All Reagan, all the time

At least for a little while.

I will not belabor the clichéed Gen-X Reagan-was-the-first-president-I-remember stuff. (Stacie did that well enough here.) I have something a little different.

When things go wrong, no matter how big or small, I often say, "You know who I blame?" The answer, of course, is "Reagan, just on principle."

Now, I know not everything is his fault. In fact, there were some things that he did well. But if you take a look at the mess we're in now--the mess we've been in for the better part of two decades--a lot of the blame lies at Reagan's feet.

I refuse to launch into any kind of anti-Reagan screed; I don't think he deserves vitriol as much as some of my blogeagues seem to. I will only casually reference Atrios and Kos in case anyone here may be laboring under the (mis)understanding that Reagan was the most popular president ever.

Instead, let me just calmly explain what I mean. Reagan, I believe, was the first president--at least in modern times--to put ideology over anything else. Political gain and partisanship won over helping people or doing right by the country every time. Nixon, bad as he was, had a genuine concern for the well-being of the country: opening China, proposing universal heath care, the EPA, for example. Carter, of course, was a saint. Johnson and Kennedy, while partisan at times and unwilling to get us out of Southeast Asia, had heartfelt compassion for the people they were elected to lead. Even George H. W. Bush, father of the current guy, tried to subvert the political demands of his party ("No new taxes!") with the real concern I think he felt for the American people--think of the ADA, for example.

But since Reagan, since the Gipper there proved that you can be extraordinarily electable and the public can even be forgiving if you are driven by pure ideology--as long as you put an optimistic face on it, anyway--the presidency has tended toward the ideological extreme.

Clinton began by pushing the liberal agenda that got him elected (health care, gays in the military, balancing that darn budget) but left trumpeting conservative ideology ("The era of big government. Is. Over!"). I still think that Clinton had his moments of genuine leadership and times when common sense trumped ideology and politics in his administration. You can really see the influence of the Reagan years, though, on Republicans' reactions to Clinton throughout his term. From the moment Clinton secured the nomination in 1992, the partisan attacks began. They continue through this day, with either blatant attacks on Clinton himself or his wife or Vice President Gore. (Gore raised his voice for a few moments in a speech the other day; ergo, he's whackadoo.)

And do I even have to begin to itemize the ways in which partisan ideology has overridden the Whopper™ and his administration in the last few years? Bush's stem-cell research stance, for example, has all the hallmarks of ideological influence rather than good science. (It's also ironic given Nancy Reagan's crusade to expand research programs.) The whole War on Terra™ is an ideological exercise--Iraq is only a terrorist threat if you belive Iraq is a terrorist threat. And it's better to pour billions into overseas wars than into inspecting container ships in our ports and funding first-responders at home.

This is all straight out of the Reagan playbook: Gay men have AIDS? Well, okay, let them die--don't want to rile up the Moral Majority. Nicaraguan Contras fighting the forces of communism? Let's see if we can give them weapons somehow despite international law and the clear will of Congress. That there union on strike? Fire 'em. Inflation too high? Cut taxes on the wealthy. Deficit too big? Cut taxes on the wealthy. Welfare queens driving Cadillacs? Cut taxes on the wealthy. This suit make me look fat? Cut taxes on the wealthy.

It is hard, perhaps because of distance, perhaps because the pickin's are slim, to think of a single Reagan-era program that helped people who needed help.

What Reagan had that made him popular, and what Clinton also came eqipped with, was an unbridled sense of optimism. Reagan always had a smile on his face; he and Democrats in Congress could fight like hell over policy, and the Dems would walk away still liking and respecting the man. There was a reason why so many people considered themselves "Reagan Democrats"--Ronnie had this thing where people, even if they didn't notice the ideological bent or the indictments pouring in like flood water, just plain liked him. Clinton, after eight years of manufactured scandal, compromised liberal agendas, and randyness, left office with even higher Gallup numbers than Reagan, because he was a charmer, always smiling, always liked.

Bush, though, while full of the partisanship that grew directly out of the Reagan years, lacks the optimism Reagan and Clinton had. He can't even successfully mask his partisanship with an air of "Compassionate Conservatism" anymore because anyone who's paying attention can see he absolutely lacks compassion or empathy. There are Republicans wildly and (in my opinion) irrationally behind Bush's War on Terra™ and tax cuts for the wealthy--but I think they have to concede that this administration is not giving us any hope or smiles to hang on to. I mean, even this morning, Donald Rumsfeld conceded about the War on Terra™, "It's quite clear to me that we do not have a coherent approach to this." They don't know what they're doing, but, darn it, they know why they're doing it!

So the best idea I've heard for dealing with the "Mourning in Amerca" (sadly, yes, that was my local paper's headline yesterday) stuff is to remind everyone, Republican, Democrat, and Independent alike, that Bush is no Reagan. (I stole it from space at dKos.) Yes, Reagan was, on balance, bad for the country, but think about how best to frame this election season in light of the new Reagan hagiopgraphy.

In other words, Bush is trying to out-Reagan Reagan, and we should be reminding those who like Bush that he's failing miserably.