What a wonderful Funeral us Americans can put on

[Guest]

Hi all,
It was sure a day of wonderful funeral events. It equalled Princess
Di's I think....and she didn't have Gorbochoff.
I'm proud that everyone could love this man so much, just not us
Illinois-born people.
Lolly

Jaz Lolly you opened a pandoras box there!

Sure it was a great thing to watch! I just spent two days on the Telly and all just for a few good laughs. (What ever else Ronnie R did, he certainly had a great sense of humor and knew how to use it! )

After the last few ceremonies, now I know why Rev Ian Paisley (Presbyterian fascist N.I) had no worries in the 80s about the Mericans arriving to deal with the ethnic cleansing being done in Norn Iron by the UDA - UDF - Unioists etc. Why would he be worried when President Ronnie Reagan already converted into a Billyboy had an Orange Man for a pastor!

The funny thing about Ronnie was he was soooo Irish as to be easily mistaken for an Irish barman in Taigland - ie the South, the wit, the jokes, the customer manner. Anyway if he was not a successful actor with mountains of money the only blessing he would have gotten from a Presbyterian Orangeman Pastor would have been an ounce of lead from the end of an M16 - Mention of which reminds me, perhaps they tried to do
just that but not with the planning of the Kennedy assasination?

[glauber]

It was, in all honesty, an extremely dignified, wonderfully executed tribute to Mr. Reagan. Far, far nicer than the sort of funerals people get in places like Nicaragua...or El Salvador.

Yes, it was very appropriate.

[kevin m.]

It was, in all honesty, an extremely dignified, wonderfully executed tribute to Mr. Reagan. Far, far nicer than the sort of funerals people get in places like Nicaragua...or El Salvador.

Yes, it was very appropriate.

Or Grenada...........

[Chuck_Clark]

... working-class America...

Probably expensive, too, but we can just tack it onto the deficit.

According to the estimates I heard the Federal portion carried a price tag of sixty-eight million dollars (a number that big needs to be written out).

$66 Mil = cost of shutting down the government for a day
$1.5 Mil= Actual cost of Federal proceedings
$500, 000 = in-kind costs to the District of Columbia for police and other services.

That doesn't count the California part.

I watched the california ceremony. Very dignified, however even as an inveterate free-speech populist I was really outraged at one point. At the end, as the family said their final goodbye, CNN cameras bored in closer and closer, not wanting to miss a single tear.

Surely at a time like that they could have been given a little PRIVACY???? Is it too much to ask the media to BACK OFF for just a minute or two? I thought it was mean and ghoulish and inappropriate.

[Rando7]

I am concerned that the extensive media coverage of the Reagan ceremonies has caused me to lose focus on the Scott Peterson and Kobe Bryant trials.

[Chuck_Clark]

The following is an unabashed rant. Procced at your own risk.

I do not understand the concept of extravagant public mourning, be it Reagan, or Princess Di, or anyone else.

I understand grief well enough when death strikes among one's family or friends. I wish I didn't understand it quite so well.

What I do not understand is why thousands of people would spend money on airfares or drive for hours to stand in line for more hours in order to spend fifteen seconds walking past the closed casket of someone they didn't even know.

And I don't understand why every time a celebrity dies you get see the building of impromptu flower shrines, even in places thousands of miles removed from that person or anything associated with them.

And I don't understand things like giant cards being signed in Illinois for a death a thousand miles away.

Mabe its just the old curmudgeon in me, but I simply don't comprehend the concept of elaborate personal grief for someone you don't even know and who wouldn't have known YOU from a bug on the wall.

And while I'm in rant mode, the populist in me can't understand how people could not be angered when, after they spent their hours in a hot summer line waiting for their fiteen second fly-by, a parade of "their betters" is ushered around them to spend their own minutes at the casket publicly mourning for the TV cameras. I can't help but think it denotes a feeling of inferiority by some folks who would love to see the return of a hereditary aristocracy that would put the misbegotten commoners in their proper place.

: Rant off:

[Walden]

It was, in all honesty, an extremely dignified, wonderfully executed tribute to Mr. Reagan. Far, far nicer than the sort of funerals people get in places like Nicaragua...or El Salvador.

Yes, it was very appropriate.

Or Grenada...........

clever

[rkottke]

Anyone else catch the fast shot of Bill Clinton at the DC service. His eyes closed and head lulled back. Hilary looked embarassed. You really had to feel sorry for her!

[Guest]

Anyone else catch the fast shot of Bill Clinton at the DC service. His eyes closed and head lulled back. Hilary looked embarassed. You really had to feel sorry for her!

Oh boy if faces were statements then there would litigation in Washington for decades ....

[glauber]

Anyone else catch the fast shot of Bill Clinton at the DC service. His eyes closed and head lulled back. Hilary looked embarassed. You really had to feel sorry for her!

Yes, she can't bear to see him praying.

[JohnPalmer]

I'm just curious as to how they had no cell phones go off, or car alarms blare from all the canon shots and fighter fly-overs.

All in all, I found nothing to question as to how much pomp there was. I thought the services were beautiful, and they taught many of us a little about American traditions.

Anyone notice that Arnold did not sing the National Anthem?...probably didn't know the words

JP

[BillChin]

...
Mabe its just the old curmudgeon in me, but I simply don't comprehend the concept of elaborate personal grief for someone you don't even know and who wouldn't have known YOU from a bug on the wall.
...

This is extremely common--cherished beliefs not shared. Many people (the stereotype is males that work in professions such as engineering, medicine, or computers) expect others to share their cherished beliefs and are amazed, stunned and disappointed when they don't. The ugliest forms of this are Internet flame wars where no one changes their mind, tempers are raised, and lives shortened and made less pleasant.

What the public outpouring of emotion shows is that Reagan touched many lives. The cliche that comes to mind is six-degrees of separation, meaning that virtually everyone is connected to everyone else on the planet after going through six people. It is a SMALL PLANET when you think of it in those terms. Public figures do touch many lives, whether the person is a politician, a musician, an artist, an author.

I believe that public grieving and public ceremony is a necessary and healthy way for people to honor those that have touched their lives, and to move forward. Those that can not or do not choose to participate are of course welcome to opt out. That is sometimes the case with immediate family or friends.

I believe that America is a place where more ritual not less would be a good thing. There is a timelessness to some rituals. Many young people watching the Reagan funeral on TV will remember it for the rest of their lives, just as I have memories of some public funerals from my youth. Few events have that kind of power, that kind of magic, that kind of majesty.
+ Bill

[Monster]

Anyone notice that Arnold did not sing the National Anthem?...probably didn't know the words

JP

I can't really picture Arnold singing anything , Can you imagine what it would be like to have Arnold sing "Happy Birthday"?

[rebl_rn]

Anyone else catch the fast shot of Bill Clinton at the DC service. His eyes closed and head lulled back. Hilary looked embarassed. You really had to feel sorry for her!

There also was a shot of Prince Charles looking like he was nodding off.

(CSPAN reran the funeral today. They'll probably be showing it again if anybody didn't see it and wants to).

I think I did hear a car alarm at one point. Can't remember when. I am surprised about the cell phones, too, since it seems no matter how many times people are reminded to turn them off someone doesn't. Maybe there were enough soldiers, sailors, marines, and airmen with guns (even ceremonial ones) that people took the admonishment to turn off the cell phones seriously.

Beth

[emmline]

I'm kinda with Chuck Clark on this one. I respect and empathize with the personal grief experienced by family and close friends of RR...but I truly did not feel a need to watch it on tv, or personally grieve...perhaps in part because the death followed a long illness, and he was a very old person, and perhaps because I didn't know him.