Posted on 08/23/2011 9:24:43 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
If Sarah Palin does decide to enter into the race for the Republican presidential nominee, she will have a few things in common with one of the greatest Republican candidates in history.
There are, of course, far too many differences between the life and career of Ronald Reagan, and that of Sarah Palin to make a litigimate comparison. However, there are interesting parallels in the lives of these two conservative politicians.
At a young age, both had congenial personalities, with a particularly strong faith in the goodness of people. Both were recognized by their peers as outstanding leaders in the early school years.
Palin attended Wasilla High School where she was the head of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, and a member of the girls' basketball and cross country running teams. During her senior year, she was co-captain and point guard at the basketball team that won the 1982 Alaska state championship, earning the nickname “Sarah Barracuda” for her competitive streak.
Reagan attended Eureka College, related by covenant to the Christian Church. At Eureka College he excelled in campus politics, sports and theater. He was a member of the football team, captain of the swim team and was elected student body president.
Ronald Reagan, like Sarah Palin, had an unusually strong competitive streak.
After graduating at the University of Idaho with a Bachelor’s Degree in Communication, with an emphasis on journalism, Sarah worked as a sportscaster for KTUU-TV and KTVA-TV in Anchorage, and as a sports reporter for the Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman
After graduating from Eureka in 1932, with a major in sociology and economics, Reagan, like Sarah Palin, landed a job as a sportscaster. His first sportscaster job was at the University of Iowa. Later he worked as a sportscaster for WOC in Davenport and WHO radio in Des Moines.
Ronald Reagan was a conservative politician who supported Barry Goldwater for President in 1964. Reagan ran for President four times and lost twice. Whatever your thoughts on Reagan, he wasn't a quitter.
John McCain's loss in 2008 was one of the few times in Sarah Palin's life that she has lost an election. Based upon her recent activities, many people believe Sarah Palin is going to enter the presidential race. If she does, it is because she is no quitter.
Sarah Palin was also a conservative politician when she first entered into politics. She believed government could not be trusted to wisely spend the taxpayer’s money.
Palin entered politics because she was concerned that revenue from a new Wasilla sales tax would not be spent wisely.
In 1996, Palin had been serving on the city council for four years, and decided to run for mayor. She defeated three-term incumbent mayor John Stein, running on a platform of "fresh ideas and energy.” In the campaign, she vowed to replace "stale leadership" and criticized Stein for wasteful spending and high taxes.
Sarah Palin once said, “To reduce deficit spending and our enormous debt, you reign in spending. You cut the budget. You don't take more from the private sector and grow government with it.”
Prior to running for Governor, Ronald Reagan was a spokesman for GE, championing the core tenets of American conservatism: free markets, lower taxes, and limited government. Ronald Reagan, like Sarah Palin, believed the government could not be trusted to wisely spend taxpayer’s money.
Ronald Reagan once said, “Government is like a baby---an alimentary canal with a big appetite at one end and no responsibility at the other.”
In 2006, Palin ran for Governor of Alaska on a clean-government platform. In the November election, Palin was heavily outspent but still victorious, defeating former Democratic governor Tony Knowles by a margin of 48.3% to 40.9%.
She became Alaska's first female governor and, at the age of 42, the youngest governor in Alaskan history, the state's first governor to have been born after Alaska achieved U.S. statehood. She took office on December 4, 2006, and for most of her term was very popular with Alaska voters. Polls taken in 2007 showed her with 93% and 89% popularity among all voters, which led some media outlets to call her "the most popular governor in America."
Ronald Reagan defeated Democrat Pat Brown in 1966 to win the office of Governor of the State of California. Reagan ran on a platform that primarily focused on two themes; entitlement reforms, emphasizing the need to reduce welfare costs, and secondly a promise to reduce incidences of criminal activity.
Though Reagan served two terms as Governor of California, he would never enjoy the enormous popularity in that state as did Sarah Palin in Alaska. In that sense, Sarah Palin is distinguished from Reagan.
Sarah Palin was chosen as John McCain’s running mate in the 2008 Presidential campaign. Her conservative views were widely attacked by the mainstream media. As a Vice-Presidential candidate she misspoke on ocassion and had a few minor gaffes in her press interviews, but those paled in comparison to the embarrassing and awkward comments attributed to Barack Obama’s Vice Presidential candidate, Joe Biden.
During the Presidential campaign Palin said, “Washington has got to, across the board, lower taxes for small businesses so that our mom and pops can reinvest and hire people, so that our businesses can thrive”.
