Copyrights reserved by the author. If you are in doubt, please click on 'Copyrights' and read the details.Ronald Reagan: the man you hated to love by J. G. Fabiano I can still remember that cold and sunny January day 23 years ago when I drove through Washington D.C. with my wife and young daughter, on our way to Atlanta. We saw a large crowd of people gathered in front of the Capitol building and I knew what was going on and I didn't like it at all. A B-movie actor named Ronald Reagan had just stolen the white house from Jimmy Carter and the Democrats. My country was going through tough times with massive unemployment, a national malaise caused by the Iran hostage crisis and an ever-growing despair that we had been defeated in a war that took tens of thousands of American lives and emotionally crippled an entire generation. I wondered how an actor was going to make things better? Hell, this particular actor was known to be so incompetent that people laughed openly at him. Who could have known that this would turn out to be his greatest strength - that he could laugh at himself too? During the early 1980's my opinion of this supposedly new style Republican was unshakeable. The nation continued to suffer through one of the worse recessions since the Great Depression. Everybody seemed to be out of work. Interest rates broke through the 20% barrier and, since I owned a business at this time, I knew I was destined for failure because of this Hollywood buffoon called Ronald Reagan. Every time he addressed the nation I would sit in front of my television set knowing his policies were leading my nation toward calamity. Then he would smile that `aw shucks' smile of his and I couldn't believe my own reaction. For some odd reason, above and beyond comprehension, I found myself liking this guy whose previous biggest claim to fame was that he co-starred in a movie with a monkey. Even though the problems of our nation seemed impossible to fix he reminded us that we were a great nation whose destiny was to lead the world. He said we were a bright city on a mountain. He told us we would be fine because we were Americans whose inner strength was defined by our optimism. He told us everything would be okay. And I believed him. I remember watching him through his entire first term. During the assassination attempt that almost took his life I remember feeling panic. I thought I might feel relief because why should I want this clown to continue as President? He fell asleep during a meeting with the Pope. He couldn't understand the term `gross national product' during a press conference. He walked into people and projected the persona of someone who by no means should be the President of the Free World. But, with every mistake, I had to love him because, for some odd reason, I learned to trust him. As much as I wanted to hate him and his policies I just couldn't get myself past that smile. I couldn't argue with his sincere love and enthusiasm for our nation and our people. He was an actor who no longer appeared to be acting. I remember he always seemed to be with his wife, Nancy. I came to the realization that this fool we had as President wasn't making decisions by himself but rather using his wife as his primary counsel. This was an outrage. Nancy Reagan never held any office and she was never elected to anything. Why should she be allowed to counsel the most powerful man on the face of the Earth? I hated her for that. She should have been decorating a room in the White House or visiting some school in the slums, the way other presidential wives did, instead of acting as the Presidents' advisor. The image of Nancy Reagan leading the President of the United States to wherever he was supposed to be bothered me a lot until I realized she did this not because she exercised some undue influence over him but because she sincerely loved him and he sincerely loved her. What better advisor could any man have than the woman whose only motive was to make sure her husband was safe? I came to this realization later on in Reagan's life, when his wife stood by him and protected him throughout his Presidency and into the latter part of his life that was destroyed by Alzheimer's.I think my respect for this woman hit its highest level when she advised the now President of the United States that he should re-examine his position on stem cell research because it could help people like her husband. Party affiliation meant nothing when compared to family. It was obvious that Ron and Nancy Reagan considered his country his family. During the last years of the Cold War, Ronald Reagan was a warrior. I was afraid his policies would push us into a third world war. I also remember watching him meet the President of the Soviet Union, Michel Gorbachev in Geneva to sign a nuclear anti-proliferation treaty. I remember it looked cold. Gorbachev wore full winter gear but Reagan wore a simple black coat. As they walked together Reagan put his arm under Gorbachev's to help him up the stairs. He took control and he never lost it. After the bombing of the Marine barracks in Lebanon, in which almost 250 marines were killed, I remember watching him walk with the families of the lost soldiers. I saw him take many of them in his arms and cry with them. He was not the President of the United States at that moment. He was a member of a family that had lost its son. And I remember the tears in my own eyes. Don't misunderstand me. I know that Ronald Reagan's policies did not help the middle class. He took away interest rate deductions on credit cards. His tax cuts gave us a deficit that took almost a decade to pay off. His campaign promise of smaller government actually gave us a government that was bigger then any government that had come before. But he gave us back something we had lost too. He gave us back our belief in ourselves. As a people. As a nation. His uncomplicated grin illuminated our television sets and his mistakes reminded us that we were all human, that we all made mistakes and that we could come back from those mistakes bigger, better, wiser. That was something we had forgotten how to do. It is something the current President of the United States should consider. Reagan admitted his mistakes. At one time he stated there was no chance that our nation would trade weapons for hostages. A few weeks later he went on national television to say he was wrong and weapons had been traded to the enemy to secure the release of our hostages. After the Lebanon disaster he did not blame a lack of intelligence or poor security, he blamed himself by stating clearly that everything good or bad that happened in our nation's affairs was his responsibility. The nation did not hate Ronald Reagan for that but seemed rather to appreciate the fact that he was one of us; those who can never be perfect. He showed us that it was okay to fail as long as you owned up to your failure. And he showed us that after failure there was always a new beginning. President George W. Bush likes to compare himself to Ronald Reagan. He could start by knowing when to admit he is wrong and then doing something about it.I still remember that cold and sunny day in January 23 years ago when I was driving through Washington, D.C. with my wife and young daughter. Though I didn't know it at the time it was the day I could start to feel good again about my country. It was the day a B-move actor named Ronald Reagan became President of our United States. THE END
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