The Triumph of Myth

Most of the bloggers--and the websites--I read have weighed in on the demise of Ronald Wilson Reagan. The range of opinion goes from give-credit where-credit-is-due to good riddance. Forgive me if I don't link to other posts, although, believe me, I've read them. In particular, though, I think Billmon covered the bases in his two pieces--the first one concedes Reagan's SIGNIFICANCE, without applying the term great, while the second focuses more on the movie aspect of his legacy, i.e., he was less of a great man and more of "he played the role of a great man on TV."

My own take on the Reagan legacy revolves around the troublesome aspect of myth. As the media pulls out archival footage of this sound byte or that, it becomes a de facto given that certain things were accomplished during the Reagan era--like, for instance, he "rebuilt" the decripit military, he shrunk the federal government, he pulled the country out of the malaise it found itself in during the Carter years, etc., ad nauseum. No doubt there will be a renewed fervor amongst the right to add Reagan's name to as many things Federal as possible, and maybe another attempt to carve his visage onto Mount Rushmore. The former is somewhat ironic, given the Gipper's public statements regarding government, although a closer examination of his record reveals his antipathy was largely rhetorical.

His rebuilding of the military must also be taken with several grains, if not a shaker, of salt. Military spending has largely been kept at constant levels, both as a percentage of GDP and in real dollar terms since the end of World War II. This shouldn't be surprising to anyone who genuinely studies this sort of thing: The Cold War was as much a means of priming the economic pump as it was a face off against evil godless communism. The idea was to keep the nation's economic engine humming at high levels. After all, it was the war that really spelled the end of the depression.

Reagan cut taxes, sure. He then raised taxes several times, and didn't really cut government spending so much as he redirected a bit more of the pie towards the military. Again, someone who really knows how a modern, developed economy functions would know that "cutting" government is akin to cutting the nation's throat. The Reagan recession of the early 80's (which hurt myself and a lot of other people quite badly) would have been far worse had Ronnie genuinely reduced the size of government.

Then there's the belief that he somehow brought America back, if not to the promised land itself, then certainly within striking distance. I'll suggest that those who hold this particular belief consider the SECOND Reagan recession (which hit Louisiana especially hard), which lasted through the Bush years. A number of people, again, myself included, were caught up in this particular downturn--it was one reason why I moved out of state.

I haven't even touched on the uglier aspects of the Reagan legacy: the support of Saddam Hussein, the support of the mujahadeen (which led to the formation of Al Qaeda and the Taliban, in one of the more severe examples of "blowback" ever recorded), the support of murderous thugs in Central America (Billmon notes his comical warning that the Sandinistas were "only two days drive from Harlingen, Texas), the pathetic support of Iran in exchange for--well, everytime one hostage was released another was taken, so you couldn't really call it much of a swap--and then there's the entire sorry legacy best commented upon by an old, now deceased, political science professor of mine named Paul Grosser. Dr. Grosser noted that, prior to Reagan, the poor were pitied. Under Reagan, the poor were held in contempt.

The political legacy of the Gipper, then, should be measured in light of the brutality in Central America, where his hands were drenched in blood, and his Middle East policy, which set the stage for the mess we have today. To be fair, the Middle East can't be entirely laid on his shoulders--his predecessors have plenty of culpability--but you can certainly assign him a share of the blame.

Then there's the myth that he somehow busted the Soviet Union. True, there is some evidence that the Soviets tried for a time to match his high level of military spending, and that might have brought about the downfall slightly more quickly (slightly on the order of perhaps a year quicker than otherwise), but again, ask someone who's actually studied the Soviet Union. They'll tell you the handwriting was on the wall, military buildup or no military buildup. The fact was that they simply never had the resources to maintain sustained growth in their economic system (which, interestingly, is a capitalist concept, yet was the cornerstone of Soviet planning). At a certain point, the law of diminishing returns worked its magic on them, and that--along with dedicated activism, and the eyes of the world being upon the region--was what brought about the end of the Soviet bloc.

However, the true believers never are ones to let facts get in the way of a good myth. And that will be the ultimate legacy of Reagan: a caretaker president who mostly blundered his way through office was somehow held by some to be the grand man of the era. Certainly he appealed to those folks who couldn't, or wouldn't, examine their country in light of the revealations post Vietnam, and our nation's cavalier attitude towards democracy, both here and abroad. Because of their refusal to consider the darker nature of the United States, they've hitched their lantern to the man who best spoke for them--a genial, and affable man to be sure, but one who never really backed up his rhetoric with anything. In fact, the argument can be made that George W. Bush is sort of a peckerwood Ronald Reagan. Those who supported the Gipper once again prefer fantasy to reality. Their myth is, thus far, secure.

Waking up from a good dream can be a difficult thing. But what started with the Gipper I think will end with Dubya. Good. The myth of Reagan will unfortunately last for some time--it's almost as if the believers have already invested too much in it to see the reality--but, over time, it will become apparent to all but a few that Ronald Reagan was the ultimate television personality--now that he's gone, it was almost like he was never really there, even if his true believers continue to haunt the corridors of power in DC and even as his rhetoric infects those who crave simplicity over reality.