That Showtime Piece on Ronald Reagan: Let’s Just Say It’s a Very Liberal Interpretation

Sacramento

People age, slow down. Their voices weaken. They may mumble and bumble -- become confused and need to be controlled. Everybody except Ronald Reagan.

Reagan never went through the aging process. He was always a doddering old fool, if we’re to believe a three-hour hatchet job that Showtime ran Sunday night. Even back in his 30s, as a film star driving around Hollywood in a new convertible, he was befuddled. Needed direction in every phase of his life.

Never mind that Reagan served six terms as head of the Screen Actors Guild. It must have been luck and magic that got him overwhelmingly elected -- and reelected -- governor and president. And, of course, the Soviets self-immolated; that couldn’t have been the old B-movie actor leading America to victory in the Cold War.

No, according to the TV movie, Reagan was led around by a badgering wife. He was the puppet of business interests and conniving aides. He was a dunce.

And he was always this old guy, this “golly gee” softie with the hoarse voice.

That’s what bugged me the most about this bad, boring movie, called “The Reagans,” which CBS ordered produced, then handed off to the lightly watched cable network when conservatives howled.

Well, I’m no right-wing conspirator. I wouldn’t even call Reagan a great president; he’s in the “good” category. But the man’s an admirable, very successful American statesman of historic importance. And CBS was wise to dump this $10-million character assassination.

I was ready to shrug off the film until Showtime announced it planned to keep running the piece, over and over.

There is a lame disclaimer before the first scene: “This film is a dramatic interpretation of events ....”

Sorry, guys, that doesn’t cut it. If you’re going to make big bucks off a historical figure’s name, you have a moral responsibility to aim for the truth. Too many people will be gleaning a lasting impression of Reagan from this film. It will distort their perception of him and history.

If you want to just make it up, go make up your own character. Leave our presidents alone.

And to smack the man when he’s in the late stages of Alzheimer’s is especially galling.

The movie was riddled with historical inaccuracies, but the core flaw was the Reagan character. It was as if actor James Brolin -- husband of liberal activist Barbra Streisand -- had studied for the Reagan role by watching “Saturday Night Live.” Brolin wound up playing a cartoon character, the liberals’ longtime vision of the man: a shallow, scripted numskull.

Look, I covered Reagan for 20 years and -- regardless of this “dramatic interpretation” -- he indeed did age. But even in his mid-70s, Reagan managed to stare down and befriend Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and end the Cold War.

In 1967, when Reagan arrived in Sacramento as governor, he was not quite 56 -- slightly younger than Arnold Schwarzenegger is now and at least as exciting. Even more articulate.

Reagan was sharp and crisp. Held weekly news conferences with Capitol reporters and performed superbly. Once, he debated U.S. Sen. Robert F. Kennedy for half an hour on network television over the Vietnam War, and the news media -- yes, that “liberal” media -- unanimously declared Reagan the winner.

“I sat in meetings for eight to 10 hours with him going over bills he’d never seen before,” recalls lobbyist George Steffes, one of Reagan’s legislative liaisons.

“He didn’t nod off. He was on top of every bill. I never once said to myself, ‘He doesn’t understand this.’ He grasped everything.”

This TV story -- billed as a Nancy-Ron romance -- turned into “Marie Antoinette meets Gomer Pyle,” observes biographer Lou Cannon, author of several Reagan books.

The movie has Nancy Reagan yapping at her husband day and night, pushing policies or personnel. Nobody should underestimate this wife’s influence on her husband -- theirs is a true romance -- but she was not a constant yapper.

“Ronald Reagan did everything Nancy told him to do -- if he agreed,” says Martin Anderson, his White House policy advisor. “Many times he’d say no. I never saw any badgering. I saw a lot of holding hands. Her taking naps on his lap on Air Force One.”

In the movie, Reagan keeps calling his wife “Nancy Pants.” That might have come from a poem Reagan once wrote. But no close aide or family member I talked to ever heard him call her that.

The script writers emphasized Reagan’s legendary name-forgetting, apparently implying that he was suffering from Alzheimer’s while in the White House. In one scene, Reagan can’t remember his national security advisor, Bud McFarlane. But based on reporting in one of Cannon’s books, that incident almost certainly never happened.

This movie represents the same old liberal view of Reagan -- a controlled, amiable dunce.

“It’s one thing to underestimate Reagan before you see him in action,” says former aide Michael Deaver. “But to underestimate him after he’s got a record of governing 16 years at the state and world levels is completely mind-boggling.”

If Reagan were to comment, he might say: There they go again.

They should finally give it up.