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Dear Editor:
Ronald Reagan was no hero to me. Not only was he not the best American president of the 20th century, I can think of at least two other Republican presidents who were better than Reagan.
Here are just some of the reasons that I do not canonize Reagan:
He tripled the national debt, changing America from a lender nation to a debtor nation.
He presided over the biggest peacetime military buildup in history while slashing funding for much-needed social programs for the poorest Americans.
He gave massive tax cuts to the wealthy while raising taxes on the working and middle classes.
His Central American policy was responsible for the deaths of more than a half-million people in Nicaragua, Guatemala, and El Salvador.
Two words: Iran-Contra.
He cut by 75% the budget for the Departmant of Housing and Urban Development, which contributed to America's homeless population skyrocketing to more than two million during the Reagan presidency.
The national mood he fostered led to a resurgence in racism, sexism, homophobia, and blind allegiance to the government.
He ignored the AIDS problem, enabling it to become a full-blown epidemic.
He surrounded himself with the godawfulest people imaginable--James Watt, Edwin Meese III, Oliver North, and John Poindexter, for example.
For those and many other reasons, I will remember the Reagan presidency as a disaster for my country. I only hope that history will do the same.
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