*
First Lady Nancy Reagan has died at the age of 94.
**
According to The New York Times the cause was congestive heart failure.
***
She will be buried next to her husband at he Ronald Reagan Presidential library in Simi Valley, California.
* Image of young Nancy Davis from here.
Underpaid Propagandist
Tramp the dirt down.
JPL
In the words of Prescott (down below on Betty’s blog) just say no
Miss Bianca
Damn. She was a raving beauty in her younger years, wasn’t she? I had no idea. Sorry, is that a sexist comment?
Elizabelle
I wonder whose prayer got answered with Nancy Reagan’s death. Nothing personal, but you know some hoary journalist was saying “I can’t cover Trump and Rubio one more moment!” And now they get to go back to the romance of the myth.
Tuned in NBC. They’re still doing a Special Report. Andrea Mitchell was up first, and then Uncle Tom Brokaw, and Chuck Todd is there bloviating now.
(PS: gonna be a field day for older Republicans getting some airtime. Ken Duberstein — remember him? — up now.)
japa21
Far classier than her husband.
Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class
Meh. She resembled my grandmother and was the living embodiment of the fakey nice nice manners I’ve always loathed in white culture.
Elizabelle
Did they do this for Betty Ford? I don’t remember.
exregis
Nancy Reagan — famous for being the second woman president of the US (1987-89). Edith Bolling was first.
patrick II
Nancy, depending on her astrologer’s advice, convinced Ronnie to cooperate with Gorbachev during glasnost. Whatever else may be said of her that may be the best advice ever offered by a first lady — and that she had a first rate astrologer.
James E Powell
@Elizabelle:
Betty Ford’s husband wasn’t canonized.
Betty Cracker
Well, thanks for nothing, Nancy. But seriously, condolences to her family. Both of her kids seem to have turned out okay, so maybe that’s down to her.
Trentrunner
She led a very long, insanely privileged life, and only took up causes in any meaningful way when they had affected her personally.
Also, totally believed in astrology. ASTROLOGY.
Elizabelle
Andrea Mitchell has just talked about “Maggie Thatcher.” She last talked to Nancy when “Maggie Thatcher” died.
The mask falls.
Tramp the dirt down, indeed.
Got a good dig in at the Carters wearing jeans in the White House. It. was. not. done. in the Reagan White House. St. Reagan would not take off his jacket, so as not to diminish the office.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Betty Cracker: I dunno… Patti seems like a whack job. Spent years trying to embarrass her father (seemingly intentionally, unlike Michael) and I’ve seen a few comments about how “Barack Obama isn’t half the President my dad was!” I think she was a PUMA
Eric U.
@exregis: I was going to say that she may have ruined a lot of lives with her anti-drug bullshit, but at least she ran the country ok.
Elizabelle
Oh Gawd. Morning Joke on now. Time to find something else to do.
M31
The only picture of Nancy I’ll ever post:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/44/NancyReaganMrTChristmas1983.jpg
Jim, Foolish Literalist
always made sure his shoes were shiny, too. Used the Constitution to polish them the very day he gave the orders for the Iran Contra deals
Elizabelle
Talking about “Ronnie” Reagan. Maggie Thatcher.
Joe talked about how absorbing and complete the Reagans’ marriage was, unlike so many others in the White House.
No one ever thinks of Jimmy and Rosalyn Carter somehow. Why is that?
sacrablue
@Betty Cracker: Do you have a current email addy, different from the one that appears in contact the author to the right? I attempted to send you a photo that I saw last night on twitter. Failed twice.
pamelabrown53
@Elizabelle:
Since Reagan the republicans have trashed the White House far beyond Reagan working in his shirt sleeves in the Oval Office.
Still, RIP, Nancy and condolences to her family and friends.
SiubhanDuinne
This is slightly odd:
I haven’t given Nancy Reagan the first thought in forever. Never wondered about her, never heard or saw her name in newscasts or on magazine covers. So I was a bit surprised last Monday evening when she just SLAMMED into my mind with no warning. I immediately checked the Googles to see whether she had died, but she hadn’t — there was nothing recent or newsworthy about her at all.