Palin’s conservative comments angered the liberal press, which dragged Palin through the mud every chance they got. Joe Biden, on the other hand, got a free pass.
Ronald Reagan lost in his first bid to win the Republican nomination for President. Like Sarah Palin, the liberal press was appalled at Reagan’s conservative views. He too was dragged through the mud with accusations about his sincerity, his management style and even his mental acuity.
Reagan was widely portrayed as uninformed and uninterested in details, the man who said trees cause pollution and once failed to recognize his own housing secretary.
He was often described as lazy, "just an actor", a man who'd rather be clearing brush at his California ranch and loved a good midday nap.
Like Sarah Palin, Ronald Reagan quickly figured out he could deliver his message over the heads of the liberal mainstream media — often decried at the time as media "manipulation."
The liberal press continues to attack Sarah Palin today, long after the 2008 election, just as they dogged Ronald Reagan long after he lost his first bid for the Republican nomination.
If Sarah Palin does decide to run for President and in the event she wins, then President Palin will have one important link to the legacy of President Reagan. They both will have been elected to replace a one-term, liberal Democrat whose toxic economic policies were so bad as to cause U.S. consumer sentiment to sink to its lowest point in decades.
Wouldn’t that be one for the history books? President Palin and President Reagan, two controversial, conservative politicians, widely expected to lose the Presidential election, both defeating a one-term, liberal, Democrat President whose economic policies caused a humiliating loss of consumer confidence.
adjective
1.(of a phrase or idea) Lacking significance through having been overused; unoriginal and trite
No need to read any further.
President Reagan was a Moviestar and was well loved by *Hollywood* he did not experience the vitriol Sarah Palin has from the Media, Hollywood and Crazy Liberals...
Many of Dean Martin’s Roasts are Major Moviestars roasting Ronald Reagan....
In addition...Ronald Reagan never had to endure what kind of Family Man he was..
Totally different Generation Ronald Regan had to deal with...
Nothing compared to what we have today...
Let’s make it happen!
If someone looks hard enough, they can usually find it. Hackneyed is right.
They also both like ice cream, they are almost identical
I was attacked in a private email by someone who shall remain anonymous suggesting that I didn’t have the utmost respect for you and Sarah......I am writing here so you know publicly that I do.
“Whatever your thoughts on Reagan, he wasn’t a quitter.”
Exactly!!
Reagan was not a quitter. Palin is a quitter. She walked out on the people of Alaska when being the governor of AK was going to hold back her personal ambitions. Abandoned the people that voted for her to seek fame and fortune in the lower 48. Disgusting!
Ronald Reagan would never have willingly abandoned the people of CA! I dumped Palin when I learned she walked out of Alaska and into a Fox News job, got the big advance for a book deal, was getting big speaking fees, etc.
Why Rush, Hannity and other “conservative” commentators still praise Palin is beyond me. Quitting an office you campaigned for and took an oath to fulfill is most definitely NOT a conservative principle!
Time to rework my tag line.
No worthy comments. The article truly speaks for itself. There’s no way I could improve on that.
Had you continued reading, in the next paragraph he wrote that, like Reagan, “she is no quitter.”
I am tired of this endless litany of comparisons between Reagan and Palin. There just really aren’t any, it’s a stretch, different times and different people.
Run Sarah, Run!
________________________________________
No comment, just two quotes from the essay.....
1)"There are, of course, far too many differences between the life and career of Ronald Reagan, and that of Sarah Palin to make a litigimate comparison"
2) Whatever your thoughts on Reagan, he wasn't a quitter."
No comment necessary.
The thing is.....that is not the excuse she gave when she quit or on TV months later.
Not sure which end this crap is coming out of, but it sure does have a foul smelly odor.
I see that you think it's preferable then to go running around the country on the government's dime while at the same time looking for another job (like most of these current jokers), all the while you're getting paid and neglecting your present duties for a job that you previously campaigned and got elected to do.
Yeah, I see how 'honorable' your thinking goes.
I totally agree with you....
We do not live in a Ronald Reagan World, are issues are NOT the same....
Comparing Sarah Palin to Ronald Reagan is ridiculous IMO....
Ronald Ragan did not live a Simple Country life..He was very wealthy, was part of the Hollywood Community...Thier was no shame in that, he was not demonized for being rich and associating with the wealthy.....
Frank Sinatra praised Reagan and said Liberal Policies were a thing of the past, when he was interviewed at the Republican national Convention...
Totally different time in our history.....
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