Posted on 12/21/2021 10:18:55 AM PST by ammodotcom
Ronald Reagan was arguably the last truly great and transformative American President. His story starts in a small town in Illinois and ends with the fall of Communism. At the time, he was the oldest man to be President, showing Americans that advanced age didn’t mean diminished energy – he united a nation like few have before and none have since.
His father gave him the nickname “Dutch” as a child, one of many that would follow Reagan throughout his life. He was so named because he resembled a stereotypical Dutch boy.
Two values were strong in the Reagan household: First, the family held a deep religious faith. For Reagan’s father, it was Catholicism. For his mother (and later Reagan) it would be the Disciples of Christ. Second, the family was outraged by injustice in the world. Reagan’s father opposed the Klan, not least of all because of their anti-Catholicism. His mother was a member of the Social Gospel movement and believed in a special role for America in eliminating injustice in the world.
One incident from Reagan’s youth was particularly impactful: When his college football team played nearby, two black teammates were not allowed to stay at the hotel. Reagan’s mother let the pair stay overnight and prepared them breakfast in the morning. Reagan himself was later an active and vocal backer of the Civil Rights Movement.
Reagan was an unremarkable student both at Dixon High School and Eureka College, but he was very active in campus extra-curriculars. He excelled at football and swimming. He also acquired a taste for acting, as well as his father’s passion for storytelling – something that would serve him immensely throughout his political career. He also got his first taste of politics at Eureka.
After college, Reagan got a job as the voice of the Chicago Cubs for Des Moines, Iowa. Here he earned a reputation for excellence in transforming bare bones cables about the game into vivid descriptions of action. While out on the West Coast with the Cubs, he conducted a screen test for Warner Bros. that sparked his film career.
Reagan’s film career was not an instant success. Reagan worked on B movies, quipping that the producers “didn’t want it good, they wanted it Thursday.” His performance as George Gipp in Knute Rockne, All Americanis perhaps his most fondly remembered role, one which led to his nickname, “The Gipper.” Another, less flattering nickname, “Bonzo,” came from Bedtime for Bonzo, a romantic comedy about a pair of psychologists who adopt a chimp as a pet.
Perhaps his most accomplished film role was his final one: Jack Browning in the 1964 remake of The Killers. Here Reagan broke type by playing a villain, starring alongside Lee Marvin, Angie Dickinson, Clu Gulager, and John Cassavettes.
During the Second World War, Ronald Reagan served in the United States Army Air Service. Poor eyesight prohibited Reagan from overseas deployment during the war, but he served with distinction, nonetheless, producing over 400 training films for the military and earning the rank of captain.
After his film career cooled down, Reagan achieved his greatest fame as the host of General Electric Theaterand Death Valley Days, two anthology series of the kind that were popular during the Golden Age of Television. However, Reagan was beginning to get a taste of the political arena.
Loved that guy.
I’d highly recommend his autobiography. We were blessed to have him.
Trump was even more transformative. That is why after everything else failed to destroy him they had to steal his election and make political prisoners out of his supporters.
Nah, Reagan changed the world more, mostly but not entirely for the better. Trump may have been potentially transformative, but in the end he changed very little.
bookmark
One of my favorite memories of him was the chaotic trip of the procession carrying him from Pt Mugu where I was working, to Simi Valley for internment.
The scene of the 101 freeway coming to a total stop as the people went to the center divider to watch him pass was incredible.
That will never be seen again for a former president.
Sad to think he was in all probability the last of his kind.
I’m very glad I grew up and came into adulthood within his 2 terms.
To think, if I was born later, those 8 wonderful, formative years would have instead been during Obama’s 2 terms. Ugh.
My grandfather knew Reagan way back when RR worked at WHO radio in Des Moines. They ate lunch together and became friends. The last Grandad heard from him was a postcard from California, while Reagan was attending a Cubs game. “I have a screen test next week, wish me luck.”
Great story.
The best there ever was and the best there ever will be.
Reagan did bring down the Soviet Union , which was very good, but Trump has revealed how corrupt our system has become. This is also transformative because admitting there is a problem is the first step in changing it.
This morning Facebook reminded me that it was on this day five years ago, that I visited the Reagan Presidential Library. One of the best day trips I ever made.
“Trump may have been potentially transformative, but in the end he changed very little.”
You may be missing the change. Don’t look at it as completed.
Trump established a far greater country by what he did. And everything the socialists have tried to change back or worse so far except those things the people have no way to stop them, has caused the libs grief.