But that was such a powerful jolt that I sent myself a one-line email saying, essentially, that I thought she would die very soon. So today’s news was a little disconcerting.
(Yes yes yes, I know she was 94 and it’s only to be expected and I could easily “predict” the imminent demise of a lot of famous nonagenarians and be right as often as not. All I can say is, this wasn’t like that. I’m not at all claiming to be psychic, but it was definitely an out-of-the-ordinary event for me.)
Nemo_N
Oh boy, brace yourselves for a week or so of how bipartisan Reagan was and how sad it is that liberals don’t follow Tip O’Neill’s example and do everything republicans say blah blah…
Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class
@M31:
I don’t remember that, but it’s awesome.
Taylor
By all accounts, Nancy Reagan was concerned about her husband’s historical legacy, and on account of that convinced him to sign the INF Treaty, signaling the beginning of the end of the Cold War. This was against strong opposition from the RW, e.g. Bob “B-1” Dornan called Ronald Reagan a “useful idiot for the Soviets.”
She certainly had her faults (e.g. “Just say no” was a pure PR stunt), but at least on this score, she deserves due credit.
John M. Burt
@Miss Bianca: She was always good looking, at every age. And at least during Reagan’s political career, she was . . . not precisely raving, but quite irrational.
I’d probably have more sympathy on this occasion, if I hadn’t been working at an old folks’ home when Reagan died. Going down the corridors, hearing the same coverage blaring from each room, being bound by professional* integrity to keep my mouth shut while news people and residents alike talked a lot of nonsense, was one of the most unpleasant things I had to do (including changing soiled undergarments) before my back went out.
*One particularly foul-tempered old person snorted contemptuously when I invoked my professionalism in response to nosy questions, given my pay grade. When I replied, “You can be a convict on a chain gang and display professionalism. It’s a matter of personal dignity” instead of “Go to Hell”, I think I reached a high point of professional integrity.
pamelabrown53
@M31:
That pic. is hilarious. Hope others take the time to click.
SiubhanDuinne
@Elizabelle:
I think of Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter a lot. And, of course, Barack and Michelle Obama.
SiubhanDuinne
@Nemo_N:
Tweety. OMG. Can I just barf now and save myself the trouble later in the week?
M31
hahaha, the Repub establishment is SOOOOO pissed at Nancy for dying now — closer to the election and the mournful respectful TV worshiping would have given a few points to the GOP.
So, it’s on to Plan B. Poor elder George Bush, I think it’s mid-October for you.
Miss Bianca
@M31:
The only picture of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher I’ll ever post:
Sorry, Nancy. I know that you and your husband may have had a very special love, but his true ideological soulmate was the Iron Lady.
Miss Bianca
@John M. Burt:
Good for you. Man, what a hard job you must have.
For some reason, I am reminded of the scene in “Hannibal” (one of the only books I could never finish because I just became too queasy), where Hannibal Lector wreaks bloody vengeance on one of the prison guards who disses him, but spares another who treated him with dignity and respect, and made no bones about the fact that he was afraid of him, even in captivity.
I guess the takeaway lesson for me from that one was, “it pays to be nice even to people you despise.”
Hal
@Nemo_N: How wonderful Nancy Reagan was as First Lady instead of that awful Michelle Obama. Tyrant Michelle wants kids to eat more and exercise while Nancy had some of the best advice and support for people with addiction issues. Just say no! Not to mention, as Whoopi Goldberg onced talked about in her comedy act, she sent a teddy bear to baby Jessica while completely ignoring Ryan White’s house being burned down at the height of the aids crisis hysteria. Just her husband.
Anywhore, rest in peace.
Linnaeus
@Miss Bianca:
Yeah, I really like that first picture.
Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class
@SiubhanDuinne:
Tip and Ronnie. At Tanagra, when the walls fell…
trollhattan
Public Peggy Noonan: “This is the sad end of America’s greatest era.”
Private Peggy Noonan [chugs]: “Thirty years too late, you shrew!”
Let us savor.
Germy
Drunk History:
The Reagans’ Rise To Power
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7y2I2w-A76g
Tim C.
@exregis: Nahhh… I think Baker was the power behind the throne at that point. Nancy had some weird influences though.
