Reagan's Magic

I mentioned some stuff worth checking out in Harper’s Magazine a few weeks ago and thought I’d add to the list. There’s a pretty substantial review of three recent books on Ronald Reagan in the May 2002 issue by Kevin Baker titled, “The Magic Reagan.” Thankfully, one of the books reviewed is Peggy Noonan’s When Character Was King.

Overall, the review provides a good discussion of the Reagan mystique, admittedly, though, from someone who doesn’t think much of the Gipper. Here’s a quote which stood out to me:

If anything, Reagan’s ascent marked the triumph of political postmodernism, detaching the present from the American past, detaching the language of our politics from any real meaning. As president, the man who told us that government was the problem ran up record budget deficits, presided over the worst financial scandals in our history, and even managed to raise most Americans’ taxes. Twenty years into the “Age of Reagan,” the state is bigger and more powerful than ever, particularly in its most coercive manifestations. We have more police, more prisons, than ever before, along with a military that is soon to be funded at levels beyond those of the Cold War, and a $30 billion national-security apparatus (albeit one incapable of monitoring a single dervish tied to a dialysis machine).

This comment seems to be in line with Michael Rogin’s excellent argument in Ronald Reagan, The Movie and just confirms the irony of our political dialogue: conservatives absolutely hate the assertions of postmodern theorists – even though most don’t have a clue as to what the postmodernists are actually saying – and yet the rise of the entertainer-president is one of the most obvious examples of how image has begun peeling away from substance, a la Baudrillard.

Perhaps just as interesting, Baker concludes: “Reagan and [the last twenty years of] Reaganism have destroyed both liberalism and conservatism, in favor of some new beast – a large, activist government that is to be deployed solely on behalf of the wealthiest and most powerful interests everywhere.”

Check out the article if you get the chance.