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June 12, 2004
Reagan Demythologized

Atrios takes on the current spate of blather about Reagan and provides a list of common errors.

  • The House and Senate did not both come under Republican rule during Reagan's time.
  • The Berlin Wall did not come down when Reagan was in office.
  • Reagan is not the president who left office with the highest approval rating in modern times.
  • Reagan was not "the most popular president ever."
  • Reagan did not preside over the longest economic expansion in history.
  • Reagan did not shrink the size of government.
  • Reagan did preside over what was at the time the "biggest tax cut in history" but it was almost instantly followed up by the "biggest tax increase in history."
  • Reagan was not "beloved by all." He was loved by some, liked by some, and hated by some with good reason.

I avoided the coverage of Reagan this week as much as I could. I respect his service to our country, in an abstract kind of way, but I'm very uncomfortable with anyone being so instantly mythologized in this way. Ours is (supposed to be) a country of laws and not of men. Ronald Reagan was not, and is not, America, he was just a man. He was not a King and he was not a God, he was an actor and a politician. We can and should thank him for his service to our country, but not more than we honor and respect the service of many others, and arguably less.

In the end, the only part of Reagan's death that actually struck a real emotional note in me was his, and his family's, struggle with Alzheimer's. A truly tragic disease, I can hardly think of a more terrible way to spend the last years of one's life or a more terrible thing to watch in a loved one. His letter to the American people announcing his disease and that he would be withdrawing from public life is unquestionably honest and moving.

Too bad our current president is more interested in pandering to his religious fanatic base than investing in -- or even allowing -- research that could end Alzheimer's.

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