One for the Gipper
Norma Sherry
We're
inclined in this country to glamorize and idolize those that have
passed on. A marriage may have been horrible for the last twenty-five
years, but the surviving spouse will undoubtedly remember only the
good times - even if they were thirty years ago. But it's not just
spouses we glorify once they've gone to the great unknown.
Ronald
Reagan, our 40th president, died on Saturday, June 5th,
and the airwaves and newspapers covered little else. I found the
astounding collective mindset to revere this past president while
forgetting or foregoing any of his past that was remotely negative,
very disturbing. After all, doing so is a blatant disregard of
history.
There
was no mention of the humanitarian programs President Reagan
dismantled; no mention that he did away with birth control services to
the poor, or that he stopped all federal and international funding
that supported family planning. We did hear or read the stories about
what a good man he was, about how he cared for the American citizen,
and how he single-handedly tore down the Berlin Wall. Depending on
which news story you heard, the attempt on his life by lovelorn
madman, John W. Hinkley, Jr., changed his life considerably. According
to the account I heard, this incident was responsible for his
fatalistic point of view - or
Nancy
's interest in the occult.
None
of the articles or all-day eulogies mentioned the Iran-Contra crimes,
the Savings and Loan scandals, the insider trading and leveraged
buy-outs that ruined many an everyday folk, or his "trickle down"
economics that coincidentally never trickled to the citizens that
actually needed a trickle. Gosh, that sounds ominously familiar.
There
was no mention of his admiration and support for the Sandinista's,
Osama Bin Laden, and the Mujaheddin, all of whom I recall quite
vividly he referred to as "The moral equivalent of the Founding
Fathers of America". Hmm, I wonder why not? But who can forget
the "Just Say No" to drugs campaign?
No
one spoke of our record deficit. But, then again, compared to our
present-day president's deficit, Reagan's was a mere drop in the
bucket. When President Bill Clinton was asked what he remembers most
about President Reagan, he replied without missing a beat, "He was a
lot a fun to be with." Dan Rather's explanation to why the
populace connected so well with him was, "He epitomized the thin
line between fantasy and reality."
There
was no mention of the AIDS epidemic and the role he didn't play, or
his poor handling of the air traffic controllers strike. No one
credited him for his enterprising concept of free-trade, the nemesis
of the nearly twenty-million unemployed American workers. Not a word
about his position on the environment. Apparently, his dismissal of
acid rain proposals as burdensome to
industry was too trivial to recall.
Not
a word of negativity, instead he will be remembered as a patriot, a
scholar, a great communicator, the emancipator, and none of what he
didn't do, or ignored, or allowed to happen under his watch. There
will be no mention or recollection of anything that resonates poorly
upon his image. That's what we do in this country. We sweep what we
don't like under the carpet. We whitewash reality. Perhaps that's
why we find ourselves repeating and repeating our same mistakes.
Ã" Norma Sherry 2004
Norma Sherry is co-founder of TogetherForeverChanging.org, an organization devoted to educating, stimulating, and igniting personal responsibility particularly with regards to our diminishing civil liberties. She is also an award-winning writer/producer and host of television program, The Norma Sherry Show, on WQXT-TV , Florida .
Email Norma: norma@togetherforeverchanging.org