SarahT
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Sorry, it’s Michael Reagan who’s the wingnut. Patti seems okay but kinda new-agey, but Ron Jr. is a total mensch. Embarasssing I can remember this stuff but not where I left my spare house keys.
Villago Delenda Est
Nancy Reagan is dead, yet the Dark Lord continues to be animated.
benw
@M31: I pity the fool!
Anya
I am learning she did good things like convincing her husband to negotiate with Gorbachev and supporting the Brady Bill. Not bad for a little lady. RIP
Betty Cracker
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: In that case, I take it back. I just had a vague recollection that she was anti-nuke when her father was in the White House and hadn’t heard anything about her at all in decades, which silence seemed sensible of her.
@sacrablue: It’s bettycrackerfl-atsign-gmail-dot-com — just checked and it is working.
Anya
@Elizabelle: David Gergen made a similar comment on CNN so I tweeted him this pic of Reagan
Hal
@Betty Cracker: I remember her posing for playboy and being accused of doing it to embarrass her father. I thought Ron Jr was the normal one, Patti the rebellious daughter and the other one the rwnj.
Germy
@Hal: Reagan was indifferent to all of them, from what I’ve read.
Miss Bianca
@SiubhanDuinne:
Sure you don’t have a touch of The Sight?
Germy
@Taylor: from her obit:
Elie
I still feel that Reagan’s Presidency marked a horrid change in American politics — he perfected the “southern strategy” with all the imbedded dog whistles. His “classy” racism allowed northern whites to vote their racist proclivities while pretending they weren’t. Nothing good came out of this period of the American Presidency, including ketchup as a vegetable for school lunches. I hope that they both rest in peace, but I have nothing but the taste of bitter bile in my mouth remembering what he stood for.
cckids
@Elizabelle:
Um, yeah. The Reagan’s own kids have talked about how “absorbing” their parents’ marriage was; to the extent that the kids felt that there wasn’t much love or room left for them. If my kids said that about me & my spouse, I’d consider it a failure.
Villago Delenda Est
@Germy: Reagan was at Michael’s graduation to present diplomas, and didn’t seem to recognize him as he handed Michael his.
But then again, he didn’t even know who his own HUD secretary was.
delk
In 1985 I tested positive for HIV.
I hated her and her useless husband. I was given 18 months. I wasn’t even supposed to live longer than his second term.
Yesterday I got the results from the blood work I had done on Thursday. Viral load undetectable.
I’m going to enjoy my day and ignore the phony tributes.
AdamK
I cannot express the depths to which I am unmoved.
trollhattan
@Elie:
“Hi, I’m Ronny Reagan. Government sucks, am I right? Please hire me for the most important government job, for which my hatred of government totally qualifies me. Thanks everybody!”
And they lick his loafers, still.
Villago Delenda Est
@delk: I am delighted you’re still with us.
I’m not so much delighted that my brother was lost to that disease in 1987.
Yes, I still blame Reagan for his death.
bystander
I just wonder who will succeed (no pun intended) to Nancy’s hard-earned title.
The only way it gets better is if Phillis Schlafly runs over Clarence Thomas in a murder-suicide.
scav
I rather figured the R establishment would take this inevitable period of mandatory idealized faux nostalgia to attempt to force a little “back in the fold!” action on the free-range wandering angry hoi before the convention gets out of hand. Clamp down on the visible name calling, reanimate the gipper and his holy 11th.
Roger Moore
@Elizabelle:
Yeah, right.
trollhattan
@delk:
Damn, navigating that in the ’80s was a tall task. Well done!
SiubhanDuinne
@Elizabelle:
Riiiiiiiiiight.
Steve in the ATL
From Gin & Tacos:
Of all of the responses to Trump from within the Republican Party, Nancy Reagan’s has been the best.
delk
@Villago Delenda Est: I am saddened to hear about your brother. Too many lost, far too young.
NotMax
As good a person as she was an actress.
;)
bemused
It would be nice to have an entirely different topic for the media to obsess over but a week long Nancyfest wasn’t what I had in mind. It’s not even going to be much of a change because now it will be flipping back and forth between the Donald and Nancy. The Ronnie adoration funeral seemed to last for weeks 24/7 and almost made me feel homicidal.
