Before Ronald Reagan, American conservatives were thought of as a nasty, brutish and grim lot. They seemed to focus on the worst in human nature and they believed that mankind was incapable of greatness.
But Ronald Reagan made America believe again that its greatest days really did lie ahead, and that the USA could reach goals that naysayers dismissed as Utopian.
So it was with the defeat of communist Russia. Paraphrasing a columnist today, you could wallpaper the Berlin Wall with newspaper articles and editorials that called Ronald Reagan an idiot for believing the Soviet Union could be defeated. And since Reagan's critics were the ones on the wrong side of history, you can't wallpaper the Berlin Wall because it no longer exists.
Now, the usual suspects are still trashing Ronald Reagan, even as his body lies in state, and even as America thinks about Nancy and the family.
And one critic today even spoke of Reagan‘s awful legacy of SDI? Awful? Really? How awful can Reagan‘s program be and that legacy be if it brought the USSR to its knees? You know, a former Soviet general said that it was Reagan‘s determination to keep pushing SDI that caused them to raise the white flag and surrender to America and the Gipper.