[Vision2020] Ten Myths about the Ronald Reagan Presidency

[nickgier at roadrunner.com]

Greetings:

This is my radio commentary/column for this week.  For the additional five myths read the attached PDF file.  Read my previous column "Why Reagan Can't Save the Republicans" at www.home.roadrunner.com/~nickgier/reagan.htm

As the Republican candidates prepare for the 2010 Congressional races, we can expect a lot of talk about Ronald Reagan and how we need to return to his tough economic and foreign policies. Many in the GOP believe that all they have to do win big is to be like Reagan and find a new Ronald Reagan as their presidential candidate. I'm afraid they will be perpetuating some or all of the myths that I cover.

By the way, those who say that they don't believe in polls have to face the fact that some pollsters predicted the Obama/McCain race to the tenth of a percent. I of course could say the 63 percent approval rating when Reagan left office was "just lies and statistics."  Let's be consistent on this issue.

Ronald Reagan signed tax increases in every year from 1982-87.  Just think of what his deficits would have been if he had not done so.  Under pressure from the Reagan myth on taxes, Obama is in a real bind.  He has promised not to raise taxes on 95 percent of the American people, but he will end up piling up as much debt in four years that Bush did in eight. "Winning one for the Gipper," Obama should simply bite the bullet and say: “Hey, I’m just doing what Reagan did.”

I'm ready to be taxed fairly.  How about you?  Or would you rather charge it to your grandkids and their kids?

Next year is Reagan's birth centenary.  The myths need to be cleared away so that we can honor the man honestly and objectively.

Nick Gier

FIVE MYTHS ABOUT THE REAGAN PRESIDENCY

By Nick Gier

RR is totally lost, out of his depth, and uncomfortable. He has not enough of either knowledge or decisiveness to cut through the contradictory advice that is being offered to him.

–Richard Pipes, notes from a 1981 National Security Council meeting

In his recent book, "Tear Down This Myth: How the Reagan Legacy Has Distorted Our Politics and Haunts Our Future," Will Bunch tells us what many have already known in bits and pieces. Drawing on his book and other sources, I will lay out five major myths about President Ronald Reagan.

Myth #1: Reagan was the most popular president. 

Fairness & Accuracy in Media reports: "Reagan’s 52 percent average approval rating for his presidency places him sixth out of the past ten presidents, behind Kennedy (70 percent), Eisenhower (66 percent), George H.W. Bush (61 percent), Clinton (55 percent), and Johnson (55 percent)."

Myth #2: Reagan was tough on terrorists. 

In August of 1982 U.S. Marines were sent to Lebanon as part of a peacekeeping force to mediate between Christian and Muslim factions in that country’s bloody civil war. When Hezbollah suicide bombers blew up a Marine barracks, killing 229 soldiers and sailors, Reagan “cut and ran,” giving the Syrian- and Iranian-backed militias free reign over large areas of the country. 

Myth #3: Reagan never raised taxes. 

In an article in the conservative National Review (10/29/03), Bruce Bartlett, one of Reagan’s economic advisors, states that the 1982 Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act, signed by Reagan, was "the largest peacetime tax increase in American history." Bartlett goes on to list tax increases for every year from 1982-1987.  

Myth #4: Reagan "proved that deficits don’t matter." 

This is a direct quote from Former Vice President Dick Cheney in response to people such as Bartlett who were saying that President George W. Bush would have to raise taxes just as Reagan did. During his two terms, Reagan added $1.67 trillion to the national debt, while Bush, Jr., cutting taxes while fighting two wars, put us back another $5.3 trillion. Just think of what Reagan’s deficits would have been like if he had not raised taxes.  

Under pressure from the effects of the Reagan myths, Obama has put himself in a real bind.  He has promised not to raise taxes on 95 percent of the American people, but this means that he will pile up as much debt in four years as Bush did in eight. "Winning one for the Gipper," Obama should simply bite the bullet and say: "Hey, I’m just doing what Reagan did."

Myth #5: Reagan won the Cold War. 

Four days after the Berlin Wall came down, USA Today asked a cross-section of Americans whom they thought was responsible for the collapse of Communism. A surprising 43 percent said Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev and only 14 percent chose Ronald Reagan.  

In reality, no one "won" the Cold War because Gorbachev and Reagan agreed to end it peacefully and diplomatically.  Reagan’s advisors were shocked when he proposed – in a one-on-one conversations with the enemy – the total abolition of nuclear weapons.
     
As Temple University historian Vladislav M. Zubok states: "It was Reagan the peacemaker, not the cold warrior, who made the greatest contribution to history."

Whatever faults President Obama has, you will never hear him say "I don’t remember," which was Reagan’s repeated answer about Oliver North selling arms to the Iranians and taking the profits to fund right-wing terrorists in Nicaragua.
     
If some say I’m being unkind to a man on the edge of Alzheimer’s, then I say that Reagan should have resigned for that very reason. One doesn’t keep a likable but incompetent man in the world’s most powerful office.
     
Further, although his national security advisors may well criticize him, you would never hear them say that Obama "is totally lost, out of his depth, and uncomfortable," as Richard Pipes said about Ronald Reagan.

Nick Gier taught philosophy at the University of Idaho for 31 years. 
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