Opinion of Ronald Reagan

[OSR stands with Israel]

I'm not convinced that his policies were as good as people make it out to be. Even with higher taxes, carter's first term without the recession had an average of 3.2 million jobs created yearly. While Reagan's non-recession yearly job growth was 3 million.  Plus inflation wasn't stopped by tax cuts but vocker's interest policy and vocker was appointed by Carter.

And a lot of carter job growth early in his admin had to do with the fact that the economy was on an upswing in 1976 due to ford. Once the recession hit we all so how disastrous his economic policies were.

[Gass3268]

You could argue almost every problem we have today was caused by actions taken by Reagan.

HP

[Santander]

You could argue almost every problem we have today was caused by actions taken by Reagan.

HP

I'm no Reagan fan, but come on...

[Kingpoleon]

Tilt FF.

[MarkD]

I can't choose between the over-simplified labels of HP or FF.
My opinion of him is that I was very, very disappointed in his (successful) appointees to the Supreme Court. When Reagan announced the nomination of Robert Bork to the Supreme Court, he said the Bork share's Reagan's own view that a judge's personal opinions should have no part in their interpretation of the laws. In other words, Reagan said that judges should render their decisions objectively. Those words were clearly the correct thing to say, but I ended up being devastated with disappointment that all of Reagan's appointees ended up betraying their responsibility to be objective by granting George W. Bush's request for an injunction to stop the Florida recounts. That request should not have been granted; the "interpretation" of the Constitution and of precedent was not a fulfillment of the intent of those who made those respective laws; the Supreme Court's decision was clearly motivated by party loyalty (that is, on the part of Rehnquist, O'Connor, Scalia, Kennedy, and Thomas).
So my only words to describe Ronald Reagan is enormously disappointing.

[Clark Kent]

Anyway, I see Reagan as a massive FF - his tax cuts finally undid the absurdly confiscatory post-WWII rates, and his foreign policy was impeccable - his SCOTUS picks had some flops, but I still put him as my favorite 20th-century leader.

Massive FF of Course- He ended the confiscatory tax rate forever and cut taxes massively, he deregulated our economy, he took us out of the terrible economy of the 1970s and created an economic boom which would last 20 years, he finally decided to take the fight to the commies in their own territory which eventually bankrupted the evil empire.

[darklordoftech]

HP. Dismantled many of the government's best functions, created a massive deficit, empowered the religious right, and turned the war on drugs into a ruthless incarceration crusade.

[Oswald Acted Alone, You Kook]

I have always given him credit for restoring America's self-esteem. Jesse Helms was right that he was the man we needed at the time. However, he is way too flawed for me to consider him a FF. His administration was involved in countless scandals, his fiscal policy was both fiscally and socially irresponsible, and he inspired an entire generation of the wrong kind of people to get into politics. HP on balance, but neither a terrible person nor one of the worst presidents in US history.

Technically speaking, his administration was the most corrupt in modern history.

So modern is basically since the mid 70's?

[The_Doctor]

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Mondale, this is not accurate per se. "In fact, a majority of those accused of ethical misconduct in the Reagan Administration were cleared of any legal wrongdoing." I would contend for the 80s, the Reagan Administration was fairly ethical, if a little struggling with the post-Watergate ethical landscape. But compare President Reagan to Johnson and Nixon and even JFK - Reagan comes off far more ethical and behaving with better principles and moral values.

EDIT: Quote is Lou Cannon. Sorry.

[Oswald Acted Alone, You Kook]

I have always given him credit for restoring America's self-esteem. Jesse Helms was right that he was the man we needed at the time. However, he is way too flawed for me to consider him a FF. His administration was involved in countless scandals, his fiscal policy was both fiscally and socially irresponsible, and he inspired an entire generation of the wrong kind of people to get into politics. HP on balance, but neither a terrible person nor one of the worst presidents in US history.

Technically speaking, his administration was the most corrupt in modern history.

So modern is basically since the mid 70's?

Ok I was wrong. I meant the most corrupt in the history of the US:

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Reagan's  administration had the most number of indictments and convictions of  any president.  It's astounding that Reagan wasn't impeached for  the Iran-Contra affair. His cabinet also rigged contracts so that they  rewarded contributors to his campaign through the HUD. Scandals also  plagued the EPA under Reagan.

Reagan is a prime example of the halo effect. Since he looked good...people just ignore his scandals.

Grant, Harding, and Nixon all were more corrupt.

[RaphaelDLG]

Incredibly overrated and a gateway drug for the far right.  Unsure whether he was the cause of everything bad and far-right in the US in the 80s-10s, or just the incredibly charismatic symptom/ talented enabler of an already-fomenting trend.

Also, while he doesn't compare to Trump in this regard (who does?), he was another one of those guys who was an idiot who knew dick about policy/what was going on and irresponsibly watched movies all day while his staff ran the country.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

1. From reading "Veil", my opinion of his governing style is less than positive.
2. That said, I have yet to read a detailed account of his Governorship; did he act like this in the 60's and the 70's as well?

[RaphaelDLG]

1. From reading "Veil", my opinion of his governing style is less than positive.
2. That said, I have yet to read a detailed account of his Governorship; did he act like this in the 60's and the 70's as well?

If you've got the time and the inclination, I highly recommend Lou Cannon's mammoth two volume set - the first one is about his time as governor.  It's a little too sympathetic to him overall, but to answer your question, my recollection is that it wasn't quite as egregious as when he was in the WH.