Mai.naem.mobile
@Germy: I did not know that mandatory minimums started under Reagan. I always thought they started under Clinton.
I thought Michael was the adopted one and did not fit in with the family and that he was estranged from the family for several years.
scav
@Roger Moore: Also, dignity thy name is Jelly Bellies. Because it’s totally all about the dress code and accessories one has, and not one’s actions that diminishes the office. Speaks volumes.
bemused
@Elizabelle:
How touching but I never had the impression that any of their kids interested them much.
donnah
Huh, I thought she was already dead.
smintheus
Just watched Philomena on Netflix last night, found it a poignant commentary on the ’80s as well as the ’50s.
Baud
I don’t have strong views on Nancy. It seemed like she was the person Peggy Noonan always wanted to be.
SarahT
@delk: Mazel Tov !
Mai.naem.mobile
I hope some Obama toadie makes his lifes mission to make sure Obamas name is on schools,healthcare facilities,parks,airports etc.because the Dems need to a page from the GOP playbook and lionize the guy. Michelles name too, on physical exercise/rec facilities and pediatric nutrition research institutions. Its.called marketing and every US corporation does it.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Betty Cracker: @Jim, Foolish Literalist: In that case, I take it back. I just had a vague recollection that she was anti-nuke when her father was in the White House
I think you’re right, in fairness> I think a lot of her schtick was the acting out as the child of two parents who weren’t much interested in their children kind of like the Palins). who now that he’s dead has unresolved issues
The whole thing is in that tone.
SarahT
@Villago Delenda Est: I’m so sorry. Losing a brother just sucks.
Keith G
In the 80’s we (my group and I) made the standard jokes about Nancy, but now I just do not care. Life is too short to poke at old angers. Nancy was born a year before my mom and I miss my mom, so absent all the standard noise, I understand that loss.
Michael Beschloss is digging up old photos. Here is one from the 60’s (I bet), that is undoubtedly a product of a very self conscious and successful image machine.
? Martin
Trump got 200 million mentions on Facebook in February. That’s 10x what any establishment candidate received. That’s the measure of the GOP (and special interests) losing control of their ability to reach voters, to advance their policy goals.
Sanders wasn’t as dramatic but also substantially led Clinton on social media. Corbyn is viewed in the UK much like Bernie/Trump as having highly unrealistic ideas, yet got voter support through social media. This is a basic breakdown of political party power (which to his credit, Reagan was very good at wielding). It’ll be interesting to see where this takes us – but I can’t help but think that the various strong party backers (NRA, religious right, unions, etc.) are going to shift tactics as their ability to get legislation is seriously threatened by the loss of party power. What does a GOP with no NRA scoring/backing look like? What does a Democratic party with no institutional support from unions look like (something we’re already seeing break down when the culinary union initially refused to work the Nevada caucus until Reid leaned on them)? That doesn’t mean that these groups don’t still take sides, but are they willing to put their money/effort in if they aren’t able to reliably get candidates that will deliver their policies?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Mai.naem.mobile: I think Michael and Maureen were adopted by Ronnie and Jane Wyman, Patti and Ron were Nancy’s kids, and Ron Jr was their favorite. I remember Michael ditched his mother in the back of the church at the old man’s funeral because the cameras were pointed at Nancy.
Why do I know this?
I saw a clip of Maureen with the olds on MSNBC, didn’t she run for office, unsuccessfully some time in the nineties?
pamelabrown53
@SiubhanDuinne:
Love it! That pic of Reagan practicing his golf swing in the Oval: well, at lest he was wearing his coat and tie!
delk
@trollhattan: Yeah. I get a bit testy when I am told how much rougher today’s 20 somethings have it compared to ‘old’ people like me, lol.
dr. bloor
@cckids:
It’s almost as if true empathy and narcissistic mirroring weren’t the same thing.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Roger Moore: Jeans and the dog in the Oval Office, also too.
Doesn’t matter, of course. Republicans can make up anything without consequence.
