Not Even a Hedgehog - The Stupidity of Ronald Reagan
Is it unconscionable that I wasn't terribly sad to hear that Ronald Reagan--the President who replied to my letter when I was eight years old by sending a glossy mini-magazine about the White House--died on Saturday? For all the worship he receives from the general public, most pundits seem to acknowledge that he was in many ways inept and that he created the modern-day, deficit-spending, government-averse Republican party. (William Saletan's explanation of "Reagan's Law" is brilliant.)
So I pretty much think the guy was a buffoon, but that's not why I wasn't especially sad; I'm patriotic enough that I'd be sad to see even our current buffoon drop dead. I'm just glad that Reagan was able to die without suffering any longer, and hopeful that he didn't really know what was happening anymore when he passed on. On a more cynical note, his timing is better than I expected; I thought he would die sometime in October, three or four days after they parade Bin Laden out of the Oval Office and two weeks before the election, just in time to cancel a couple of the debates. (Howard Fineman argues that Reagan's death is good for Bush, but it would have been almost inarguably better for him to give the eulogy at an October 30 funeral. Can you imagine a better way for Bush to suddenly appear to rise above the fray of the campaign and invoke his ties to a man who, right or wrong, some folks believe belongs on Mount Rushmore?)
Republican revisionists aside, history will not be kind to Reagan; in the right place at the right time to watch the Cold War end, he accomplished precious little else during his eight years in office--unless ballooning the debt or lying to Congress about selling weapons to revolutionaries counts as achievement. I hope his soul lingers this week, suddenly restored to the lucidity he possessed back when he was president (of the Screen Actors Guild, not the United States--he surely wasn't with it by then), able to hear the kind words that will be heaped on him by those who fetishize him because he seemed able to smile through anything. And I hope, out of kindness, that his soul flees the scene on Saturday. This campaign season will see his ideas excoriated for the fluff and pandering they were during his presidency and remain as carried on by Bush, and teachers in future classrooms will no doubt heap something quite unlike praise upon the man as they explain to their pupils how he started the chain reaction that allowed them to be born indebted for the sins and spending of their fathers. It already worked that way in the Bible. Reagan made sure it worked that way in America, too.
4 comments:
Remind me to be an ass when your beloved Bill Clinton dies.
Talk about someone at the right place at the right time; look at Clinton and the economic prosperity of the 90s. You should be praising Gates and Greenspan for that.
Reagan should not get all the credit for ending the Cold War, but he played a major role and should be remembered.
Was Reagan perfect? No.
Was he right for America in the 80s? I think the answer is a definite yes.
~rusty
When my beloved Clinton dies, thoroughly biased folk like Rusty will be the only ones who suggest that he wasn't one of the best leaders the nation has ever had. Intelligence and thoughtfulness leave a far better long-term legacy than using the notion that you're an idiot to defend yourself against an arms scandal.
Yet Rusty claims that Reagan was the right person for the '80s, so I ask: Why? And wouldn't American politics be in better shape if we had chosen Walter Mondale's candor (I'm going to raise your taxes; let me tell you why) over Reagan's deceit(I'm not going to raise your taxes--oops, I had to)? Is it a good thing that we now talk around every problem rather than dealing with it directly? As Mondale said, "Reagan was promising them 'morning in America,' and I was promising a root canal." Isn't a root canal sometimes a necessary and good thing? Don't we need politicians who are willing to say so? More than anything else, Reagan shaped a culture of untruth and deceit that pervades today's political environment. Maybe that's the right man for the craven '80s, but it surely isn't helping us today.
[sarcasm]
you know Richard, you are right.
Americans should have voted in a landslide, of oh, 49 states or so, to elect Mondale. Let's tax ourselves out of the economic prosperity of 83 and 84 and return to the late 70s and first two years of Reagan.
Wait, that wouldn't happen, cause raising marginal tax rates REALLY helps the economy grow. Whatever was I thinking?
[/sarcasm]
I am truely sorry that I even replied to this blog. I will just take my optimistic view of the world and go share it with people who believe that Republicans actually are capable of doing some good in the world. Cause I can't find that here.
And to be honest, trying to have an honest dicussion about any political topic just doesn't seem feasible here.
I guess I'm supposed to respond with some sort of gnashing of teeth or something. But frankly, good riddance. I'm not terribly interested in being told how government will destroy us all or listening to you claim to be part of that wonderful optimistic Republican party when what you mean is that you've been drinking the Kool-Aid with the rest of them and have become delusional as a result. If by honest discussion you mean that you want to find someone who agrees with you, Rusty, then you've clearly been looking in the wrong place by looking here. Good luck finding a better one.
Post a Comment