Take that, Ronald!

Each time I drive back to Illinois I tap the roof of my car as I enter my home state. I enter, always, in the little town of Big Foot to which there is little more than the Big Foot Inn (my alternator fried out there once), a used car dealership, a graveyard and a pickle factory.

But these last few years of Illinois returns have been difficult because Illinois, like many other places, strokes about Ronald Reagan. Highway 14 entering the state in Big Foot was renamed Ronald Reagan Highway or something like that.

There's a sign. I glare at it. I'm unsure for that moment whether I like being back home.

Now that Gerald Ford has kicked the bucket, we're finding out a bit more about what he really thought of various administrations. Still swinging from the grave!

His thoughts on Reagan make me gleeful:

"It makes me very irritated when Reagan's people pound their chests and say that because we had this big military buildup, the Kremlin collapsed....When you put peace, prosperity and human rights against poverty, a massive unsuccessful military program and a lack of human rights, communism was bound to collapse....No president, no Democrat or Republican, can claim credit for those programs. I'll tell you who deserves the credit -- the American people"

"...[Reagan was] a great spokesman for attractive political objectives...but when it came to implementation, his record never matched his words"

"[Reagan was] probably the least well-informed on the details of running the government of any president I knew....[He] was just a poor manager, and you can't be president and do a good job unless you manage."

Perhaps this will finally end that self-important Republican campaign to put Reagan on our currency.
-cK