Are all Republicans as forgetful as Ronald Reagan when it comes to who is responsible for the recession?

Apparently, yes. Reagan's forgetfulness, however, wasn't entirely deliberate.

What's worse is that most of these Republicans continue to adhere to the same failed economic policies that nearly brought the economy to complete ruin. They have learned absolutely nothing from this disaster. .

Bush is not 100% responsible. If you understood economics, you would realize that the Federal Reserve is the agency which creates bubbles. The Fed was created in 1913 by Democratic president Woodrow Wilson and a Democratic Congress. The Fed inflates the currency, leading to malinvestments (the boom periods) which must be liquidated (although usually politicians and the Fed just reflate the bubble, creating a worse correction in the future). If you want a healthy economy, you have to allow the malinvestments of the bubble years to be liquidated and prevent the creation of a new bubble. The last time we had a healthy economy was during the 1880s, which was a decade of great prosperity (the economy was healthy during the early 1920s, until the Fed bailed out England under the influence of Irving Fisher, Benjamin Strong, and other early Chicago school economists, creating the stock market bubble; Chicago school economists, including Time's Man of the Year Ben Bernanke, are also largely to blame for the current crisis, as their proposals have been heavily influential since the time of Reagan). The sustainable boom of the 1880s was destroyed by the Billion Dollar Congress of 1890's McKinley Tariff and Sherman Silver Purchase Act, which created a timebomb that went off right as Grover Cleveland took office for his 2nd non-consecutive term (it was unfairly blamed on Cleveland and McKinley ended up as president after he beat the extreme inflationist Democrat nominee in 1896; McKinley ended up getting credit for Cleveland's recovery and Republicans ran the country for 16 years until the GOP split in 2 in 1912).

The current depression was created by the reckless bipartisan big government policies of both parties over the last century or so.

Bush is partly responsible for the recession. Reagan is also partly responsible.

The cause of the current troubles dates back to 1980's, when U.S. President Ronald Reagan and U.K. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher came to power. It was during this time that borrowing ballooned and regulation of banks and financial markets became less stringent. These leaders believed that markets are self-correcting, meaning that if prices get out of whack, they will eventually revert to historical norms. Instead, this laissez-faire attitude created the current housing bubble, which in turn led to the seizing up of credit markets.

President Bush during his first term aggressively sought to loosen mortgage loan qualification standards for first-time homebuyers, which also added to the recession, since many of those people shouldn't have been given loans in the first place.

If I let myself believe "facts" like that, I'd still be a liberal. Does Bush deserve some blame for the recession? Yes. He was aware of problems in the sub-prime housing market as late as 2005. He either didn't listen to advisers that there was a big problem brewing or just didn't want to "rock the boat" financially since things were already somewhat weak.

While this was going on, John McCain and other Republicans were aware and were trying to do something about it. They went before Barney Frank and the House Finance Committee twice in 2006 and 2007 to try to put regulation on Fannie and Freddie to stop their buying of bad mortgages. This was voted down, also twice, along party lines.

Barney Frank and Chris Dodd, chair of the Senate Banking Committee, were the ones putting pressure on Fannie and Freddie and banks to accept bad sub-prime mortgages. ACORN was enlisted as "muscle" to pursue this with local banks. Banks were threatened with restrictions on interstate growth if they didn't comply. These policies pushed "more affordable" adjustable rate mortgage (ARMs) on those with the least ability to afford the rate changes when they reset and forced Fannie and Freddie to accept these junk mortgages.

While this was going on, Fannie and Freddie were packaging these junk mortgages as mortgage-backed securities and selling them to Wall Street, a game of hot potato to diffuse their risk when they finally exploded (or imploded). Ratings companies like Standard and Poor, were giving these packages AA or better ratings instead of junk ratings they deserved. Everyone else's involvement might have been unethical, but the rating companies actions I believe, were actually criminal, but they have never been touched.

So you see, there is enough blame to go around. Bush's blame is not going to war with the Dems that were creating this toxic situation in order to be heroes to their constituents in creating "affordable housing" and on Wall Street for Enron level greed.

Now, to the Gipper. Since Kennedy, the problem of monetary policy has been recognized as a problem. It was seriously exasperated with Johnson's "Great Society". We got addicted to government spending and printing money to pay for it like some counterfeiter. The steps needed to deal with this were a political third-rail, so the consequences were just kicked down the road to the next guy. To his credit, Carter tried to do something about it, but when credit rates went too high, he backed off.

Reagan drew a line in the sand and made a stand. This meant raising rates, but this time, they stuck. This, on top of the stagnation of the 70's lead to recession, many including Reagan, agonized over the pain it caused. It was like watching (or being) an addict going through detox. But like detox, when it was over in 83, Reagan tax policies, tax cuts across the board and lowering the highest rates from 70% to 35%, caused business to take off, in the process creating more revenue for the government. This created the basis for strong economic boom for the next 20 years.

Reagan's initial actions did cause a recession only because he refused to kick the can down the road to another generation. Because of it, the US was returned to its position of economic powerhouse of the world and an example to the rest of the world. I don't expect Progressive Democrats to learn from the past, but I expect Republicans to. It's been said that Democrats tax and spend, Republicans just spend. Although they did forget the lessons, the next batch in 2010 might regain their core principles. A similar malaise is on this country as it was in the late 70's which believes our best days are behind us. Republicans with courage and integrity can lead us through the detox we need again so it can again be "morning in America".

Oh, please, that was over A YEAR ago! lol

People are so impatient that they think the economy reacts as quick as a McDonalds fast food order. They can't wrap their heads around why it may take a few years for the economy to react to legislation, which itself takes time to pass.

we failed to recognize that the easy way to riches will be our demise.

We must rid our country of leaders that lead use to ruin. Have sound financial plans and a small responsible goverment for the the people by the people.

Remove the Federal reserve

Abolish the useless military industrial complex

Remove the IRS

Once again we will be free

Was George ALSO responsible for the recession of 2000? I think republicans may be forgetful, but they are not lacking facts and truth as you appear to be.

The Democrat congress caused the recession, that's the way it really is. The recession started with the housing crisis. What caused the housing crisis? Banks were being forced to provide loans to people who coun't afford to pay them. Both Bush and McCain warned us about sub-prime loans prior to the recession but Democrats wouldn't listen. They overregulated the banks to the point where they crashed.

Yes, they deny everything.

They also deny that Bush ran up the deficit with 2 unpaid for tax cuts, 2 unpaid for wars, and the unpaid for Medicare Part D all totaling more than 3.49 Trillion Dollars added to the deficit.

You remind me of the story about the guy who threw feed to the pigs to get them used to a certain domain to count on for food and other necessities. At first all he did was put up posts. Now the pigs were a bit leery but continued eating the slop thrown out there for them. Next, the guy put up fencing between some of the posts only, then all of them and left the gate open. Lastly, he installed the gate and there was no freedom for the pigs to roam and find their own food, shelter, mates or anything else. The guy fed them what he wanted, when he wanted. It's a good progressive tactic, a bit at a time.