as their edit, after the same thing was added by me a day or so ago! Is there some commandment about NOT communicating here? You invited participation, yet everyone is running around like chickens with their heads off, never communicating! --[[User:TK|Terry]] 23:28, 16 March 2007 (EDT)
:::Let me make two observervations: (1) the stuff about it being outed on Nov. 3 1986 (we need to check if that is prior to election day 1986 when the Democrats regained the Senate and were in a position to hold public investigations, or after election day) is well researched, and we can put it in at the point it belongs. (2) The stuff about Iraq is going to need some clarification, because this narrative picks up "after Reagan was re-elected", i.e. after Nov. 84, and his swearing in Jan. 85; NSDD 139, 5 April 1984 is ''prior''. While all this material is extremely (a) valid and (b) relevent, we are writing an historical narrative of events, not doing a hit piece with piecemeal material out of context. So this is what I'd like to discuss, gaining some structure to events.

:::Let me add, as an after thought, all accounts I read all over the web dismiss this all as a "scandal" of a bunch of greedy arms dealers and other assorted low-lifes which either includes Reagan, or Reagan gave his assent to. That POV has been explicitely stated eleswhere. So what we are examining is the motives for Reagan's giving assent to this matter. And beginning with a conclusory premise, that (a) Reagan's just another greedy corrupt Republican (b) this is just more evidence of the currupt aims, motives, and duplicity of Republicans in power and why you can't trust them, will fail. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 11:20, 17 March 2007 (EDT)

==Iraq==

--[[User:TK|TK]] 03:35, 19 March 2007 (EDT)

'''Comment on this inclusion''':''although the U.S. government under Reagan gave direct support to Iraq during the war. President Ronald Reagan stated that the United States "could not afford to allow Iraq to lose the war to Iran", and that the United States "would do whatever was necessary and legal to prevent Iraq from losing the war with Iran.");''

this may warrant inclusion at some point, and it no way contradicts US policy aims as stated by Henry Kissinger upon the outbreak of the Iran-iraq War in 1981, "All we can do is hope they both loose." [[User:RobS|RobS]] 11:31, 17 March 2007 (EDT)
:Being old enough to remember this time really good but too old to remember exactly where I heard this: The CIA, in shipments of Iran's weapons, would include "faulty" munitions such as hand grenades that would explode as soon as the handle was released, killing the thrower. Not all, but like 15-20% were "defective". I'll see if I can find a source.
::''primea facia'' this may be faulty; you will recall CIA was not involved in Iran/Contra; and using Israel & private arms dealers is what the matter was all about. Please, do not come here with warrantless, unqualified speculation. Get legitimate source documents first, then bring it to our attention. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 11:46, 17 March 2007 (EDT)
----
*Reagan said, '''''"could not afford to allow Iraq to lose the war to Iran..."'''''
This is the same problem that confronts President Bush today, i.e. allowing Iran to gain ascendancy over the majority Shia in Iraq, and the region. I'm sorry if this conflicts with journalists and scandalmongers aims to sell newspapers to paint Reagan in bed with the fascist Ba'athists, but this is not a propaganda vehicle, and we are here to write factual biography of Mr. Reagan. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 16:26, 18 March 2007 (EDT)

::Exactly, RobS. In the secular, political world, sometimes the person you end up in bed with, well...the reason you do is just because there isn't room anywhere else, or you are simply too tired to look elsewhere. ;-) --[[User:TK|TK]] 21:25, 18 March 2007 (EDT)

:::So the point here is, the crazies in Iran gaining hegemony in the Gulf needed to be detered (then, as now); then in Reagan's second term the fear that if a militarized Iraq survived the War intact, it might turn it's attention elsewhere, like Kuwait, which it did.

:::What do we know? Journalists blew the story wide open to sell headlines, and partisan Democrats looking to make a scandal, hastened (1) the Gulf War of 1991; (2) the fact that Iran ''still'' isn't an ally, and remains hostile with nuke capabilities. And if Iran hasn't got a nuke yet, they got the money to buy brainpower or an operational bomb from cash starved North Korea.

:::All this so partisans could create a scandal. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 01:03, 19 March 2007 (EDT)

*Indeed. Welcome to my world. I console myself knowing that sooner or later (usually later) the public gets damned mad, and there is literally political hell to pay. I have been waiting for that now about 7 years. Look at http://newt.org for American Solutions....something is being done, and the ground work being layed. --[[User:TK|TK]] 03:35, 19 March 2007 (EDT)

:The public wouldn't get mad if they stopped eating up all the journalists and the paid purveyors if lies lies. Truth is, news items have a shelf life, and a "sell by" date. Journalists do not care if (1) four years later Saddam indeed invades Kuwait as Iran/Contra tried to head off, or (b) 20 years later Iran still isn't an ally and now is a hostile power seeking nuclear weapons. All these scandalmongers wish to do is build careers, create and sell interesting news items, and the world be damned if consequences down the road surface as a result of thier actions. They're always in the postion to blame others. And as P.T. Barnum said, there's a sucker born every minute to buy thier lies. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 21:51, 19 March 2007 (EDT)

==NSDD 139==
Here are portions of the relevent context of NSDD 139 5 April 1984 extracted for discussion.

*In light of recent developments in the Iran-Iraq War and the threat which an escalation of that conflict or a terrorist campaign could pose for the vital interests of the U.S. and its Allies, measures must be taken now to improve our immediate ability to deter an expansion of the conflict in the Persian Gulf and, if necessary, defend U.S. interests...

*In the recognition of the growing threat of Iranian-sponsored terrorism...

*...prepare a plan of action designed to avert an Iraqi collapse.

*The Secretary of State will ensure that the policy of the United States Government condemning the use of chemical warfare (CW) munitions in the Iran-Iraq war is unambiguous and consistent, with the 1925 Geneva protocol. Our condemnation of the use of CW munitions by the belligerents should place equal stress on the urgent need to dissuade Iran from continuing the ruthless and inhumane tactics which have characterized recent offensives. (TS)

Here are extracts from '''Iran-Iraq War (1980-1988)''', < http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/war/iran-iraq.htm >

===Iraqi Retreats, 1982-84===
*The Iranian high command passed from regular military leaders to clergy in mid-1982....

*In July 1982 Iran launched Operation Ramadan... near Basra...the clergy used "human-wave" attacks... Ranging in age from only nine years old and up, these eager but relatively untrained soldiers swept over minefields and fortifications to clear safe paths for the tanks...

*...by the end of 1983, an estimated 120,000 Iranians and 60,000 Iraqis had been killed. Despite these losses, in 1983 Iran held a distinct advantage in the attempt to wage and eventually to win the war of attrition.

*Beginning in 1984, ...according to Jane's Defence Weekly and other sources, Baghdad used chemical weapons against Iranian troop concentrations...

*In April 1984, Saddam Hussein proposed to meet Khomeini personally in a neutral location to discuss peace negotiations...

*...Iraq launched a new series of attacks on shipping on February 1, 1984.

===The War of Attrition, 1984-87===
*By 1984 it was reported that some 300,000 Iranian soldiers and 250,000 Iraqi troops had been killed, or wounded....

*In early 1984...

*...the Iranian command again resorted to the human-wave tactic. In March 1984, an East European journalist claimed that he "saw tens of thousands of children, roped together in groups of about twenty to prevent the faint-hearted from deserting, make such an attack."

*Despite Iraqi denials since the war started, in February 1984 the Iraqi command ordered the use of chemical weapons. Within a four-week period between February and March 1984, the Iraqis reportedly killed 40,000 Iranians and lost 9,000 of their own men...

*Ranging in age from only nine years old and up, these eager but relatively untrained soldiers swept over minefields and fortifications to clear safe paths for the tanks.

*Within a four-week period between February and March 1984, the Iraqis reportedly killed 40,000 Iranians and lost 9,000 of their own men....in February 1984 the Iraqi command ordered the use of chemical weapons....between May 1981 and March 1984, Iran charged Iraq with forty uses of chemical weapons.

If anything is missing from the source documents to add to, or clarify context, please bring it forward. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 21:21, 20 March 2007 (EDT)

:*'''Some very valuable additions, Rob!''' --~ [[User:TK|Sysop-TK]] [[User_talk:TK|Talk2Me!]] 22:05, 20 March 2007 (EDT)

==Reagan & Shamir==
*''Reagan, though he once told Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir that he had personally liberated concentration camps''
this is total bull, and you should know better. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 16:06, 22 March 2007 (EDT)

Reagan's participation in the liberation of concentration camps is bull, yes.

However, he did claim later in life, telling both Shamir and Simon Wiesenthal that he had personally liberated camps, when in fact he had merely seen film footage.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=13736

----

== So much for being different from Wikipedia? ==

I noticed that Conservapedia now has a page explaining how it's different from Wikipedia [http://www.conservapedia.com/Differences_with_Wikipedia]. Reason No. 2, to quote it verbatim, is:

''We do not allow opinions of journalists to be repeated here as though they are facts. Instead, we require authoritative support. Wikipedia presents as facts numerous assertions that are based merely on journalists' (biased) opinion.''

Now, I think this is a commendable policy. One journalist's view should not necessarily be taken as fact. And this holds doubly true in the case of columnists, editorialists and other commentators whose work regularly appears on the Op-Ed pages of newspapers. By definition, these kinds of journalists are presenting opinions, and often selectively use or disregard facts.

So I find it particularly troubling to see how many times this entry violates this policy. The opinions of Peggy Noonan, Cal Thomas, et al, are presented here in the guise of factual statements, used to justify specific opinions on Reagan's legacy, involvement with the Hollywood Blacklist, the end of the Cold War, etc. It just doesn't lend much credibility to the entry or to Conservapedia, particularly in light of the claim that Conservapedia "does not allow opinions of journalists to be repeated here as though they are facts."

And, I'd add that presenting the views of Henry Kissinger, Margaret Thatcher or other officials and politicians in a similar manner is just as problematic. While these sorts of individuals may have a unique perspective on events, having been personally and directly involved in ways most journalists and other observers have not, their views are still opinions, and should be presented -- as in the case of the op-ed columnists mentioned above -- as the opinions of interested parties, rather than given as fact.

Certainly, the same can be said of the academics and scholars cited in the entry. However, those viewpoints are clearly presented as individual interpretations (and are not upheld as the simple truth). Moreover, in general I'd feel more comfortable citing an academic book than a newspaper columnist or insider because there's usually a rigorous standard of methodology and research being used that just isn't there for journalists and politicians. If you cite an academic book, you can usually point to the fifty pages of sources and references at the back to show what it's based on. You're lucky if columnists even name their sources (much less the specific place where they found their information), while politicians are wont to simply refer to each other for credibility, which means the foundation for their opinions is often lacking in substance.

Now, I'm sure that pointing out this blatant contradiction of policy won't lead to its rectification for this entry, or for Conservapedia in general. But, I feel compelled for some odd reason to point out why the site will likely want for credibility, and to suggest some ways in which the standards and quality of submissions can become a bit more robust. The site is still young, and it's possible that with a concerted effort Conservapedia can achieve its purported goals. I just won't be holding my breath. --[[User:SmithHall|SmithHall]] 12:06, 23 March 2007 (EDT)

*Well, whilst everyone is entitled to keep whatever opinions one wants to, it should be pointed out that most of that Journalists "report", these days, are just opinions as well, at best, and outright propaganda at the worst. In the end, what one's peers say about them, and the job you've done, is what counts in history. An automobile mechanic, being praised by other mechanics, is much more valuable to the rest of us, than praise from me. If you are laboring under the delusion that journalists, or academics are somehow "fairer" than other humans, you would be wrong.--~ [[User:TK|TerryK]] [[User_talk:TK|Talk2Me!]] 17:26, 23 March 2007 (EDT)

** That's certainly debatable. The reason historians and scholars tend to view memoirs and other ex post facto recollections with considerable skepticism is that people often rewrite or whitewash their past deeds to portray themselves in the most flattering light possible. Or, often they do so to flatter their friends and allies. There's nothing inherently evil in this; it's human nature. After all, we've all heard a few "fish stories" in our day.

My main point, however, was not that any particular kind of source was inherently better than others. Rather, it was to note that the opinions of columnists presented in the Reagan entry violate the Conservapedia policy cited above. I'd remove the quotes, but I'd get shouted down for "liberal bias" when all I want to see happen is Conservapedia actually abiding by its stated policies. The preceding unsigned comment was made by [[SmithHall]]

*There is only one quote from a columnist, which is, in the US, a different category than Journalist. Peggy Noonan was an Assistant to the President, a member of his administration. --~ [[User:TK|TerryK]] [[User_talk:TK|Talk2Me!]] 23:36, 23 March 2007 (EDT)

== Requested edit ==

Could someone add this article to [[:Category:Actors]]? Thanks. --[[User:Interiot|Interiot]] 15:58, 31 March 2007 (EDT)

*That catagory is inappropriate. Should we add "Painters" or "House Painters" to Hitler? --~ [[User:TK|TerryK]] [[User_talk:TK|MyTalk]] 23:17, 1 April 2007 (EDT)
Second thought, it is appropriate. --~ [[User:TK|TerryK]] [[User_talk:TK|MyTalk]] 01:06, 2 April 2007 (EDT)

==[[Iran Hostage Crisis]]==

Should there be some mention of the [[Iran Hostage Crisis]] in the foreign policy section? There isn't even a casual one-sentence dismissal of 444 days of captivity experienced by dozens of Americans. Completely left out. [[User:Reaganomist|Reaganomist]] 16:38, 5 April 2007 (EDT)

*The Iran hostage crisis was on Jimmy Carter's watch, however you are right in saying it needs mention here as well, for the World knows that they turned them loose because they understood what Reagan would do to them if they didn't.--~ [[User:TK|TerryK]] [[User_talk:TK|MyTalk]] 19:25, 5 April 2007 (EDT)

::Yes, they released them moments after news of his election. Heck, if I was a terrorist I'd be terrified of Reagan too. We could use another Reagan. [[User:Reaganomist|Reaganomist]] 19:35, 5 April 2007 (EDT)

==Saint Reagan==
I know he's a saint and all, but could we cut down the opening paragraph and make the dek more of a summary than a glowing review? Thanks [[User:Flippin|Flippin]] 12:00, 7 May 2007 (EDT)

*Flippin, you have crossed the line several times recently, with sarcastic, intemperate remarks, especially dragging Andy's family into your vendetta. I am sure you have many pairs of socks, so you shouldn't mind when I block you. Please be productive, and find another hobby aside from merely tweeking Conservatives, like producing articles, if you wish to remain here. --[[User:TK|Sysop-TK]] [[User_talk:TK|/MyTalk]] 19:03, 7 May 2007 (EDT)

== Fixing Iran-Contra Section ==

At the *very least*, can we please get the name of the Bolan amendment right? That is a brutal blow to any pretense of competency on this issue. Also the argument that it is an impingement upon the power of the executive is highly tendentious; can it be fixed? [[User:Brainslug|Brainslug]] 12:28, 7 May 2007 (EDT)

==1976 Election, running against Ford==

There's a section that says that Reagan withdrew his nomination because he could have beaten Ford and didn't want to be the spoiler. I'm sorry, but that's not true. Reagan almost pulled it off, but he came up short when the electoral count was being tallied. If he could have won the Republican nomination in 1976, he would have. No one runs for months of hard campaigning just to withdrew because they would win. [[User:Learn together|Learn together]] 04:32, 8 May 2007 (EDT)

*I'm sorry, I was there, that is what happened. There isn't an electoral tally at conventions. If he had stayed in, and once the first rounds of votes had been taken, the state delegates are then free from their commitment to vote per the primary. At that point hundreds would have voted with their hearts, which were always with Reagan. Recognizing the problem it would cause in the general election, he put a stop to it. --[[User:TK|Sysop-TK]] [[User_talk:TK|/MyTalk]] 04:43, 8 May 2007 (EDT)

::Well if you were there, then that trumps my knowledge. I was with my parents watching on TV and it didn't come across that way, but I was younger and TV isn't exactly going to report what happens in the trenches anyway, nor would I necessarily have the memory recall of someone dedicated enough to go to the live event. [[User:Learn together|Learn together]] 11:05, 8 May 2007 (EDT)

*TV is good for some dramatic shows. I own a TIVO. --[[User:TK|Sysop-TK]] [[User_talk:TK|/MyTalk]] 14:09, 8 May 2007 (EDT)

==Tip O'Neill==

Reagan did not only forge a friendship with O'Neill to "pass legislation" - O'Neill and Reagan were friends for many years following the end of Reagan and O'Neill's reign as the two most powerful men in the nation (1st and 2nd, respectivally). And neither Tip nor Reagan let their friendship get in the way of politics - or vice versa.

*That is very true. Too bad many today can't manage the same civility. --[[User:TK|Sysop-TK]] [[User_talk:TK|/MyTalk]] 20:41, 11 June 2007 (EDT)

I’m reading Reagan’s autobiography right now and it seemed like he was trying to have a good relationship with Tip O’Neil, but O’Neil was resisting. He told of an instance where he invited O’Neil to the White House and they both had a really good time. Then the next day after O’Neil was attacked him in the press, he called up O’Neil and asked him why he was mad at him after they seemed to form such a good friendship, O’Neil said his and Reagan’s friendship was, “politics before 6:00pm, friendship after 6:00pm.” --[[User:Tash|Tash]] 13:06, 28 July 2007 (EDT)

:Yes. President Reagan had "learning curve" in Washington, as all Presidents do. In the end, he considered O'Neil, and O'Neil considered Reagan, among their best friends in politics. They truly had a deep affection for each other, more than would be common for two Irishmen who had reached the pinnacles of their chosen profession. --[[User:TK|Sysop-TK]] [[User_talk:TK|/MyTalk]] 13:26, 28 July 2007 (EDT)

== California ==

The Californian section on Reagan is sorely lacking. I would like to add more information concerning major landmarks in Californian history under Reagan's term as Governor which is not listed so far.

Also his history before California is very brief. - Kazuma

Feel free to make some suggestions here since the page is locked. I totally agree! [[User:DanH|DanH]] 21:54, 28 June 2007 (EDT)

== Question ==

How is [[criticism of Ronald Reagan]] '''not''' [[placement bias]]? [[User:Aziraphale|Aziraphale]] 20:21, 18 October 2007 (EDT)

== Parody? ==

"'''Ronald Wilson Reagan''' (February 6, 1911- June 5, 2004), '''''heroic leader''''' and father of modern political discourse"

I'd remove it, but I'm afraid it may have been left there on purpose. '''[[user:FernoKlump|FernoKlump]]''' 19:25, 22 May 2008 (EDT)

== Holocaust ==
I'm not so oblivious as to try to add it myself, but just out of curiosity...since [[Barack Obama|Obama's]] page now contains the account of his statement that his uncle liberated Auschwitz, shouldn't Reagan's claims (to Yitzak Shamir and Elie Wiesel) to have liberated concentration camps himself be added here? [[User:Murray|Murray]] 21:03, 2 June 2008 (EDT)

== Daughter that did playboy ==
Should this be mentioned?

== Election margin ==

Just putting a fact tag there for now since this is probably a pretty sensitive article here, but where are you getting that Reagan's 58.77% of the popular vote in 1984 is the largest in almost 100 years? Nixon got 60.67% in 1972, and if you don't want to count that because of Watergate, Johnson got 61.05% in 1964, Roosevelt 60.8% in 1936 and Wilson got 60.32% in 1920, none of which could be called "almost 100 years." [http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/index.html] [[User:Mikek|Mikek]] 13:38, 15 January 2009 (EST)
:Direct link doesn't work for source, hit the "Compare National Data by Year (Table)" link below the map.[[User:Mikek|Mikek]] 13:41, 15 January 2009 (EST)
::I checked the source you provided, and the original line you added the fact tag to is substantialy correct. At over 54 million voters, it is the largest turnout for over a century until the 2000 election and later. [[User:Karajou|Karajou]] 14:26, 15 January 2009 (EST)
:::If the stat is just referring to the number of people who voted for him, I'm not sure how meaningful it is... as the population increases, obviously the number of voters is going to increase. You're right that it was the largest number of votes for a candidate ever at the time; but that also happened in 1972, 1964, 1956, 1952, 1936, 1932, 1928, etc, and Barack Obama is the most popular presidential candidate ever by that standard.
:::If saying that he received the most votes ever at the time is the intention of the statement and you do want it to stay, it should at least be reworded because the way it's written it looks like the stat is referring to the percentage of the vote that he received. [[User:Mikek|Mikek]] 14:53, 15 January 2009 (EST)
::::The re-wording would be fine; I would suggest the actual number of voters in addition to that percentage. [[User:Karajou|Karajou]] 14:55, 15 January 2009 (EST)

*Everyone is sooooo impatient, but I fixed the stats, etc. Please don't expect immediate results, lol. --[[User:TK|'''₮K''']]/Admin[[User_Talk:TK|/Talk]] 15:41, 15 January 2009 (EST)

== Liberal ==

Reagan was a leading Hollywood liberal in the 1940s, as he himself said many times. That is essential to understanding him. If people are puzzled by the category, then they should read the article and learn some history. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 22:43, 3 March 2009 (EST)

== Year of the Bible ==

I set up a separate article for [[Year of the Bible]] which deserves its own article. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 03:57, 23 May 2009 (EDT)

==Category==
I noticed liberals is a category for Reagan. The only reason I can think of why that exists is because he was a convert to Conservatism. I am inclined to delete that category.--[[User:Jpatt|Jpatt]] 12:37, 23 October 2009 (EDT)
::the reason is that in the 1940s he was one of the country's foremost liberals--there was talk already of a political career by 1945 and he was one of the most famous labor union leaders and supporters of FDR and Truman. Reagan is a complicate person and his transformation in the 1950s is central to the story.

:::Reagan had an open mind, and that led him to conservatism, particularly after Nancy's father introduced him to the logical ideas underlying conservatism. But I don't know why we would list Reagan as a "liberal". Usually people are known by where they end up, not their missteps along the way.--[[User:Aschlafly|Andy Schlafly]] 20:34, 23 October 2009 (EDT)
::::Reagan's case is an interesting one for the historian--how to deal with people who switch positions. A lot of people moved from left to right, like Herbert Hoover, Whittaker Chambers, James Burnham and John Dos Passos (and a few moved in the other direction--such as Woodrow Wilson, Gary Wills and Barry Goldwater). (There also are people like Senator Lieberman who are even more complex). We can 1) use the status where they ended up; 2) use the status where they were most important historically; or 3) use both. My own preference is #3 because it gives more information. In other words, a student writing about liberalism in the 1940s should be able to include Reagan. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 20:43, 23 October 2009 (EDT)

Jensen, sorry, your thinking is poppycock. This issue was previously decided, as was the official name of the article. Please communicate more, and you wouldn't exert unnecessary effort. --[[User:TK|'''ṬK''']]/Admin[[User_Talk:TK|/Talk]] 19:03, 11 November 2009 (EST)
::TK seems to have recovered the old fighting spirit--but while recuperating I recommend he take time to read a book or two. :) [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 19:49, 11 November 2009 (EST)
:::What about a "former liberals" category? That would appear to be more accurate. [[User:MichaelZ|MichaelZ]] 19:54, 11 November 2009 (EST)
::::yes that's the solution. :) -- I added it.[[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 21:19, 11 November 2009 (EST)

== title ==

Conservatives never call him "Ronald Wilson Reagan" and we don't want out CP users to start calling him that, so the title should be "Ronald Reagan" [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 13:28, 13 December 2009 (EST)

== Ronald Reagan Jr. an atheist ==

Ronald Reagan Jr. is a self-proclaimed "unabashed atheist," and he even headlined the Freedom from Religion Foundation's 2009 conference. You do note some things about his other children, and the family section is a little lacking. It seems worth a note, but the final call is up to you, of course. [[User:DanieleGiusto|DanieleGiusto]] 18:39, 4 March 2010 (EST)
:It could be a minor entry here, if any, but a separate article on Ron Jr. is authorized. [[User:Karajou|Karajou]] 18:41, 4 March 2010 (EST)

::Doesn't sound like an atheist to me:

<blockquote>
Ron Reagan: I don't claim anything. But my sympathies would be in that direction. I admire the fact that the central core of [[Buddhist]] teaching involves mindfulness and loving kindness and compassion. 
 

