{"version": "1.0", "type": "rich", "title": "Ronald Reagan Was Once Donald Trump", "author_name": "kontextmaschine", "author_url": "https://kontextmaschine.com", "provider_name": "kontextmaschine", "provider_url": "https://kontextmaschine.com", "url": "https://kontextmaschine.com/post/634112715589320704/", "html": "Ronald Reagan Was Once Donald Trump\n

argumate:

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kontextmaschine:

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To hear the right\u2019s triumphalism of recent \nyears, you\u2019d think that only smug Democrats were appalled by Reagan \nwhile Republicans quickly recognized that their party, decimated by \nRichard Nixon and Watergate, had found its savior.

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The Republican elites of Reagan\u2019s day were as blindsided by him as their counterparts have been by Trump.

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A typical liberal-Establishment take on Reagan could be found in Harper\u2019s,\n which called him Ronald Duck, \u201cthe Candidate from Disneyland.\u201d That he \nhad come to be deemed \u201ca serious candidate for president,\u201d the magazine \nintoned, was \u201ca shame and embarrassment for the country.\u201d

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A strategic memo by Carter\u2019s pollster, \nPatrick Caddell, laid out the campaign against Reagan\u2019s obvious \nvulnerabilities with bullet points: \u201cIs Reagan Safe? \u2026 Shoots From the \nHip \u2026 Over His Head \u2026 What Are His Solutions?\u201d But it was the strategy \nof Caddell\u2019s counterpart in the Reagan camp, the pollster Richard \nWirthlin, that carried the day with the electorate. Voters wanted to \n\u201cfollow some authority figure,\u201d he theorized \u2014 a \u201cleader who can take \ncharge with authority; return a sense of discipline to our government; \nand, manifest the willpower needed to get this country back on track.\u201d

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(yep)

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I have been pushing the Trump/Reagan thing. How many people on Tumblr were alive then, I wonder. How many people on Tumblr are alive now, even.

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I think it’s really significant that Reagan was shaped by the movie studio system, where you as the principal would do the projects the studio boss said, or at least the ones your agent said, in the way the director said, and you were just responsible for the charisma gap

And Trump coming from 80s NYC tabloids AND ‘00s reality TV, the first is a lot about politicking with the players and the second is just the principal drawing on his personality to throw whatever at the wall and the editors pick out and polish the jewels after the fact

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