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~

 


Photobucket&nbs

Pages

iVillage Member
Registered: 06-11-2004
Sat, 06-12-2004 - 2:59am
Out of curiosity, just what about Clinton made him earn your repsect versus Reagan? Granted there were maybe a few things Clinton may have done to help at least students, but versus Reagan? I dont think so. And also what other presidents (also out of curiosity) earned your respect? Hopefully not Carter.

As I have said before, this nation is founded upon freedoms and liberites such as the one we are excercising today, but I wholeheartedly agree with Jim (vader716) that there is timing to your truths as you call them. And here is also a thought, truth is one persons interpretation, especially when it comes to such a job as president. When it comes to these truths you speak of, of how it really was let me ask you this, Were you there for the briefings that went on? I know I wasnt, nor was any of my family. I come from a family who has had a LONG line of military service. And you may or may not know this, but until Reagan came into office, there were men serving our country that with Carter's cutbacks could not afford to feed their families(and some were E-6, 7, etc. fyi E9 is the highest before officer)and were on food stamps and government cheese (my family being one of them). It was Reagan who gave the military a 50% increase in pay, it was Reagan who built our military back up to what it use to be. And that was yet another factor that helped Reagan win the Cold War without a single fire shot. Do you honestly think that with the military the way it was, that we could have survived an attack from the Soviet Union? Carter felt it more appropriate to put that money into special interest groups, well what about our security as a nation for a special interest group? Reagan helped give respect back to those men and women who served and still serve our country. And I do believe that it says something about a man's integrity and character as President when the servicemen and women support and trust his decisions, and I can tell you most assuredly that that wasnt and isnt the case for former-President Clinton. And this having nothing to do about his personal life, but his policies.

Kudos to you Jim, for standing up for common decency and respect!!

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
Sat, 06-12-2004 - 9:08am

From July 2003.........


 


Photobucket&nbs

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
Sat, 06-12-2004 - 11:59am

I agree holding up signs in view of the grieving is tacky.


Discussing the darker side of Reagan's political life is not disrespectful. Not everyone believes or experienced the benefits

 


Photobucket&nbs

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-18-2004
Sat, 06-12-2004 - 12:10pm
It (the "darker" side of Reagan's policies) COULD have waited until he was buried.

That is the whole point. Tasteless timing.

I'll defend Reagan and his policies because I think they were wonderful for our country.

But, IT COULD have waited. That is where the poor taste and disrespect comes in.

And holding up those signs wasn't tacky. That minimalizes it. It was a disgusting, hateful, reprehensible act. Those people are without any sense of decency. I think of the vile manner that those people acted and my teeth clench and my blood boils. Were I on that corner those signs would not have been there, come hell or high water. Yes it makes me that angry. I don't hate people but they are as close as I come to it.


Jim

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-23-2003
Sat, 06-12-2004 - 12:15pm

Well, sorry I don't have time today to make up a list...even a short one...I'll try next week when time isn't so tight for me.


As for President's I admired?


iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
Sat, 06-12-2004 - 12:26pm

Maybe those people with the signs had just cause.


They could have

 


Photobucket&nbs

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2003
Sat, 06-12-2004 - 3:52pm
<>

Excuse me for expressing my opnion, I didn't realie I had wondered into a funeral. I think a week of continuous news coverage about a dead president, no matter how great, is a bit much. Now I realize you disagree, but such is the nature of free speach.

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2003
Sat, 06-12-2004 - 4:02pm
<>

Perhaps this is what all this antipathy is about--differen't beliefs about the treatment of the dead. I'm with you--definitely cremation. No ceremony. Afterward the ashes can be set free. With these kinds of beliefs, can't those who condone the week long wake, at least attempt to understand where we're coming from.

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2003
Sat, 06-12-2004 - 4:10pm
I agree holding the signs up was tacky, but my judgment doesn't replace their right to express themselves peacefuly.

<>

You do realize that this is an opinion. So you think I have poor taste, well you've said it more than once. Enough already.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-23-2003
Sat, 06-12-2004 - 4:49pm

Perhaps this is what all this antipathy is about--differen't beliefs about the treatment of the dead. I'm with you--definitely cremation. No ceremony. Afterward the ashes can be set free. With these kinds of beliefs, can't those who condone the week long wake, at least attempt to understand where we're coming from.


I think you may be very


Pages