Q: Your father has been eulogized as a model of genuineness. But did you see any schism between his public and private selves? 
 
Ron Reagan: In private, you got what you got in public. He treated everyone the same. '''He was just a very warm man, and he worked hard to impress upon his children the value of kindness. He was biologically incapable of gossip. There was no smallness in him.''' [http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/27/magazine/27QUESTIONS.html?ex=1205812800&en=2cf65449d478f3c3&ei=5070] 
</blockquote>

::BTW, he prefers '''''Ronald P. Reagan''''' as his moniker.
--<big>[[User:TK|'''ṬK''']]</big>/Admin[[User_Talk:TK|/Talk]] 19:16, 4 March 2010 (EST)
:::Ever hear [[Ron P. Reagan]] on [[Air America]] before they filed for bankruptcy? He sounds pretty good, when he reads a script. I supposed taking his meds helps, too. [[User:RobSmith|Rob Smith]] 21:29, 4 March 2010 (EST)
::::Although they might be needed, I know he has so far declined to take them! I think he's still in syndication, without Air Red. --<big>[[User:TK|'''ṬK''']]</big>/Admin[[User_Talk:TK|/Talk]] 22:27, 4 March 2010 (EST)
:::::Ron Reagan: "I would be unelectable. I'm an atheist."
:::::Sounds a bit like an atheist to me.--[[User:KimSell|KimSell]] 08:19, 6 March 2010 (EST)
::::::"God had spared him in order that he might do good. But he accepted that as a responsibility, not a mandate. And there is a profound difference. Humble as he was, he never would have assumed a free pass to heaven. But in his heart of hearts, I suspect he felt he would be welcome there. And so he is home." -Ron P. Reagan speaking about things he doesn't believe in. He'd make a good politician. [http://reagan.4ringcircus.net/libretto/ron_eulogy.html] [[User:RobSmith|Rob Smith]] 12:41, 6 March 2010 (EST)

== Can someone fix the typo? ==

In the Hollywood section, the first sentence ends with ''"and look at prospects in the film '''indystry'''"''. Can someone fix the typo?" Thanks! [[User:Tzoran|Tyler Zoran]] [[User talk:Tzoran|Talk]] 17:15, 18 July 2010 (EDT)
:Yup! --<big>[[User:TK|'''ṬK''']]</big>/Admin[[User_Talk:TK|/Talk]] 18:19, 18 July 2010 (EDT)
::Thanks! [[User:Tzoran|Tyler Zoran]] [[User talk:Tzoran|Talk]] 18:20, 18 July 2010 (EDT)

== Objection to one aspect of Reagan's foreign policy ==

One thing I have a question about, under foreign policy, there is no mention of the military coups that Reagan initiated in Chad, Grenada, and Fiji. In Chad, the U.S. started a military coup and backed the rebels, propping up Hissen Habre, who's U.S.-backed regime would go on to kill over 10,000 and torture over 200,000 people. In Grenada, the U.S. sent in a strike force to take down the existing government, killing nearly 500 people. In Fiji, no one died, but the government was forcibly overthrown by U.S. troops. All these were initiated and planed by Reagan. It seems as if this information would be a pretty important part of someone's foreign policy, but there is no mention under Reagan's foreign policy section.unsigned by Esmith543

: Rescuing American medical students from being captured by communists invading Grenada is somehow objectionable???--[[User:Aschlafly|Andy Schlafly]] 20:53, 31 December 2010 (EST)

Rescuing the students is not objectionable, but did they have to overthrow the government and install a new, pro-nuclear Pacific government? What about the attacks in Chad and Fiji? Killing 10,000 and torturing 200,000 is very objectionable.unsigned by Esmith543

:There is nothing wrong with spreading western style governments. It will cost lives, particularly in turbulent places like Chad. Reagan was a hero in my book. [[User:LeeroyR|LeeroyR]] 22:12, 31 December 2010 (EST)

::And there is nothing wrong with blocking communist regimes like Cuba from spreading to vulnerable neighbors like Grenada. Esmith, would you think it wrong for someone to intervene to stop a bully who is picking on someone else?--[[User:Aschlafly|Andy Schlafly]] 22:35, 31 December 2010 (EST)

How many lives does it take for us to look back and question our actions. Apparently, hundreds of thousands is not enough. Would you condemn the action had it cost a million lives? Ten million? The reason that we are better than communist regimes is that we do not accept that the ends justify the means. Mao once said that "if the worst came to the worst and one-half dies, there will still be one-half left, but imperialism would be razed to the ground and the whole world would become socialist." That is an abhorrent thing to say. However, if we imagine that Reagan had said that, and the word "imperialism" were replaced with "communism", and the word "socialist" were to be replaced with "democratic", would Reagan still be a hero? Just to be clear, Reagan did not say anything of the sort (to my knowledge), but we cannot excuse the deaths of 10,00 people because of an attempted spread of western government. I would not think it wrong for someone to stop a bully, but I would think it wrong if in the process of stopping that bully, thousands of people are killed. Further, regardless of what motives Reagan had, whether you think them good or bad, why is there no mention on Conservapedia of this?

:Communism a plague on the Earth, your comparison is invalid. Reagan was right in his attempts to destroy it through any means necessary. [[User:LeeroyR|LeeroyR]] 23:25, 31 December 2010 (EST)

Why is communism a plague on the Earth? Because it encourages the killing of millions? Are you seriously advocating the deaths of untold millions to achieve the destruction of any communist government?

:Because it is a godless ideology that eliminates private property and has killed many (Stalin and his gulags). I am not advocating the deaths of millions in the journey of wiping communism off the map, but any war has collateral damage, and this was no different and it was necessary. [[User:LeeroyR|LeeroyR]] 00:31, 1 January 2011 (EST)

:: The article should mention Grenada, and other anti-Communist policies. Go ahead and suggest something, but be sure to have reliable sources. [[User:RSchlafly|RSchlafly]] 00:48, 1 January 2011 (EST)

Here are some suggestions: the coup in Chad and the propping-up of Hissan Habre, leading to the death of 10,00 people. This is documented here: http://www.1215.org/lawnotes/lawnotes/usbomber.htm (I know this website is anti-American, but documents it well), http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/North_Africa/CrimesAgainstHumanity_Chad.html, http://www.faqs.org/minorities/Sub-Saharan-Africa/Chad.html. For Fiji: http://www.worldpress.org/Asia/2773.cfm, http://www.nytimes.com/1987/06/19/world/ousted-fijian-premier-suspects-us-on-coup.html, http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/war/fiji.htm Grenada: http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h2047.html, http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/october/20/newsid_3720000/3720608.stm Also, there should be a mention of Reagan's decision to arm the Mujahideen, whose leader was none other than Osama bin Laden, and would later become Al-Qaeda, when the Soviet Union decided to invade Afghanistan. My sources for this are as follows: http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO109C.html, http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/dec/30/uk-mujahideen-afghanistan-soviet-invasion, http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Afghanistan/Afghanistan_CIA_Taliban.html (this one also does not like America, but it also provides information)

: You don't have any reliable sources for most of what you say. I suggest: Reagan invaded Grenada in order to prevent a Communist coup there. He also supported anti-Communist rebels in Afghanistan and El Salvidor. He has been accused of supporting anti-Communist movements in other countries as well. [[User:RSchlafly|RSchlafly]] 02:18, 3 January 2011 (EST)

Sorry it took so long to get back to you, I've been away. What exactly was wrong with my sources? Go ahead and make the changes, because the page has been locked, at least to non-administrators. I also believe that it is significant to say that the leader of the anti-Communist rebels in Afghanistan was Osama bin Laden, and this is how he started the Taliban.

: Maybe if it were true. I could not verify it. Your sources don't say that. [[User:RSchlafly|RSchlafly]] 21:53, 13 January 2011 (EST)
::globalsecurity.org is certainly not an objectionable source; the link provided gives no clue why (a) the Fiji coup should be included in the Reagan biographical article; (b) any U.S. government or Reagan administration foreign policy connection. 17:41, 15 January 2011 (EST)
::And the ''Reagan-armed-bin Laden'' myth is debunked by the 9/11 Commission Report ([http://www.9-11commission.gov/report/911Report.pdf Chapt. 2]). As the Commission Report points out, bin Laden's rise to credibility to lead the jihad against the US & the West was ''precisely'' because he did not get in bed or take aid from the US in the Afghan war of resistance against the Soivet Union. [[User:RobSmith|Rob Smith]] 18:15, 15 January 2011 (EST)

== Photo ==

It seems that official Presidential portraits/well known photos are used for all other Presidents...why is this one different? the picture seems to go against Conservapedia's claim of neutrality, as the photo cannot be taken in a way other than positive. [[User:SamuelGates|SamuelGates]] 00:47, 14 March 2011 (EDT)

== File size ==

This file is coming in around 92 MB, almost 3 times the suggested size. I have a fast connection, but the article is still slow to load. I propose some rewriting/condensing and/or creating branched articles from this one to make it more manageable. I know nearly identical information about Reagan’s family appears at least twice within the article. This could be condensed into the section about his personal life.

One possible idea is to create a separate article on Reagan's Alzheimer’s and include his letter to America in it with a link to the new article from this one. If no one objects, I will probably begin working on this sometime in the next day or so. Also, any ideas on how to break up/rewrite the article would be greatly appreciated. [[User:SharonW|SharonW]] 14:37, 15 June 2011 (EDT)
:I have no objections...please proceed. [[User:Karajou|Karajou]] 14:44, 15 June 2011 (EDT)

== Photo ==

I find a certain bias... (well, I myself am biased, as I do not take too kindly Reagan's admiration of the military industrial complex, something Ron Paul has warned against) ... how come Eisenhower's picture in his article is the official portrait, while old Ron's has an American flag backdrop and is waving a miniflag. Why isn't the official portrait used? --[[User:WilliamMoran|WilliamMoran]] 00:22, 3 September 2011 (EDT)

==boll weevils, not blue dogs==
The democratic coalition that voted for the diluted version of the Kemp-Roth tax bill were known as Boll Weevils, not blue dogs.

Illegal drugs

2011-11-18T05:18:02Z

Keysersoze:

[[Image:Drugs.jpg|right]]
[[Drugs]] are any chemical substances that effect a physical, mental, emotional, or behavioral change in an individual. [[Drug abuse]] is the use of any licit or illicit chemical substance that results in physical, mental, emotional, or behavioral impairment in an individual. '''Illegal drugs''' are drugs whose possession and/or use is forbidden by law (in most jurisdictions) due to their harmfulness and, usually, lack of therapeutic use. [[The Bible]] generally prohibits the use of drugs such as these. The most common illegal drugs are:

*[[Cannabis]] (''Cannabis sativa'') is the common hemp plant, which provides hallucinogens with some varying psychoactive properties. Other names for the Cannabis plant prepared for use are: Marijuana, Pot, Acapulco gold, Grass, Weed and Reefer. The main psychoactive ingredient within Cannabis is Delta-9-Tetrahydroannabinol (THC). There are three different preparations of Cannabis: Marijuana (Ground flower buds and/or leaves), Hashish (Pressed Cannabis Trichomes) and Hashish Oil (Ethanol extracted Cannabinoids). Although marijuana is illegal there are many groups researching its therapeutic properties and painkilling properties for people with chronic pain or disease.

*[[Coca]] (mostly ''Erythroxylum coca'') is a bush with leaves that contain cocaine. Coca is not to be confused with cocoa, which comes from cacao seeds and is used in making chocolate, cocoa, and cocoa butter.

*[[Cocaine]] is a stimulant derived from the leaves of the coca bush.

*[[Hallucinogens]] are drugs that affect sensation, thinking, self-awareness, and emotion. Hallucinogens include LSD (acid, microdot), mescaline, and the cacti that coatain it: peyote and san pedro (mexc, buttons, cactus), amphetamine variants (PMA, STP, DOB, DOM, 2C-I, 2C-E), phencyclidine (PCP, angel dust, hog), phencyclidine analogues (PCE, PCPy, TCP), and others (psilocybin, psilocyn, DMT, 5-MeO-DMT, ayahuasca).

*[[Heroin]] is a semisynthetic derivative of morphine.(diacetylmorphine)

*[[Opium]] is the brown, gummy exudate of the incised, unripe seedpod of the opium poppy. It contains over 20 different alkaloids, but the most important of these are morphine and codiene.

*[[Opium poppy]] (''Papaver somniferum'') is the source for the natural and semisynthetic opiates.

*[[Poppy straw]] is the entire cut and dried opium poppy-plant material, other than the seeds. Opium is extracted from poppy straw in commercial operations that produce the drug for medical use.

*[[Qat]] (kat, khat) is a stimulant from the buds or leaves of Catha edulis that is chewed or drunk as tea. It contains cathinone, a natural stimulant structurally similar to ephedrine.

Legal (pharmaceutical) drugs are also often used for recreational (i.e., non-therapeutic) purposes. Such use is usually illegal. Drugs often illegally abused in this manner include:

*Some cough suppressants, mainly any formulation which contains [[dextromethorphan]] (Robitussin, Delsym), are used in high doses to produce dissociative hallucinations, much like phencyclidine or ketamine. Althouth available over the counter in most states, frequent or long-term use of these high doses can lead to toxic psychosis.

*[[Depressants]] (sedatives) are drugs that reduce tension and anxiety and include chloral hydrate, barbiturates (Amytal, Nembutal, Seconal, phenobarbital), benzodiazepines (Valium, Xanax, Ativan), methaqualone (Quaalude or Mandrax), glutethimide (Doriden), and others (Equanil, Placidyl, Valmid).

*[[Narcotics]] are drugs that relieve pain, often induce sleep or a type of "euphoria," and refer to opium, opium derivatives, and synthetic substitutes. Natural narcotics include opium (paregoric, parepectolin), [[morphine]] (MS-Contin, Roxanol), codeine (Tylenol #3, Empirin with codeine), and thebaine. Semisynthetic narcotics include heroin (horse, smack), and hydromorphone (Dilaudid). Synthetic narcotics include meperidine or Pethidine (Demerol), methadone (Dolophine, Methadose, Actiq), and others (Darvon, Vicodin, Oxycontin).

*[[Stimulants]] are drugs that relieve mild depression, increase energy and activity, and include cocaine (coke, snow, crack), amphetamines (Methamphetamine, Desoxyn, Dexedrine), ephedrine, ecstasy (clarity, essence, doctor, Adam), phenmetrazine (Preludin), methylphenidate (Ritalin), and others (Cylert, Sanorex, Tenuate).

==Arguments for legalization==
Whilst there are undoubtedly arguments against legalizing particular or all recreational drugs, there are arguments to the contrary.

*Crime. Some argue that the primary immorality associated with illicit drugs is the resultant drug-related crime. The cocaine industry is notoriously immoral, whilst a legal industry would almost certainly be far less so. Celerino Castillo, a twenty-year veteran of law enforcement (including twelve years in the [[Drug Enforcement Administration]]), calls the drug war a "vile and despicable presence doing irreparable harm to all of the American landscape," and insists that legalization is the only real solution to eliminating drug cartels and gangs.<ref>[http://mapinc.org/newsleap/v08/n258/a06.html Drug War Doing Irreparable Harm], Brownsville Herald, 3 March 2008.</ref>

*[[Human Rights]]. It has been suggested that it is a human right to have access to recreational drugs, and that it is immoral of the government to prevent this. However, this argument is not without criticism. Drug use may lead to a user negatively affecting the lives of others.

*Futility of criminalization. The laws on illicit drugs cannot be effectively enforced and drugs are easy to procure. When a law cannot be effectively enforced, it is of questionable merit. Also, since [[alcohol]] is a dangerous, legal alternative, people will frequently turn to it instead, which is arguably no better.

== References ==
{{reflist}}
==External Links==
*[http://www.aim.org/wls/category/drugs/ What Liberals Say - Category: Drugs], [[Accuracy In Media]]

[[Category:Illegal Drugs]]

Illegal drugs

2011-11-18T05:11:09Z

Keysersoze: they actually contain cocaine

[[Image:Drugs.jpg|right]]
[[Drugs]] are any chemical substances that effect a physical, mental, emotional, or behavioral change in an individual. [[Drug abuse]] is the use of any licit or illicit chemical substance that results in physical, mental, emotional, or behavioral impairment in an individual. '''Illegal drugs''' are drugs whose possession and/or use is forbidden by law (in most jurisdictions) due to their harmfulness and, usually, lack of therapeutic use. [[The Bible]] generally prohibits the use of drugs such as these. The most common illegal drugs are:

*[[Cannabis]] (''Cannabis sativa'') is the common hemp plant, which provides hallucinogens with some varying psychoactive properties. Other names for the Cannabis plant prepared for use are: Marijuana, Pot, Acapulco gold, Grass, Weed and Reefer. The main psychoactive ingredient within Cannabis is Delta-9-Tetrahydroannabinol (THC). There are three different preparations of Cannabis: Marijuana (Ground flower buds and/or leaves), Hashish (Pressed Cannabis Trichomes) and Hashish Oil (Ethanol extracted Cannabinoids). Although marijuana is illegal there are many groups researching its therapeutic properties and painkilling properties for people with chronic pain or disease.

*[[Coca]] (mostly ''Erythroxylum coca'') is a bush with leaves that contain cocaine. Coca is not to be confused with cocoa, which comes from cacao seeds and is used in making chocolate, cocoa, and cocoa butter.

*[[Cocaine]] is a stimulant derived from the leaves of the coca bush.

*[[Hallucinogens]] are drugs that affect sensation, thinking, self-awareness, and emotion. Hallucinogens include LSD (acid, microdot), mescaline and peyote (mexc, buttons, cactus), amphetamine variants (PMA, STP, DOB, DOM, 2C-I, 2C-E), phencyclidine (PCP, angel dust, hog), phencyclidine analogues (PCE, PCPy, TCP), and others (psilocybin, psilocyn, DMT, 5-MeO-DMT, ayahuasca).

*[[Heroin]] is a semisynthetic derivative of morphine.

*[[Opium]] is the brown, gummy exudate of the incised, unripe seedpod of the opium poppy.

*[[Opium poppy]] (''Papaver somniferum'') is the source for the natural and semisynthetic narcotics.

*[[Poppy straw]] is the entire cut and dried opium poppy-plant material, other than the seeds. Opium is extracted from poppy straw in commercial operations that produce the drug for medical use.

*[[Qat]] (kat, khat) is a stimulant from the buds or leaves of Catha edulis that is chewed or drunk as tea.

Legal (pharmaceutical) drugs are also often used for recreational (i.e., non-therapeutic) purposes. Such use is usually illegal. Drugs often illegally abused in this manner include:

*Some cough suppressants, mainly any formulation which contains [[dextromethorphan]] (Robitussin, Delsym), are used in high doses to produce dissociative hallucinations, much like phencyclidine or ketamine. Althouth available over the counter in most states, frequent or long-term use of these high doses can lead to toxic psychosis.

*[[Depressants]] (sedatives) are drugs that reduce tension and anxiety and include chloral hydrate, barbiturates (Amytal, Nembutal, Seconal, phenobarbital), benzodiazepines (Valium, Xanax, Ativan), methaqualone (Quaalude or Mandrax), glutethimide (Doriden), and others (Equanil, Placidyl, Valmid).

*[[Narcotics]] are drugs that relieve pain, often induce sleep or a type of "euphoria," and refer to opium, opium derivatives, and synthetic substitutes. Natural narcotics include opium (paregoric, parepectolin), [[morphine]] (MS-Contin, Roxanol), codeine (Tylenol #3, Empirin with codeine), and thebaine. Semisynthetic narcotics include heroin (horse, smack), and hydromorphone (Dilaudid). Synthetic narcotics include meperidine or Pethidine (Demerol), methadone (Dolophine, Methadose, Actiq), and others (Darvon, Vicodin, Oxycontin).

*[[Stimulants]] are drugs that relieve mild depression, increase energy and activity, and include cocaine (coke, snow, crack), amphetamines (Desoxyn, Dexedrine), ephedrine, ecstasy (clarity, essence, doctor, Adam), phenmetrazine (Preludin), methylphenidate (Ritalin), and others (Cylert, Sanorex, Tenuate).

==Arguments for legalization==
Whilst there are undoubtedly arguments against legalizing particular or all recreational drugs, there are arguments to the contrary.

*Crime. Some argue that the primary immorality associated with illicit drugs is the resultant drug-related crime. The cocaine industry is notoriously immoral, whilst a legal industry would almost certainly be far less so. Celerino Castillo, a twenty-year veteran of law enforcement (including twelve years in the [[Drug Enforcement Administration]]), calls the drug war a "vile and despicable presence doing irreparable harm to all of the American landscape," and insists that legalization is the only real solution to eliminating drug cartels and gangs.<ref>[http://mapinc.org/newsleap/v08/n258/a06.html Drug War Doing Irreparable Harm], Brownsville Herald, 3 March 2008.</ref>

*[[Human Rights]]. It has been suggested that it is a human right to have access to recreational drugs, and that it is immoral of the government to prevent this. However, this argument is not without criticism. Drug use may lead to a user negatively affecting the lives of others.

*Futility of criminalization. The laws on illicit drugs cannot be effectively enforced and drugs are easy to procure. When a law cannot be effectively enforced, it is of questionable merit. Also, since [[alcohol]] is a dangerous, legal alternative, people will frequently turn to it instead, which is arguably no better.

== References ==
{{reflist}}
==External Links==
*[http://www.aim.org/wls/category/drugs/ What Liberals Say - Category: Drugs], [[Accuracy In Media]]

[[Category:Illegal Drugs]]

Neutron

2011-11-18T04:47:21Z

Keysersoze:

[[Image:310px-Beta Negative Decay svg.png|right|thumb|300px|The [[Feynmann diagram]] of the neutron beta decay process]]
A '''neutron''' is the neutral particle in an [[atom]]'s [[nucleus]]. It is a [[baryon]], comprised of two down [[quark]]s and an up [[quark]] It keeps the positive protons in the nucleus from being pushed apart from each other by their like charges. A lack or excess of neutrons causes an atom to become unstable; [[beta decay|beta radiation]] is the conversion of a neutron into a [[proton]] which emits an [[electron]] and an [[anti-electron neutrino]]. Although neutrons comprise a large part of all matter, they are inherently unstable if not bound to anucleus, and decay into a proton and an electron in a brief period of time.

