Sunday, 06 June 2004

Reagan remembered. I was eleven years old when Ronald Reagan became President, and 19 when he retired; I have fuzzy memories of the Carter years, and exactly one memory of Gerald Ford (for some reason a campaign commercial of his left an impression on my six-year-old mind), but it was Reagan who my developing brain latched onto as the template for what a "President of the United States" looked like.

In some ways I still think of Reagan as the last Real President, in the "real men don't eat quiche" sense (another mark of growing up in the Eighties): Real Presidents know how to deliver a speech and make it sound like something out of a movie. Real Presidents have charisma and a gently self-depreciating sense of humor.

Take this photo, for example. The story behind it, as I remember, is that Reagan was the speaker at a dinner for the press — it may have been the annual White House Correspondents' Dinner, but don't hold me to that — and all the photographers were eating and had put their cameras on the floor (or left them at home). Reagan said something like "I've always wanted to do this," stuck his hands in his ears, and waggled his tongue; only one photographer had the presence of mind to dive for his camera and get the shot, while everybody else just laughed.

Reagan could get away with that. None of the Presidents since him could: Dubya takes himself too seriously, Clinton was more of a back-slapper, and the elder Bush never connected with audiences. None of them had the cheerful charm that Reagan brought to the office, and whether you loved Reagan's policies or hated them, you had to admire his touch. The Gingriches and the Dubyas, the lesser men who've tried to claim Reagan's mantle, have lost the best of what Reagan had to offer: Reagan could bridge the gap between parties and inspire all Americans with his vision of a shining city on a hill. His successors, diminished in stature, present their opponents with more hate than hope.

I'm not much for the latter-day GOP effort to canonize Reagan as their partisan saint, and there are at least two men named Roosevelt (and probably one named Truman) who I'd put ahead of Reagan on the list of the Twentieth Century's greatest Presidents. What I will say, though, is that Reagan had the courage of his convictions: When Reagan wanted tax cuts for the rich, he at least had the moral integrity to argue for tax cuts for the rich. Supply-side economics may have been smoke and mirrors, but at least Reagan didn't lie outright about how much of a cut the top 1% were getting.

I've already said my peace about Reagan's contribution to the Cold War; I think he left a good legacy, an admirable legacy — but he didn't single-handedly stare down the Soviets, as his hagiographers would have us believe. Reagan deserves better treatment than the crassly partisan efforts to idolize him; we should remember that Reagan embraced proposals to eliminate all nuclear weapons, which put him out of step (then and now) with the hardliners in his own party.

Reagan's legacy belongs to us all, and we all join in mourning his passing.

- Posted by Scott Forbes at 1:36 pm. comments.