The feud is discussed in this CS thread. In a nutshell, in his new book, Killing Reagan (why is the man so death-obsessed?!), Bill O’Reilly asserts that Reagan was effectively senile for much of his presidency, and speculates that the assassination attempt he survived accelerated the progress of the Alzheimer’s that was diagnosed after he left office. He also asserts it got so bad that Reagan’s staff considered invoking the 25th Amendment to remove him from office. George Will accuses O’Reilly of not being a real historian and of having done no research cited in the book that backs up his claims and never having interviewed any of Reagan’s close staffers or looked at any materials in the Reagan Library. O’Reilly fires back that Will is an “elitist” and a “Reagan loyalist” and an all-around poopyhead, and so it goes.
Still, O’Reilly could be right about the above, if not right for the right reasons. Senility would explain a lot about how many flat-wrong things Reagan said while POTUS, his out-of-touchness with the facts. Then again, that’s not the only explanation possible – the most informative and insightful book about Reagan I’ve ever read is The Invisible Bridge: The Fall of Nixon and the Rise of Reagan, by Rick Perlstein. In Perlstein’s account, Reagan always, from childhood on, thought more in terms of black-and-white moral narratives than facts. (Also, he was always a self-aggrandizer, back to his days as a lifeguard. He was frustrated that he never could seem to reach “star” status in Hollywood, despite having all apparent qualifications for it and paying his dues in so many films. And he was an astonishingly cold and indifferent father.)
What’s more significant, however, is that this feud raises once again the question of whether Reagan was a good POTUS or a bad one. And that goes to the heart of the legitimacy and value of modern movement conservatism, being so much identified with Reagan’s legacy as it is. And that’s what has George Will so pissed.
The notion that Reagan wasn’t successful, or that he left the country worse off, is not a fundamental truth. It is, in fact, so far off the mark as to be laughable.
LIberals tried this same thing in 1984. “Who are you going to believe - me, or your own lying eyes?” With the observed results.
A mixed bag. He did some good stuff, he did some not so good stuff. What he did do was to take a country very down in the dumps of “malaise” and restore confidence through the sheer force of his sunny personality. And, that does in fact have an effect on the economy.
Reagan’s administration did push the vapidly stupid economic policy, and distrust of government that has hung around the GOP’s necks for the last few decades.
He promoted dumb idea, and it lives on beyond him, making lives worse, increasing human misery. Conservatives believe the government is out to get them, that historically low taxes are tyranny, and that regulating smog is a communist plot.
I’d say he’s a failure as a president, at least at that level.
He’s not an outright failure, he did good things, but he did a lot of damage.
I think you have to put Reagan in the context of his time. Reagan was a great leader and visionary, but probably middle of the pack on economic and administrative management in terms presidential rankings. Where Reagan was strong was what was needed in the 80s. Americans seemed to have been a lot more confident and united then. There has not been a mention of the cold war yet, but he was instrumental in ending it.
Pardon me if I’m being whooshed here, but I don’t think sunny personality has much to do with it at all. The performance of the economy during his term looks exactly as you would expect if you were presented with a graphic economic history through January 1981, given a pencil, and told: “Draw where you think this line should go, extrapolating from historical cycles.” Occam’s razor suggests Reagan caught a wave by being elected in 1981.
And I’m not saying this to diss Reagan per se. But if you think Reagan had something big to do with the economy in the 1980s, you have to believe that Clinton was the greatest economic genius who ever lived; which I don’t.
By the way, can anyone explain to me what O’Reilly is up to? I don’t see how he benefits in any way from undermining Reagan’s legacy given his target (Reagan-idolizing) audience.
Well, there were a lot of factors there. Perhaps Reagan’s arms buildup put a strain on the Soviets’ budget while they tried to keep up, but falling oil prices probably played a much bigger role in that. More than anything else, however, it was Gorbachev’s glasnost policy – once the people were free to criticize the Soviet Communist system, it became apparent that nobody really believed in it any more; and an idea-state can survive only so long as the people believe in it or at least appear to. I recall a review by the late John J. Reilly of Harry Turtledove’s AH novel In the Presence of Mine Enemies (set in Nazi Germany in the 1990s) (can’t link to the review, the website went dark after he died) – he remarked that what limits the life of a revolutionary-ideological state is that “eventually, even the secret police lose interest.”
He’s trying to sell his book, that’s what he’s up to. He’s more of a huckster than an ideologue, unlike Will. Not that he isn’t committed in his way, but perhaps he thinks movement conservatism does not really need Reaganolatry any more. When you think about it, a movement skeptical of government as such does not essentially need a get-things-done sort of POTUS.
I must say, Will and O’Reilly are giving us the most entertaining catfight one can present without a tank of Jell-O and a couple of bi-curious supermodels.
I’m friends with a gentleman who was in DOD and traveled with the President many times during the early-mid 80’s. He is a conservative Republican, and was a supporter of Reagans policies. But he told me basically the same thing years ago. And it was based on his own observations and experiences, not something somebody else told him. So as much as I find O’Reilly to be a hot headed gas bag, I have cause to believe he’s correct on this.
Reagan was a great President but his flaws should be well known and I’m not sure why Will is so mad at O’Reilly. Will himself was often frustrated with Reagan’s simplemindedness.
What Reagan did do was change minds so that Bill Clinton could complete the Reagan Revolution.