Outside the US, post Trump, we now have far more threatening nuclear countries than ever and the US is supporting their efforts. We are in up to our eyeballs with countries that are making every effort to destroy us. We are going broke trying to support the failures of countries all over the globe. We are inviting and supplementing illegals into the country expediting the destruction of our standards, safety, and resources along with punishing our children with a future filled with ruination. Within the US, we are going financially demolished with the libs using a failing ecology theme tossing our supplies of fossil fuels into a point where they can’t save us (from ourselves). There’s a lot more, but here’s the result I think you may have missed:
Biden’s approval rating first of December: 38%
Harris’ approval rating first of December: 28%
https://www.dailynews.com/2021/12/02/like-it-or-not-the-democrats-are-stuck-with-kamala-harris/
Congress approval rating late October: 21%
Within about a year’s time frame, through executive orders to change what Trump did while using congress attacking him personally trying to make him the demon for his actions while lying about both the acts and the results, they have been gutting themselves trying to erase Trump’s results. And the people are seeing it in the polls even the libs are running as they can’t seem to stack the deck with their style of polling.
Trump did a lot while he was in. But the results of his work is still out in cyberspace to come back and bite the libs when they try to gain their type of control again. Like Jack Palance said, “Day ain’t over.” The best may be on the horizon. Look for it, I think it’s there.
wy69
Reagan was able to use the Establishment to take down the Soviet Union, a worthy accomplishment, but he couldn't take down the Establishment and didn't really try. Another word for the Deep State or the Establishment was the "blob." Trump couldn't get around the blob last time, and I'm skeptical about him being able to do it next time.
“...able to suit up a trained, competent and loyal team skilled enough and strong enough to get around the bureaucracy, the media, and the voter fraud team?”
There is only one way to do this and I feel it is getting the public educated and that requires saying something. The numbers they currently display shows that people are getting tired of blind leadership and the pain and harm it is accomplishing. When you make people uncomfortable and cause them difficulties, even a dog will bite its master if the guy hits it with a rolled up newspaper enough. But it is going to have to be a concerted effort to the truth and causing the voters not to blindly believe what they hear. That is the hurdle and was when Trump took office. And the first thing he did was throw the lying press off his plane. That was the start.
But he got no support from even his own party. He was even attacked by them...with nothing to harm him with while his party was sitting on their mouths.
“Reagan was able to use the Establishment to take down the Soviet Union...”
Reagan didn’t take down Russia. He caused them to change their style of aggressiveness but they took down the wall in 1989 and another one was put up in 1991. I was stationed in Northern California at that time but was sent TDY to Germany and Italy for the moment those things got crazy.
Russia is still out there, stronger militarily than we are, even though you can only destroy the earth once, and are using their influence with a few hundred countries around the world, some openly threatening the US with nuclear armament like North Korea, Iran, and now even China is talking to them.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_relations_of_Russia#Africa
“Trump couldn’t get around the blob last time, and I’m skeptical about him being able to do it next time.”
Nothing from nothing leaves nothing. If Trump can’t get support from his party, and the voters get more and more pissed at what’s happening, as is being identified with floor level polls, then maybe something can get a gain. Rome wasn’t built in a day. Neither will the US be rebuilt rapidly. That will take time but the first step is the way. And that’s getting people behind the leaders that they can trust. I can’t think of one liberal that I can trust. That’s why I call Trump an independent, not a card carrying conservative. And whoever gets in has to be. The old way has killed the golden goose.
wy69
The downside of Reagan was that afterwards we thought we were going to permanently be the sole superpower, with Russia forever crushed and China forever our junior partner who gave us what we needed and never challenged us. Of course Russia was going to come back and China was going to challenge us, still I'm glad the old Soviet bloc is gone.
Sure, we have to hope things will get better and maybe they will. I can't help marveling at how easy it was for the blob to put Team Biden in power, though. Oil will rebound when Biden's program fails, but with immigration, when things are finally fixed it will be like closing the barn door too late, and inflation and the deficit are going to be with us for a long time.
“...inflation and the deficit are going to be with us for a long time.”
Since 1970, the federal government has run deficits during every fiscal year for all but four years, from 1998 to 2001. And that was because the Clinton administration gutted our spending with the destruction of our military forces. And it was done with the borrow from Peter to pay Paul theology.
Ever since the time of Alexander Hamilton, the U.S. government has turned to deficit spending as a means of financing wars, growing federal influence and providing public services without having to raise taxes by cutting existing programs. But the cost was yet to come as it was based upon more services than worth with the lies spreading havoc and stabbing the public in the back.
It has taken over 50 years to destroy the highest standard of living in a country systematically ever, and if it isn’t reversed, or even slowed until we can get it done, our living conditions, even with all the advantages we have, will end up a third world country mirroring what is happening in the UK today.
Ya gotta start somewhere. 2022 and 2024 is the time. Waiting longer is going to make it harder, if not impossible, to correct the organized and methodical destruction of a country that has been successful for over 300 years.
But the question remains, has the GOP got the guts to put themselves out on the limb that we sent them there to do? Or are they as much a part of the “screwing” of the people they are supposedly working for with their own concerns over those of their supporters? And that’s where people like Trump come in. Someone that is not trapped in the game. Need a bunch of them. But it can be done. Just not overnight.
And it can’t be done with meeting them in the aisle. They want to harm. So are they any different than the terrorists that harm people for their own good? Just the same.
wy69
Love this breakdown. Trump’s legacy will always be dimished, but we’re better off for the reality of it.
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