Happy Birthday, Mr. Reagan

The day at work wasn't quite so boring today, and I wasn't so irritable.  Maybe I just needed some ginkgo biloba to improve my outlook!  And a few beers with Mr. Kellas.

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Mr. Reagan's birthday was today.  It's fitting that as he turns 90 years old, the liberal propaganda about Reagan is beginning to be replaced with an honest reassessment of the Reagan record.  We've seen his policies on fiscal and monetary economics vindicated, and we've seen him gain greater credit for the defeat of the Soviet Union that ultimately came from his policies (and ultimately allowed us to cut military spending significantly).  We've also found out he was not the amiable dunce everyone wanted to believe (check out In His Own Hand).  As a younger wave of Presidential historians and political scientists (influenced by people like Sam Kernell rather than neo-progressive like Arthur Schlesinger), I think the scholarship is going to be even more flattering to Reagan's leadership.  Happy Birthday, Mr. Reagan!

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Mr. Sharon won in a landslide, but we knew that was coming.  What we don't know is the nature of the government that will be formed, how long the Knesset will hold together under this arrangement, who will necessarily lead Likud if it falls apart (probably Netanyahu over Sharon), and how Sharon will proceed on the Palestinian issue.  Further, we don't know about the wildcard military situation: Iraq and Syria have become fast friends, and Iraq has been flexing its puny little military muscles lately.  Puny or not, lobbing one missile into Israel could make things a whole lot more complicated.

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