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n2doc

(47,953 posts)
Tue Mar 3, 2015, 11:39 AM Mar 2015

Scott Walker has a weird theory about unions and foreign policy. We made it a quiz

by Amanda Taub

Saturday morning, Wisconsin Governor and GOP Presidential hopeful Scott Walker said that he believes the "most significant foreign policy decision of my lifetime" was when President Reagan fired 11,000 striking air traffic controllers in 1981. "It sent a message not only across America, it sent a message around the world," Walker asserted, that "we weren't to be messed with."

That's right: Walker believes that Reagan's union-busting was more important than any other US foreign policy decision since 1967, the year Walker was born. And no, in case you're wondering, this wasn't an accidental gaffe: Walker has repeated this theory multiple times to different audiences. This was just the latest instance. In his book, Walker wrote that Reagan firing the aircraft controllers "not only stiffened the spines of members of Congress, it also stiffened the resolve of our allies, it also encouraged democratic reformers behind the Iron Curtain. It helped win the Cold War."

This is certainly an unusual theory of US foreign policy. But to give it the credit it's due, we've created a handy quiz to help you decide if you agree with Walker's theory.
http://www.vox.com/2015/3/3/8136165/walker-union-foreign-policy
(note, the poll at the link is worth taking....)

Was firing the air-traffic controllers really the most consequential US foreign policy decision since 1967?


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1 (100%)
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Scott Walker has a weird theory about unions and foreign policy. We made it a quiz (Original Post) n2doc Mar 2015 OP
... catbyte Mar 2015 #1
Took the quiz. I did rate it as more important than Reagan's attempt to end Detente. ieoeja Mar 2015 #2
The Kochs like 'em stupid and tractable. n/t Orsino Mar 2015 #3
this is disturbingly close to the Argentinean junta's National Security Doctrine, where all domestic MisterP Mar 2015 #4
 

ieoeja

(9,748 posts)
2. Took the quiz. I did rate it as more important than Reagan's attempt to end Detente.
Tue Mar 3, 2015, 12:50 PM
Mar 2015

Because that didn't accomplish shit. The Iron Curtain was down. And Reagan couldn't re-erect it despite all his efforts.

Had he succeeded, there would still be a Communist Soviet Union.

MisterP

(23,730 posts)
4. this is disturbingly close to the Argentinean junta's National Security Doctrine, where all domestic
Tue Mar 3, 2015, 04:11 PM
Mar 2015

fights were part of the great global clash between diabolic "totalitarianism" and the "Christian West": Moscow had infiltrated every bank, every school, every church, every unit of the military itself

they murdered 30,000 because they couldn't even tell when they'd won

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