Reagan’s Popularity
Ronald Reagan might have gone into the history books as the greatest President of the past half-century. However, as Ernest Conine pointed out so well in his column (Op-Ed Page, Jan. 18), Reagan’s “amiable toleration of greed and sleaze as operating norms” has presented an insurmountable obstacle. This weakness may well cause historians to put him at the side of Warren G. Harding.
As Conine said, he could well have used the power of the presidency as a “bully pulpit” to sound the alarm against moral degeneration and to energize the watchdog agencies of government.
Reagan chose instead to look the other way, become an accomplice, and play the clown, while allowing taxpayers to be robbed of billions.
ROBERT OLDS
Santa Barbara
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