Twenty years ago, Reagan came up big in Normandy

WPost via Statesman Journal ^ | 6.7.04 | Lou Cannon

[ambrose]

Twenty years ago, Reagan came up big in Normandy

His visit was a pivotal event in an election year

LOU CANNON

The Washington Post

June 7, 2004

SUMMERLAND, Calif. - Twenty years ago, on the 40th anniversary of D-Day, Ronald Reagan took Normandy by storm.

In the highlight of a series of crafted made-for-television appearances that were emblematic of his theatrical presidency, Reagan gave an elegiac speech at Pointe du Hoc, where U.S. Army Rangers had scaled a 130-foot, knife-shaped cliff with grappling hooks and ladders borrowed from the London Fire Department.

Speaking to moist-eyed veterans of this daring achievement before a stone memorial that honored them, Reagan said: "Behind me is a memorial that symbolizes the Ranger daggers that were thrust into the top of these cliffs. And before me are the men who put them there. These are the boys of Pointe du Hoc. These are the men who took the cliffs. These are the champions who helped free a continent. These are the heroes who helped end a war."

Later that day, Reagan and his wife, Nancy, toured the Normandy American Cemetery, where white crosses and Stars of David mark the graves of 9,386 U.S. servicemen who died in the Allied invasion of France and the aftermath. He gave another evocative speech at Omaha Beach, reading from the letter of the daughter of a veteran who had survived the assault. Fulfilling a promise to her father, she had returned that day to put flowers on the graves.

[Neanderthal]

Nothing about Clinton's 100% phony performance at Normandy.

[Jimmy Valentine]

I do so detest the Washington Post.

Never a kind word; always a qualification.

Regards,

[KC_Conspirator]

I remember that. Did he not take stones and make them into a cross right in front of the cameras?

My wife said something about that yesteday. She said she did not think Klinton believed that the Greatest Generation saved America and D-Day was one of the most pivotal days in modern history, be she knew he was smart enough to understand he had to pretend he thought that way.