I found it harder to write about Reagan’s death than i thought it would be. Not because I am so choked up as conflicted about his place in history.

I grew up in California with Ronald Reagan as governor. My next door neighbors has known him when they were all much younger and had taught Sunday school with “Dutch”. The first vote that I cast in a presidential election was for Reagan. (That was back when I thought I was a loyal republican like my parents instead of a swing voter).

But I also remember a Reagan who started an arms race which caused the deficit to spiral. I remember a president who was at times so out of touch on environmental issues that he expressed that trees cause acid rain. I remember a president who hands off management style led to the arms for hostages deal in Iran. I remember being embarrassed by Reagan at times.

But he was the cold warrior who made friends with a USSR Premier. He started an arms race but he also, in the end, negotiated with the “Evil Empire” to reduce nuclear weapons. Gorbachev said in an interview I watched on the night of Reagan’s death that he is not sure what they were able to accomplish together might have been achieved if someone else was in the white house. Brian Mulrooney, then PM of Canada, said in the same interview that Reagan was not ready to address acid rain. He became president at a time when the U.S. was losing jobs and did not want to make it harder for industry. If I heard the number correctly, we added 18 million jobs while he was president. We criticized “Reaganomics” but it would behoove us to remember that that the balanced budget that we were finally able to achieve (all be it briefly) under Clinton was not so much that we cut spending as we grew tax revenue with a strong economy. Reagan quipped that “I had to believe it was working when they stopped calling it Reaganomics “.

In the end a president should be measured on accomplishments not rhetoric, and Reagan accomplished enough that he deserves our thanks and his family deserves our thoughts and prayers.

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