Recently a friend sent me a link to an old ad (It’s Morning Again in America) that set me reminiscing…
I remember.
I remember Vietnam and worrying that my dad might get called up.
I remember the election of 1968. Nixon won but things didn’t seem to get better.
I remember gas wars and cheap gas.
I remember Agnew resigning, then Nixon (kept those newspapers for years).
I remember gas lines and shortages.
I remember gas prices going up overnight and no Christmas lights to conserve energy.
I remember my mother wearing her WIN button to high school football games (Whip Inflation Now).
I remember why Nightline started and how it became an institution after 444 days (before 24/7 cable news).
I remember why I voted for Reagan over Carter in my first Presidential election.
I remember thinking Carter is a nice man, a sincere Christian, but Reagan knows how to be President.
I remember Carter’s inauguration celebration… And Reagan’s. Reagan made me proud to be an American.
Reagan knew that perception wasn’t just reality, it was how you influenced and won over your enemy.
He was, like all of us, a man of many faults, but in the end no one held it against him because when they listened to his vision of what America could be, they took on his dream as their own. Americans wanted hope, they wanted to know things were going to get better, that our best days weren’t all behind us. Those of us just coming of age wanted to know there was a future for us. The last of the baby boomers (and us early lost Gen Xers, the 13th Generation) grew up worrying about nuclear war, had only known a losing war that our older cousins or brothers fought in, saw our leaders resign in disgrace, experienced high inflation, high interest, high gas prices, high unemployment, had a morally upright President who told us we needed to lower our expectations. It was like we grew up destined to be depressed and negative about the future but we wanted something more, we wanted what our parents had with their memories of heroes and the booming 50’s and elders who led with integrity. Voting for Reagan was like voting for everything you wanted to believe in about yourself, your fellow man, your country.
Reagan won the hearts of Americans, not just Republicans. He didn’t become a moderate, or tone down his own political beliefs in the hope that no one would be offended by him and therefore vote for him; instead he appealed to average Americans of all stripes, convincing them that his values and his dreams were no different from theirs. They didn’t suddenly become conservative or Republican, they were Americans voting for the man who represented them. When 1984 came, we all new he had delivered what he could and still believed we could do better. Who would have voted against him? Obviously great campaign ads like It’s Morning Again in America helped us remember why we loved him, but only because they reflected what we wanted to believe about our President and our country. We can look forward with confidence to future. Since 1980: more working than ever before, interest half the record highs in 1980, inflation cut in half from four years ago, more buying homes, 6500 men & women getting married. Under the leadership of President Reagan, our country is prouder, stronger, better. Why would we want to return to where we were 4 short years ago?
It was an awesome ad based on awesome results. I want my children to have a Presidential candidate they can vote for who inspires them the way President Reagan inspired their parent’s generation.
Some might say we see Reagan’s success through the rosy glasses of history… however, he won 525 of 538 electoral college votes, every state but Minnesota (which was close) and the District of Columbia. To understand why, I just have to read his first inaugural address and realize he delivered on what he promised
… If we look to the answer as to why, for so many years, we achieved so much, prospered as no other people on Earth, it was because here, in this land, we unleashed the energy and individual genius of man to a greater extent than has ever been done before. Freedom and the dignity of the individual have been more available and assured here than in any other place on Earth. The price for this freedom at times has been high, but we have never been unwilling to pay that price.
…we are too great a nation to limit ourselves to small dreams. …I do not believe in a fate that will fall on us no matter what we do. I do believe in a fate that will fall on us if we do nothing.
… We have every right to dream heroic dreams. Those who say that we are in a time when there are no heroes just don’t know where to look. You can see heroes every day going in and out of factory gates. Others, a handful in number, produce enough food to feed all of us and then the world beyond. You meet heroes across a counter—and they are on both sides of that counter. There are entrepreneurs with faith in themselves and faith in an idea who create new jobs, new wealth and opportunity. They are individuals and families whose taxes support the Government and whose voluntary gifts support church, charity, culture, art, and education. Their patriotism is quiet but deep. Their values sustain our national life. I have used the words “they” and “their” in speaking of these heroes. I could say “you” and “your” because I am addressing the heroes of whom I speak—you, the citizens of this blessed land. Your dreams, your hopes, your goals are going to be the dreams, the hopes, and the goals of this administration, so help me God.
…I believe we, the Americans of today, are ready to act worthy of ourselves, ready to do what must be done to ensure happiness and liberty for ourselves, our children and our children’s children. …peace is the highest aspiration of the American people. We will negotiate for it, sacrifice for it; we will not surrender for it—now or ever.
… At the end of this open mall are those shrines to the giants on whose shoulders we stand. …George Washington …Thomas Jefferson …Abraham Lincoln. Beyond those monuments to heroism is the Potomac River, and on the far shore the sloping hills of Arlington National Cemetery with its row on row of simple white markers… Each one of those markers is a monument to the kinds of hero I spoke of earlier. … Under one such marker lies a young man—Martin Treptow—who left his job in a small town barber shop in 1917 to go to France with the famed Rainbow Division. There, on the western front, he was killed trying to carry a message between battalions under heavy artillery fire.
We are told that on his body was found a diary. On the flyleaf under the heading, “My Pledge,” he had written these words: “America must win this war. Therefore, I will work, I will save, I will sacrifice, I will endure, I will fight cheerfully and do my utmost, as if the issue of the whole struggle depended on me alone.”
The crisis we are facing today does not require of us the kind of sacrifice that Martin Treptow and so many thousands of others were called upon to make. It does require, however, our best effort, and our willingness to believe in ourselves and to believe in our capacity to perform great deeds; to believe that together, with God’s help, we can and will resolve the problems which now confront us.
And, after all, why shouldn’t we believe that? We are Americans.
Loading ...