Clinton’s Praise of the Reagan Admin’s Handling of AIDS Is Infuriating Just About Everyone

Lindsey EllefsonMar 11th, 2016, 4:47 pm
 

Screen Shot 2016-03-11 at 4.39.46 PMHistorically, AIDS advocacy groups have never liked President Ronald Reagan or his wife, Nancy. As her funeral was today, plenty of other people who did like them have been saying kind things about her that have nothing to do with AIDS; people who didn’t have been saying nothing.

Hillary Clinton didn’t get the memo, apparently, because she neither exclusively took the anti-Reagan tack of Nancy’s detractors nor the pro-Reagan route of her fans; Clinton mixed the two into a version of events that never really happened and, according to Joe My God and others, people are quite upset. Here’s what she said, completely unprovoked and for no reason, since no one asked her about AIDS at all:

And a transcript for you, too:

It may be hard for your viewers to remember how difficult it was for people to talk about HIV/AIDS in the 1980s. And because of both President and Mrs. Reagan, in particular, Mrs. Reagan, we started national conversation when before no one would talk about it, no one wanted to do anything about it, and that too is something that really appreciated, with her very effective, low-key advocacy, but it penetrated the public conscience and people began to say “Hey, we have to do something about this too.”

You see, AIDS was first reported by medical professionals in 1981. The president waited until 1987 to address the epidemic in a speech. He remained quiet for six years as 27,909 people died. In 1985, his wife refused to help famous American actor Rock Hudson as he died from the disease. It wasn’t, to her mind, a good look.

Before you suggest that the Reagan administration was simply unaware of the disease that ravaged over 50,000 people before he spoke on it, know that as early as 1982, Press Secretary Larry Speakes was made aware of it and spent his time laughing about how he hadn’t heard of it, presumably because he wasn’t gay.

For Clinton to wantonly rewrite history was dangerous and unfair, according to the masses who have spoken out already today.

The Reagan Administration is synonymous with the “silence = death” slogan when it comes to AIDS. It is bizarre to insist that their legacy could be anything else. There is no definitive proof that either Ronald or Nancy took any steps to address the epidemic prior to 1987. AIDS is still so taboo that it is being used as the big “gotcha!” in movies. If known reactionists like Sacha Baron Cohen are using it as a punchline, it’s safe to say that the topic is not yet settled and blasé enough and not yet far from the collective public memory to be so callously rewritten.

Clinton is not the first left-leaning public figure to attempt this particular revision of history. Mediaite took Bob Beckel to task for the exact same misstep two years ago. Everything from our previous article remains applicable and true today.

Anyway, as “AIDS” has trended on Twitter all afternoon, she has now apologized. And so the unnecessary politicization of a former first lady’s death continues.

[image via screengrab]

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