==See Also==

*[[Atom]]
*[[Proton]]
*[[Electron]]
*[[Periodic table of the elements]]
*[[Quark]]
*[[nucleon]]

==Links==

*[http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/Science/2007/09/18/study_contradicts_neutron_theory/8801/ Study contradicts neutron theory]

[[Category:Physics]]
[[Category:Chemistry]]

Isotopes

2011-11-18T04:43:37Z

Keysersoze:

'''Isotopes''' are two or more [[atom]]s that have the same number of [[proton]]s (ie they are of the same [[element]]), but different numbers of [[neutron]]s.<ref>Wile, Dr. Jay L. ''Exploring Creation With Physical Science''. Apologia Educational Ministries, Inc. 1999, 2000</ref> For example, the most common isotope of [[hydrogen]] has a single proton and no neutrons in its [[nucleus]]. A very small proportion of hydrogen atoms are of the isotope deuterium (with one proton and one neutron)<ref>[http://www.purchon.com/chemistry/deuterium.htm Deuterium - Purchon.com]</ref> or tritium (with one proton and two neutrons)<ref>[http://www.physics.isu.edu/radinf/tritium.htm Tritium - Physics.isu.edu]</ref>. Isotopes can be very difficult to separate because they have the same external electron shell configuration, which gives them basically identical chemical beheavior. This means that they must be separated by physical means such as diffusion, centrifugation, or sometimes fractional distillation.

==References==
<references/>

[[Category:Chemistry]]

Critical mass

2011-11-18T04:37:00Z

Keysersoze: gotta be fissile, radioactive is neither necessary, nor sufficient

'''Critical mass''' refers to the mass of a fissile [[isotopes|isotope]] necessary to cause a sustainable nuclear chain reaction.<ref>Wile, Dr. Jay L. ''Exploring Creation With Physical Science''. Apologia Educational Ministries, Inc. 1999, 2000</ref>

==References==
<references/>

[[Category:Physics]]

Nuclear fission

2011-11-18T04:35:06Z

Keysersoze:

'''Nuclear fission''' is the process by which a large [[nucleus]] is split into two smaller nuclei.<ref>Wile, Dr. Jay L. ''Exploring Creation With Physical Science''. Apologia Educational Ministries, Inc. 1999, 2000</ref>

The fission of a nucleus of sufficient mass releases an enormous amount of [[energy]], which can be harnessed in a [[nuclear reactor]] to generate electrical power. Nuclear fission can also be used in a destructive fashion, such as in a [[nuclear weapon]]. Fission also releases [[neutron]]s which can then impact and cause other nuclei to split, causing a chain reaction. The two most common fissile elements used in nuclear power applications and weapons applications are [[uranium]] 235 and [[plutonium]] 239.

A [[critical mass]] of the right [[radioactive]] material is required to begin this chain reaction. This is because if the mass undergoing fission is not sufficiently large, it's high surface area to mass ratio allows a large percentage of the neutrons required to sustain the chain reaction to escape. Once a critical mass of the proper radioactive material of good enough purity is achieved, the chain reaction begins.

==References==
<references/>

[[category: physics]]

Flying machine

2011-11-18T04:22:29Z

Keysersoze:

'''Flying machines''' have been around for centuries. The ancients flew kites, and some of these were large enough to carry a man. Hot air balloons were publicly demonstrated in france in the late 18th century by the mongoflier brothers, and sealed hydrogen balloons were made practical by the chemist Charles shortly thereafter.

Just before World War I the first successful powered aircraft took off at [[Kitty Hawk]], located by the [[Atlantic Ocean]] in the State of [[North Carolina]].

The first successful motor-powered manned flight was by [[Orville Wright]] on December 17, 1903. The first flight lasted 12 seconds and the airplane flew 120 feet. The whole first flight could have taken place inside the modern-day [[An-124]] cargo plane.

Later that same day, Orville's brother [[Wilbur Wright]] flew the same aircraft 852 feet in 49 seconds.

[[Leonardo da Vinci]]'s drawing of a helicopter-like flying machine is a well known example of early ambitions to build a flying vehicle.

[[Category:Aircraft]]

The Jazz Singer (1927 film)

2011-11-18T03:39:58Z

Keysersoze: added description

{{Infobox Film
| name=The Jazz Singer
| image=
| caption=
| director=[[Alan Crosland]]
| producer=
| writer=Samson Raphaelson (original play) Alfred A. Cohn (adaptation)
| starring=[[Al Jolson]] May McAvoy Warner Oland Eugenie Besserer 
| music=Louis Silvers
| cinematography=Hal Mohr
| editing=Harold McCord
| distributor=[[Warner Brothers]]
| released=October 6, 1927
| runtime=88 minutes
| country=[[United States]]
| language=[[English]]
| budget=$422,000
| gross=$3,000,000
}}

'''The Jazz Singer''' is a 1927 musical/drama starring Al Jolson. It is known as the first feature-length film with audible dialogue.
The dialogue only occurs duing a few minutes of the movie; in one instance between the verses of a musical number. However the rest of the film has a soundtrack of background music and sound effects. John Barrymore's DON JUAN had used a similar music and sound effect soundtrack the previous year, but it was the dialogue in the Jolson movie which caused a sensation and led to a rapid conversion of the film industry to sound. The first feature length film with dialogue throughout, THE LIGHTS OF NEW YORK, was released soon after.

Essay:Greatest Conservative Movies

2011-11-18T00:06:24Z

Keysersoze: bruce almighty: changed sucessively to successfully

'''There have been many superb [[conservative]] films''':

{| class="wikitable sortable"
|-
!Film
!Year
!Rating
!Comments
!Gross (Domestic)
|-
|''Witness''
|1985
|R
|Highlights the virtues of strong moral values, with more substance than ''High Noon''.
|$ 65,500,000
|-
|''[[Spider-Man]]''
|2002
|PG-13
|Praises moral virtue (hard-working teenager, devout aunt and well-meaning uncle) and pokes fun at [[liberals]] (entertainers and journalist). Hero chooses [[abstinence]]. This was one of the most profitable films ever made.
|$ 403,706,375
|-
|''[[Invasion of the Body Snatchers]]''
|1956
|UR
|A science fiction condemnation of [[communism]], produced for only $420,000 and remade successfully in three additional movies.
|$ 2,500,000
|-
|''[[The Exorcist]]''
|1973
|R
|(''not for children'') - A portrayal of pure evil against a positive characterization of [[Christianity]]. It broke the record for movie revenue.
|$ 441,071,011
|-
|''[[Dark Matter]]''
|2007
|R
|A candid look at [[professor values]] along with problems associated with lack of assimilation; [[liberal]]s first praised the movie, but after realizing its [[conservative]] message then panned it.
|$ 30,041
|-
|''Miracle''
|2004
|PG
|Movie about the United States hockey team which won the gold medal in the 1980 Winter Olympics. Stresses the important of hard work, resiliency, selflessness and putting your best effort forward to reach an unseen goal.
|$ 64,445,708
|-
|''[[Gone With the Wind]]''
|1939
|UR
|Celebrates a strongly ''feminine'' heroine who is the antithesis of a modern [[feminist]], and held the record for top-grossing movie for decades.
|$ 198,676,459
|-
|''[[Ben-Hur (film, 1959)|Ben-Hur]]''
|1959
|UR
|Celebrates honor and duty to family and country, with a pro-Christian ending, long held the record for the most [[Academy Awards]].
|$ 17,300,000
|-
|''[[Expelled | Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed]]''
|2008
|PG
|[[Ben Stein]] exposes [[evolution|evolutionists]]' scientific and education system [[deceit]].
|$ 7,690,545
|-
|''[[Atlas Shrugged]]''
|2011
|PG-13
|Big screen adaptation of the classic objectivist text.
|$ 4,563,873
|-
|''[[Hillary: The Movie]]''
|2008
|UR
|Citizens United film exposing Hillary Clinton. This movie led to the overturning of McCain-Feingold legislation by the [[U.S. Supreme Court]] in ''[[Citizens United v. FEC]]''.
|NA - TV
|-
|''[[Indoctrinate U]]''
|2007
|UR
|Exposed political correctness, racial and ethnic politics in the academic setting. <ref>[http://video.yahoo.com/watch/3624795/9994231 Indoctrinate U -Part 1/3, Yahoo]</ref>
|Unknown
|-
|''[[Fireproof (film)|Fireproof]]''
|2008
|PG
|Highly successful pro-Christian, pro-marriage film created by [[Sherwood Pictures]].
|$ 33,451,479
|-
|''[[Beauty and the Beast]]''
|1991
|G
|A powerful and immensely popular antidote to [[feminism]], far better than the [[liberal]] movies churned out by [[Disney]] since.
|$ 25,487,028
|-
|''[[Titanic]]''
|1997
|PG-13
|Every life had value and the most powerful men gave up their seats on lifeboats to women and children first; the media and a young [[RINO]] are rightly criticized; broke the record in movie revenues.
|$ 600,779,824
|-
|''The Lives of Others''
|2006
|R
|(''Not for children'') - This German-language film is a stinging criticism of the [[communist]] [[East Germany]] from a liberal perspective.
|$ 11,286,112
|-
|''[[The Sound of Music]]''
|1965
|UR
|Solid family entertainment.
|$ 158,671,368
|-
|''[[Chinatown]]''
|1974
|UR
|A thriller about the deceit surrounding water rights in southern California and LA's water system, removing most of the water from the central valley.
|$ 30,000,000 (world wide estimate)
|-
|''[[The Fountainhead]]''
|1949
|UR
|Gary Cooper and Patricia Neal starring in Ayn Rand's classic story of the right of the individual to produce on their own terms.
|Unknown
|-
|''The Undefeated''
|2011
|PG-13
|Documentary about [[Sarah Palin]]
|$ 100,085 (to date)
|-
|''Moses''
|1974
|PG
|Italian-British-American production which features [[Burt Lancaster]] playing [[Moses]] the lawgiver. Less flamboyant than Cecil B. Demille's movie The Ten Commandments and focuses more on the biblical figure of Moses. Originally a 6-part TV mini-series, but edited to make it a movie.
|-
|''[[The Ten Commandments]]''
|1956
|UR
|The definitive film portrayal of [[Exodus]].
|$ 65,500,000
|-
|''[[Mr. Smith Goes To Washington]]''
|1939
|UR
|A tale of a good, simple man rising above the pressures of [[liberals]] to do the right thing. Features perhaps the best defense of the American political system ever committed to film.
|Unknown
|-
|''[[Star Wars]]''
|1977-2005
|PG
|Simple truths about the triumph of good over evil.
|$460,998,007
|-
|''The Winning Team''
|1952
|UR
|[[Ronald Reagan]] stars as a baseball pitcher who overcomes his problems to help his team win. This was one of Reagan's own favorites.
|Unknown
|-
|''[[King of Kings]]''
|1961
|UR
|
|Unknown
|-
|''[[Iron Eagle]]''
|1986
|PG-13
|
|$ 24,159,872
|-
|''[[On The Waterfront]]''
|1954
|UR
|[[Marlon Brando]] plays Terry Malloy, who under the inspiration of a Catholic priest (Father Barry, played by [[Karl Malden]]), becomes a Christ-like figure. Betrayed by his brother and almost killed by the gang, he finds the strength to overcome and redeem his people from the slavery to the mobsters who run the waterfront. In stunning contrast to the liberals who kept silent about the Communist subversion in Hollywood, the film portrays the informer as the hero; liberal Hollywood never forgave director [[Elia Kazan]] for his stunning film. In real life, Kazan, Malden and screenwriter Budd Schulberg all testified before Congress, along with [[Ronald Reagan]]. Together they broke the power of the Reds in Hollywood.
|$ 9,600,000
|-
|''The Name of the Rose''
|1986
|R
|A mystery centered around the balance between faith and science, as well as debate over the role of poverty in religion and religious orders.
|$ 5,595,706
|-
|''[[Sergeant York]]''
|1941
|UR
|A young American soldier during WWI overcomes an unfounded religious objection to killing and becomes a war hero.
|Unknown
|-
|''[[Knute Rockne: All-American]]''
|1940
|UR
|Stars [[Ronald Reagan]] as corageous football player George Gipp, who dies before an important game.
|Unknown
|-
|''[[Ninotchka]]''
|1939
|UR
|
|Unknown
|-
|''[[Forbidden Planet]]''
|1956
|UR
|
|$ 3,000,000
|-
|''[[Rudy]]''
|1993
|PG
|A young man overcomes many obstacles, including dyslexia, to play for the [[Notre Dame]] football team. Shows the value of hard work and never giving up.
|$ 22,750,363
|-
|''[[The Prince of Egypt]]''
|1998
|PG
|A telling of the life of [[Moses]].
|$ 101,217,900
|-
|''[[Strategic Air Command (film)|Strategic Air Command]]''
|1955
|UR
|Actor (and Brigadier [[General]]) [[James Stewart]]'s story of the real [[Strategic Air Command]] and its transition from prop planes to jet planes.
|Unknown
|-
|''[[A Gathering of Eagles]]''
|1963
|UR
|Illustrates duty, honor, and the burden of command.
|Unknown
|-
|''[[Red Dawn]]''
|1984
|PG-13
|
|$ 35,866,000
|-
|''[[Harry's War]]''
|1981
|PG
|Anti-IRS comedy.
|Unknown
|-
|''[[The Patriot]]''
|2000
|R
|A patriot fights for American freedom during the [[American Revolution]].
|$ 113,330,342
|-
|''[[Ladder 49]]''
|2004
|PG-13
|Shows the courageousness of firefighters.
|$ 74,541,707
|-
|''[[Rocky]]''
|1976
|PG
|A talented but down-on-his-luck fighter gets a chance to challenge himself to the ends of his ability. This film reinforces man's ability to overcome challenges.
|$ 117,235,247
|-
|''[[October Sky]]''
|1999
|PG
|Four high school boys from a rural coal mining town, inspired by Sputnik, set out to build their own rockets and become rocket scientists.
|$ 32,481,825
|-
|''[[Amazing Grace (film)|Amazing Grace]]''
|2006
|PG
|Shows the horrors of slave trade.
|$ 21,208,358
|-
|''[[Bruce Almighty]]''
|2003
|PG-13
|Shows, in a comedic, accessible way, that no one mortal can successfully do [[God]]'s job.
|$ 242,589,580
|-
|''[[World Trade Center]]''
|2006
|PG-13
|Highlights the bravery of the firemen and police in [[9/11]]
|$ 70,236,496
|-
|''[[Flight 93]]''
|2006
|PG-13
|Shows the bravery of the passengers on Flight 93, which was hijacked on September 11th, 2001, and crashed into a Pennsylvania field. The passengers fought back against the hijackers.
|NA - TV
|-
|''[[A Man For All Seasons]]''
|1966
|UR
|
|$ 20,000,000<ref>This figure is a worldwide gross.</ref>
|-
|''[[Chariots of Fire]]''
|1981
|PG
|
|$ 58,972,904
|-
|''[[One Foot In Heaven]]''
|1941
|UR
|
|Unknown
|-
|''[[Quo Vadis?]]''
|1951
|UR
|
|Unknown
|-
|''[[The Lost Weekend]]''
|1945
|UR
|Illustrates the dangers of alcohol abuse.
|Unknown
|-
|''[[The Manchurian Candidate]]''
|1962
|PG-13
|Anti-communist in general, but with a swipe at [[Joseph McCarthy]].
|Unknown
|-
|''[[The Green Berets]]''
|1968
|G
|Vivid defense of our troops' conduct in the Vietnam War.
|$ 11,000,000
|-
|''[[My Son John]]''
|1952
|UR
|A small-town couple's world is turned upside-down by the discovery that their adult son is a Communist.
|Unknown
|-

|''[[True Lies]]''
|1994
|R
|Stars the future Republican governor of California, [[Arnold Schwarzenegger]]. Teaches conservative values like marital loyalty, and political incorrect facts such as the fact that most terrorists are Middle Eastern Arabic speakers who don't value human life.
|$ 146,261,000
|-
|''[[The Island]]''
|2005
|PG-13
|Pro-life statement against cloning to harvest organs.
|$ 35,799,026
|-
|''[[Evelyn]]''
|2002
|PG
|True story of Irish father's legal struggle to recover his kids from an orphanage.
|$ 1,483,975
|-
|''[[Shane]]''
|1953
|UR
|Western about defending a homesteading family.
|$ 20,000,000
|-
|''[[Lean on Me]]''
|1989
|PG-13
|A true story about combating drug use, violence, and contempt for authority while exalting positive values like academic achievement and family values.<ref>http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097722/</ref>
|$ 31,906,454
|-
|''[[Hero]]''
|1992
|PG-13
|Even those with character flaws can do good.
|$ 19,487,173
|-
|''[[The 6th Day]]''
|2000
|PG-13
|Pro-Life, Anti-Cloning movie Featuring Republican Governor [[Arnold Schwarzenegger]]
|$ 34,543,701
|-
|''Ghost Busters''
|1984
|PG
|Fitting satire of an unfair (and likely liberal) professor, paganism, and an EPA regulator.
|$ 238,632,124
|-
|[[Facing the Giants]]
|2006
|PG
|Trust in [[God]], let him take over, and good things will happen.
|$ 10,178,331
|-
|''Flash of Genius''
|2008
|PG-13
|The intellectual property of a hard-working, solitary inventor is promoted, and his children stuck by his side through enormous difficulties.
|$ 3,744,790
|-
|''Oh, God!''
|1977
|PG
|Acceptance of God's calling is rewarded, the faithful are vindicated, and naysayers are proven wrong.
|$ 41,687,243
|-
|''[[Courageous]]''
|2011
|PG-13
|Upcoming [[Sherwood Pictures]] film focusing on the role of fathers.
|
|-
|''[[Air Force One (film)|Air Force One]]''
|1997
|R
|Positively portrays a strong U.S. president who takes an uncompromising stance against terrorism. Includes positive material about family, authority, the military and sacrifice.
|$ 172,956,409
|-
|''[[The Fellowship of the Ring (film, 2001)|The Lord of the Rings: the Fellowship of the Ring]]''
|2001
|PG-13
|Clear distinction between good and evil with positive themes of friendship, bravery, honor, sacrifice and overcoming temptation.
|$ 314,776,114
|-
|''[[The Two Towers (film, 2002)|The Lord of the Rings: the Two Towers]]''
|2002
|PG-13
|Strong portrayals of redemption and good over evil.
|$ 340,478,898
|-
|''[[The Return of the King (2003 film)|The Lord of the Rings: the Return of the King]]''
|2003
|PG-13
|Bravery, heroism, sacrifice and good ultimately triumphing over evil.
|$ 377,027,325
|-
|''[[Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World]]''
|2003
|PG-13
|Promotes many positive conservative values including faith in God, patriotism, duty, honor, respect for authority, discipline, bravery, sacrifice, and friendship.
|$ 93,926,386
|-
|''[[The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe]]''
|2005
|PG
|Based upon the Christian allegory written by C.S. Lewis.
|$ 291,709,845
|-
|''[[The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian]]''
|2008
|PG
|
|$ 141,621,490
|-
|''[[The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader]]''
|2010
|PG
|
|$ 104,383,624
|-
|''Coach Carter''
|2005
|PG-13
|Promotes the theme that graduating from high school and having proper moral values are more important than becoming famous athletes.
|$ 67,253,092
|-
|''[[The Seventh Sign]]''
|1988
|R
|Starring Demi Moore, a fictional account of the return of Jesus to usher in the apocalypse and judge mankind. Catholic themed movie has Demi offering her life for the souls of others.
|$ 18,875,011
|-
|''[[Maafa21]]''
|2009
|UR
|This film explores the inception of [[Planned Parenthood]] as an organization created to exterminate African-Americans. It exposes the words of its' racist founder [[Margaret Sanger]] and their impact on black genocide more than a century later. <ref>[http://www.maafa21.com www.maafa21.com]</ref>
|NA - DVD
|-
|''[[Twelve O'Clock High]]''
|1949
|UR
|A thrilling movie about the heroics of fighter pilots during [[World War II]]; used as an educational film for management training seminars.
|$ 3,225,000
|-
|''[[Escape from Hell]]''
|2000
|UR
|Drama about a doctor and near-death experience.
|NA - DVD
|-
|''[[Waiting for Superman]]''
|2010
|PG
|Documentary on the failed public school system.
|$ 6,410,257
|-
|''The Hurt Locker''
|2008
|R
|A look into the life of an American bomb disposal regiment in Iraq risking their lives for their country and for the innocent by confronting evil. Rated R for violence and language.
|$ 12,647,089
|-
|''The Tunnel'' (''Der Tunnel'')
|2001
|
|Based on a true story a group of East Berliners escaping harsh Communist rule and hatch a plan to help others escape that same oppressive regime.
|$ 10,890
|-
|''A Charlie Brown Christmas''
|1965
|G
|The real meaning of Christmas is discussed, as Linus quotes Luke 2:8-14. Decries the materialism that can surround the Christmas holiday.
|NA - TV
|-
|''The Room''
|2003
|R
|A tragedy showing the corrosive effects of [[liberal values]] like [[alcoholism]] and [[adultery]], while reflecting the conservative traits of [[charity]], innovation (in banking) and support for small business.
|Unknown
|-
|''[[The Great Global Warming Swindle]]''
|2007
|UR
|Exposing the greatest fraud in the history of science.
|NA - TV
|-
|''[[Fiddler on the Roof]]''
|1971
|G
|A celebration of tradition, faith, and the importance of family, against a historical background of the persecution of Russian Jews.
|$ 50,000,000
|-
|''[[Kids Aren't Cars]]''
|2011
|UR
|How the teachers' unions are destroying our public schools. <ref>[http://www.kidsarentcars.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/KACOneSheet.pdf KAC Summary]</ref>
|Unknown
|-
|''[[How Should We Then Live]]''
|1976
|UR
|Christian film that traces Western history from Ancient Rome until 1976. A study of philosophic, scientific, and religious movements reflecting changing patterns.
|NA - TV
|-
|''[[Gattaca]]''
|1997
|PG-13
|A condemnation of human genetic engineering, and a wonderful triumph of individualism in an extremely totalitarian regime. Unfortunately the movie ends with a materialistic message: "They say every atom in our bodies was once a part of a star. So, maybe I'm not leaving, maybe I'm going home" (A phrase said when the protagonist finally managed to go to space).
|$ 12,339,633
|-
|''The Lion King''
|1994
|G
|A main message of the movie is honoring thy father, and the power-hungry main antagonist, once he becomes ruler, favors big government, pushes [[liberal values]] and destroys their territory.
|$ 312,825,899
|-
|''Space Jam''
|1996
|PG
|Michael Jordan uses the help of beloved children's characters from the '50s (a simpler time in America's history) to beat back foreign invaders who wish to take away our freedoms.
|$ 90,443,603
|-
|''Contact''
|1997
|PG
|The overall message is about how science and faith do not have to be in opposition to one another.
|$ 100,853,835
|-
|''The Sandlot''
|1993
|PG
|Honestly depicts 1950s America when boys acted like boys and girls acted like girls, wimps were taught to toughen up, and every boy had a chance to be great. No historical revisionism.
|$ 32,416,586
|-
|''I Confess''
|1953
|UR
|In this classic by Alfred Hitchcock, a clergyman honors his sacred vow of confidentiality with respect to a confession despite intense pressure to disclose it.
|Unknown
|-
|''Mr. Skeffinton''
|1944
|UR
|Bette Davis portrays a socialite whose life is ruined when she turns ugly with age. Anti-Nazi and anti-materialistic.
|Unknown
|-
|''The Forgotten''
|2004
|PG-13
|A mystery film with a great [[Pro-life]] message.<ref>[http://www.decentfilms.com/reviews/forgotten.html ''The Forgotten''] at Decent Film Guide</ref>
|Unknown
|-
|}

