Trying To Fill Reagans Boots

Note: This article was in the works as the nation was advised of the sad passing of former President Ronald Reagan. I would like to extend my condolences to the Reagan family and commend their bravery through his tragic struggle with Alzheimer’s. The American public of all political backgrounds will undoubtedly remember him as true American legend.

In that past three and a half years the American public has caught on the reality of President George W. Bush trying to model and position himself after the legacy of the former President Ronald Reagan. A myriad of articles have touched on the topic of Bush’s style and agenda being modeled after the spread of the Reagan White House. In January 2003 Bill Keller in a New York Times editorial frankly put it, “Bush is not, as Reagan was, an original, but he has adapted Reagan's ideas to new times, and found some new language in which to market them.” The legacy of Reagan advisors and their direct successors have continuously littered the Bush White House. The temptation to model this administration after the only President that left his presidential tenure with greater admiration of the American public that he possessed at the start of his administration has proven too good to pass up. This mixed with the guilty pleasure of only facing mild resistance in comparison to that caused by Reagan’s disregard of public opinion and political opposition has only encouraged Bush’s advisors to redouble their efforts and push the envelope further.

Keller makes a startling estimation, “That Bush is Reaganesque is a conceit that some conservatives have wishfully, tentatively embraced since he emerged as a candidate, and one that Bush himself has encouraged. The [GOP] party faithful have been pining for a new Reagan since Reagan, and for Bush the analogy has the added virtue of providing an alternative political lineage; he's not Daddy's Boy, he's Reagan Jr. The comparison has only gained currency since Bush entered the White House. Some Republicans speak of the current era, with the culmination of Reagan's ballistic missile defense and the continuing assault on marginal tax rates and, especially, the standing tall against global evil as the recommencing of the Reagan ‘revolution.'”

In California during the Vietnam era the then Gov. Reagan blasted and intimidated anti-war protest. Bush’s stance on anti-war protest can only be compared to Reagan’s if it is qualified with the distinction that Bush has been capable of usurping the constitutional rights of the anti-war protester and suspected terrorist threats alike. But in all due respect to Reagan, I don’t believe the urge to undermine the veracity of the constitution was ever part of his agenda.

On May 15, 1967 CBS television and radio hosted a trans-Atlantic debate titled “Town Meeting of the World: ‘The Image of America and the Youth of the World.’ European youth engaged in questioning Sen. Robert F. Kennedy and Gov. Ronald Reagan in a debate that began with questioning their view of the Vietnam war. Reagan made a naïve though seemingly logical estimation, “Well, I definitely think the [anti-war] demonstrations are prolonging the war in that they're giving the enemy, who I believe must face defeat on relative comparison of the power of the two nations, they are giving him encouragement to continue, to hold out in the hope that division here in America will bring about a peace without defeat for that enemy.”

Reagan’s quasi-logic was based on the amount of credence he gave to the ability of our awesomely terrifying war machine to crush a technologically and seemingly ignorant class of third-world peasants. He couldn’t imagine the possibility of an outgunned and comparatively non-robust people could withhold the might of our season armed forces.

This blunder of reasoning would cost Reagan dearly for over a decade; stifled his presidential aspirations, left him open to an astonishing rebuff by Kennedy and ironically alienated the European audience whose imperialism the Vietnam War was in aide of. And tragically this view cost an amazing loss of life and submitted the United States to an embarrassing retreat as no one in Reagan’s circle of allies considered the inability of our military might to debase the sheer will of the communists. He also overestimated the U.S. ability to perform an effective offensive against guerilla warfare, an erroneous mentality that wouldappear several times during his presidency.

However hostile Reagan was to anti-war protest as a governor, Reagan showed a level of maturity that the Bush administration does not. In the same debate Reagan went on to state, “But again, and I'm sure the Senator [Kennedy] agrees with me, America will jealously guard this right of dissent, because I think the greatness of our country has been based on our thinking that everyone has a right even to be wrong.”

As an attitude of dissent against the occupation of Iraq is growing, justifications for the war not surfaced and as casualties of terrorist attacks against our troops increase. The American people have learned a lot since the Vietnam war. People’s distaste of the senseless loss of life of American troops is not as easily moderated by insults of being “un-American.” Americans are quickly becoming less willing to allow our young people die for a country that is violently showing their disapproval of our military presence.

I am reminded of the now infamous Evil Empire speech of 1982 that bears another pearl of wisdom that Regan gave us that is often over looked; “Regimes planted by bayonets do not take root.” Reagan, though a harsh critic of communism and totalitarian regimes that insisted on increasing military spending, did not commit our troops to extensive military campaign. He could not support senseless loss of American troops any more than the American public could stomach it, which motivated the withdrawal from Lebanon after the bombing of military barracks in Beirut. However this was not the only factor. Reagan’s approach towards establishing democracy in troubled regions was approached in the same manner he did on social service issues, with the attitude of self sufficiency. He offered aide, even though illegally at times such as in the Iran-Contra affair, for people to carry out their own revolution.

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