SACRAMENTO – While perusing a recent Sunday opinion section, I spotted a headline on a column from my friend and colleague, Larry Wilson, which caused me to spit out some of my coffee: “Reagan wasn’t that great, really.” Watching the final days unfold of an unusually inane presidential race, I’m left with the opposite impression. Reagan was indeed a great president. Any sensible person would be thrilled to have someone like him on Tuesday’s ballot.
Reagan’s greatness didn’t flow from his academic brilliance (although he was far smarter than his critics gave him credit for), but from his ability to convey important philosophical truths in a way that resonated with the American people. Wilson’s column focused on a new 800-page biography of the late president, which I’ve yet to read. But a 2008 biography of Reagan, “The Education of Ronald Reagan,” captured a key reason the Gipper remains such an inspiring figure.
Author Thomas W. Evans pointed to Reagan’s eight years working for General Electric, where he toured the country and spoke to 250,000 employees: As GE’s “traveling ambassador,” Reagan “became familiar with such diverse thinkers as von Mises, Lenin, Hayek, and the Chinese military strategist Sun Tzu. He read and reread the practical economics of Henry Hazlitt. He quoted Jefferson, Madison and Hamilton.” He honed his philosophy and learned how to convey it.
He embraced a philosophy of freedom, which informed his policies ranging from deregulation to immigration to taxes to dealing with the totalitarian Soviet empire. Reagan battled a Democratic Party committed only to government expansion – a disposition it still has today. Sadly, Reagan’s own party is now led by a man who shows no signs of having read great freedom thinkers, as he touts ideas that are anathema to Reagan’s free-market, anti-authoritarian legacy.
One of my favorite Reagan quotations: “I’ve spoken of the shining city all my political life, but I don’t know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when I said it. But in my mind it was a tall, proud city … teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace; a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity. And if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here.” Compare that to the GOP’s modern rhetoric about cat-eating and tariffs.
Of course, despite tacking to the center for the election, Vice President Harris promotes an agenda of endless federal meddling, higher taxes, more regulations, increased spending and other big-government drivel. So it’s easy to get discouraged about the state of the freedom philosophy in America today. There aren’t many political alternatives, with the Libertarian Party – aside from its usual ineffectiveness – torn apart by its own MAGA-related divisions.
What can a freedom lover do, regardless of which flawed candidate wins the election? It’s a tough predicament, although the nation has seen worse. Reagan famously said, “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for (and) protected.” But what exactly do we do when freedom isn’t on the ballot – and when the choices are between gastroenteritis and dysentery?
The political world is unpredictable, so it’s difficult to chart a strategy. I never thought I’d see the party of Reagan morph into the party of Pat Buchanan. It’s hard to imagine the improbable rise of Donald Trump. I found it inexplicable that Bernie Sanders almost won the Democratic nod in 2020, or that Joe Biden would have tapped Harris for vice president. It’s even stranger that Biden was pushed out of the race – or that Harris would run a campaign that tries to appeal to some Republicans.
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Most politically-minded people will encourage us to spend even more time fixated on candidates and elections. Obviously one cannot ignorepolitics as it surely won’t ignore us. But in my ideal libertarian world, the government would be so limited that we could spend our days not fretting about the latest nonsense our governor spewed or the latest regulation our president was contemplating.
Sadly, that’s not the world we live in. We probably can’t change the nation’s political dynamics, but we can be happy warriors who eschew government intervention, mind our own business, treat others fairly, practice self-control and build a culture that recognizes the blessings of our liberty.
“Whatever else history may say about me when I’m gone, I hope it will record that I appealed to your best hopes, not your worst fears; to your confidence rather than your doubts,” Reagan said as he departed public life. “My dream is that you will travel the road ahead with liberty’s lamp guiding your steps and opportunity’s arm steadying your way.” Maybe he wasn’t a great president, but he certainly knew how to sound like one.
Steven Greenhut is Western region director for the R Street Institute and a member of the Southern California News Group editorial board. Write to him at sgreenhut@rstreet.org.