Ronald Reagan, 33rd Governor of California, 40th president of the United States and one bad actor once said, “Politics is just like show business. You have a hell of an opening, coast for a while, and then have a hell of a close.”
Although I can’t say much for his arc, Reagan did give us a hell of a close. There were unrelenting TV specials, memorial books, magazines and DVDs; Official Seal of the 40th President ashtrays; country western “You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet” tribute albums; commemorative T-shirts, mugs, medallions and bomber jackets, an AFC movie marathon (Bedtime for Bonzo, Naughty But Nice, Brother Rat), Nick at Night reruns of Death Valley Days, a legacy of Reaganomics,and a fan base who swore he hung the moon as he tore down the Berlin Wall.
“This is where Morning in America takes you,” my conscience said. A make-believe fantasy gas-lit political world.
Reagan slow-motion death spiral gave our media plenty of prehumous prep. Broadcast, print and internet media were locked and backloaded with content for the most anticipated ending of the young century.
Predictably, after Reagan’s reworked history was loosed on the American public, a long gaunlet of teary-eyed political trumpeters reprised our his performance. Government was bad. Poor people were bad. Drugs were bad. Regulations were bad. We were told that only the individual, only the “I” could fix it.
There were proposals in Congress for a Ronald Reagan national holiday. Reagan-named buildings, parks, and highways sprouted nationwide.
Conveniently left out of the litany and blocked from our collective memory was Reagan’s support for Saddam Hussein, Reagan’s Nicaraguan terrorist “Freedom Fighters,” Reagan’s violation of the Boland Amendment, Reagan’s Iran-Contra scandal, Reagan’s Beirut disaster, Reagan’s arms for hostages deal, Reagan’s denial of the AIDS epidemic, Reagan’s wreath-laying at Bitburg, Reagan’s close ties with Ferdinand Marcos, John Poindexter, James Watt. All of these unsavory Reaganisms were trivialized, sanitized or censored. And it wasn’t surprising. A Reagan said, “Facts are stupid things.”
I was always taught not to speak ill of the dead. They can’t defend themselves. Keep your curses to yourself. To respect the dead shows compassion for the grieving, the offspring, the lovers in waiting. Treat the dead as we want to be treated after WE die.
Why? Speaking ill of the dead makes you see who we are as a people is educating. Let the dead serve as a warning. Let the assholes be known. I know there’ll be horrible things said about me. Least of them, being, “thank God he’s dead.” But shouldn’t we learn from our mistakes, even if we we’re one of them?
So let it be said, thank God that Death Valley Days President, free-market fool is dead. Thank God that font of Republican stupidity is dead.
“All the waste in a year from a nuclear power plant can be stored under a desk,” Reagan said.
Thank God that 2-bit actor who should be stored under a desk is dead.
“A tree’s a tree,” How many more do you need to look at?” Reagan said.
Thank God that soulless cheater poison feeder tear the solar panels of the Whitehouse gasbag is dead.
“Why should we subsidize intellectual curiosity?” Reagan said.
Thank God that Hillbilly Ellegy progenitor shill for the filthy rich is dead.
“Fascism was really the basis for the New Deal,” Reagan said.
Thank God that kiss-ass of all things anti-regulatory, anti-government, and anti-humane is dead .
“What we have found in this country, and maybe we’re more aware of it now, is one problem that we’ve had, even in the best of times, and that is the people who are sleeping on the grates, the homeless who are homeless, you might say, by choice,” Reagan said.
Thank God that slicked-back smartass root of our homeless epidemic is dead.
“Unemployment insurance is a pre-paid vacation for freeloaders,” Reagan said.
The source of fake news was dead.
That cradle of social insecurity is dead.
“We were told four years ago that 17 million people went to bed hungry every night. Well, that was probably true. They were all on a diet,” Reagan said.
The well spring of infotainment is dead.
He may live on in others even if they deny it. So let’s dig the hole deeper and bury this charade of government is the problem, filthy rich, needs to be buried deep. But thank God that ketchup is a vegetable lying sack of Hollywood cowboy shit is dead. That empty the state mental hospitals into the street mother fucker is finally dead.
“Growing and decaying vegetation in this land are responsible for 93 percent of the oxides of nitrogen,” Reagan said.
“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. The U.S. Geological Survey has told me that the proven potential for oil in Alaska alone is greater than the proven reserves in Saudi Arabia,” Reagan said.
“It’s silly talking about how many years we will have to spend in the jungles of Vietnam when we could pave the whole country and put parking stripes on it and still be home by Christmas,” Reagan said.
God willing, Reagan will have a hell of a close.
VVVV
It’s difficult to boil an entire administration’s worth of economic policy down to a few words, but for a working definition of Reaganomics, let’s look at a few key features of Reagan’s policies: cutting taxes (especially for the rich) for trickle-down economics, cutting social welfare spending, increasing military spending, and deregulating economic activity in the name of “free” markets. Reagan’s path to American greatness meant making rich people pay less in taxes, giving poor people less help, building the imperial forces he used in foreign policy, and making life easier for the capitalist class. Sound familiar? It should given Trump’s Reaganomics revitalization project. Trump has also cut taxes for the rich on the basis of trickle-down theory, cut social spending on programs like food stamps, increased military spending while leaning into imperial symbolism, and rolled back regulations on banks and fossil fuel industries, two of the worst actors in our national economy. But it’s more than just the fundamental tenets of Trumponomics that the current president has in common with Reagan. Trump has inherited the world Reagan helped create. Reagan’s handling of the AIDS crisis in the 1980s, characterized by downplaying and ignoring the threat, is mirrored in how Trump has handled COVID-19. Or look at Reagan’s massive expansion of the war on drugs, which only helped exacerbate the racist injustices at the very root of our so-called justice system, helping set the stage for the Black Lives Matter protests Trump has been so eager to decry this year, reviving the law-and-order politics of Reagan and Nixon before him. Trump is not a foil to Reagan; he is the natural evolution of the GOP’s emphasis on telegenic oppressors. It only makes sense that, 40 years after a movie star set this country on a course toward nationalism and economic exploitation, a reality TV star is doing everything he can to accelerate a downward spiral into mythical American exceptionalism that Reagan wrote the script for.
— Nathan Callahan, November 19, 2003
