Delusions of Ronald Reagan

Conservatives have found comfort in their delusions of a "B" actor named Ronald Reagan. I don't know what movie they are watching but their Reagan myth isn't much about reality.

In 1983, Reagan cut and ran in Beirut when 241 American servicemen were killed when their barracks were bombed by an Iran-backed terrorist group. Later, during Iran-Contra, it was learned that the Reagan administration was selling weapons to Iran to arm his right-wing drug-dealing death squads in Latin America. Reagan was selling weapons to Iran after Iran had held 55 Americans hostage for 444 days.

The USSR may be gone, but Russia still exists. Conservatives forget the role Mikhail Gorbachev, Lech Walesa (Polish trade-union organizer) and Osama bin Laden (jihadist who fought Reagan's war in Afghanistan) played in tearing down that wall.

Reagan didn't have to deal with an economy that has been victimized by 30 years of "voodoo" economics like we do today. When Reagan took office, the Fed funds rate was more than 20 percent and quarterly GDP growth was positive 1.6 percent. Obama took office with Fed funds rate at zero and quarterly GDP was collapsing a rate of negative 4.5 percent.

Really, Nixon wasn't that bad.

ROBERT FIGUEROA

Modesto