THE LEGACY OF RONALD REAGAN

  THE LEGACY OF RONALD REAGAN

    In pursuit of the truth - http://www.cinipsbegoneblogspot.com -Veteran's Day, Tues. Nov. 11, 2014

This article in the Commentary, Nov. Issue - 2014,  by Henry Olsen and Peter Wehner is dedicated to Neurologist Ben Olsen, our next President  or Vice-President of the U.S.A.  Excerpts as follows:

 

    "The core of Reagan's thought lay not primarily in his love of freedom, as powerful as that was, but in something else, something captured in the epitaph on his grave, which quoted his own words" 'I know in my heart that man is good. That what is right will always triumph. And there's purpose and worth to each and every life.'

 

    For Reagan, human dignity - not human freedom - came first. This idea permeated his political career. As early as 1957, in a commencement address at Eureka College, his alma mater, he defined the Cold War as "simple a struggle between those of us who believe that man has the dignity and sacred right and the ability to choose and shape his own destiny and those who do not so believe." For Reagan, human dignity was what enabled human freedom - that is, the ability of each individual to "shape his own destiny" - not in reverse.

 

    A minor-seeming difference, but a crucial one for Reagan, it meant that everyone's choice, whether great or humble was worthy of protection, and that common virtues were to be valued as much as, not much more than, uncommon ones. A 1964 National Review essay makes that crystal clear. Conservatives he wrote, aim to "represent the forgotten American - that simple soul who goes to work, takes out his insurance, pays for his kids' schooling, contributes to his church and charity and knows there just 'ain't no such thing as a free lunch/'" Buy virtue of his dignity, such a person, neither high nor low, ought to be allowed to live his life as he sees fit.

 

    He  believed the same dignity was to be found among the destitute.... What he despised was a system that "perpetuated poverty by substituting a permanent dole for a pay check," thereby "destroying self-reliance, dignity, and self-respect....   In his 1986 memoir The Triumph of Politics, Stockman complained that Reagan "sees the plight of real people before anything else."....

 

    Reagan also placed a heavy emphasis on deregulation. Except where absolutely necessary, government regulation, he said, infringed on human dignity because "government can't control the economy withy controlling people...   In 1964, he endorsed the idea of Social Security. That same year, and at a time when Medicare did not yet exist, he declared that "no one in this country should be denied medical care because of a lack of funds."...

 

    Reagan's welfare state would provide assistance only to those truly in need, and those benefits would be generous. He often touted the success of his California welfare reform, which not only removed people from the rolls but increased benefits to remaining recipients by average of 43%.

 

.... He also wanted to eliminate subsidies to Amtrak, which was costing tax-payers an average of $35 for each passenger it boarded.... He objected to Social Security and Medicare's cookie cutter uniformity and their coerciveness.... A person working over an average lifetime at an average salary, he pointed out, could buy an annuity upon retirement that paid nearly twice as much as Social Security.

 

    Finally, Reagan's fundamental stress on human dignity infused his view of the world beyond America's shores as well as his deep, uncompromising opposition to Communism - truly, to him, the Soviet Union was an "evil empire" in which individuals were conceived were conceived and treated as slaves, to be used at will by the state....  Reagan often quipped that he did not leave the Democratic Party; in its leftward lurch, it left him... Reagan's core political ideas was his public disposition, often characterized as sunny and optimistic...

 

    One of them was his unusual courage... he was being labeled a racist, a warmonger, a callous oppressor of the poor. Seemingly serenely, Reagan held fast to his course - a course that would eventually see the rollback of Soviet expansionism and the collapse of the "evil empire" abroad and thanks to "Reaganomics," the revival of prosperity at  home.                                                                                                                              

 

 Reagan held fast to his course - a course that would eventually see the rollback of Soviet expansionism and the collapse of the "evil empire" abroad and thanks to "Reagonomics,"the revival of prosperity at home...."

 

GEORGE H. KUBECK