This is where AS becomes a hard case:
Reagan did indeed presage some of the worst aspects of today's degenerate Republicanism. His deficit spending, his subversion of constitutionalism in Iran-Contra, his coded appeal to Southern bigotry when beginning his campaign, and his dithering on the HIV epidemic are all fore-runners of later abuse. But they were mild in comparison to Bush.
Reagan would never have signed the biggest increase in entitlement spending since LBJ; Reagan's domestic spending record was far better than Bush's; Reagan raised taxes when he felt it necessary; he reformed the tax system in his second term; he vetoed pork; his Supreme Court nominees were diverse; he would never have gone to war in the reckless, unplanned way the Bush administration did in Iraq; and his foreign policy was a blend of deep conviction but also pragmatism, as he reached out to an imploding Soviet Union in his final years. Even on Iran-Contra, he eventually fessed up, and apologized. You can see the seeds of future conservative self-destruction and hubris, but Reagan's record, to my mind, is on balance, a conservative one in the best sense. His undoing of excessive government control of the economy and his defeat of the Soviet Union dwarf everything else.
They were mild compared to Bush? I'm not sure that is much of a compliment, to put things in such relative terms. Wouldn't Bush-41, whose 'kinder, gentler' phrase might suggest a more apt comparison, by someone fully in the Conservative tradition? (not that I would suggest picking Kirby Silver Surfer over Aqua Man, for someone else).
The rest shows how AS still has it bad for his boyhood hero. It was Reagan who brought us the Ed Meese spectacular and not even a peep of political or personal dismay over Bowers v. Hardwick (1986). It was Reagan who gave official jobs to the Hugh Hewitts of the world, who haunt us still with the 'Reagan Revolution'; and whose 'strategy for the judiciary' wound up in Borkfest, directly or indirectly.
Last he incorrectly identifies Reagan as a prime cause of the Soviet collapse, a hagiographic halo whose false glow will probably be with us for quite some time, it appears.
sullylink
