Keep Reagan's Record in Balance.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
Keep Reagan's Record in Balance.
67
Thu, 06-10-2004 - 9:57am

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A29859-2004Jun9.html


The good that Ronald Reagan did is not being buried with his bones tomorrow, as Shakespeare's Mark Antony predicted of Caesar. Reagan's good is being disinterred and magnified. It is being raised to new and unrealistic heights that will live on, and hang heavily over his successors, in public expectations.


This is not to begrudge the 40th president the thunderous applause that has come from politicians, journalists, historians and citizens to mark Reagan's final bow. Ill should rarely be spoken of the dead. But it is puzzling how these assessments of Reagan's accomplishments have improved so dramatically and uniformly in the 16 years since he left office.


Perhaps this is how contemporary history is made or, in the electronic era, mismade and distorted. Reagan's growing reputation as the great victor in the Cold War who made Mikhail Gorbachev tear down the Berlin Wall depends on looking at Reagan and his times through the light cast by subsequent events.


The craving by Americans for uncluttered heroism -- for what is seen in retrospect as the order and clarity of the Cold War -- also powers this yearning for a near-mythical transformation of Reagan's death into a moment to sweep aside the dread and anguish of the wars in Iraq and against al Qaeda.


Yes, winners always write the history. But it is dangerously easy today to make the leap from that news footage of Reagan speaking at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin to concluding that he came to office with a master plan to make victory in the Cold War inevitable. As one television executive said to me not long ago, "Today history is what we say it is."


To one who covered many of the key international events of that day, Reagan seemed in fact to come late to a realistic view of the Soviet Union and the world, and -- like most presidents -- to have improvised furiously and not always successfully in foreign affairs.


It is also easy in today's elegiac mood to forget how unpopular Reagan was abroad for most of his presidency, even among his peers. France's Francois Mitterrand once sputtered in rage at me when I asked about his ideological conflicts with Reagan over Soviet policies. Kremlin officials expressed private delight at Reagan's election because they would be able to "roll him."


That is no skin off Reagan's record. He was more right about the evil and the fate of Soviet imperialism than Mitterrand, Gorbachev and most other leaders of the day. He was far from the amiable dunce portrayed by his knee-jerk critics.


But the opposition that Reagan stirred should not be airbrushed out of the final photograph of his times. Nor can we ignore the fact that the analysis and policies that brought some breakthroughs with Moscow originated more with George Shultz at the State Department than at Reagan's White House.


The Wall collapsed a year after Reagan's successor had been chosen and had started to alter policies toward Moscow. That collapse was due more to the struggle in the 1980s of the citizens of Poland, Hungary, East Germany and other satellite nations than to new actions by Washington. Nor should we minimize the contribution that a half-century of common dedication by U.S. and West European citizens and their military forces made to the final collapse of the Soviet empire.


There were important costs that came with Reagan's undeniable successes. His confrontational style used in getting much-needed Pershing 2 missiles deployed in Europe helped prematurely end the career of West Germany's highly competent chancellor, Helmut Schmidt.


U.S. support extended to guerrillas to drive the Soviets out of Afghanistan has blown back in the form of al Qaeda and extreme instability in Central Asia. U.S. help to Saddam Hussein in Iraq also boomeranged. Iran-contra was not as great an aberration at the Reagan White House as it is often painted today.


The commentariat has made many of the right points about Reagan's uplifting personality and all the good and the fascinating that will live after him. Even if he was not a great president, he lived a great life from which we can all learn.


But if we airbrush and prettify history for the small screen and the front page, and ultimately for the books to come, we will not learn the most important lessons about mistakes that can be avoided. Let Reagan be Reagan, warts and all, for all time now.


The Man, the Myths
Don't believe everything you hear about Ronald Reagan.


http://slate.msn.com/id/2102060/


Gorby had the lead role, not Gipper.


>"In the collapse of communism he deserves credit not as an instigator, but an abettor. Best Supporting Actor."<


Quote from.........


http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20040610/COMARTIN10/TPComment/TopStories


Op-ed: REAGAN'S SHAMEFUL LEGACY


http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=127&ncid=742&e=7&u=/ucru/20040608/cm_ucru/reagansshamefullegacy

cl-Libraone~

 


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iVillage Member
Registered: 06-04-2004
Fri, 06-11-2004 - 9:50pm
Yes I know, why wait until NOW to post about it? Where were your posts if you felt so passionatly about his political uh oh's before he died?
iVillage Member
Registered: 06-04-2004
Fri, 06-11-2004 - 9:55pm
Yeah your right, we were watching television or maybe visiting his casket to pay respects. Ever thought of that? Do we revolve our lives around this board? No! Who said anything about waiting 6 months? Can you post where it says that's what those of us who are calling your posts direspectful, have said to wait? I think it's was more along the lines of waiting a week until he was buried. Is that too much to ask or is your political disagreement with what those who respected him has said in his honor at his funeral irk you that bad. Bad enough that you'd show lack of common curdecy for it?
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-23-2003
Fri, 06-11-2004 - 9:58pm

Why are you only interested in the "truth" right now? When he just died?


LOL!


iVillage Member
Registered: 06-11-2004
Fri, 06-11-2004 - 10:02pm
"deification", inevitably this is my least favorite word of the day

I am a Republican and that being said, I will be very nearly as sad to see Jimmy Carter pass on as I have Ronald Reagan. I will certainly wait at least five minutes after Bill Clinton is in the ground to start in on what I thought of him politically and otherwise....

Hail to the Chief.

Be nice, nice is good.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-23-2003
Fri, 06-11-2004 - 10:03pm

Interesting...but not likely.


iVillage Member
Registered: 03-23-2003
Fri, 06-11-2004 - 10:06pm
OMG, READ the ARCHIVES.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-23-2003
Fri, 06-11-2004 - 10:14pm

Yeah your right, we were watching television or maybe visiting his casket to pay respects. Ever thought of that? Do we revolve our lives around this board? No!


Good.


iVillage Member
Registered: 03-23-2003
Fri, 06-11-2004 - 10:22pm

sigh...no one is picking on the man personally.


iVillage Member
Registered: 06-11-2004
Fri, 06-11-2004 - 10:28pm
sorry, you're right (from the left, of course)...

good luck

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-18-2004
Fri, 06-11-2004 - 11:23pm
Some people do not see the problem with discussing him, his administration, and their mistakes even on the most solemn of days.

I think it is extremely distasteful to try and "set the record" straight and expose lies and mistakes a person made during a period of mourning. People have all the time in the world to discuss Reagan's mistakes. Who cares if his family and friends make up complete stories of great acts if it helps the mourning process.

The fact is the left and many people on this board can't resist taking shots at him. I couldn't care less what anyone has to say about this truth or that truth while his wife is crying over his casket. It lacks common decency. Those who made their attacks may not think so or certainly would never admit it but it doesn't change the fact that it remains indecent.

Indecency is like pornography, I may not be able to define it but I know it when I see it.

Jim

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