PoliticalChic
Diamond Member
1. President Obama decided to read a biography of Ronald Reagan during his Christmas holiday in Hawaii might be taken as a sign that Reagans triumph over liberals is complete. Can anyone imagine John F. Kennedy admitting he was reading a biography of Calvin Coolidge, or Jimmy Carter taking in lessons from Dwight Eisenhower? This represents the culmination of a remarkable turnabout in Reagans reputation, most notably among liberals
2. liberals are attempting a subtle revisionism. We can expect to hear (and have already heard once or twice) that even Reagan didnt attack entitlements the way Paul Ryan and todays radical House Republicans propose to do.
3. A hundred years ago, the leading Progressives appropriated Abraham Lincoln for their cause, even as they explicitly attacked Lincolns (and the Founders) central political philosophy of natural rights. It culminated in the chutzpah of Franklin Roosevelts declaration in 1929 that it is time for us Democrats to claim Lincoln as one of our own,
4. The liberal revision of Reagan has been unfolding for a while now, and at the center of it is the effort to separate him from his conservative beliefs .He raised taxes! He talked to the Soviets and reached arms agreements!
5. The late John Patrick Diggins, an unorthodox liberal who was a close friend of Arthur Schlesinger Jr.s, argued in his 2007 book "Ronald Reagan: Fate, Freedom, and the Making of History," that Reagan deserves to be considered one of the four greatest American presidents, alongside Washington, Lincoln, and Franklin Roosevelt.
6. In a 2009 National Journal article entitled Republicans Have Reagan All Wrong, [Jonathan] Rauch asserts that Reagan was not a Reaganite. He builds a purely circumstantial case. Reagan cut Washingtons share of GDP by only 1 percent, raised taxes several times, ran up huge deficits, and backed away from cutting Social Security and Medicare.
7. And in discussing Reagans greatest acknowledged achievement ending the Cold War liberals conveniently omit that they opposed him at every turn. Who can forget the relentless scorn heaped on Reagan for the evil empire speech and the Strategic Defense Initiative? Historian Henry Steele Commager said the evil empire speech was the worst presidential speech in American history, and Ive read them all. What is the world to think, New York Times columnist Anthony Lewis wrote, when the greatest of powers is led by a man who applies to the most difficult human problem a simplistic theology?
8. Liberals who now laud Reagans Cold War statecraft should be made to explain why they were wrong and Reagan right, for it gets directly to liberalisms sentimental view of human affairs which affects current policy, from the War on Terror to crime and the welfare state. More broadly, they should be made to explain why they appreciate the virtues of conservatives only after they are gone from the scene (as we have also seen with Goldwater, Eisenhower, and even Nixon to some extent).
9. .[In] his 1965 autobiography, "Wheres the Rest of Me?," The classic liberal, Reagan wrote, used to be the man who believed the individual was, and should be forever, the master of his destiny. That is now the conservative position. The liberal used to believe in freedom under law. He now takes the ancient feudal position that power is everything. He believes in a stronger and stronger central government, in the philosophy that control is better than freedom. The conservative now quotes Thomas Paine, a longtime refuge of the liberals: Government is a necessary evil; let us have as little of it as possible.
Reagan Reclaimed - Steven F. Hayward - National Review Online
2. liberals are attempting a subtle revisionism. We can expect to hear (and have already heard once or twice) that even Reagan didnt attack entitlements the way Paul Ryan and todays radical House Republicans propose to do.
3. A hundred years ago, the leading Progressives appropriated Abraham Lincoln for their cause, even as they explicitly attacked Lincolns (and the Founders) central political philosophy of natural rights. It culminated in the chutzpah of Franklin Roosevelts declaration in 1929 that it is time for us Democrats to claim Lincoln as one of our own,
4. The liberal revision of Reagan has been unfolding for a while now, and at the center of it is the effort to separate him from his conservative beliefs .He raised taxes! He talked to the Soviets and reached arms agreements!
5. The late John Patrick Diggins, an unorthodox liberal who was a close friend of Arthur Schlesinger Jr.s, argued in his 2007 book "Ronald Reagan: Fate, Freedom, and the Making of History," that Reagan deserves to be considered one of the four greatest American presidents, alongside Washington, Lincoln, and Franklin Roosevelt.
6. In a 2009 National Journal article entitled Republicans Have Reagan All Wrong, [Jonathan] Rauch asserts that Reagan was not a Reaganite. He builds a purely circumstantial case. Reagan cut Washingtons share of GDP by only 1 percent, raised taxes several times, ran up huge deficits, and backed away from cutting Social Security and Medicare.
7. And in discussing Reagans greatest acknowledged achievement ending the Cold War liberals conveniently omit that they opposed him at every turn. Who can forget the relentless scorn heaped on Reagan for the evil empire speech and the Strategic Defense Initiative? Historian Henry Steele Commager said the evil empire speech was the worst presidential speech in American history, and Ive read them all. What is the world to think, New York Times columnist Anthony Lewis wrote, when the greatest of powers is led by a man who applies to the most difficult human problem a simplistic theology?
8. Liberals who now laud Reagans Cold War statecraft should be made to explain why they were wrong and Reagan right, for it gets directly to liberalisms sentimental view of human affairs which affects current policy, from the War on Terror to crime and the welfare state. More broadly, they should be made to explain why they appreciate the virtues of conservatives only after they are gone from the scene (as we have also seen with Goldwater, Eisenhower, and even Nixon to some extent).
9. .[In] his 1965 autobiography, "Wheres the Rest of Me?," The classic liberal, Reagan wrote, used to be the man who believed the individual was, and should be forever, the master of his destiny. That is now the conservative position. The liberal used to believe in freedom under law. He now takes the ancient feudal position that power is everything. He believes in a stronger and stronger central government, in the philosophy that control is better than freedom. The conservative now quotes Thomas Paine, a longtime refuge of the liberals: Government is a necessary evil; let us have as little of it as possible.
Reagan Reclaimed - Steven F. Hayward - National Review Online