== Debatable Whether Conservative ==

{| class="wikitable sortable"
|-
!Film
!Year
!Rating
!Comments
!Gross (Domestic)
|-
|''[[The Passion of the Christ]]''
|2004
|R
|Downplays the [[Resurrection]],<ref>The original version of the film had no references at all to the Resurrection.</ref> and strength of Christianity and omits powerful angels; instead exaggerates triumph of evil; film had little lasting effect on public or its producer; portrayed nails as through the hands rather than through the wrists as depicted by the [[Shroud of Turin]] and confirmed by modern science.
|$ 370,782,930
|-

|''[[It's a Wonderful Life]]''
|1946
|UR
|Falsely teaches that humanism is what makes life worthwhile; marginalizes [[faith]] with a cartoonish depiction and demonizes capitalism as sadistic and greedy.
|$ 3,300,000
|-
|''[[High Noon]]''
|1952
|UR
|Bill Clinton saw this movie 20 times, and John Wayne said it was the most un-American movie ever;<ref>http://www.brightlightsfilm.com/47/highnoon.php</ref> though susceptible of various interpretations, most of all it seems to scare people into wanting more government.
|$ 3,750,000
|-
|''[[P.C.U.]]''
|1994
|PG-13
|College students fight back against a campus where the administration promotes official [[diversity]] awareness weekends and radical [[feminism]], [[vegan]]ism, and [[political correctness]] run amok, but a conservative group on campus is also portrayed just as negatively as the P.C. groups.
|$ 4,350,774
|-
|''Pillow Talk''
|1959
|UR
|A classic starring Rock Hudson and Doris Day in which conservative values triumph over liberal ones. There are no distortions by feminist ideology. Indeed, in one scene a leading man slaps the leading lady, but then is beaten up by dimwitted bystanders for it!
|$ 18,750,000
|-
|''[[Blues Brothers]]''
|1980
|R
|Comedy musical. A story of redemption, "A mission from God", raising money to save a Catholic orphanage. R-rated movie for vulgar language, slap stick comedy. Vatican approved. <ref>[http://liveshots.blogs.foxnews.com/2010/06/18/vatican-blesses-blues-brothers/ Vatican Calls The Blues Brothers “Catholic”, FOXNews, June 19, 2010]</ref>
|$ 57,229,890
|-
|''The Way We Were''
|1973
|PG
|Unique in the way that it appears liberal to liberals while unintentionally sending a [[conservative]] message to young women.
|$ 49,919,870
|-
|''Grease''
|1978
|PG-13
|Some [[conservative]] messages and no [[feminism]] or other [[political correctness]]; mocks [[public school]] and even [[television]].
|$ 153,113,000
|-
|''Fargo''
|1996
|R
|Pregnant sheriff with traditional American family values solves an elaborate criminal embezzlement, kidnapping and murder scheme.
|$ 24,611,975
|-
|''[[Juno (film)|Juno]]''
|2007
|PG-13
|A pregnant teenage woman rejects [[abortion]] and decides for an adoptive birth instead. This movie pushes [[feminism]] and marginalizes the essential role of fatherhood.
|$ 143,492,840
|-
|''[[The Dark Knight]]''
|2008
|PG-13
|Christian allegory with message of not giving in to terrorists, but the movie also arguably has some liberal themes as pointed on [[Talk:Essay:Greatest Conservative Movies]].
|$ 533,316,061
|-
|''Camelot''
|1967
|G
|The famous jousting scene is a powerful display of Christian values and chivalry, but the movie seems lost afterward.
|$ 31,102,578
|-
|}

== References ==
<references/>

[[Category:Essays about Conservatism]]
[[Category:Hollywood]]

Michael Dukakis

2010-10-04T04:07:49Z

Keysersoze:

'''Michael S. Dukakis''' (born 1933) was a three-term [[Massachusetts]] [[governor]], who ran for [[President of the United States]] in 1988 as a [[Democrat]]. After obtaining the party's nomination, he lost to President [[George H.W. Bush]] Mostly due to his soft on crime policies. His running mate was Senator [[Lloyd Bentsen]] of Texas.

Dukakis is a US Army veteran, serving in South Korea from 1955 to 1957.

==Gubernatorial Career==
Dukakis was first elected Governor of Massachusetts in 1974. He was defeated in the 1978 Democratic primary by Edward J. King, but would return to defeat king in 1982 and be reelected Governor in 1986. He was Massachusetts' longest serving Governor.

==1988 Deomcratic primary==
Dukakis finished third in the Iowa caucuses, but went on to win the New Hampshire primary by a considerable margin. From this point forward he led the field in the all-important accrual of delegates.

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dukakis, Michael}}

[[Category:Democratic Governors]]
[[Category:Massachusetts Governors]]
[[Category:Reagan Era]]
[[Category: Liberals]]

Talk:Bay of Pigs invasion

2010-10-04T03:49:25Z

Keysersoze:

I've largely cleaned up and rewritten this article, but I think it should be renamed to Bay of Pigs Invasion. [[User:Arctic Nation|Arctic Nation]] 16:21, 17 May 2007 (EDT)

I have placed most of my contribution to the Wikipedia page here. At present I am banned from Wikipedia apparently because extreme left wing contributers were unable to refute factual data presented. Not yet satisfied with presentation here so will continue to edit, El Jigue 6-10-08

Kendra if you wish to deleted documented evidence could be so kind as to explain why. El [User:Jigue|Jigue]] 19:51, 11 June 2008 (EDT)

==Kennedy altering the plan for reduced cuban air support==
I've got a great reference where Barry Goldwater enumerates the changes to the plan Kennedy ordered(reducing the Cuban bomber force), and blames these changes for the plan's failure. It's from his 1970's Autobiography. Should I stick it in?[[User:Keysersoze|Keysersoze]] 23:49, 3 October 2010 (EDT)

Talk:Bay of Pigs invasion

2010-10-04T03:49:05Z

Keysersoze:

Talk:Bay of Pigs invasion

2010-10-04T03:45:11Z

Keysersoze: proposed addition

I've largely cleaned up and rewritten this article, but I think it should be renamed to Bay of Pigs Invasion. [[User:Arctic Nation|Arctic Nation]] 16:21, 17 May 2007 (EDT)

I have placed most of my contribution to the Wikipedia page here. At present I am banned from Wikipedia apparently because extreme left wing contributers were unable to refute factual data presented. Not yet satisfied with presentation here so will continue to edit, El Jigue 6-10-08

Kendra if you wish to deleted documented evidence could be so kind as to explain why. El [User:Jigue|Jigue]] 19:51, 11 June 2008 (EDT)

==Kennedy altering the plan for reduced cuban air support==
I didn't noticed any mention of this, did I miss it? If it's not covered I've got a great reference where Barry Goldwater enumerates the changes to the plan Kennedy ordered, and blames these changes for the plan's failure.

Talk:Cell division

2010-07-22T03:36:15Z

Keysersoze: Created page with 'I thought mitosis was only in plants'

I thought mitosis was only in plants

Talk:Magnetic resonance imaging

2010-07-22T03:23:25Z

Keysersoze: Created page with 'Should this have a brief explanation of how it works? (neutron spin allignment and excitation by radio waves to flip the spins from the metastable anti-parallel state to the stab…'

Should this have a brief explanation of how it works? (neutron spin allignment and excitation by radio waves to flip the spins from the metastable anti-parallel state to the stable parallel one and all that jazz?)[[User:Keysersoze|Keysersoze]] 23:23, 21 July 2010 (EDT)

Parsley

2010-07-22T03:02:31Z

Keysersoze: added ref to apiol

[[Image:Parsley.jpg|thumb|right|300px]]
'''Parsley''' (Petroselinum crispum), a [[biennial plants|biennial]] herb, has bright green [[leaf|leaves]] often used used as an herb and a garnish. It is the primary ingredient in "tabouleh".

Parsley root is used as a vegetable. These roots are often used Central and Eastern European soups or stews.

To grow parsley one needs a deep pot in order to accommodate the long taproot. If grown indoors at least five hours of sunlight a day is required.

Parsley owes it's distinctive flavor to apiol, a dimethoxy-methylenedioxy-allylbenzene. Apiol has been used in the illicit production of designer drugs.

Old wives tales and herbalists tout parsley as an aid to [[abortion]],<ref>http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12807304</ref> but this link is tenuous.

==References==
<references/>

[[Category:Herbs]]

Constantine

2010-07-22T02:22:52Z

Keysersoze: added 'In Rome', christianity was already legal elsewhere

{{Rome}}'''Constantine''' (274 - May 22, 337 AD) was a [[Rome|Roman]] [[Emperor]] famous for being the first Christian Emperor of Rome, and legalizing [[Christianity]].

He is often held up by the [[Church]] as the ideal religious [[King]], ruling at the will of the just [[God]] who ended the persecution of Christians.

==Struggle for Political Power==

Constantine's early life did not show what he was to become as Constantine is well-known to have considered many different religions. He had shown no particulare revulsion to the last great persecution of Christians under the Emperor [[Diocletian]]. He became Caesar of the West upon the death of his father in 306 AD<ref>Who’s Who in Christianity, Lavinia Coh-Sherbok, 1998</ref> and ruled the region of Gaul while Severus became the Augustus of the West, a higher designation than Caesar. Maximian usurped the power of Augustus and his son Maxentius, who had also assumed the title of Caesar, had Severus executed. Maximian had a falling out with his son and feared Galerius, who was Augustus of the East; Maximian sought Constantine's protection. Continued bickering eventually saw Constantine given the title of Augustus in 310. Maximian tried to revolt and was killed by Constantine. Galerius died of disease in 311 and his nephew Maximinus Daia, who had also been made an Augustus, took his lands. Continued difficulties with Maxentius led to open warfare between him and Constantine. Constantine invaded Italy to face Maxentius and then had the event that proved to be the turning point of his life.

==Victory and embracing of Christianity==

While preparing for battle against Maxentius, Constantine is said to have seen in the sky the [[Chi Ro]], an early Christian symbol, which the Latin words "IN HOC SIGNO VINCES," or, "under this sign shall you conquer." He ordered his troops to paint the Chi Ro on their shields and won a crushing victory at the Battle of the Milvian Bridge the next day (Oct 28th, 312) as recorded by the historian and bishop of Caesarea [[Eusebius]]. Maxentius drowned while trying to escape. Constantine met with Licinius in Milan in early 313 and together they signed the Edict of Milan which gave equal rights for all religions<ref>An Encyclopedia of World History, Kingsport Press, 1948</ref> and made Christianity legal in Rome for the first time and after almost 300 years of persecution. Property that had been confiscated from Christians was restored. An effort by Maximinus Daia to attack Licinius later that year met in failure and he fled and died soon after. Constantine was now the sole leader of the West while Licinius was the sole leader of the East. After a brief war in 314 AD, the two made peace agreeing on the boundaries between them. In 316, at the invitation of the newly legalized Christian church, Constantine tried to settle the Donatist schism. Tensions between Constantine and Licinius grew when Licinius again started persecuting Christians in 320 and led to all out civil war in 324, which ended with Licinius' surrender and imprisonment. Later that year, Constantine accused Licinius of conspiracy and had him killed. Constantine had become sole Emperor and would remain so until his death in 337 AD

==Constantine as sole Emperor==

In 324 Constantine began building a new city on the site of the village of Byzantium, on the Bosporous. The city was completed six years and given the name of Nova Roma (New Rome), and made his new capital. After Constantine's death, the city would be renamed [[Constantinople]] after him.

With his authority over the entire Empire safely secured, one of Constantine's first actions was to call together a meeting of Christian leaders. After years of never being able to all meet together openly, Constantine encouraged Christian leaders from all over the Empire to come together and draw up common understandings of their beliefs. This became the [[Council of Nicaea]] in 325 AD

Upon Constantine's death in 337 AD, his Empire was divided between his three sons. They would not work together peacefully and open warfare would soon ensue as they would each seek to consolidate power for themselves.

==Archaeology==

It is worth noting that much of Constantine's earlier religiosity remains in the archaeological record. For example, Roman coins from the time period of Constantine I can be found, emblazoned with the legend,

"IMP CONSTANT AUG, SOL INV.," expanded as, "Imperator Constantine Augustus, to Sol Invictus," and translated as, "Commander Constantine, Augustus, dedicated to the God of the Unconquered Sun."

==References==
<References/>

[[category:Roman emperors]]
[[Category:Early Christians]]

Nero

2010-07-22T02:17:07Z

Keysersoze: more of same

[[Image:Nero.jpg|right|100px]]

'''Nero''' (37 - June 8, 68) was the Emperor of [[Rome]] from AD 54-68.

Nero is most remembered as the emperor who 'fiddled while [[Great Fire of Rome|Rome burned]]', but this is considered to be more urban legend than fact. The legend is largely due to Nero's commissioning of a palace for himself in the area that burned leading to many rumors of Nero starting the fire. Contemporary sources however credit Nero with trying to put out the fire. Afterward, when he needed a scapegoat for the fire, he blamed the Christians, who were unpopular because of their failure to believe in the Roman gods and their suspected disloyalty. After the fire he introduced laws to ensure wide streets, to prevent the spread of fires in the future.

Nero liked to consider himself a great artist and actor, and behaved in a manner totally inappropriate for his office. He also went on a tour of [[Greece]], took part in the [[Olympics|Olympic Games]], and was awarded first place in all competitions he entered (even though, for example, he failed to complete one of the races).

It is believed the [[Saint Peter|apostle Peter]] was [[martyr|martyred]] under Nero as well as the [[Saint Paul|apostle Paul]].

He murdered [[Claudius|Claudius]]' daughter Antonia and had his own mother killed in 59. He stole [[Otho|Otho's]] wife Poppaea and later beat her to death. Finally, he was declared a public enemy by the Senate and with mobs coming to get him, he committed [[suicide]] on June 8, 68, with the help of an eager slave. His last words were said to be, "What an artist dies in me!"<ref>''Ancient Rome'', Nigel Rodgers, Hermes House, page 73.</ref>

==References==
<references/>
[[Category:Roman emperors]]

Nero

2010-07-22T02:16:24Z

Keysersoze: grammer

[[Image:Nero.jpg|right|100px]]

'''Nero''' (37 - June 8, 68) was the Emperor of [[Rome]] from AD 54-68.

Nero is most remembered as the emperor who 'fiddled while [[Great Fire of Rome|Rome burned]]', but this is considered to be more urban legend than fact. The legend is largely due to Nero's commissioning of a palace for himself in the area that burned leading to many rumors of Nero starting the fire. Contemporary sources however credit Nero with trying to put out the fire. Afterward, when he needed a scapegoat for the fire, he blamed the Christians, who were unpopular because of their failure to believe in the Roman gods and their suspected disloyalty. After the fire he introduced laws to ensure wide streets, to prevent the spread of fires in the future.

Nero liked to consider himself a great artist and actor, and behaved in a manner totally inappropriate for his office. He also went on a tour of [[Greece]], took part in the [[Olympics|Olympic Games]], and was awarded first place in all competitions he entered (even though, for example, he failed to complete one the races).

It is believed the [[Saint Peter|apostle Peter]] was [[martyr|martyred]] under Nero as well as the [[Saint Paul|apostle Paul]].

He murdered [[Claudius|Claudius]]' daughter Antonia and had his own mother killed in 59. He stole [[Otho|Otho's]] wife Poppaea and later beat her to death. Finally, he was declared a public enemy by the Senate and with mobs coming to get him, he committed [[suicide]] on June 8, 68, with the help of an eager slave. His last words were said to be, "What an artist dies in me!"<ref>''Ancient Rome'', Nigel Rodgers, Hermes House, page 73.</ref>

==References==
<references/>
[[Category:Roman emperors]]

Nero

2010-07-22T02:15:28Z

Keysersoze: added claudius' daughter's name

[[Image:Nero.jpg|right|100px]]

'''Nero''' (37 - June 8, 68) was the Emperor of [[Rome]] from AD 54-68.

Nero is most remembered as the emperor who 'fiddled while [[Great Fire of Rome|Rome burned]]', but this is considered to be more urban legend than fact. The legend is largely due to Nero's commissioning of a palace for himself in the area that burned leading to many rumors of Nero starting the fire. Contemporary sources however credit Nero with trying to put out the fire. Afterward, when he needed a scapegoat for the fire, he blamed the Christians, who were unpopular because of their failure to believe in the Roman gods and their suspected disloyalty. After the fire he introduced laws to ensure wide streets, to prevent the spread of fires in the future.

Nero liked to consider himself a great artist and actor, and behaved in a manner totally inappropriate for his office. He also went on a tour of [[Greece]], took part in the [[Olympics|Olympic Games]], and was awarded first place in all competitions he entered (even though, for example, he failed to complete one the races).

It is believed the [[Saint Peter|apostle Peter]] was [[martyr|martyred]] under Nero as well as the [[Saint Paul|apostle Paul]].

He murdered [[Claudius|Claudius]]' daughter Antonia and had his mother killed in 59. He stole [[Otho|Otho's]] wife Poppaea and later beat her to death. Finally, he was declared a public enemy by the Senate and with mobs coming to get him, he committed [[suicide]] on June 8, 68, with the help of an eager slave. His last words were said to be, "What an artist dies in me!"<ref>''Ancient Rome'', Nigel Rodgers, Hermes House, page 73.</ref>

==References==
<references/>
[[Category:Roman emperors]]

World War II in the Air

2010-07-22T01:42:54Z

Keysersoze: fixed turbo-supercharger description

World War II (1939-45) was fought on land, sea and air across the globe. This article concerns the war waged by the major air forces.
[[File:B-29.jpg|thumb|300px|A B-29 en route to Japan]]

==Air Power and Germany: The Luftwaffe==
[[Image:Ww2-stuka.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Ju-87, the Junkers 87 (Stuka) Dive Bomber; Germany built 5800 of them]]

The '''[[Luftwaffe]]''' was the name of the German Air Force during the Nazi era (1933-45). The pride of [[Nazi Germany]] under its bombastic leader Hermann Goering, it learned new combat techniques in the Spanish Civil War and was seen by Hitler as the decisive strategic weapon he needed. Its advanced technology and rapid growth led to exaggerated fears in the 1930s that cowed the British and French into appeasement. In the war the Luftwaffe performed well in 1939-41, as its Stuka dive bombers terrified enemy infantry units. But the Luftwaffe was poorly coordinated with overall German strategy, and never ramped up to the size and scope needed in a total war. It never built large bombers, was deficient in [[radar]], and could not deal with the faster, more agile [[P-51 Mustang]] pursuit planes after 1943. The Luftwaffe was narrowly defeated in the great [[Battle of Britain]] (1940), and reached maximum size pf 1.9 million airmen in 1942. Grueling operations wasted it away on the eastern front after 1942. It lost most of its fighter planes to Mustangs in 1944 while trying to defend against massive American and British air raids.

When its gasoline supply ran dry in 1944, it was reduced to anti-aircraft flak roles, and many of its men were sent to infantry units. By 1944 it operated 39,000 flak batteries staffed with a million people in uniform, both men and women.

The Luftwaffe lacked the bomber forces for strategic bombing, because it did not think such bombing was worth it. They did attempt some strategic bombing in the east. Their one success was destroying an airbase at Poltava, Russia, which housed 43 new B-17 bombers and a million tons of aviation fuel.<ref> Richard J. Evans, ''The Third Reich at War'' (2009) 436-7</ref>

==Air Power and Britain==
===Strategic bombing===
The British had their own very well-developed theory of strategic bombing, and built the long-range bombers to implement it. Before 1944, however, the main German industrial targets were out of range, so the RAF bombers concentrated on military and transportation targets in France and Belgium.
===The Invasion of Britain===
The [[Battle of Britain]] was not the totality of German air operations against Britain, but it was of utter strategic significance after the fall of France. Germany believed that it could defeat Britain only by physical invasion, codenamed [[Operation Sea Lion]]. The British Army rescued its soldiers at Dunkink but lost most of its equipment and weapons, and was no match for the fully equipped German army.

German capabilities to launch an invasion were primitive--many small boats and transport ships with a very thin layer of naval warships. The German Army and Navy realized an invasion could succeed only if the Luftwaffe could guarantee the Royal Navy would not be able to attack the landing force. To do so, the Royal Air Force had to be defeated. The Battle of Britain decided whether an invasion was possible.
===Radar===
Radar was the secret weapon that made possible effective RAF counterattacks on invading Luftwaffe fleets. The Germans were several years behind in development, and in any case radar was a defensive weapon and would not be much help top German bombers.

===Battle of Britain===
[[Image:WW2-hurricane.jpg|thumb|250px|British Hawker Hurricane fighter]]
The [[Battle of Britain]], August to September. 1940, was fought for air supremacy over Britain. After the fall of France in June, 1940, Germany believed that it could defeat Britain only by physical invasion, codenamed [[Operation Sea Lion]]. Hitler at least wanted to threaten an invasion, perhaps to force a peace. German [[amphibious warfare]] tactics and capabilities were primitive, and the German Army and Navy believed an invasion could succeed only if the German Air Force could guarantee the Royal Navy would not be able to attack the landing force. To do so, the Royal Air Force had to be defeated. <ref>An invasion was unlikely to succeed; over a third of the days were bad flying weather that grounded most flights. On those days the Royal Navy battleships could plow through the storms and sink the entire invasion fleet.</ref> The Luftwaffe used 1300 medium bombers guarded by 900 fighters; they made 1500 sorties a day from bases in France, Belgium and Norway. The RAF had 650 fighters, with more coming out of the factories every day. Thanks to its new radar system, the British knew where the Germans were, and could concentrate their counterattacks. The Germans used their strategic bombing doctrine to focus on RAF airfields and radar stations. After the RAF bomber forces (quite separate from the fighter forces) attacked Berlin and other cities, Hitler swore revenge and diverted the Luftwaffe to attacks on London. The success the Luftwaffe was having in rapidly wearing down the RAF was squandered, as the civilians being hit were far less critical than the airfields and radar stations that were now ignored.<ref> Civilian deaths were 300 to 600 a day, plus 1000 to 3000 injured. London was not a factory city and aircraft production went up.</ref> The last German daylight raid was September 30; the Luftwaffe was taking unacceptable losses and broke off the attack; occasional blitz raids hit London and other cities from time to time before May 1941, killing some 43,000 civilians. The Luftwaffe lost 1733 planes, the British, 915. The British showed more determination, better radar, and better ground control, while the Germans violated their own doctrine with wasted attacks on London.
[[Image:WW2-Air-spitfire.jpg|right|250px|Supermarine Spitfire with its nose high and rolling opposite to the turn of the opposing Luftwaffe Messerschmitt 109E, during the Battle of Britain, 1940]]

The British surprised the Germans with their high quality airplanes; flying close to home bases where they could refuel, and using radar as part of an integrated air defense system, they had a significant advantage over German planes operating at long range. The Hawker Hurricane fighter plane played a vital role for the Royal Air Force (RAF) in winning the Battle of Britain in the summer of 1940. A fast, heavily armed monoplane that went into service in 1937, the Hurricane was effective against both German fighters and bombers and accounted for 70-75% of German losses during the battle. The Germans immediately pulled out their Stukas, which were so slow they were child's play for the Hurricanes and Spitfires. The Battle of Britain showed the world that Hitler's vaunted war machine could be defeated.
Churchill's tribute to the Royal Air Force is eloquent:
:Never, in the course of human events, have so many, owed so much, to so few.

