How Has Ronald Reagan Changed Over Time

Ronald Reagan was elected the 40th President of the United States on November 4, 1980. Reagan dominated the primary elections for the Republican Party. George Bush was Reagan’s running mate, and the two men campaigned on a platform promising a balanced budget, steep tax cuts, increased defense spending, and a constitutional amendment to band abortion. Reagan charged that the country’s military had been allowed to deteriorate badly because of the Democrats. Reagan is known for his national television reminder of the country’s economic problems by asking, “Are you better off now than you were four years ago?” On election day Reagan had more than half the popular vote, and the electoral college was 489 to Jimmy Carter’s 49. For many Republicans, even still today, Reagan is one of America’s most admired politicians. Reagan was against all health care programs supported by government, including Medicare and Medicaid. He is known very well for his supply-side, “trickle-down economics”, or “Reaganomics”, which is a economic philosophy that suggests that cutting down government
He built up the American military and adapted a more confrontational policy with the Soviet Union. He referred to it as an “Evil Empire” in one of his speeches. The policy is credited for speeding up the economic collapse and the opining of the Soviet Union which happened in the late 1980's. However, the policy also included support provided to anti-Communist resistance activities all around the world, which gave weapons to fighters in Afghanistan, some of who led the Afghan and Taliban resistance to the US invasion of Afghanistan nearly two decades later in the 2000's. Possibly one of the biggest scandals of Reagan’s presidency came from this policy, the CIA violated American law by selling weapons and guns to Iran to supply the “Contra” rebels in Nicaragua, which was known as the Iran-Contra