Ronald Reagan (left to right)

Reagan was never "left".

Considering the obvious slide into senility and diaper-wearing, the right could use a more coherent idol who perhaps didn't keep the company of more than one third-world dictator. . .

I debated giving him a three meaning that he really didn't move that much. The Democrats moved left. Poor old Joe McCarthy had just been sworn into office on January 3, 1947, and was a freshman senator. I don't think he had much to do with the House hearings held the same year. He did not become a committee chairman until January 3, 1953, so unless Ronnie Reagan used a time machine a la George Orwell, I doubt seriously that Reagan ever appeared before the McCarthy committee, naming names. At least that is what I gleaned from the published history on the subject. As to the Stalinists who got caught up and hoisted on their own petard, I say "good." I remember reading how Lillian Hellman and Dashiel Hammett excoriated France, England and the other allies fighting Hitler while Uncle Joe Stalin and Adolf Hitler were still pals before the attack on the USSR in June, 1941. The other Stalinist lefto sheep in Hollywood followed right along. You can say all you want about Whittaker Cha... Read more

Updating: Sorry E.O., but he did name names, and much worse, he allowed SAG to become an instrument of the blacklists, as summarized nicely here: http://www.cobbles.com/simpp_archive/linkbackups/hu ac_blacklist.htm And yes, he was given an FBI informant number, T-10 http://www.debcentral.com/education/archive22.html http://www.reference.com/browse/wiki/Ronald_Reagan That's just from a quick googling. You can also read about it in a book entitled Naming Names by Victor Navasky. Updating further: No, the above links are not "news" sites, nor really academic sites. They do however reference scholarly materials, and I never said he "publicly" named anyone - he did it in closed session per the committee's modus operendi. T-10 is an informant number E.O. You have one of those numbers because you are informing. Navasky's bookcontains many details I couldn't begin to type in here. Moreover,I doubt they were discussing the filming of Bedtime for Bonzo in closed session. ... Read more

(Yawn.) Drummond's comment is typical weak, left-wing tripe, "snitching out his friends in the Screen Actor's Guild at the McCarthy hearings . . ." Reagan testified, as President of the Screen Actors Guild, as a friendly witness (there actually were some of those) before the HOUSE Un-American Activities Commission (I believe McCarthy was a SENATOR) on October 23, 1947, naming NO names of Hollywood actors or "big shots" whatsoever, snitching out on nobody. His political epiphany, which was the result of a gradual ideological awakening, resulted in a monumentally successful presidential campaign against Jimmy Carter, who all but ceded the Presidency to Reagan in 1980. Remember him for his accomplishments, his speeches, his undying belief in the American Spirit. Not for some imagined snitching on his friends on the part of a misinformed detractor. UPDATE: Thanks for the further cure for my insomnia, more left-wing slanted "news" but even in your reference sources (who, by t... Read more

A great man who said it best:I did not leave the Democratic party.It left me.

Reagan was an open advocate of the New Deal in his earlier years, and even in his later years, did seem to have a great respect for FDR. In fact, in accepting the nomination as the Republican candidate for presidency in 1980, he quoted the former president. In this context it seems particularly bizarre that Reagan then proceeded to attack so fervently the benevolent social institutions and system of progressive taxation which FDR had largely created.

I'm tearing up...

He's a better conservative than Dubya. He was a better president than Dubya. Let's hope that our next president matches the Reagan ideal.