A Boring Dystopia

things I dislike Reagan for:

• ignoring HIV because he was okay with it just killing the gays (until straight people started getting it.)
• trickle-down economics (how we got the billionaire oligarchy)
• Iran-Contra.
• firing the striking air traffic controllers.
• doubling down on the War on Drugs.

things Reagan was kinda based for:

• actually wanting to eliminate nuclear weapons. everyone remembers SDI as a ridiculously expensive boondoggle (which it would have been tbf) or as a trap to get USSR to spend itself into bankruptcy (it wasn't imo, since the Russians realized they could build MIRVs), but I honestly think Reagan sincerely wanted a missile shield to have a missile shield. apparently he was hawkish on nuclear war until he watched The Day After, which terrified him and left him depressed for weeks and completely changed his thinking on nukes. he got so close to bilateral disarmament at the Reikjavik summit, but it fell apart because of his insistence on pursuing SDI.

• not being a raging egotistical jerk like Trump. he was respectful towards Carter and Mondale. he even respected the Soviet Premiers he met with, despite his anti-Communism. he had actual principles and ideals, even if I disagree with some of them.

when the USSR collapsed, Bush ignored Russia's pleas to help it restructure and rebuild, to secure its nuclear weapons stockpiles, to integrate its economy. so we ended up with a country with starving nuclear weapons designers trying to grow potatoes in their back yards, and a Mafia takeover, and massive distrust and antipathy towards the West. I think Reagan would have actually lent them a helping hand, and Putin wouldn't have happened.