Cheers,
Scott.
pamelabrown53
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Actually, I’m pretty sure that Patti was from Nancy’s first marriage. (Hence the Patty DAVIS). Wasn’t Ron Jr. there only natural child together?
Feathers
Awful person, but she pushed Ronnie towards peace with USSR, so an enormously positive influence on world history.
I’m reminded of my grandmother’s observation that Nancy Reagan was “a general’s wife.” She told me once that a man’s making general was largely dependent on how hard his wife wanted it and how good she was at steering him towards that goal. My grandmother was a colonel’s wife. He entered the army as a private, and managed to keep his officer rank at the end of WWII, so Grandma Feathers did alright by him.
dr. bloor
@Villago Delenda Est: Count me in as well. I lost my brother about a year before the antiretrovirals started hitting the market. Earlier funding leading to earlier discovery is hypothetical of course, but If St. Ronnie and Princess Nancy spend the rest of eternity being painfully devoured by their denial, I won’t lose any sleep.
Miss Bianca
@delk:
Glad that you are still here. It has been immensely gratifying to me to watch the progress of HIV go from Inevitable Death Sentence to Sucks, But Manageable.
Ryan
Sad news to be sure. On the positive side, she can sit out the rest of the primary.
Mary G
She did eventually break with Republicans and supported stem cell research.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Yeah, I’m sure that line’s for Katich.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Eric U.: She ruined almost as many – and probably ended far more – with her HIV/AIDS denial. I’m told you’re not to say bad things about recently dead people. I’ll try. Nancy Reagan is dead. Good.
Zinsky
I wonder if her astrologer saw that coming…Now she can join her husband, the date rapist, in Hell.
dww44
@Elizabelle: To those on the right, Jimmy and Rosalyn don’t count. Nancy went on my “Not Like” list when, shortly after their first inauguration, she and/or some of her inner circle were reported as saying that “it was nice to have some class” back in the White House. The inference was that Jimmy and Rosalyn were lacking in manners and style. Does anyone remember this?
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/02/04/garden/first-lady-s-china-makes-its-debut.htm
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Elizabelle: Doesn’t any of that side recall that Reagan was already married when he and Nancy started courting? Some marriages must be more absorbing and complete than others.
Ruckus
@scav:
Conservatives like bullshit and window dressings, because they hide what they don’t want you to see. That they are fucking you. You aren’t supposed to know that until they are done and you can’t find your pants. Because they’ve stolen them too.
Elie
In a strange way, Trump is burying the Reagan legacy. May be the only good thing from his candidacy…. Raegan built the modern Republican crypto-racist, neocon lovers and gave them permission to exercise their beliefs…
Tinare
@pamelabrown53: No. Patti was their biological child. Davis was Nancy’s maiden name. Patti changed her name to try to have her own career.
As for Nancy, she can rot with her husband.
SiubhanDuinne
@Miss Bianca:
Not predictably enough that I could make money at it.
Baud
@SiubhanDuinne: You haven’t, um, had any thoughts about me, have you?
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Mai.naem.mobile: Michael is the adopted child of Raygun and the first Mrs. Raygun, Jane Wyman. So he might easily have had complicated feelings about his father and the second Mrs. Raygun.
Ruckus
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
Every once in a while we really need a like button. This is one of those times.
Like.
I have never understood why you can’t speak ill of the dead. Some of them have caused untold suffering of people who never did anything to them. Like Nancy and her husband. I’m supposed to be nice because they died? What the fuck for? So the part of me that doesn’t actually exist goes to a place that doesn’t either? And wouldn’t I be better off if either of those things existed because I at least attempted to call attention to/help end the shitty things that the living/now dead had done?
Baud
@Ruckus:
Because death is considered am opportunity for new beginnings for the living.
And because it invites retaliation. Think of how blogs are during primary season and extrapolate that to all of society.
Eric U.
@Ruckus: I think the prohibition against saying ill of the dead is probably because so many people deserve it. The Republicans taking advantage of Reagan’s death certainly pushed the boundaries in my book. Fortunately, I could ignore most of it.
