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In his ghostwritten memoirs, Reagan (1911 - 2004) said "Looking back now, I realize it wasn't a bad apprenticeship for someone who'd someday enter public life....the GE tours (and SAG) became almost a graduate course in political science." It was a prelude to becoming California governor (1967 - 1975), then president (1981 - 1989), an actor's role of a lifetime, impersonating a president.
In his book, "Triumph of Politics: Why the Reagan Revolution Failed," David Stockman, Reagan's Director of the Office of Management and Budget (1981 - 1985), called him shallow and extreme, a man who "ignore(d) all the relevant facts and wander(ed) in circles." His administration was a "frontal attack on the welfare state."
His close advisors weren't "the best and brightest" and some were "intellectually disreputable." He considered Reagan "a cranky obscurantist whose political base was barnacled with every kook and fringe group that inhabited the vasty deep of American politics."
In 2011, however, he'll be reinvented, Los Angeles Times writer Richard Simon saying events across the country are planned. "A Reagan-themed float (graced) Colorado Boulevard in Pasadena during" the New Year's day Rose parade. CNN called it "the first time (it) ever included a presidential-themed float."
Reagan's Dixon, IL boyhood home commissioned a musical piece to honor him, the "Reagan Suite." Eureka College, his alma mater, will commemorate his roots. Warner Bros., where he made films, may produce one about his Hollywood years. Supporters hope to name a mountain in Nevada after him, and a Reagan statue in London will be unveiled.
His 100th birthday is on Super Bowl Sunday, so expect synergies to his "Gipper" role (George Gipp, Notre Dame football star) in "Knute Rockne All American" (1940). As president, he used the phrase "Win one for the Gipper" as a political slogan.
Reagan's Presidential Library will also host events that weekend, including a ribbon-cutting ceremony and military flyover to celebrate its museum's multimillion makeover, followed the next day by a Los Angeles concert.
Imagine - all that and more is just the beginning, making him bigger than life, reinventing him better than Hollywood by transforming a ham actor into a superstar, a third-rate president into a demigod, a rogue perhaps heading for Mount Rushmore instead of a long overdue defrocking.
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