Ronald Reagan is dead
While I don’t think even Ronald Reagan deserved a slow death by Alzheimer’s, I’m not going to pretend that I thought the man was anything but bad for the world. This long post over on Informed Comment pretty much sums up most of the problems I had with the man.
Reagan’s policies thus bequeathed to us the major problems we now have in the world, including a militant Islamist International whose skills were honed in Afghanistan with Reagan’s blessing and monetary support; and a proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, which the Reagan administration in some cases actually encouraged behind the scenes for short-term policy reasons. His aggressive foreign policy orientation has been revived and expanded, making the US into a neocolonial power in the Middle East. Reagan’s gutting of the unions and attempt to remove social supports for the poor and the middle class has contributed to the creation of an America where most people barely get by while government programs that could help create wealth are destroyed.
Now, of course, we have to listen to a few days of the media and those on the right distorting Reagan’s record and trying to make him out to be some sort of knight in shining armor, while ignoring all the pain and suffering he caused both in America and around the world.
