America’s beloved 40th president, Ronald Reagan, may have passed ten years ago today. But the legacy of his White House service, between 1981 and 1989, is still the stuff of political adoration.
Who can forget his world-famous 1987 speech at the Berlin Wall, where he delivered one of the most memorable lines of his presidency: “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”
Mr. Reagan, or “The Great Communicator” as he was dubbed, was credited with helping to win the Cold War and for overseeing one of the most robust and expanding economies in U.S. history.
His politics and policies still resonate today among copy-cat campaigners who often try to align themselves with the Gipper and his limited government vision. In 2010, a Vanity Fair poll found that Mr. Reagan led the list of who Republicans would most like to see added to the faces at Mount Rushmore.
Some of Mr. Reagan’s other memorable quotes:
In the 1960s, he spoke on national television in support of Republican nominee Barry Goldwater, saying: “You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We’ll preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we’ll sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness.”
In his 1980 debate with President Jimmy Carter, Mr. Reagan said: “Next Tuesday all of you will go to the polls. You’ll stand there in the polling place and make a decision. I think when you make that decision it might be well if you would ask yourself: Are you better off than you were four years ago?”
And during his campaign for presidency, he often said: “In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.”
Mr. Reagan, born Feb. 6, 1911 in Illinois, died June 5, 2004, in Bel-Air, Calif.
• Cheryl K. Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.