But it was misleading. The Battle of Britain was won by hundreds of thousands of factory workers, mechanics, engineers, technicians, radar operators, generals and colonels, sergeants and privates, and not merely the heroic RAF pilots.
==Air Power and U.S.==
The stunning success of the Luftwaffe's Stuka dive bombers in the blitzkriegs that shattered Poland in 1939 and France in 1940, proved to civilians that air power would dominate the battlefield, leaving the infantry far behind. The US Army was reluctant to draw that conclusion, but it was dumbfounded by the performance of the Stukas acting as a highly mobile, highly effective strike force--a super artillery. To defend against the Luftwaffe the Army decided to vastly expand the anti-aircraft units provided by the otherwise obsolete Coast Artillery branch. Airmen retorted the only solution was to build better planes that would shoot the Stukas down and gain control of the air. Airmen felt strongly that only they understood the enormous potential of air power, and that their vision was being held back. They dreamed of complete independence, noting that Germany's Luftwaffe and Britain's Royal Air Force (RAF) had long been disentangled from the old-fashioned, narrow-minded mud soldiers. The American people, enthusiastic about aviation in exact proportion to their fear of high-casualty trench warfare, and their love affair with modern technology, had long been supportive of a well-funded, independent air force. President Roosevelt sided with public opinion and the aviators. In 1940 he vowed to build 50,000 airplanes a year, far more than the most starry-eyed aviator had ever imagined. He gave command of the Navy to an aviator, Admiral Ernest King, with a mandate for an aviation-oriented war in the Pacific.<ref> FDR allowed King to build up land-based naval and Marine aviation, and seize control of the long-range bombers used in antisubmarine patrols in the Atlantic. </ref> Roosevelt basically agreed with Robert Lovett, the civilian Assistant Secretary of War for Air, who argued, "While I don't go so far as to claim that air power alone will win the war, I do claim the war will not be won without it."<ref> Walter Isaacson and Evan Thomas, [http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0684837714/ref=sib_dp_srch_bod?v=search-inside&keywords=claim+that+air+power&go.x=0&go.y=0&go=Go%21# ''The Wise Men: Six Friends and the World They Made'' (1997) p. 203 online] </ref>

Roosevelt rejected proposals for complete independence for the Air Corps, because the old-line generals and the entire Navy were vehemently opposed. In the compromise that was reached everyone understood that after the war the aviators would get their independence. Meanwhile, their status was upgraded from "Army Air Corps" to "Army Air Forces" (AAF) in June, 1941, and they seized almost complete freedom in terms of internal administration. Thus the AAF set up its own medical service independent of the Surgeon General, its own WAC units, and its own logistics system. It had full control over the design and procurement of airplanes and related electronic gear and ordnance. Its purchasing agents controlled 15% of the nation's Gross National Product. Together with naval aviation, it creamed the best young men in the nation. General [[Hap Arnold]] headed the AAF. One of the first military men to fly, and the youngest colonel in World War I, he selected for the most important combat commands men who were ten years younger than their Army counterparts, including [[Ira Eaker]] (b. 1896), [[Jimmy Doolittle]] (b. 1896), [[Hoyt Vandenberg]] (b. 1899), [[Elwood Queseda]] (b. 1904), and, youngest of them all, [[Curtis LeMay]] (b. 1906). Although a West Pointer himself, Arnold did not automatically turn to Academy men for top positions. Since he operated without theater commanders, Arnold could and did move his generals around, and speedily removed underachievers. Aware of the need for engineering expertise, he went outside the military and formed close liaisons with top engineers like rocket specialist Theodore von Karmen at Cal Tech. Arnold was given seats on the US Joint Chiefs of Staff and the US-British Combined Chiefs of Staff. Arnold, however, was officially Deputy Chief of [Army] Staff, so on committees he deferred to his boss, General Marshall. Thus Marshall made all the basic strategic decisions, which were worked out by his "War Plans Division" (WPD, later renamed the Operations Division). WPD's section leaders were infantrymen or engineers, with a handful of aviators in token positions. The AAF had its own planning division, whose advice was largely ignored by WPD. Airmen were also underrepresented in the planning divisions of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and of the Combined Chiefs. Aviators were largely shut out of the decision-making and planning process because they lacked seniority in a highly rank-conscious system. The freeze intensified demands for independence, and fueled a spirit of "proving" the superiority of air power doctrine. Because of the young, pragmatic leadership at top, and the universal glamor accorded aviators, morale in the AAF was strikingly higher than anywhere else (except perhaps Navy aviation.)

The AAF provided extensive technical training, promoted officers and enlisted faster, provided comfortable barracks and good food, and was safe. The only dangerous jobs were voluntary ones as crew of fighters and bombers--or involuntary ones at jungle bases in the Southwest Pacific. Marshall, an infantryman uninterested in aviation before 1939, became a partial convert to air power and allowed the aviators more autonomy. He authorized vast spending on planes, and insisted that American forces had to have air supremacy before taking the offensive. However, he repeatedly overruled Arnold by agreeing with Roosevelt's requests in 1941-42 to send half of the new light bombers and fighters to the British and Soviets, thereby delaying the buildup of American air power. The Army's major theater commands were given to infantrymen [[Douglas MacArthur]] and [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]]. Neither had paid much attention to aviation before the war (though Ike learned to fly). By 1942 both had become air power enthusiasts, and built their strategies around the need for tactical air supremacy. MacArthur had been badly defeated in the Philippines in 1941-42 primarily because the Japanese controlled the sky. His planes were outnumbered and outclassed, his airfields shot up, his radar destroyed, his supply lines cut. His infantry never had a chance. MacArthur vowed never again. His island hopping campaign was based on the strategy of isolating Japanese strongholds while leaping past them. Each leap was determined by the range of his air force, and the first task on securing an objective was to build an airfield to prepare for the next leap.<ref> .. Quesada 41 (1948): our doctrine = "attainment of...air supremacy as a prerequisite for a major surface campaign" </ref>

===North Africa 1942-43===
see also [[Operation Torch]]

Eisenhower's first command was the [[Operation Torch|invasion of North Africa]] in November, 1942, at a time when the Luftwaffe was still strong. One of Ike's corps commanders, General Lloyd Fredendall, used his planes as a "combat air patrol" that circled endlessly over his front lines ready to defend against Luftwaffe attackers. Like most infantrymen, Fredendall assumed that all assets should be used to assist the ground forces. (More concerned with defense than attack, Fredendall was soon replaced by Patton.) Likewise the Luftwaffe made the mistake of dividing up its air assets, and failed to gain control of the air or to cut Allied supplies. The RAF in North Africa, under General [[Arthur Tedder]], concentrated its air power and defeated the Luftwaffe. The RAF had an excellent training program (using bases in Canada), maintained very high aircrew morale, and inculcated a fighting spirit. Senior officers monitored battles by radar, and directed planes by radio to where they were most needed. The RAF's success convinced Eisenhower that its system maximized the effectiveness of tactical air power; Ike became a true believer. The point was that air power had to be consolidated at the highest level, and had to operate almost autonomously. Brigade, division and corps commanders lost control of air assets (except for a few unarmed little "grasshoppers," used to spot artillery; the AAF wanted no part of that subservient role.) With one airman in overall charge, air assets could be concentrated for maximum offensive capability, not frittered away in ineffective "penny packets." Eisenhower--a tanker in 1918 who had theorized on the best way to concentrate armor--recognized the analogy. Split up among infantry in supporting roles tanks were wasted; concentrated in a powerful force they could dictate the terms of battle.

The fundamental assumption of air power doctrine was that the air war was just as important as the ground war. Indeed, the main function of the sea and ground forces, insisted the air enthusiasts, was to seize forward air bases. ''Field Manual 100-20,'' issued in July 1943, became the airman's bible for the rest of the war, and taught the doctrine of equality of air and land warfare. The idea of combined arms operations (air, land, sea) strongly appealed to Eisenhower and MacArthur. Eisenhower invaded only after he was certain of air supremacy, and he made the establishment of forward air bases his first priority. MacArthur's leaps reflected the same doctrine. In each theater the senior ground command post had an attached air command post. Requests from the front lines went all the way to the top, where the air commander decided whether to act, when and how. This slowed down response time--it might take 48 hours to arrange a strike--and involved rejecting numerous requests from the infantry for a little help here, or a little intervention there.

===Tactical Doctrine===
Tactical air doctrine stated that the primary mission was to turn tactical superiority into complete air supremacy--to totally defeat the enemy air force and obtain control of its air space. This could be done directly through dogfights, and raids on airfields and radar stations, or indirectly by destroying aircraft factories and fuel supplies. [[Anti-aircraft artillery]] (called "ack-ack by the British, "flak" by the Germans, and "Archie" by the Yanks) could also play a role, but it was downgraded by most airmen. The Allies won air supremacy in the Pacific in 1943, and in Europe in 1944. That meant that Allied supplies and reinforcements would get through to the battlefront, but not the enemy's. It meant the Allies could concentrate their strike forces wherever they pleased, and overwhelm the enemy with a preponderance of firepower. This was the basic Allied strategy, and it worked. Air superiority depended on having the fastest, most maneuverable fighters, in sufficient quantity, based on well-supplied airfields, within range. The RAF demonstrated the importance of speed and maneuverability in the Battle of Britain (August, 1940), when its fast Spitfire fighters easily riddled the clumsy Stukas as they were pulling out of dives. The race to build the fastest fighter became one of the central themes of World War Two. The Japanese lost, because they never advanced beyond the Zero--a great plane in 1941, a loser in 1944.

Amazingly, the Germans "won" the technical race. In the critical year of the air war, 1944, they were flying the fastest, most maneuverable most heavily armed plane of the era, the Messerschmitt 262, the first jet. (The first British jet appeared a month later; the first US jet was ready in late 1945.) However, Hitler sent the ME-262 back to the drawing boards for reconfiguration as a bomber, and it never played a major role in the war. Hitler saw airplanes only as offensive weapons, and his interference prevented the Luftwaffe from acquiring and using enough fighter planes to stop the Allied bombers. By the fall of 1944, the Luftwaffe had virtually disappered. Hitler instead emphasized ant-aircraft defenses, such as the flak batteries that surrounded all major German cities and war plants, and which consumed a large fraction of all German munitions production in the last year of the war.<ref> Overy, ''Air War'' 121</ref>

Once total [[air supremacy]] in a theater was gained the second mission was interdiction of the flow of enemy supplies and reinforcements in a zone five to fifty miles behind the front. Whatever moved had to be exposed to air strikes, or else confined to moonless nights. (Radar was not good enough for nighttime tactical operations against ground targets.) A large fraction of tactical air power focused on this mission.

The third and lowest priority mission was "close air support" or direct assistance to ground units on the battlefront by blowing up bunkers, slicing through armor, and mowing down exposed infantry. Airmen disliked the mission because it subordinated the air war to the ground war; furthermore, slit trenches, camouflage, and flak guns usually reduced the effectiveness of close air support. "Operation Cobra" in July, 1944, targeted a critical strip of 3,000 acres of German strength that held up the breakthrough out of Normandy. General [[Omar Bradley]], his ground forces stymied, placed his bets on air power. 1,500 heavies, 380 medium bombers and 550 fighter bombers dropped 4,000 tons of high explosives and napalm. Bradley was horrified when 77 planes bombed short: The ground belched, shook and spewed dirt to the sky. Scores of our troops were hit, their bodies flung from slit trenches. Doughboys were dazed and frightened....A bomb landed squarely on McNair in a slit trench and threw his body sixty feet and mangled it beyond recognition except for the three stars on his collar.<ref> Bradley 280; Craven and Cate 3:234</ref> The Germans were stunned senseless, with tanks overturned, telephone wires severed, commanders missing, and a third of their combat troops killed or wounded. The defense line broke; [[Joe Collins]] rushed his VII Corps forward; the Germans retreated in a rout; the Battle of France was won; air power seemed invincible. However, the sight of a senior colleague killed by error was unnerving, and after Cobra Army generals were so reluctant to risk "friendly fire" casualties that they often passed over excellent attack opportunities. Infantrymen, on the other hand, were ecstatic about the effectiveness of close air support:
[[File:P-47b.jpg|thumb|300px|P-47C]]

:Air strikes on the way; we watch from a top window as P-47s dip in and out of clouds through suddenly erupting strings of Christmas-tree lights [flak], before one speck turns over and drops toward earth in the damnest sight of the Second World War, the dive-bomber attack, the speck snarling, screaming, dropping faster than a stone until it's clearly doomed to smash into the earth, then, past the limits of belief, an impossible flattening beyond houses and trees, an upward arch that makes the eyes hurt, and, as the speck hurtles away, WHOOM, the earth erupts five hundred feet up in swirling black smoke. More specks snarl, dive, scream, two squadrons, eight of them, leaving congealing, combining, whirling pillars of black smoke, lifting trees, houses, vehicles, and, we devoutly hope, bits of Germans. We yell and pound each other's backs. Gods from the clouds; this is how you do it! You don't attack painfully across frozen plains, you simply drop in on the enemy and blow them out of existence.<ref> Brendan Phibbs, ''The Other Side of Time: A Combat Surgeon in World War II'' (1987) p 149</ref>

Two-way mobile radio equipment was not good enough for close air support until the last year of the war, when armored divisions assigned airmen to radio-equipped tanks to guide the attacks. In the first days of the [[Battle of the Bulge]], in December 1944, bad weather grounded all planes. When the skies cleared, 52,000 AAF and 12,000 RAF sorties against German positions and supply lines immediately doomed Hitler's last offensive. Patton said the cooperation of XIX TAC Air Force was "the best example of the combined use of air and ground troops that I ever witnessed."<ref> See [http://books.google.com/books?id=jTXWGhwBacAC&pg=PA272&lpg=PA272&dq=%22best+example+of+the+combined+use+of+air+and+ground%22&source=web&ots=S1zv3CvdEN&sig=c_zXiV7qXb5gWAX95SAYh5fpbAo&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=4&ct=result Craven & Cate 3:272 online]</ref> On the whole, however, ground forces grumbled endlessly that the AAF was not providing the "help" needed. Complaints escalated when it was noted that Marine Aviation had begun to provide close air support to Marines on the ground. The Army would never be satisfied, although in Vietnam they finally had ample close air support through their own helicopter gunships.

====P-47 Thunderbolt ====
see [[P-47]]

To implement tactical air the United States needed better planes and pilots. The aircraft industry had lagged behind Germany, Britain and even Japan during the 1930s, so the nation entered the war with inferior equipment. At Guadalcanal, the Bell P-400 Aircobras were helpless against superior Japanese planes (consequently they were relegated to close air support, to the delight of the mud soldiers.) When Stalin asked for 500 additional Lend-Lease planes in 1942, he specified he did not want any more of the Curtiss P-40 Tomahawks, because it "was not up to the mark in the fight against modern German fighter planes." In a frantic technological race against the Nazis, American designers created a series of fighters and bombers that had the speed, climb-rate, maneuverability, and range to do the job.

The workhorse of tactical air power was the [[P-47]] Thunderbolt. It originated in 1940, when Arnold asked for a plane to give air superiority over the Germans. Alexander Kartveli, chief designer at Republic Aviation, met the challenge using an unusually large fuselage and the new 18 cylinder, 2,000 horsepower air-cooled radial "Double Wasp" engine from Pratt and Whitney. Its high-altitude performance was dramatically enhanced by a General Electric turbo-supercharger.<ref>The turbo-supercharger utilizes an exhaust-driven turbine to drive a centrifugal supercharger. GE, at work on the device since 1918, finally solved the extremely difficult problems of very high 11 speed rotation at high temperatures... smuggled: Constant 222 C&C 5:248 </ref>

The 1945 version P-47M, burning 115/145 grade gasoline, had a maximum speed of 460 mph, a ceiling of 40,000 feet, and (with auxiliary drop tanks) a combat range of 2,000 miles. Escorting B-17s and B-29s, its 8 50-caliber machine guns could rip apart Luftwaffe or Japanese fighters (which had only 90 octane gasoline). As a tactical weapon it was armed with five 500 pound bombs plus ten 5" rockets. At ten tons, the big Thunderbolt needed a long runway, and was less agile than the Luftwaffe's Focke-Wolf 190. But it was better than good enough, downing 3 German planes for every loss.

===Tactical Missions in Europe===
As the Luftwaffe disintegrated in 1944, escorting became less necessary and fighters were increasingly assigned to tactical ground-attack missions, along with the medium bombers. To avoid the lethal fast-firing [[20mm antiaircraft gun|20mm Oerlikon flak guns]], pilots come in fast and low (under enemy radar), made a quick run, then disappeared before the gunners could respond. The main missions were to keep the Luftwaffe suppressed by shooting up airstrips, and to interdict the movement of munitions, oil and troops by blasting away at railway bridges and tunnels, oil tank farms, canal barges, trucks and moving trains. Occasionally a choice target was discovered through intelligence. [[ULTRA]] [[communications intelligence]] three days after D-Day pinpointed the location of Panzer Group West headquarters. A quick raid destroyed its radio gear and killed many key officers, ruining the Germans' ability to coordinate a panzer counterattack against the beachheads. In Europe after D-Day the Air Force averaged 1,300 light bomber crews and 4,500 fighter pilots. They claimed destruction of 86,000 railroad cars, 9,000 locomotives, 68,000 trucks, and 6,000 tanks and armored artillery pieces. Thunderbolts alone dropped 120,000 tons of bombs and thousands of tanks of napalm, fired 135 million bullets and 60,000 rockets, and claimed 3,916 enemy planes killed. Beyond the destruction itself, the appearance of unopposed Allied fighter-bombers ruined morale, as privates and generals alike dived for the ditches. Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, for example, was seriously wounded in July, 1944, when he dared to ride around France in the daytime. The commander of the elite 2nd Panzer Division fulminated:<ref> Craven & Cate 3:227, 235</ref>
:They have complete mastery of the air. They bomb and strafe every movement, even single vehicles and individuals. They reconnoiter our area constantly and direct their artillery fire....The feeling of helplessness against enemy aircraft has a paralyzing effect, and during the bombing barrage the effect on inexperienced troops is literally 'soul-shattering.'

===Tactical issues in the Pacific===
General [[George Kenney]], in charge of tactical air power under MacArthur, never had enough planes, pilots or supplies. (He was not allowed any authority whatever over the Navy's carriers.) But the Japanese were always in worse shape--their equipment deteriorated rapidly because of poor airfields and incompetent maintenance. The Japanese had excellent planes and pilots in 1942, but ground commanders dictated their missions and ignored the need for air superiority before any other mission could be attempted. Theoretically, Japanese doctrine stressed the need to gain air superiority, but the infantry commanders repeatedly wasted air assets defending minor positions. When Arnold, echoing the official Army line, stated the Pacific was a "defensive" theater, Kenney retorted that the Japanese pilot was always on the offensive. "He attacks all the time and persists in acting that way. To defend against him you not only have to attack him but to beat him to the punch." Key to Kenney's strategy was the neutralization of bypassed strongpoints like Rabaul and Truk through repeated bombings. One obstacle was "the kids coming here from the States were green as grass. They were not getting enough gunnery, acrobatics, formation flying, or night flying." So he set up extensive retraining programs. The arrival of superior fighters, especially the twin-tailed P-38 Lightning, gave the Americans an edge in range and performance. Occasionally a ripe target appeared, as in the [[Battle of the Bismark Sea]] (March, 1943) when bombers sank a major convoy bringing troops and supplies to New Guinea. That success was no fluke. High-flying bombers almost never could hit moving ships. Kenney solved that weakness by teaching pilots the effective new tactic of flying in close to the water then pulling up and lobbing bombs that skipped across the water and into the target.<ref> Kenney, ''Kenney Reports'' 112; Leary, ''We Shall Return'' p 99; Quesada 39</ref>

Supplies were always short in the Southwest Pacific--one enterprising supply sergeant on Guadalcanal ordered engine gaskets from Sears, and thanks to the highly efficient mail service received them quicker than through regular channels.
====Exhaustion====
Kenney finally rationalized the supply system, but had no good solution to the lack of reinforcements. Airmen flew far more often in the Southwest Pacific than in Europe, and although rest time in Australia was scheduled, there was no fixed number of missions that would produce transfer back to the states. Coupled with the monotonous, hot, sickly environment, the result was bad morale that jaded veterans quickly passed along to newcomers. After a few months, epidemics of combat fatigue would drastically reduce the efficiency of units. The men who had been at jungle airfields longest, the flight surgeons reported, were in bad shape:
:Many have chronic dysentery or other disease, and almost all show chronic fatigue states. . . .They appear listless, unkempt, careless, and apathetic with almost masklike facial expression. Speech is slow, thought content is poor, they complain of chronic headaches, insomnia, memory defect, feel forgotten, worry about themselves, are afraid of new assignments, have no sense of responsibility, and are hopeless about the future. <ref> A. Mae Mills Link and Hubert A. Coleman, ''Medical Support'' (1955) 851; </ref>

===Marine Aviation: Reluctant Ground Support===
The Marines had their own land-based aviation, built around the excellent Chance Vought F4U Corsair, an unusually big fighter-bomber. By 1944 10,000 Marine pilots operated 126 combat squadrons. Marine Aviation originally had the mission of [[Air warfare planning#close air support|close air support]] for ground troops, but it dropped that role in the 1920s and 1930s and became a junior component of naval aviation. The new mission was to protect the fleet from enemy air attacks. Marine pilots, like all aviators, fiercely believed in the prime importance of air superiority; they did not wish to be tied down to supporting ground troops. On the other hand, the ground Marines needed close air support because they lacked heavy firepower of their own. Mobility was a basic mission of Marine ground forces; they were too lightly armed to employ the sort of heavy artillery barrages and massed tank movements the Army used to clear the battlefield. The Japanese were so well dug in that Marines often needed air strikes on positions 300 to 1,500 yards ahead. In 1944, after considerable internal acrimony, Marine Aviation was forced to start helping out.

At [[Iwo Jima]] ex-pilots in the air liaison party (ALP), a predecessor of modern [[forward air control]], not only requested air support, but actually directed it in tactical detail. The Marine formula increased responsiveness, reduced "friendly" casualties, and (flying weather permitting) substituted well for the missing armor and artillery.

For the next half century close air support would remain central to the mission of Marine Aviation, provoking eternal jealousy from the Army which was never allowed to operate fixed-wing fighters or bombers. ..The Army was allowed to have some unarmed transports and spotter planes. Beginning in 1965 (in Vietnam) heavily armed Army helicopter gunships were used to provide close air support.

===Engineers Bulldoze New Airfields===
Arnold correctly anticipated that he would have to build forward airfields in inhospitable places. Working closely with the Army Corps of Engineers, he created Aviation Engineer Battalions that by 1945 included 118,000 men. Runways, hangers, radar stations, power generators, barracks, gasoline storage tanks and ordnance dumps had to be built hurriedly on tiny coral islands, mud flats, featureless deserts, dense jungles, or exposed locations still under enemy artillery fire. The heavy construction gear had to be imported, along with the engineers, blueprints, steel-mesh landing mats, prefabricated hangars, aviation fuel, bombs and ammunition, and all necessary supplies. As soon as one project was finished the battalion would load up its gear and move forward to the next challenge, while headquarters inked in a new airfield on the maps. The engineers opened an entirely new airfield in North Africa every other day for seven straight months. Once when heavy rains along the coast reduced the capacity of old airfields, two companies of Airborne Engineers loaded miniaturized gear into 56 transports, flew a thousand miles to a dry Sahara location, started blasting away, and were ready for the first B-17 24 hours later. Often engineers had to repair and use a captured enemy airfield. The German fields were well-built all-weather operations; by contrast the Japanese installations were ramshackle affairs with poor siting, poor drainage, scant protection, and narrow, bumpy runways. Engineering was a low priority for the offense-minded Japanese, who chronically lacked adequate equipment and imagination.<ref> Craven & Cate 7:250,253</ref>

==Strategic Bombing Doctrine==
The airmen, while delighted with the greatly enhanced importance of air power implied by the emphasis on tactical air supremacy, in fact had a quite different doctrine regarding how air power could best be applied. It was "[[strategic bombing]]." Do not be misled by tanks and artillery and infantry, they insisted- -that was ancient history. The war could be won hundreds or thousands of miles behind the front lines--an invasion would be unnecessary because the bombers alone could defeat Germany and Japan. Modern warfare depended upon industrial production in large, fixed, visible factories, oil refineries and electric power stations. As Lovett explained, "Our main job is to carry the war to the country of the people fighting us--to make their working conditions as intolerable as possible, to destroy their plants, their sources of electric power, their communications system."<ref> see [http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0684837714/ref=sib_dp_srch_bod?v=search-inside&keywords=claim+that+air+power&go.x=0&go.y=0&go=Go%21# Isaacson and Thomas, ''Wise Men'' p. 206]</ref> Strategic bombing was "guaranteed" to destroy those installations sooner or later. To win the war, therefore, it was necessary merely to build up a strategic air force from suitable bases. In Europe, the enemy was within attack range of B-17 bases in Britain and Italy. Matters were more complicated in the Pacific, where the Rising Sun flew above all the islands within range of Tokyo. Perhaps suitable bases could be built in China; a very-long-range bomber for those bases, the B-29, went into mass production. Closer and more secure bases could be built in the Mariana Islands (Saipan, Guam, Tinian), which therefore were invaded in June 1944.

