Ronald Reagan is dead. He had a profound influence on my generation – children of the ‘70’s, the era of stagflagion and malaise. I was a few months shy of voting age when he was first elected President in 1980. I clearly remember the loathing directed toward him by my fellow students and professors – comments that were made off-hand, with the clear assumption that all thinking people would agree with them. But Reagan proved the critics wrong. For a man derided as in imbecile, he did some pretty smart things. He brought down the Soviet Union, he restored the US economy, and he made it respectable to fight creeping government encroachment on the liberty of the American people.
When the Lord calls me home, whenever that day may be, I will leave with the greatest love for this country of ours and eternal optimism for its future.
I now begin the journey that will lead me into the sunset of my life. I know that for America there will always be a bright dawn ahead.
– Ronald Reagan, November 5, 1994
UPDATE: Toren Smith (via James Hudnall via Amritas) posts a great picture and a lot of great quotes.
David, is the myth of Reagan so all important when looking through the glass of history? The collapse of communism just shows that the effort of collective restraint paid more of a dividend than all the committments this country made through its military might.It was the economic not the military circumstance that ultimately fell
the paper tiger in the same vein that all totalitarian regimes follow.For Reagan to go to
that German soldier cemetary was unexscusable not
to mention what befell the very Jews of
Europe by these very men(cowards).