I’m listening to my buddy Thor right now and going on the assumption that this book gets better. He mentioned on Facebook that it’s a “fair” book, so we’ll see. As it stands right now from what I’ve read, it seems it may turn out to be one big bash fest.

The whole of chapter 1 can be summed up pretty much in a single sentence; I am jealous of things named after Ronald Reagan, and I hate his guts.

He starts off talking about the Republican primary debate that took place in front of Air Force 1 at the Reagan Library. He makes some interesting points about how everything seemed to revolve around Reagan rather than issues, which is true from what I remember. This is probably one reason that we ended up with a RINO running for President, since it looks like they were more concerned with what they look like in terms of message as apposed to how they would address issues. I will have to rewatch/listen to that. I would’ve expected the author to point out that Reagan welcomed debate with everyone, as shown with how he mentioned he wished that the third candidate was present for the debate he had with Carter (that John Anderson fella). Though Ron Paul and Mike Huckabee were present for that debate, they were largely shunned. I think it would’ve been nice to point out this quality that Reagan had, but it wasn’t mentioned.

After that, the author goes into a rant of all the places that bear Reagan’s name. Buildings and the like. It feels like the major part of this chapter is this topic, but it ended up just sounding pathetic, to be honest. He finishes out the chapter stating that it took 3 steps to create a myth of Reagan.

1. Eliminate references to anything bad from ’81-’89
2. Give Reagan more credit than he deserves, or just make things up
3. Make him appear more Conservative than he was

In chapter 2, there was a refreshing change in the book. It goes on about Reagan’s life, though it’s definitely abridged. He ends up directing the reader towards Reagan being someone that used acting, staging and one-liners to make himself more down-to-earth-like. Ironically enough, the author also uses one-liners a few different times throughout the chapter as little jabs at Reagan. At the end of the chapter, he seems to be implying that when Reagan said, “There you go again!,” during the Carter/Reagan debate, he sealed his own election, winning it with that one-liner. That’s a far cry to be sure.

So, I start on chapter 3 tonight on lunch break. Let’s hope it gets a tad better.