Victor Davis Hanson // National Review
It’s an evergreen media strategy for disparaging the sitting GOP executive.
When Ronald Reagan was elected president in 1980, many in the media considered him a dangerous extremist.
Some reporters warned that Reagan courted nuclear war and would tank the economy. He certainly was not like the gentleman Republican and moderate ex-president Gerald Ford.
But by 1989, the media was fond of a new adjective: “Reaganesque.” Reagan in retirement and without power was seen as a senior statesman.
Not so for his once-centrist and better-liked vice president, George H.W. Bush, who suddenly was reinvented as a fool and a ninny in comparison.