In August, 1941, the AAF devised AWPD-1, its plan to win the war through air power alone (an appendix discussed tactical support for an invasion, should that prove necessary.)<ref> See [http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/readings/awpd-1-jfacc/awpdproc.htm text of AWPD-1]</ref> AWPD-1 read like an engineering document, and focused on the choke points of the German war economy. It listed 154 German targets in order of priority (electric power, railroad yards and bridges, synthetic oil plants, aircraft factories). By assuming half the bombs would land within 400 yards of their targets, it concluded that 3,800 bombers could finish the job in six months time. A total of 62,000 combat planes, and 37,000 trainers would have to be built. AWPD-42, completed a year later, provided more tactical air power, proposed a detailed strategic air war against Japan, and reaffirmed the same German targets (plus submarine yards). The summit conference at Casablanca in January, 1943, accepted the basic plan of AWPD-42: Germany and Japan would be the targets of massive strategic bombing that would either force their surrender or soften them up for an infantry invasion.<ref>See [http://www.maxwell.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/readings/awpd-1-jfacc/awpdcovr.htm "AWPD-1 The Process" (1996) </ref>

Marshall and King did not fully accept the doctrine of strategic bombing. They insisted that control of the air would always be supplementary, and they much preferred tactical air. Furthermore, they denied that strategic bombing of the enemy's industrial strength would be decisive in warfare. Marshall accepted AWPD-1 as a blueprint for airplane acquisition and force levels (it proved astonishingly accurate), but refused to believe that strategic bombing could be decisive, noting "an almost invariable rule that only armies can win wars." Secretary of War Stimson, who usually backed Marshall 100%, disagreed this time: "I fear Marshall and his deputies are very much wedded to the theory that it is merely an auxiliary force." The debate between the AAF and the Army and Navy resulted in a compromise: both strategic and tactical air power would be used. The production of planes (AAF, Navy, Marines) was split about equally between strategic and tactical air, with 44% going to strategic bombers (especially the [[B-17]] and [[B-29]]), 24% going to tactical ground-support and interdiction bombers (medium land-based Army and Marine, and and light carrier-based Navy planes), and 20% to fighters (which could either escort strategic bombers or be used as tactical air.) The remainder went for transports, trainers, and unarmed reconnaissance planes. Arnold kept to the compromise, and did provide Marshall with ample tactical air power, but with the proviso that his airmen would always decide on how, when and where it was to be used. In the boldest move for AAF autonomy, Arnold gained almost complete control over the strategic bombing campaigns against Japan and Germany. Nimitz and MacArthur, therefore, shared control of the Pacific war with Arnold in Washington, while Eisenhower shared control of the European war with Arnold. Secretary of War Stimson, however, trumped them all when he kept control of the atomic bomb in his own hands.

==Goals and Achievements of Strategic Bombing==
The American strategic bombing campaign against Germany was operated in parallel with RAF Bomber Command, which fervently believed in its own version of strategic bombing doctrine. The AAF bombed during the day, the RAF at night, when interception was difficult. Nightime navigation was so poor that the RAF quickly gave up precision bombing; their real target was the morale of the people who lived in the largest cities. According to Air Marshal Harris of RAF Bomber Command massive nightly raids would eventually burn out all the major German cities. The populace might survive in shelters, but they would be "dehoused", and lose confidence in the Fuehrer, which would lead to loss of German will to resist. Furthermore, the factories and railroad system would eventually be burned out as well. The British were willing to spend 30% of their GNP on Bomber Command, in order to weaken Germany, gain revenge, and avoid the high infantry casualties such as the Soviets were enduring.<ref> .. Werrell 707 </ref> Strategic bombing did "dehouse" 7.5 million Germans, but it hardly mattered, for the target cities had a surplus of housing (because most young men were away the army, most civilians had evacuated to the countryside, and all Jews sent to death camps and their apartments seized.) As the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey reported after the war, "Allied bombing widely and seriously depressed German morale, but depressed as discouraged workers were not necessarily unproductive workers." The German civilian air defense system enrolled 22 million volunteers, supervised by 75,000 full-time officials. Focusing on basement shelters in residential districts in the cities, the Germans built interconnected passageways, pained on fire retardants, and stored emergency supplies. The Gestapo, making tens of thousands of arrests, made certain that discontent was kept unfocused. Bombs did occasionally damage factories, but fast repairs were made. Rare indeed was the bomb dropped from 20,000 feet that destroyed a steel machine tool, especially when the bombadier had only the vaguest idea where it was or where he was.

==Luftwaffe's Bombing Failure==
The uses made of air power depend primarily on doctrine. This is clear from the failure of the Germans, Japanese and Soviets to build long-range strategic bombers. Germany had short- range bombers, but lacking a clear doctrine of how to use them it lost the "Battle of Britain" in late summer 1940. The Luftwaffe started by successfully attacking radar stations, command posts, airfields and fighter planes--a strategy that was on the verge of gaining complete and permanent air supremacy. Hitler, enraged when the RAF bombed Berlin, ordered the Luftwaffe to switch to bombing civilians (the "Blitz"). Thousands died but British morale never faltered. The RAF rebuilt its fighter strength and soon cleared British airspace of the Luftwaffe. The Luftwaffe could bomb and strafe, but was unprepared to defend itself against Spitfires and Hurricanes. Hitler's invasion of Britain required air superiority, so it had to be canceled. On the eastern front, Hitler expected the blitzkrieg to work so quickly that strategic bombing of Russian munitions factories would be unnecessary. By the time the Luftwaffe realized the necessity of hitting those factories, reverses on the ground put them out of range.

In the Mediterranean, the Luftwaffe tried to defeat the invasions of Sicily and Italy with tactical bombing. They failed because the Allied air forces systematically destroyed most of their air fields, and because by 1943 German pilots were so poorly trained that they could scarcely handle large planes. The Luftwaffe threw everything it had against the Salerno beachhead, but was outgunned ten to one, and then lost the vital airfields at Foggia.<ref>Foggia became the major base of the 15th Air Force. Its 2,000 heavy bombers hit Germany from the south while the 4,000 heavies of the 8th Air Force used bases in Britain, along with 1,300 RAF heavies. While bad weather in the north often canceled raids, sunny Italian skies allowed for more action. </ref> After that it had only one success in Italy, a devastating raid on the American supply depot at Bari, in December, 1943. (Only 30 out of 100 bombers got through, but one found an ammunition ship.) The Germans ferociously opposed the American landing at Anzio in February, 1944, but the Luftwaffe was outnumbered 5 to 1 and so totally outclassed in equipment and skill that it inflicted little damage. Italian air space belonged to the Allies, and the Luftwaffe's strategic capability was zilch.

===B-17 Flying Fortress as Strategic Weapon===

[[File:B-17.jpg|thumb|290px|B-17 Flying Fortress]]
The centerpiece of America's strategic bombing was the [[B-17 Flying Fortress]]. Although originally designed in 1934, it was ahead of its time and proved a highly effective heavy bomber. A policy of continuous improvements added power gun turrets, bullet-proof glass, self-sealing fuel tanks, high-altitude oxygen systems, enlarged wing and tail surfaces, better radios, and ground- scanning radar. The power plant was upgraded with turbo- superchargers and 1,200 horsepower Wright Cyclone engines operating on 100 octane fuel (and later, 110/145 grade). The service ceiling rose to 35,000 feet, the range to 3,300 miles with a 4,000 pound payload. The AAF considered B-17 the perfect embodiment of its strategic bombing doctrine because of its long- range, its ability to defend itself, and its highly accurate Norden bombsight. The Norden allowed daylight precision bombing of specific targets like factories. It worked well enough in leisurely practice runs in sunny California at 10,000 feet with no flak or enemy planes. Over German airspace, in bad weather at 20,000 feet with shells exploding all around and enemy fighters a constant threat, the B-17 had at most 30 seconds over the target. "The flak is murder," the pilots said. "If you fly straight and level through it for more than ten seconds, you're a dead duck." Furthermore, it was hard to find the target in the first place. Navigation errors often put streams of 500 bombers many miles the wrong direction. At high altitude, with the usual cloud cover, it was nearly impossible to identify urban landmarks visually. On clear nights camouflage and dummy cities confused the navigators.<ref>Cloud cover over Germany averaged 50-80%. In winter, a severe storm occurred every three days; early morning fog covered airfields in England every third morning. In 1944, the 8th Air Force was able to fly from Britain on only 200 days.</ref> H2X, an American adaptation of the British radar system H2S, provided a crude mapping of the ground through cloud cover. It helped locate targets, but beginners' luck in its early trials gave planners a much exaggerated estimate of the accuracy the Flying Fortress could achieve. In late 1943, one bomber in 25 hit within one mile of the aiming point, and only one in 5 even got within five miles. If the aiming point was a factory or railroad yard, fewer than 10% of the bombs that did land there would do any real damage. Bombs that missed and landed in residential areas were just like the RAF's; they would destroy apartments, but the residents were usually safe in underground shelters. <ref> Craven & Cate 3:20] LeMay told of flak, 314 </ref>

General Ira Eaker's Eighth Air Force first launched its heavy bombers against Hitler in August, 1942. The main priority until 1944 was the destruction of Luftwaffe planes in the air and on the ground. One year later, after 83 major missions aimed at France, Holland, and the German cities closest to the English Channel, Eaker sent 376 B-17s against the vital ball bearing factories at Schweinfurt and the Messerschmitt factory at Regensburg. Both small cities were located deep in Germany, far out of range of the P-47 and Spitfire fighters that normally escorted the bombers. German fighters and flak downed 60 bombers--a half dozen more raids like that and the 8th Air Force would cease to exist. After 30 more peripheral raids the Eighth tried Schweinfurt again in October, and again 60 Flying Fortresses (out of 320) were shot down. Accuracy was good despite the fierce resistance, and damage was heavy. The Germans took several months to rebuild (and to disperse critical plants so one raid would not prove fatal.) An effort to knock out the oil refineries at Ploesti, Rumania, which provided a third of Nazi oil, cost 54 out of 177 B-24 Liberators. However, the daring raid at very low level (100 to 300 feet) destroyed 40% of Ploesti's capacity. German repair crews made unexpectedly speedy repairs. The lessons were a profound blow to strategic bombing doctrines. Luftwaffe clearly had air superiority over the Nazi heartland, unescorted bombers would suffer unacceptably high losses, and even severe damage could be quickly repaired.<ref>Craven & Cate, 2:676, 2:682-7, 479; </ref>

In daylight, large formations of several hundred B-17s were easily spotted. For self-defense each Flying Fortress had 13 50- calibre machine guns, and flew in loose formations of 6 planes, each covering the others. In 1942-43 the Luftwaffe proved the Fortresses were vulnerable. Unexpectedly heavy German flak defenses disrupted formations, and damaged on average one-fourth of the bombers in each mission. Berlin was surrounded by an outer searchlight belt 60 miles in diameter, and a flak area 40 miles across. The searchlights helped the guns locate their targets and also blinded the navigators. Three massive 120-foot flak towers resembling medieval castles protected central Berlin with 8 128mm high velocity guns each. They fired a salvo every 90 seconds that created a killing window 260 yards across in the path of the bombers.

Hit by flak, some bombers crashed, while others fell out of formation; the stragglers were easy prey for fighters. The Luftwaffe moved fighters from the Eastern Front to the West. Improved German radar, new airfields, and centralized ground control allowed groups of fighters to be quickly vectored into the predicted flight path of the bombers. The fighters discovered the best way to attack was head-on ("Twelve O'Clock High!") because the very fast closing speed gave the B-17 gunners only a split second to aim, while the fighter pilot could aim his machine guns by pointing his entire aircraft at the bomber. The B-17 loss rate climbed from 3.5% per sortie in 1942 to 5% in early 1943. The B-17 was a robust plane able to withstand heavy punishment, but when 5% were lost in a single mission, the life expectancy per bomber was a mere 13 missions. The Luftwaffe was winning this war of attrition. New defensive techniques included forward-firing chin turrets, tighter formations of 18 planes, and deceptive diversionary attacks; they were not enough.

==Destroying the Luftwaffe, 1944==
In late 1943 the AAF suddenly realized the need to revise its basic doctrine: strategic bombing against a technologically sophisticated enemy like Germany was impossible without air supremacy. (The B-29 did not need escorts against Japan.) General Arnold replaced [[Ira Eaker]] with [[Carl Spaatz]] and [[Jimmy Doolittle]], who fully appreciated the new reality. They provided [[P-51 Mustang]] fighter escorts all the way into Germany and back, and cleverly used B- 17s as bait for Luftwaffe planes, which the escorts then shot down. Doolittle's slogan was "The First Duty of 8th AF Fighters is to Destroy German Fighters!"--a slogan that fits 21st century Offensive Counter-Air (OCA) doctrine. In one "Big Week" in February, 1944, American bombers protected by hundreds of fighters, flew 3,800 sorties dropping 10,000 tons of high explosives on the main German aircraft and ball-bearing factories. The US suffered 2,600 casualties, with a loss of 137 bombers and 21 fighters. Ball bearing production was unaffected, as Nazi munitions boss Albert Speer repaired the damage in a few weeks; he even managed to double aircraft production. Sensing the danger, Speer began dispersing production into numerous small, hidden factories.<ref>Craven & Cate, 3:43-6</ref>
[[File:P-51c.jpg|thumb|270px|The P-51 easily shot down slower German fighters]]
Paradoxically, the Luftwaffe would have to come out and attack or see its planes destroyed at the factory. Before getting at the bombers the Germans had to confront the more numerous, better armed and faster American fighters. The heavily armed BF-110 could kill a bomber, but it slowness made it easy prey for the speedy P-47 Thunderbolts and P-51 Mustangs armed with numerous fast-firing machine guns. The big, slow twin-engine Ju-88 was dangerous because it could stand further off and fire its rockets into the tight B-17 formations; but it too was hunted down. Germany's severe shortage of aviation fuel had sharply curtailed the training of new pilots, and most of the instructors had been sent into battle. Rookie pilots were rushed into combat after only 160 flying hours in training compared to 400 hours for the AAF, 360 for the RAF and 120 for the Japanese. They never had a chance against more numerous, better trained Americans flying superior planes.

The Germans began losing one thousand planes a month on the western front (and another 400 on the eastern front). Realizing that the best way to defeat the Luftwaffe was not to stick close to the bombers but to aggressively seek out the enemy, Doolittle told his Mustangs to "go hunting for Jerries. Flush them out in the air and beat them up on the ground on the way home." On one occasion German air controllers identified a large force of approaching B-17s, and sent all the Luftwaffe's 750 fighters to attack. Error. The bogeys were all Mustangs, which shot down 98 interceptors while losing 11. The actual B-17s were elsewhere, and completed their mission without a loss. In February, 1944, the Luftwaffe lost 33% of its frontline fighters and 18% of its pilots; the next month it lost 56% of its fighters and 22% of the pilots. April was just as bad, 43% and 20%, and May was worst of all, at 50% and 25%. German factories continued to produce many new planes, and inexperienced pilots did report for duty; but their life expectancy was down to a couple of combat sorties. Increasingly the Luftwaffe went into hiding; with losses down to 1% per mission, the American bombers now got through.<ref> Craven and Cate 3:664 </ref>

By April, 1944, Luftwaffe tactical air power had vanished, and Eisenhower decided he could go ahead with the invasion of Normandy. He guaranteed the invaders that "if you see fighting aircraft over you, they will be ours." Indeed, on D-Day Allied aircraft flew 14,000 sorties, while the Luftwaffe managed a mere 260, mostly in defense of its own battered airfields. In the two weeks after D-Day, the Luftwaffe lost 600 of the 800 planes it kept in France. From April through August, 1944, both the AAF's and the RAF's strategic bombers were placed under Eisenhower's direction, where they were used tactically to support the invasion. Airmen protested vigorously against this subordination of the air war to the land campaign, but Eisenhower forced the issue and used the bombers to simultaneously strangle Germany's supply system, burn out its oil refineries, and destroy its warplanes. Mission accomplished, Ike returned the bombers in September.<ref>Murray, ''Luftwaffe'' 183, 207, 211; Craven & Cate, 3:47 </ref>

==Failure of German Secret Weapons==
Hitler tried to sustain morale by promising that "secret weapons" would turn the war around. He did indeed have the weapons. The first of 9,300 V-1 flying bombs hit London in mid- June, 1944, and together with 1,300 V-2 rockets caused 8,000 civilian deaths and 23,000 injuries. Although they did not seriously undercut British morale or munitions production, they bothered the British government a great deal--Germany now had its own unanswered weapons system. Using proximity fuzes, British ack-ack gunners (many of them women) learned how to shoot down the 400 mph V-1s; nothing could stop the supersonic V-2s. The British government, in near panic, demanded that upwards of 40% of bomber sorties be targeted against the launch sites, and got its way in "Operation CROSSBOW." The attacks were futile, and the diversion represented a major success for Hitler. In early 1943 the strategic bombers were directed against U- boat pens, which were easy to reach and which represented a major strategic threat to Allied logistics. However, the pens were very solidly built--it took 7,000 flying hours to destroy one sub there, about the same effort that it took to destroy one-third of Cologne. The antisubmarine campaign thus was a victory for Hitler.<ref> Webster & Franklin, 4:24</ref>

Every raid against a V-1 or V-2 launch site was one less raid against the Third Reich. On the whole, however, the secret weapons were still another case of too little too late. The Luftwaffe ran the V-1 program, which used a jet engine, but it diverted scarce engineering talent and manufacturing capacity that were urgently needed to improve German radar, air defense, and jet fighters. The German Army ran the V-2 program. The rockets were a technological triumph, and bothered the British leadership even more than the V-1s. But they were so inaccurate they rarely could hit militarily significant targets.

Furthermore, the program used up scarce technical resources that could have gone into the development of air defense weapons like proximity fuzes and "Waterfall," a deadly ground-to-air rocket. The secret weapon of greatest threat to the Allies was the jet plane that could outfly Allied fighters and shoot down bombers. The Messerschmitt ME-262 prototype flew in 1939, but was never given high priority until too late. Hitler never understood air power; his personal interference repeatedly delayed the jets. First he proclaimed they would not be necessary, then insisted they be redesigned as bombers to make retaliation raids against London. The Luftwaffe would have been a much more deadly threat if it built ten thousand jets; it only made one thousand and they rarely flew combat missions.

===Destroying Germany's Oil and Transportation===
Besides knocking out the Luftwaffe, the second most striking achievement of the strategic bombing campaign was the destruction of the German oil supply. Oil was essential for U-boats and tanks, while very high quality aviation gasoline was essential for piston planes.<ref> Jet planes ran on cheap kerosene, and rockets used plain alcohol; the railroad system used coal, which was in abundant supply.</ref> Germany had few wells, and depended on imports from Russia (before 1941) and Nazi ally Romania, and on synthetic oil plants that used chemical processes to turn coal into oil. Heedless of the risk of Allied bombing, the Germans had carelessly concentrated 80% of synthetic oil production in just 20 plants. These became a top priority for the AAF and RAF in 1944, and were targets for 210,000 tons of bombs. The oil plants were very hard to hit, but also hard to repair. As graph #1 shows, the bombings dried up the oil supply in the summer of 1944. An extreme oil emergency followed, which grew worse month by month.
[[Image:German-aviation-gas-ww2.jpg|thumb|325px|Germany's supply of aviation gasoline 1940-45]]

The third notable achievement of the bombing campaign was the degradation of the German transportation system--its railroads and canals (there was little truck traffic.) In the two months before and after D-Day the American Liberators (B-24), Flying Fortresses and British Lancasters hammered away at the French railroad system. Underground Resistance fighters sabotaged some 350 locomotives and 15,000 freight cars every month. Critical bridges and tunnels were cut by bombing or sabotage. Berlin responded by sending in 60,000 German railway workers, but even they took two or three days to reopen a line after heavy raids on switching yards. The system deteriorated quickly, and it proved incapable of carrying reinforcements and supplies to oppose the Normandy invasion. To that extent the assignment of strategic bombers to the tactical job of interdiction was successful. When Bomber Command hit German cities, it inevitably hit some railroad yards. The AAF made railroad yards a high priority, and gave considerable attention as well to bridges, moving trains, ferries, and other choke points. The "transportation policy" of targeting the railroad system came in for intense debate among Allied strategists. It was argued that enemy had the densest and best operated railway system in the world, and one with a great deal of slack. The Nazis systematically looted rolling stock from conquered nations, so they always had plenty of locomotives and freight cars. Furthermore, most traffic was "civilian," and urgent troop train traffic would always get through. The critics exaggerated the resilience of the German system. As wave after wave of bombers blasted away, repairs took longer and longer. Delays became longer and more frustrating. Yes, the troop trains usually got through, but the "civilian" traffic that did not get through comprised food, uniforms, medical equipment, horses, fodder, tanks, fuel, howitzers, flak shells and machine guns for the front lines, and coal, steel, spare parts, subassemblies, and critical components for munitions factories. By January, 1945, the transportation system was cracking in dozens of places, and front-line units had more luck trying to capture Allied weapons than waiting for fresh supplies of their own.

==Unanswered Weapons Systems==
Germany and Japan were burned out and lost the war in large part because of strategic bombing. Targeting became somewhat more accurate in 1944, but the real solution to inaccurate bombs was more of them. The AAF dropped 3.5 million bombs (500,000 tons) against Japan, and 8 million (1.6 million tons) against Germany.

The RAF expended about the same tonnage against Germany; Navy and Marine bombs against Japan are not included, nor are the two atomic bombs. While it can be calculated that strategic bombing cost the US and Britain more money than it cost Germany, that calculation is irrelevant. The Allies had plenty of money. The cost of the US tactical and strategic air war against Germany was 18,400 planes lost in combat, 51,000 dead, 30,000 POWs, and 13,000 wounded. Against Japan, the AAF lost 4,500 planes, 16,000 dead, 6,000 POWs, and 5,000 wounded; Marine Aviation lost 1,600 killed, 1,100 wounded. Naval aviation lost several thousand dead.

