Why and when America stopped being great

 President Ronald Reagan was the creator of the phrase ‘making America great again’. With the end of the Vietnam War a strong recession struck the U.S.A., unemployment was high and inflation rampant. Iran had seized the U.S. embassy in Teheran and held the Americans there as hostages. The price of oil was very high per barrel- the Carter administration had created a synthetic fuels pilot program at parachute Colorado that wasn’t yet productive; making America great again without debt and with the economy going well was an appealing idea that the great communicator sold rather easily.

President Trump exploited the Reagan slogan that few remembered to contrast himself with vast left-leaning changes the Obama administration brought, or at least perceived changes. Many of those changes were offensive to naturally conservative American blue-collar workers yet were fine with Democrats. So the phrase was naturally contentious to start.

It was a simple reply to the changes brought about by prior administrations that had exported U.S. manufacturing to China, permitted too lax of border security to prevent millions of illegal migrants to enter the nation, allowed legalization of dope in some states, created a number of ‘sanctuary from U.S. immigration law’ cities, piled up trillions and trillions of dollars of U.S. public debt, ended marriage as strictly heterosexual etc. The United States had allowed the 9–11 disaster to happen, had a perennial public debt, trashed its ecosphere and destroyed its wilderness areas generally, declined in its comparative international standing in education achievement by students. It had great military expenses and protracted foreign wars. In short there were many challenges that President Trump thought he could correct.

The total 90 pound weakling defense and restoration of wilderness- especially in Alaska, that Mr. Trump proved to be in regard to environmental protection made a few people disappointed with his ability to ‘make America great again’ On some other points he did work to return to a stronger America with a dose of nationalism. His lack of a savoir fare regarding education, philosophy, science and so forth were other disappointments with the Trump administration. Yet his one redeeming factor was making SCOTUS somewhat conservative again. It is too bad he did not make the Bush II court appointments.