Quote:
Originally posted by Sazare
Um, that Clinton knows about the Reagan administration and their history with AIDS is practically guaranteed. The facts of the matter are that they genuinely didn't care about the plight of the gay community that was rapidly wasting away at the hands of the disease beyond its potential as joke fodder and that Nancy Reagan wasn't doing **** behind the scenes but plugging away at her tacky and pointless "Just Say No!" anti-drug campaign. It wasn't until years in when the administration realized the disease wasn't restricted to gays that they lifted a finger (and even then only to help straight people).
She may have apologized, but it's pretty clearly disingenuous. |
If this election cycle has proven anything, Bernie and Hillary have extensive careers and when called out on things that happened 20+ years ago or addressing something from then, gaffes have been happening or straight up dodging the topic. Hillary may have been discussing what the Reagans did in the latter half of your post and not the former for when it was mostly known as a "gay disease". That's why an apology was more or less issued. To me, that's a fair apology due to the fact the Reagans did eventually address and do something about it (after much public outcry).
If any issues defined the Reagan administration, they were AIDS, drugs and Alzheimer's. The Reagans did address all at some point in their years in office or after. So, what Hillary said in total was somewhat - mostly true (if this were a Politifact radar thing). The Reagans were late to the AIDS battle but when they showed up, they actually did what they needed to start doing. People who are mad are mainly mad because the Reagans ignored the issue for years not because they didn't do anything about it (since that would be completely false).
EDIT: Only mentioned Bernie here because Hillary and him are the only two candidates with long careers in this election cycle. Therefore, there's always vetting going on concerning their pasts more than other candidates this cycle.
