Reagan, the American Dream Turned into a Liberal Revolution

On the front page of Il Giornale, the only major Italian newspaper to welcome the election of Ronald Reagan, in November 1980, Andrew Montanelli wrote: “I have a very positive concept of Reagan, which is the opposite of the very negative one that I have. Carter.”

Montanelli was, as usual, against the tide. An entirely different climate welcomed Ronald Reagan’s election to the White House, and that was a shock to the Salons inactive up until then.

Doctor: “Tell me, boy from the future, who was the president of the United States in 1985?” Marty: Ronald Reagan. Document: “Ronald Reagan? the actor? Uh! Who is Vice President Jerry Lewis? I assume Marilyn Monroe is the First Lady and John Wayne is Secretary of War! This is a delicious conversation that appears in a scene from Back to the Future, the cult movie directed by Robert Zemeckis in 1985. It is a dialogue perfectly symbolic of the authentic astonishment mixed with a certain atmosphere of self-sufficiency that welcomed Ronald Reagan’s ascension to the White House in 1980. Hollywood actor, plus To the second row, cowboy, at the head of the largest planetary-level superpower in the middle of the Cold War. Danger to the world according to some. Several years have passed since then. Time is necessary and sufficient to allow historians and political scientists to arrive at a calm and reflective evaluation of his work. Well, Ronald Reagan is considered, almost unanimously, among the best presidents in US history, “the one who won the Cold War without firing a shot,” Margaret Thatcher would say. The description Reagan will give for much of American and world history, with his innovative economic and foreign policy, will become “a creed,” indeed Reagan.

The ideological and cultural influences will extend beyond his presidency, to host the season of Democrat Bill Clinton and the season of Republican George W. Bush, the son of his vice president. If the 1980s are remembered today as a happy season of prosperity, it is because of that impulse of optimism, pragmatism, and modernization that Reagan was able to give to the United States and thus to all the industrialized nations of the West. Forty years after his inauguration in the White House, the historical debate over Reagan’s personality ended with the recognition of his active and decisive role in the physical and moral rebuilding of the West, the successes of the economy that restored efficiency and prosperity, foreign policy victories that peacefully ended the Cold War and restored pride for the United States after the crisis of confidence caused by the defeat. In Vietnam. Hence the return of faith in the American dream. A man with great natural charisma, personified as a boy, when elected as a student representative to the college, is able to admire his skills as a great communicator. His story is entirely American, one that proved the United States is a land of opportunity. Ronald Reagan liked to remember that his origins are humble, very similar to those of Margaret Thatcher, daughter of a grocer, son of a shop assistant who is. Born on February 6, 1911 in Tampico, they numbered just over 849 souls, and they are so young that they do not have a doctor. Only one real and even dusty street, Main Street, is where the store his father works for is located. Above their home. A place equivalent to that of many other countries in the US province. In the future, Ronald Reagan would describe himself as a “Main Street Republican”, a way of emphasizing the authenticity of his ancestry. The father is an Irish Catholic and alcoholic transitions from one risky job to another, a condition that pushes the family into extreme poverty. The mother is a religious woman who belongs to the group of the disciples of Christ. Raising children on honesty and respect, and teaching them the importance of studying to free themselves from misery. In 1920, the family, after an unfortunate attempt to settle in Chicago, landed in Dickson, another small town in Illinois. Here Reagan experienced the Great Depression, which renders the father unemployed and further exacerbates the family’s economic conditions and life’s difficulties. Even a satisfying meal at the table became a problem. The images and suffering of these terrible years will accompany Ronald Reagan throughout his life and point to his connotations as an advocate of social right. In 1980, on the eve of his great electoral victory as President of the United States of America, Neal, his only brother, told him: “Who knows which party they will be tonight in Dickson.” He replied, “I would like to be there, look in the corner.” During the election campaign, he was asked by a reporter how he imagined Americans would perceive him. He replied, displaying his typical smile: “Would you laugh if I told you that maybe they see themselves in me, and that I am one of them?” After all, I have never been able to distinguish myself, and I don’t think that I am somehow different from them. ”