One fourth of the German war economy was neutralized because of direct bomb damage, the resulting delays, shortages and roundabout solutions, and the spending on anti-aircraft, civil defense, repair, and removal of factories to safer locations. The raids were so large and so often repeated that in city after city the repair system broke down. In 1944 the bombing prevented the full mobilization of the German economic potential. Speer and his staff were brilliant in improvising solutions and work-arounds, but their challenge became more difficulty every week as one backup system after another broke down. By March, 1945, most of Germany's factories, railroads and telephones had stopped working; troops, tanks, trains and trucks were immobilized. With all their great cities crumbling into rubble, with the awareness the Allies had a weapons system they could not answer, Germans suddenly realized they were going to lose the war. In February, 1945, General Marshall overruled the ethical objections of Air Force commanders and ordered a terror attack on Berlin. It was designed to help the Soviet advance and to convince the Nazis their cause was hopeless; 2,900 died (both sides exaggerated the total to 25,000 for propaganda purposes.) Josef Goebbels, Hitler's bloodthirsty propaganda minister, was disconsolate when his beautiful ministry buildings were totally burned out: "The air war has now turned into a crazy orgy. We are totally defenseless against it. The Reich will gradually be turned into a complete desert." By July, 1945, Japan was almost totally shut down. The American and British airmen had achieved the goals of strategic bombing--but neither Berlin nor Tokyo would surrender. The Nazis quit when the Soviets smashed Berlin in the bloodiest battle of the war. The Japanese surrender will be considered later.

==Strategic Bombing of Japan==
Army Chief of Staff [[George C. Marshall]] explained American strategy three weeks before Pearl Harbor:<ref> Robert L. Sherrod "Memorandum for David W. Hulburd, Jr." November 15, 1941. ''The Papers of George Catlett Marshall, ed. Larry I. Bland et al. vol. 2, ''We Cannot Delay, July 1, 1939-December 6, 1941'' (1986), #2-602 pp. 676-681. [http://76.7.58.34/gsdl274/cgi-bin/library?e=d-00000-00---off-0themarsh--00-1--0-10-0---0---0prompt-10---4-------0-1l--11-en-50---20-about---01-3-1-00-0-0-11-1-0utfZz-8-00&a=d&c=themarsh&cl=CL2.2&d=HASHa5a59dba9dbe679bec58d0 online version]. Marshall made the statement to a secret press conference. </ref>
:"We are preparing for an offensive war against Japan, whereas the Japs believe we are preparing only to defend the Phillipines. ...We have 35 Flying Fortresses already there—the largest concentration anywhere in the world. Twenty more will be added next month, and 60 more in January....If war with the Japanese does come, we'll fight mercilessly. Flying fortresses will be dispatched immediately to set the paper cities of Japan on fire. There wont be any hesitation about bombing civilians—it will be all-out."
When war began the Philippine airbases were quickly lost. American strategy then focused on getting forwar airbases close enough to Japan to use the very-long-range [[B-29]] bomber, then in development. At first the B-29's were stationed in China and made raids in 1944; the logistics made China an impossible base. Finally, in summer 1944, the U.S. won the [[Battle of the Philippine Sea]] and captured islands that were in range.

The flamability of Japan's large cities, and the concentration of munitions production there, made strategic bombing the war-winning weapon. Two months before Pearl Harbor Chinese leader Chiang Kai-shek proposed sending Flying Fortresses over Tokyo and Osaka, "whose paper and bamboo houses would go up in smoke if subjected to bombing raids." Massive efforts (costing $4.5 billion dollars) to establish air bases in China failed. Hundreds of thousands of Chinese peasants broke rocks with little hammers and dug drainage ditches by hand. Shipping supplies around the world to equip the bases was almost impossible, and when some bases were ready in 1944 the Japanese Army simply moved overland and captured them. The Marianas, captured in June 1944, gave a close secure base, and the B-29 gave the Americans the weapon they needed. The B-29 represented the highest achievement of traditional (pre-jet) aeronautics. Its four 2,200 horsepower Wright R-3350 supercharged engines could lift four tons of bombs 3,500 miles at 33,000 feet (high above Japanese flak or fighters). Computerized fire-control mechanisms made its 13 guns exceptionally lethal against fighters. However, the systematic raids that began in June, 1944, were unsatisfactory, because the AAF had learned too much in Europe; it overemphasized self-defense.

[[Image:Lemay45.jpg|thumb|300px|''Time'' Aug. 13, 1945]]

Arnold, in personal charge of the campaign (bypassing the theater commanders) brought in a new leader, brilliant, indefatigable, hard-charging General [[Curtis LeMay]]. In early 1945, LeMay ordered a radical change in tactics: remove the machine guns and gunners, fly in low at night. (Much fuel was used to get to 30,000 feet; it could now be replaced with more bombs.) The Japanese radar, fighter, and anti-aircraft systems were so ineffective that they could not hit the bombers. Fires raged through the cities, and millions of civilians fled to the mountains. Tokyo was hit repeatedly, and suffered a fire storm in March that killed 83,000. On June 5, 51,000 buildings in four miles of Kobe were burned out by 473 B-29s; Japanese opposition was fierce, as 11 B-29s went down and 176 were damaged. Osaka, where one-sixth of the Empire's munitions were made, was hit by 1,733 tons of incendiaries dropped by 247 B-29s. A firestorm burned out 8.1 square miles, including 135,000 houses; 4,000 died. The police reported: Although damage to big factories was slight, approximately one-fourth of some 4,000 lesser factories, which operated hand-in-hand with the big factories, were completely destroyed by fire.... Moreover, owing to the rising fear of air attacks, workers in general were reluctant to work in the factories, and the attendance fluctuated as much as 50 percent.

Japan's stocks of guns, shells, explosives, and other military supplies were thoroughly protected in dispersed or underground storage depots, and were not vulnerable to air attack. The bombing affected long-term factors of production. Physical damage to factories, plus decreases due to dispersal forced by the threat of further physical damage, reduced physical productive capacity by roughly the following percentages of pre-attack plant capacity: oil refineries, 83%; aircraft engine plants, 75%; air-frame plants, 60%; electronics and communication equipment plants, 70%; army ordnance plants, 30%; naval ordnance plants, 28%; merchant and naval shipyards, 15%; aluminum, 35%; steel, 15%; and chemicals, 10%.<ref>United States Strategic Bombing Survey, ''Summary Report: (Pacific War)'' (1946) [http://www.anesi.com/ussbs01.htm#eeoaaatj online p, 18]</ref>

Munitions output plummeted, and by July, 1945, Japan no longer had an industrial base. The problem was that it still had an Army, which was not based in the cities, and was largely undamaged by the raids. The Army was short of food and gasoline, but, as Iwo Jima and Okinawa proved, was capable of ferocious resistance.

==Why the Atomic Bomb?==
Why did the US drop the atomic bomb? Historians have puzzled over the problem for years. On the one hand, Japan was clearly defeated and wanted to surrender. After sifting through the records and cross-examining Japanese leaders, the experts of the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey concluded in 1946 that Japan would have surrendered by the end of 1945 because of the devastation wrought by the sea/air blockade and the incessant B-29 and carrier raids. The Survey lends weight to the retrospective conclusion that the atomic bomb did not have to be used to gain victory. Some "revisionists" have suggested Hiroshima was supposed to be an unmistakable signal to Stalin to play along diplomatically with the Americans who planned to rule the postwar world. Many have asked whether some sort of demonstration explosion should have been made, in order to frighten Tokyo without killing so many people. The option was considered, but with only two bombs available Truman decided instead to drop millions of leaflets upon Hiroshima and Nagasaki warning people to leave immediately, and at the Potsdam Conference he explicitly warned Japan it must surrender immediately or be hit with terrible force.

The civilian government in Tokyo wanted peace on conditional terms, but that was impossible because of Roosevelt's policy of "unconditional" surrender, and because the civilians did not control Japan's decisions--the Army did (in the name of the Emperor.) It is often assumed that Hiroshima caused Japan to surrender. Perhaps; but simultaneously the Soviet Union declared war, invaded Manchuria, and crushed the Japanese army there. This ended Japan's feeble hopes for a negotiated peace and proved conclusively that the Army could no longer defend the nation. Even after Hiroshima and the invasion of Manchuria the Army and Navy wanted to fight on, while the civilians wanted to give up. The decisive move was the unprecedented intervention of Emperor Hirohito, who opened negotiations. With Roosevelt gone, the Americans redefined "unconditional" to allow continuance of the Emperor. Hirohito then broadcast an order to the nation and its armed forces to surrender, which was immediately obeyed.

===Military Opposition to A-Bomb===
No military ethic will support the use of atomic bombs on the civilians of Hiroshima and Nagasaki--the military value of those targets was simply too small. (Both had once been major military ports, but by midsummer no ships were moving.) However, it would be incorrect to conclude that the American generals were the "guilty" party: they considered use of the atomic bomb on cities to be immoral, and opposed its use.

The U.S. Navy had very little to do with the atomic bomb decision. Having temporarily lost 5 of its 11 big carriers at Okinawa, it did not want to face the Kamikazes again during an invasion of Japan. It argued that the blockade was working well, cutting off nearly all oil, food and troop movements to and from Japan. It expected that the blockade would eventually lead to surrender. Not for several years were the admirals able to integrate atomic weapons into their Mahanian doctrine. Civilians overruled them.

In July 1945 the AAF saw its doctrine of strategic bombing working as intended. The original plan was to have used [[B-29]] bombers, from high altitude, with greater precision than the [[B-17]] and [[B-24]] bombers used in Europe. Unexpected high-altitude winds proved this was impossible, and Gen. [[Curtis LeMay]], newly commanding the strategic bombers, on his own authority changed to low-altitude incendiary bombing.He shed the machine guns and gunners, and the gasoline no longer needed to lift the planes to 30,000 feet. The result was a doubling of the bomb load, and very scared fliers who were greatly relieved to discover their losses were less using the new tactics.<ref>Craven and Cate, 5: 608-14; Thomas R. Searle "'It made a lot of sense to kill skilled workers': The firebombing of Tokyo in March 1945," ''Journal of Military History 103-134 66, no. 1 (Jan 2002): p. 103-134 </ref> From the first raid on March 9, the new tactic was devastating. working to perfection. The B-29 dropping conventional high explosives and incendiaries was the perfect instrument to destroy the infrastructure of Japan's larger cities. The great bombing campaign had just started; it was planned to peak a year later. The atomic bomb was not part of AAF doctrine; the AAF generals had not been consulted, knew very little about the bomb and even demanded a direct order from President Truman before they agreed to explode

The Army agreed that the combination of blockade and strategic bombing would eventually destroy every Japanese city, but felt it could not destroy the Japanese Army, which was widely dispersed and dug in.

General Marshall worried that the American people might grow weary of more years of warfare, and might even demand some sort of compromise peace in order to bring the soldiers home. (Marshall underestimated the intense determination of nearly all Americans to destroy Japan.) Furthermore he objected to dropping the bombs on cities on moral and political grounds (Japan might become an enemy forever). Most of all, he had a tactical rather than strategic use in mind. Only a handful of bombs were being built, (two to four per month) and MacArthur's invasion forces ought to have all of them. Marshall and his planners concluded that Japan would surrender only after ground troops captured Tokyo. The invasion of Kyushu was scheduled November 1; all bombs available then (probably seven) should be used there. They would give invading infantry forces enough firepower to destroy defensive ground installations, communications facilities, kill exposed enemy soldiers, and also block the arrival of reinforcements. To waste the precious bombs on irrelevant civilians would cause more American casualties, and like all the high American officials Marshall was committed to minimizing American--not Japanese-- losses.

In mid-1945 the Japanese troops on the home islands of Kyushu and Honshu were very poorly trained, equipped and officered. Furthermore, total US air supremacy would have rendered them immobile. Unlike Iwo Jima and Okinawa, Kyushu and Honshu were big enough to permit extensive use of tanks and large-scale maneuvering. The Kamikazes were a potential threat: Japan had 10,000 planes left and 19,000 pilots, plus enough gasoline for the purpose. However, but with its new close-in air bases on Okinawa, the AAF was prepared to close down every Japanese airfield. In sum, Japanese resistance might have been suicidal, with very heavy losses, but American losses would probably have been small, just as MacArthur predicted. Stimson and Truman, however, overruled Marshall and decided that the first two bombs would be used on cities in order to demonstrate the awesome power of the Allied forces.

===Manhattan Project===
President [[Harry S. Truman]], who had been completely frozen out of decision making and secret information before he suddenly became President in April, did not know what he wanted to do. He lurched this way then that, depending on who talked to him last.<ref> J. Samuel Walker, ''Prompt and Utter Destruction: Truman and the Use of Atomic Bombs against Japan'' (1997) [http://www.questia.com/read/35245486?title=Prompt%20and%20Utter%20Destruction%3a%20Truman%20and%20the%20Use%20of%20Atomic%20Bombs%20against%20Japan online edition]</ref> The man who talked to him last about the bomb was Henry Stimson. Stimson rarely participated in strategic planning, but he had one card up his sleeve--the atomic bomb. To build it, Roosevelt, set up the Manhattan Project.

The Manhattan Project was managed by Major General [[Leslie Groves]] (Corps of Engineers) with a staff of reservists and many thousands of civilian scientists and engineers. Nominally Groves reported directly to Marshall, but in fact Stimson was in charge. Stimson secured the necessary money and approval from Roosevelt and from Congress, and made sure Manhattan had the highest priorities. He controlled all planning for the use of the bomb, overruling the high command of the Army, Navy and AAF in the process. He wanted "Little Boy" (the Hiroshima bomb) dropped within hours of its earliest possible availability. And it was. Stimson wanted Japan to surrender, and thought the Hiroshima bomb on August 6 would provide the final push Tokyo needed. When nothing seemed to happen he had Truman drop "Fat Man" on Nagasaki on August 9. The Japanese offered to surrender on August 10.<ref> See Richard Rhodes, ''The Making of the Atomic Bomb'' (1995)
</ref>

===Stimson's vision===
In retrospect it seems possible that the impact of continued blockade, relentless conventional bombing, and the Russian invasion of Manchuria would have somehow forced the Japanese Army to surrender sometime in late 1945 or early 1946 even without the atomic bombs. Millions of Japanese would have died. <ref> for "revisionists" who reject use of the bomb, see Gar Alperovitz, ''The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb'' (1996) and Barton J. Bernstein, "Seizing the Contested Terrain of Early Nuclear History: Stimson, Conant, and Their Allies Explain the Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb," Diplomatic History 17 (Winter 1993): 35-72</ref> But Stimson saw well beyond the immediate end of the war. He was the only top government official who tried to predict the meaning of the atomic age--he envisioned a new era in human affairs. For a half century he had worked to inject order, science, and moralism into matters of law, of state, and of diplomacy. His views had seemed outdated in the age of total warfare, but now he held what he called "the royal straight flush." The impact of the atom, he foresaw, would go far beyond military concerns to encompass diplomacy and world affairs, as well as business, economics and science. Above all, said Stimson, this "most terrible weapon ever known in human history" opened up "the opportunity to bring the world into a pattern in which the peace of the world and our civilization can be saved." That is, the very destructiveness of the new weaponry would shatter the ages-old belief that wars could be advantageous. It might now be possible to call a halt to the use of destruction as a ready solution to human conflicts. Indeed, society's new control over the most elemental forces of nature finally "caps the climax of the race between man's growing technical power for destructiveness and his psychological power of self-control and group control--his moral power."

In 1931, when Japan invaded Manchuria Stimson, then Secretary of State, proclaimed the famous "Stimson Doctrine." It said no fruits of illegal aggression would ever be recognized by the United States. Japan just laughed. Now the wheels of justice had turned and the "peace-loving" nations (as Stimson called them) had the chance to punish Japan's misdeeds in a manner that would warn aggressor nations never again to invade their neighbors. To validate the new moral order, the atomic bomb had to be used against civilians. Indeed, the Japanese people since 1945 have been intensely anti-militaristic, pointing with anguish to their experience at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Was Stimson then guilty of a crime (as many Japanese now believe)? Perhaps, but it has to be recognized that he moved the issue to a higher plane than one of military ethics. The question was not one of whether soldiers should use this weapon or not. Involved was the simple issue of ending a horrible war, and the more subtle and more important question of the possibility of genuine peace among nations. Stimson's decision involved the fate of mankind, and he posed the problem to the world in such clear and articulate fashion that there was near unanimous agreement mankind had to find a way so that atomic weapons would never be used again. Thanks in great part to Stimson's vision, they never have been used since August of 1945.<ref>See Sean L. Malloy, ''Atomic Tragedy: Henry L. Stimson and the Decision to Use the Bomb Against Japan'' (2008); John Bonnett, "Jekyll and Hyde: Henry L. Stimson, Mentalite, and the Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb on Japan." ''War in History'' 1997 4(2): 174-212. Issn: 0968-3445 Fulltext: [[Ebsco]]; McGeorge Bundy, ''Danger and Survival: Choices about the Bomb in the First Fifty Years'' (1988);
Elting E. Morison, ''Turmoil and Tradition: A Study of the Life and Times of Henry L. Stimson'' (1960); Robert P. Newman, "Hiroshima and the Trashing of Henry Stimson" ''The New England Quarterly,'' Vol. 71, No. 1 (Mar., 1998), pp. 5-32 [http://www.jstor.org/stable/366722 in JSTOR]</ref>

==Ethics debate on Strategic Bombing==
During the war prewar pacifists and a few churchmen (especially Catholics troubled over the bombing of Catholic cities like Rome and Cologne) began to question the morality of bombing cities. After Hiroshima the issue focused on the atomic bomb, with much of the discussion echoing the fears of the interwar period about flotillas of enemy bombers dropping poison gas on New York City. This time the technology was capable of mass destruction; everyone had genuine fears of a nuclear war that would kill tens of millions of Americans within minutes. Only the United States had ever used atomic weapons--and in both cases the victims were civilian populations of another race. Many of the top soldiers thought the atomic bomb was unnecessary--that their particular strategy would have won the war eventually. Each of the alternative strategies, however (such as the Army invasion of Kyushu and Honshu, the Navy's tight blockade, the Air Force's relentless firebombing) would have produced more American casualties--and probably far more Japanese killed. Some historians, starting form the assumption that the bomb was "unnecessary" have speculated that it must therefore have been used for some motivation other than military victory. Perhaps the bureaucratic dynamics of the Manhattan Project were such that the bomb had to be dropped to prove the expenditures on it were not wasted? This was highly unlikely, since Truman would not have been blamed for expenditures that took place before he took charge. Other historians suggest that the bomb was dropped in order to influence or frighten the Russians, or perhaps to keep them out of the war. In fact the Pentagon, the State Department and the White House had been begging the Russians to enter the war, and at no time did Truman ever suggest to Stalin that in fact his entry into the Pacific war was unnecessary or unwanted. As for frighteneing the Russians, that seems unlikely too. Truman and Stimson knew that Russia had the capability of building their own bomb; unleashing the American weapon was less likely to frighten the dedicated Communists than to divert them from peaceful recovery into a new arms race.

Was it necessary? Did unleashing the nuclear genie doom the human race to the risk of eventual annihilation? Were Americans so fascinated with technology that they had lost sight of the moral dimensions of their behavior? Were the American conventional bombing campaigns against cities inherently immoral?

===Targets Fought Back===
In evaluating the strategic bombing campaigns it is important to keep in mind what the targets were. The AAF (and the RAF) concentrated on the largest 75 to 100 cities in Germany and Japan. In Germany the targeted cities contained 25 million people before the war; the damage was done primarily in 1944-45 when at least 5 million people had evacuated. Of all 75 million civilians in Germany, 1/2 of one percent (300,000) were killed, another 1% were injured, 10% were dehoused, 25% deprived of gas, water and electricity for varying periods, and 100% were inconvenienced by fear, shortages and disruptions.<ref>.. USSBS 1:72, 95 </ref> The bombing campaigns did not target civilians outside large cities, or their food supplies. (Tactical air sometimes did strafe passenger trains; the pilots could not tell whether they carried civilians or soldiers.) The main emphasis was on large cities for several reasons. Pragmatically, the target had to be large enough to hit. Small cities or factories in the forests were extremely hard to bomb from high altitude. Big bombers flew high when it was discovered the risk from flak was near 100% at 8,000 feet, but "only" 25% at 20,000 feet. Even at great height bombers often had to zigzag and rush their bombing run lest the ground crews get their range. The RAF noticed that when flak was light, 41% of its bombs hit near the target, compared to only 32% when flak was heavy. The Luftwaffe had figured out the logic of strategic bombing, and by late 1944 used over one million men and women to operate 16,000 heavy (high altitude) guns, 50,000 light guns, 7,500 searchlights, and 1,500 barrage baloons. The extremely critical synthetic oil plants at Leuna, Ludwigshaven and elsewhere were ringed by scores of batteries each with 8 to 12 guns. The 600 guns guarding Cologne could hurl 80 tons of shells skyward every minute. The best response was to saturate the defenses by putting as many bombers over target as quickly as possible. For every 100 sorties in 1944, 25 bombers were hit by flak; most managed to hold formation and return--stragglers usually crashed or were shot down by fighters. The Pentagon did not see enemy cities as mere passive housing tracks filled with innocent civilians but rather as the nerve centers of warmaking and as active fortresses that fought back vigorously and which often inflicted more damage than they received. ** Some raids caused "firestorms," notably Hamburg and Kassel in 1943, Dresden and Tokyo in 1945. Firestorms were very hard to start; they occurred in unpredictable situations when a number of scattered fires suddenly combined into a tornado-like inferno which sucked up all the oxygen (including the oxygen in underground shelters). At Hamburg 40,000 people suffocated inside shelters. Tens of thousands died in Dresden, but the railway yards, munitions factories and military bases were mostly undamaged. At Hamburg, full factory production resumed in a matter of weeks, but about a million civilians fled the city.<ref> Martin Middlebrook, '' The Battle of Hamburg: The Firestorm Raid'' (2nd ed. 2000) [http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0304353450/ref=sib_dp_srch_pop?v=search-inside&keywords=million&go.x=0&go.y=0&go=Go%21# p. 353 online]</ref>

===Target Cities Critical to War Effort===

The large cities were prime targets because they contained most of the enemy's munitions factories, railroad yards, government offices and communications centers. According to Air Force doctrine, only a small fraction of the enemy population was targeted for attack--notably the centers of war production, communications, command and control. Civilians were repeatedly warned (by billions of leaflets) to evacuate those cities, or else they would be considered as willing participants in the enemy war effort. Without its cities, an enemy army would lose its munitions supply and its power of movement. As early as 1916, and certainly by the 1930s, it was a well-recognized concept that "civilians" who worked in munitions factories were as much a part of the war effort as soldiers in the front lines, and were legitimate targets. The munitions workers themselves felt that way, as they glanced at posters or listened to speeches from visiting dignitaries telling them how essential they were to the war. They were "non-peaceable" civilians. The efforts of civilian munitions workers in the cities across the globe were largely responsible for deciding who would win the war. Churchill strongly protested Eisenhower's plans to bomb French railroads before D-Day, warning that many Frenchmen would be killed (and therefore France would never trust Britain again.) Eisenhower insisted, and so too did French leader [[Charles de Gaulle]]. He wanted his homeland liberated! MacArthur, however, refused to allow bombing of Manila in 1945 because the Filipinos were American subjects.

Primary responsibility for saving the lives of people in the cities was held by the defending government, not by the attacking one according the US Air Force then (and now). Every government did in fact promote civil defense by installing sirens, building bomb shelters, teaching first-aid, assigning fire-fighters and rescue workers, establishing aid stations and support agencies, and training city dwellers on what to do when a raid was imminent. (The British took advantage of this by sending wooden Mosquito bombers over Berlin every night--6,000 sorties in all; their light bombs did little damage but the sirens and rush to shelters ruined every Berliner's sleep.)

===Peaceable Civilians Evacuated===
In World War Two, bombing raids were not a sudden and totally annihilating event. The raids came every few days and lasted for months. Anyone who wanted to be a peaceable civilian and avoid the risk of air attack could and should have left the major cities. The major nations realized this and encouraged evacuation. A year before the Blitz began the British evacuated a million and a half women, children and elderly from London. Japan and Germany evacuated non-essential civilians from their cities as well. In Cologne, 90% of the small children were removed. Artistic treasures were safeguarded in old mines, and architectural monuments were sandbagged and given special fire protection. (The thousand-year old Cologne Cathedral thus remained standing while the rest of the city was flattened.)

As for morality of bombing innocent civilians, the American position was, and is, that the local government, not the US, is responsible for protecting its civilians. If they are innocent they should be evacuated to the safe countryside.

As Allied raids increased in intensity, the Nazis removed 1.5 million children and adults not engaged in war work. Simultaneously they moved hundreds of thousands of prisoners of war and foreign "volunteers" into Berlin and other major cities to work in the munitions factories.

With the coming of of hydrogen bombs in the mid 1950s and intercontinental missiles in the early 1960s, cities became defenseless, for they could be annihilated within minutes, with no warning and no chance for evacuation. But that was not the case in World War Two. The peaceable civilians had the knowledge and opportunity to get out, and most of them did so. If anyone missed the message from their own government, they could not fail to catch one of the hundreds of millions of leaflets dropped by Allied planes warning them that a real raid was imminent and they should evacuate immediately. In late 1944 American intelligence discovered that in Berlin, "Evacuation has been very thorough and the city now is relatively empty." In peacetime, Berlin had four million population; now it had scarcely one million, many of them foreign forced laborers.

===Total Mobilization of Civilians===
In January 1943, Berlin decreed the full mobilization of every German. Civilian jobs not essential to the war effort were to be abolished. Hitler declared "total war. Goebbels intensified the propaganda barrage, and the Nazi Party, the Gestapo and the SS turned the screws. As Field Marshal von Rundstedt proclaimed:
:The Fuhrer has decreed: that our conduct of war must become fanatical since the battle has touched German soil along broad sectors, and German cities and villages are being turned into battlegrounds....Every bunker, every block in a German city, and every German village must be turned into a fortress against which the enemy will either bleed to death or its garrison be buried in man-to-man combat.

All civilian men became liable for militia duty in the Volkssturm, and in 1945 many fought in the last ditches. In Japan, total mobilization had been declared as early as 1938 (when Japan was fighting China): "We must mobilize our entire resources, both physical and spiritual; it is not enough merely to provide sufficient munitions."<ref>Quoted in Conrad Totman, [http://books.google.com/books?id=UJLtPR_gMtsC&pg=PA435&lpg=PA435&dq=%22entire+resources,+both+physical+and+spiritual%22&source=web&ots=j1M8y-kwVm&sig=Gv7d1URKUV7U2TkQNtzXK0nhNrw&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=1&ct=result ''History of Japan'' (2000) online p. 435] </ref> </ref>Civilians were more tightly organized on behalf of the state than in any other nation, and American policy makers concluded there were no peaceable civilians in Japan. The AAF policy said that deliberate killing of innocent civilians was immoral, but that in Germany and Japan all workers "voluntary or involuntary" were assisting the enemy and should accept the risks "which must be the lot of any individual who participates directly in the war effort of a belligerent nation."ref> Crane, [http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0700611037/ref=sib_dp_srch_bod?v=search-inside&keywords=+must+be+the+lot+of+any+individual&go.x=0&go.y=0&go=Go%21# ''Bombs, Cities, and Civilians'' p. 45 online] </ref>

====Dispersal of critical installations====
Speer figured out the antidote to air raids in 1943-- disperse critical factories outside the major cities. The V-1 and V-2 missiles were built in caves and underground factories that were largely immune from bombs. Local officials resisted and dispersal made the Germans even more reliant on their fragile transportation system. With railroad yards hit every week, it took longer and longer for parts to reach underground assembly factories, and it became more and more difficult to move the final product to the front lines.

The Soviets carried dispersion to the logical extreme. As the Germans pushed east in 1941-42, the Russians loaded trains full of blueprints, engineers, skilled craftsmen, critical materials, vital parts, and necessary tools, and set up shop in makeshift quarters in the Urals. Often the new quarters lacked heat and the workers froze in place.

A complete dispersal outside the major cities could indeed drastically limited the direct damage done by strategic bombing. However, dispersal to small, remote locations with poor transportation and communications created extremely complex management problems. It slowed everything down and multiplied the difficulties of overall coordination, of recruiting, training and housing workers, of supplying fuel and raw materials, of cross-shipping of sub-assemblies, and of final shipment to the front line soldiers. Postwar analysts in the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey who stressed the unexpectedly small amount of damage done to individual plants overlooked the vast damage done to the German and Japanese system of providing munitions to the battlefront. Germany ground forces fought hard, but after the summer of 1944 they were defeated in every battle, in large part because they had lost control of their airspace, and because strategic bombing cut the front lines off from their industrial base.<ref>Albert Speer, [http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0684829495/ref=sib_dp_srch_pop?v=search-inside&keywords=287&go.x=0&go.y=0&go=Go%21# ''Inside the Third Reich'' (1969) p. 287]; Richard Overy, ''The Air War: 1939-1945'' (1981) p. 122 </ref>
===Revenge===
Revenge and racism played a role in the bombings. The American public demanded revenge for Pearl Harbor, and saw the Japanese as moral subhumans. (However Americans also proudly went to war to defend the morally worthy Filipinos and Chinese.) The British, having watched fifty thousand civilians die from the Blitz, were more than pleased to retaliate ten times over. Strategic bombing doctrine had always held with enough pounding, enemy morale would collapse and they would be forced to surrender. That is indeed what happened with Japan. The Germans surrendered only after Berlin was captured, but the ability to resist invasion had been blasted away by the Allied bombings that Germany was helpless to stop. The bottom line regarding strategic bombing in World War Two is that it was the only way a total war could be fought and won. The alternatives were compromise with the Nazis and Japanese, or invasions that would have killed far more people in Japan (and did kill far more Germans than the bombings did).<ref>Lacking strategic bombers, the Russians relied on their ground forces to capture Berlin in April, 1945. It was the bloodiest battle of the war. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers were killed, along with very large numbers of civilians. Antony Beevor, ''The Fall of Berlin 1945'' (2003)</ref>

==Further reading==
* British Air Ministry. ''Rise and Fall of the German Air Force (1948, reprint 1969), excellent official history; reprint has introduction by H. A. Probert, who was not the author
* Haulman, Daniel L. ''Hitting Home: The Air Offensive Against Japan,'' (1998) [http://www.usaaf.net/ww2/hittinghome/ online edition]
* Murray, Williamson. ''Luftwaffe: Strategy for Defeat, 1933-1945'' (1985), standard history [http://www.maxwell.af.mil/au/aul/aupress/catalog/books/Murray_B12.htm online edition]
* Overy, Richard J. ''The Air War, 1939-1945'' (1981), sophisticated standard interpretation, covering all major countries
* Overy, Richard. ''The Battle of Britain: The Myth and the Reality'' (2001) 192 pages [http://www.amazon.com/Battle-Britain-Myth-Reality/dp/0393322971/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1213520462&sr=1-2 excerpt and text search]
* Overy. Richard. "The Means to Victory: Bombs and Bombing" in Overy, ''Why the Allies Won'' (1995), pp 101-33
* Sherry, Michael. ''The Rise of American Air Power: The Creation of Armageddon'' (1987), important study 1930s-1960s
* [http://www.airforcehistory.hq.af.mil/Publications/titleindex.htm U.S. Air Force official histories (mostly pamphlets)]
* Werrell, Kenneth P. "The Strategic Bombing of Germany in World War II: Costs and Accomplishments," ''Journal of American History'' 73 (1986) 702-713; good place to start. [http://www.jstor.org/pss/1902984 in JSTOR]
* Russell, Edward T. ''Leaping the Atlantic Wall: Army Air Forces Campaigns in Western Europe, 1942-1945'' (1999) [http://www.usaaf.net/ww2/atlanticwall/index.htm online edition]

====notes====
<references/>

[[Category:World War II]]
[[Category:Air Power]]

P-47 Thunderbolt

2010-07-22T00:32:49Z

Keysersoze: replaced wrongheaded explanation of how turbo-supercharger works

The '''P-47''' fighter plane, nicknamed the '''Thunderbolt''', was the workhorse tactical airplane of the US Army Air Forces (AAF) in [[World War II]]. In a frantic technological race against the Nazis, American designers created a series of fighters and bombers that had the speed, climb-rate, maneuverability, and range to do the job.

[[Image:P-47b.jpg|thumb|300px]]
==Origins==
The P-47 originated in 1940, when AAF commander General [[Hap Arnold]] asked for a plane to give air superiority over the Germans. Alexander Kartveli, chief designer at Republic Aviation, met the challenge using an unusually large fuselage and the new 18 cylinder, 2,000 horsepower air-cooled radial "Double Wasp" engine from Pratt and Whitney. Its high-altitude performance was dramatically enhanced by a General Electric turbo-supercharger.<ref>The turbo-supercharger utilized an exhaust-driven compressor to drive a centrifugal supercharger. GE, at work on the device since 1918, finally solved the extremely difficult problems of very high speed rotation at high temperatures.</ref>
==Weapon system==
Production model #1 flew in spring 1942 and #10,000 flew in fall 1944. The plane, produced by Republic Aviation, cost an average of $80,000 (compared to $50,000 for the smaller [[P-51]]). The 1945 version P-47M, burning 115/145 grade gasoline, had a maximum speed of 460 mph, a ceiling of 40,000 feet, and (with auxiliary drop tanks) a combat range of 2,000 miles. Escorting the [[B-17]] and the [[B-29]], its 8 50-caliber machine guns could rip apart Luftwaffe or Japanese fighters (which had only 90 octane gasoline). As a tactical weapon it was armed with five 500 pound bombs plus ten 5" rockets. At ten tons, the big Thunderbolt needed a long runway, and was less agile than the Luftwaffe's Focke-Wolf 190. But it was better than good enough, downing 3 German planes for every loss.
==Tactical air support==
The main missions of the P-47 were tactical air support for ground combat, and (until the [[P-51]] came on line), defending strategic bombers from Luftwaffe fighters. Although its loss rate was only 7 per 1,000 sorties, these tactical workhorses were sent out so often that half were shot down, chiefly by flak guns.

Infantrymen were ecstatic about the effectiveness of close air support:
:Air strikes on the way; we watch from a top window as P-47s dip in and out of clouds through suddenly erupting strings of Christmas-tree lights [flak], before one speck turns over and drops toward earth in the damnest sight of the Second World War, the dive-bomber attack, the speck snarling, screaming, dropping faster than a stone until it's clearly doomed to smash into the earth, then, past the limits of belief, an impossible flattening beyond houses and trees, an upward arch that makes the eyes hurt, and, as the speck hurtles away, WHOOM, the earth erupts five hundred feet up in swirling black smoke. More specks snarl, dive, scream, two squadrons, eight of them, leaving congealing, combining, whirling pillars of black smoke, lifting trees, houses, vehicles, and, we devoutly hope, bits of Germans. We yell and pound each other's backs. Gods from the clouds; this is how you do it! You don't attack painfully across frozen plains, you simply drop in on the enemy and blow them out of existence.<ref> Brendan Phibbs, ''The Other Side of Time: A Combat Surgeon in World War II'' (1987) entry for Jan. 21, 1945 p 149</ref>
==Escort role==
The slower, shorter-range P-47 was already escorting bombers part of the way into Germany; in a reversal of roles, that mission in January 1944 went to the [[P-51]] Mustang while the P-47 was re assigned to tactical targets on the ground. The Thunderbolt's air-cooled engine was less vulnerable to ground flak; one bullet hole in the plumbing of a Mustanng's water-cooled engine would drain off the coolant and crash the P-51.
==Impact==
Thunderbolt groups claimed the destruction of 6,000 tanks and armored fighting vehicles, 9,000 locomotives, 86,000 items of rolling stock, 68,000 trucks, and huge numbers of enemy troops killed or wounded. According to air power historian W. A. Jacobs, "All authorities agreed that the P-47 was the best fighter-bomber."<ref> W. A. Jacobs, "The Battle for France, 1944," in B. Franklin Cooling, ''Case Studies in the Development of Close Air Support'' (1990), p. 250.</ref>
==The Pacific War==
Although most well-known for the war in Europe, the P-47 had an excellent service record in the Pacific theater as well. The first Thunderbolts to fight the Japanese arrived in June 1943 in [[Port Moresby]], [[New Guinea]].

[[Image:P-47a.jpg|thumb|300px|318th Fighter Group's P-47's intercept Japansese "Betty" bomber, Pagan Island, 1944]]

They formed the 348th Fighter Group, under the command of Lt. Col. [[Neel Kearby]]. The big fighter proved itself against the Japanese on October 11, when four Thunderbolts, including one flown by Col. Kearby, engaged a force of forty Japanese fighters over [[Wewak]], New Guinea, a major Japanese base. The American pilots downed nine enemy fighters without suffering so much as a bullet hole. Kearby himself shot down six to become the first P-47 [[Flying ace|ace]] of the Pacific War. By the end of 1943, the 348th had downed over 150 enemy planes for the loss of only eight pilots.

By this time, other units had converted to the P-47 as well, so that almost half of the Fifth Air Force’s fighter strength was Thunderbolts. Like almost all other Allied planes, the Thunderbolt was less maneuverable than the Japanese fighters, but had the advantage in speed (especially diving speed), power, and toughness. P-47 squadrons later saw heavy action in the [[Philippines]] campaign, and longer-range P-47Ns flew escort and fighter sweep missions over the Japanese mainland from bases in [[Okinawa]].<ref>''Mustang and Thunderbolt Aces of the Pacific and CBI'', by John Stanaway, Osprey Publishing, 1999</ref>

[[RAF]] P-47s saw action in the [[Burma]] campaign, starting from late 1944. They were used mainly in the ground attack role.<ref>''The Encyclopedia of 20th Century Air Warfare'', ed. by Chris Bishop, Aerospace Publishing, 2001</ref>

==Post-war Service==
The P-47 served in the Air National Guard after the war, and in several foreign air forces besides. The Republic of [[Taiwan]] flew Thunderbolts, and two of them were lost to Chinese [[MiG-15]]s on March 18, 1954.<ref>[http://www.acig.org/artman/publish/article_170.shtml PRC/Chinese Air-to-Air Victories]</ref> Four days later, two Taiwanese P-47s avenged their comrades by teaming up to down a MiG-15.<ref>[http://www.acig.org/artman/publish/article_171.shtml Taiwanese Air-to-Air Victories]</ref>

Many Central and South American countries acquired surplus P-47s from the United States. [[Chile]] flew Thunderbolt fighters until 1959.<ref>[http://www.ipmsstockholm.org/magazine/2001/05/stuff_eng_ibes_p47.htm South American ‘Jug’]</ref>

French P-47s saw action in the [[Algerian War of Independence]].<ref>[http://www.vectorsite.net/avp47.html The Republic P-47 Thunderbolt]</ref>

==Bibliography==
* Cooling, Benjamin Franklin ed. ''Close Air Support'' (1990) GPO
* Craven, Wesley and James Cate, eds. ''The Army Air Forces In World War II''] official history. (1948-55)
** [http://www.airforcehistory.hq.af.mil/Publications/fulltext/aaf_wwii-v3.pdf Volume Three: ''Europe: Argument to V-E Day January 1944 to May 1945'']
** [http://www.airforcehistory.hq.af.mil/Publications/fulltext/aaf_wwii-v6.pdf Volume Six: ''Men and Planes'']
* Johnsen, Frederick A. ''Republic P-47 Thunderbolt'' (1999) [http://www.amazon.com/Republic-P-47-Thunderbolt-WarbirdTech-23/dp/1580070183/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2/103-4827826-5463040?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1192685947&sr=1-2 excerpt and text search]
* McFarland, Stephen L. and Wesley Phillips Newton. ''To Command the Sky: The Battle for Air Superiority over Germany, 1942-1944'' (1991)
* Rowland, Michael D. "Why the U.S. Air Force Did Not Use the F-47 Thunderbolt in the Korean War," ''Air Power History,'' Vol. 50, 2003 [http://www.questia.com/googleScholar.qst?docId=5002554880 online edition]
* Spire, David N. ''Air Power for Patton's Army: The 19th Tactical Air Command in the Second World War'' (2002) [http://www.airforcehistory.hq.af.mil/Publications/Annotations/spireair.htm online edition]
==See also==
* [[B-17]]
* [[B-29]]
* [[P-51]]
* [[P-38]]
* [[World War II in the Air]]

====notes====
<references/>
[[Category:World War II aircraft]]
[[Category:Aircraft]]
[[Category:United States Air Force]]

[[category:Air Power]]

Enola Gay

2010-07-21T03:44:17Z

Keysersoze: added a .

'''Enola Gay''' was the name of the [[B-29 Superfortress]] that dropped the [[atomic bomb]] on [[Hiroshima]] during [[World War II]]. The pilot, Paul Tibbetts, named it after his mother.

The atomic bombing of [[nagasaki]] was the work of another B-29 named Bock's Car.

[[Image: Enola Gay crew.jpg|right|thumb|200 px|The crew of the Enola Gay.]]

[[category:World War II]]
[[Category:Aircraft]]

Enola Gay

2010-07-21T03:43:27Z

Keysersoze: added link

'''Enola Gay''' was the name of the [[B-29 Superfortress]] that dropped the [[atomic bomb]] on [[Hiroshima]] during [[World War II]]. The pilot, Paul Tibbetts, named it after his mother.

The atomic bombing of [[nagasaki]] was the work of another B-29 named Bock's Car

[[Image: Enola Gay crew.jpg|right|thumb|200 px|The crew of the Enola Gay.]]

[[category:World War II]]
[[Category:Aircraft]]

Enola Gay

2010-07-21T03:40:46Z

Keysersoze: mentioned the other atomic bomber

'''Enola Gay''' was the name of the [[B-29 Superfortress]] that dropped the [[atomic bomb]] on [[Hiroshima]] during [[World War II]]. The pilot, Paul Tibbetts, named it after his mother.

The atomic bombing of nagasaki was the work of another B-29 named Bock's Car

[[Image: Enola Gay crew.jpg|right|thumb|200 px|The crew of the Enola Gay.]]

[[category:World War II]]
[[Category:Aircraft]]

Ferrari

2010-07-21T03:25:20Z

Keysersoze: oops, fixed it

'''Ferrari''' is a sports car manufacturer from [[Italy]]. Founded in 1947 by Enzo Ferrari, they have made some of the most famous track cars in the world in [[Formula1]] and numerous other motor racing classes. They have also produced some of the best engineered and most exclusive road vehicles in the world.
 Ferrari only builds 4,500 cars a year with production split between the V8-engined cars (F430 and F430 Spider) and the V12-engined cars, the 599 GTB Fiorano 2-seater berlinetta and the flagship 2+2 612 Scaglietti.<Ref>About Ferrari : [http://www.ferrariusa.com/index.php?page=about]</ref>
 Since 1950 Ferrari has partipated in every season of the [[Formula One|F1]] World Championship. in 2004 Ferrarri had won 14 Drivers' and 14 Constructors' titles. Ferrari also has an exceptional record of success in endurance racing events such as the 24 Hours of Lemans, where their 250 GTOs set numerous records.

==References==
<References/>

[[category:cars]]

Ferrari

2010-07-21T03:23:45Z

Keysersoze:

'''Ferrari''' is a sports car manufacturer from [[Italy]]. Founded in 1947 by Enzo Ferrari, they have made some of the most famous track cars in the world in [[Formula1]] and numerous other Motor Racing classes. They have also produced some of the best engineered and most exclusive road vehicles in the world.
 Ferrari only builds 4,500 cars a year with production split between the V8-engined cars (F430 and F430 Spider) and the V12-engined cars, the 599 GTB Fiorano 2-seater berlinetta and the flagship 2+2 612 Scaglietti.<Ref>About Ferrari : [http://www.ferrariusa.com/index.php?page=about]</ref>
 Since 1950 Ferrari has partipated in every season of the [[Formula One|F1]] World Championship. in 2004 Ferrarri had won 14 Drivers' and 14 Constructors' titles. Ferrari also has an exceptional record of success in endurance racing events such as the 24 Hours of Lemans, where their 250 GTOs set numerous records.

==References==
<References/>

[[category:cars]]

Talk:Electric car

2010-07-21T03:12:20Z

Keysersoze: Henney Kilowatt myth

The following statement is somewhat bizarre: "many of the citizens that use the electric car use renewable resources as a source of power that do not produce pollution." How many citizens do this? "Many" electric car owners apparently. And the source for this remarkable information? Anyway, do they have their own windmills powered up to charge their batteries or what? Their own hydro plants perhaps? --[[User:British_cons|British_cons]] [[User_talk:British_cons|(talk)]] 17:46, 19 March 2007 (EDT)

there are many different nonpolluting resources that people use today, solar power, wind power, water power, etc.

:There are many things which use electricity. Your computer, a factory which makes cars, and an electric car. All these do not produce pollution at the point where they use electricity - the pollution is generated earlier at the power station. All of these could be non-polluting if a renewable energy source were used. An electric car is no more or less naturally polluting than any of these. The fact that it could be made non-polluting if a non-polluting source were used says nothing about an electric car that could not also be said about the other electricity users. The idea that electric cars are automatically non-polluting is false. If there were a massive change in the electricity producing industry then they, along with your computer and the car making factory would be non-polluting.--[[User:British_cons|British_cons]] [[User_talk:British_cons|(talk)]] 04:02, 20 March 2007 (EDT)

yes I admit that you are correct on most of that, but all electric cars can get power from solar powered charging stations -here is a url to a picture; I can't figure out how to get it onto the page http://www.physics.uiowa.edu/~umallik/adventure/nov_06-04/solarstation2.gif --[[User:Benburned|Benburned]] 19:46, 20 March 2007 (EDT)

== I removed this... ==

I removed the following:
:An electric car has not yet been made that is safer than many of the gas alternatives, however it does not need gas so it pays for itself and is environmentally friendly. Some could parallel the electric car to a hydrogen powered car, though the technology for a hydrogen powered car is not yet refined to the point in which it can be mass produced. Electric cars are not currently mass produced.
It's very poorly written, uncited, and the last part doesn't actually tell us anything and is redundant. [[User:HelpJazz|Help]][[User talk:HelpJazz|Jazz]] 00:23, 29 January 2008 (EST)

==Henney Kilowatt myth==
The Henney was not transistor controlled. I know several sources claim this, but it just isn't true. I suspect this picture, and the inaccurate description, came from Wikipedia. Even They've corrected this, so I hope someone who has the authority will rectify this situation.

Electric car

2010-07-21T03:04:48Z

Keysersoze: greater efficiency mentioned

[[Image:800px-Kilowatt.jpg|right|thumb|''Henney Kilowatt'', the world's first transistor-controlled electric car.]]
[[Image:5667ruy.jpg|right|thumb|Venturi Fetish, a limited production electric car capable of reaching 0-100km/h in 4.5 seconds]]
An '''electric car''' is a type of [[car]] that runs on [[electricity]]. Because it runs on electricity it is a zero emission car, a car that doesn't produce [[pollution]] at the point of use. It is probable that some type of [[fossil fuel]] would have been used to generate the electricity in the first place, in some cases all the electric car really does is move the pollution somewhere else.
However, due to the poor efficiency of small internal cumbustion engines and the relatively high efficiency of power generating stations, electric cars produce less polution and consume less fuel even when run entirely on fossil-fuel based power.
[[Category:Cars]]