This is a story I have never told before. I met Reagan during his second term. He told me he regretted leaving the Communist party, but he could never go back. He figured he was going to hell for all the bad things he had done as president. It was really sad.
pamelabrown53
@Tinare:
Thanks for the correction.
trollhattan
@Elie:
I don’t know, it seems like Trump is using a lot of Reagan’s rhetorical gymnastics, only recast in belligerent tone and delivery. I hear Trump fans calling him “a Washington outsider” and “guy who gets stuff done” and the echoes from 1980 are rather loud.
Ruckus
@Baud:
You think blogs aren’t society?
Do you think that dying absolves one of all the bad things they did? If that was the case then some of us wouldn’t die. But we all do. And if you throw in the heaven/hell bit then realize that both of those are supposed to exist for all eternity. Which really doesn’t mean anything either because it’s what the living do to each other that counts. And if we can’t discuss the bad that someone did then what’s the point of thinking that we might get better, however slow progress is?
Germy
@Eric U.:
I think the prohibition against speaking ill of the dead came from the old belief that the dead walk the earth at night seeking revenge.
Baud
@Ruckus:
Of course, but most of society follows different norms.
No. I didn’t suggest that the dead can never be criticized for their actions in life, particularly when they are public figures. I always understood “don’t speak ill of the dead” as meaning “abandon the type of rhetoric you might use if the person were still living” because they are gone forever.
SiubhanDuinne
@Baud:
The Great Duinnie sees all, knows all.
geg6
Screw this bitch. Screw her sideways. Days like this make me wish I believed in a god or hell because I’d be praying to the god that this hag spend eternity in hell.
But my sympathies to Patti and Ron, who turned out okay despite their evil parents.
Anne Laurie
I read Kitty Kelley’s book when it first came out, back when the Reagans were still news. It lead with an anecdote about teenage Nancy getting her birth certificate legally amended — ‘the only details she wouldn’t change were ‘white female’. The way she presented the known facts (and this is why Kelley was so feared/hated; she was good at facts), Nancy was abandoned shortly after birth to poverty-stricken relatives of her fame-obsessed mother. When she was eight (‘but she looked younger’) her mom married a prosperous ‘perennial bachelor’, reclaimed Nancy, and ‘left her in charge as a substitute social partner’ while returning to her Hollywood dreams. (She never saw the grandmother who’d raised her again.) Kelley never quite spelled it out, but the implication from those early chapters was that Nancy got sold to a pedophile by her own mother. Publicly, she ‘worshipped’ her separately self-absorbed mother and stepfather, but that seems to have been a matter of manipulating her image while using them for whatever advantages she could. Her ‘lifelong love affair’ with an already-married, much-more-famous actor-turned-politician seems to have been a mixture of narcissistic mirroring & addiction to being power-behind-the-throne for a dimwitted figurehead who called her ‘Mommy’. The only person she seems to have genuinely loved was her son Ronnie… and he turned out to be a lefty-ish ballet dancer, not the powerful political/business macher she wanted!
Germy
@Baud:
And because they can’t yell “Oh yeah?? Fuck you!!” like the living.
Baud
@Germy:
I believe John Cole will find a way.
Betty Cracker
@Anne Laurie: That’s just sad.
I'll be Frank
Never say bad about the dead, only good. Nancy is dead. Good.
Technocrat
@Germy:
I think there’s some truth to that. We typically agree that a person should be able to defend themselves from accusations – it’s the same reason “whispering behind his back” is considered sort of icky.
The dead can’t defend themselves.
Ruckus
@Eric U.:
This just re-enforces my point. If (and this is a big if for many people) we want things to get better for the humans that follow us on this rock then we have to know where we started and what was done wrong. Even if that wasn’t considered wrong at the time. It’s the only way we move forward and make life better. None of us are perfect, many/most of us are not even close. But you can’t move things forward if you don’t discuss them and who and why they were bad ideas and why they were thought to be good ideas at the time and who held those thoughts and why.
Baud
@Technocrat: Agree. It is a good point.
geg6
@pamelabrown53:
Nope, she’s Ronnie’s daughter. I think she took the Davis name (Nancy’s maiden name) when she went into acting, I believe, to distance herself from her father. Now whether that was because she hated him at the time or just wanted to try to make it in Hollywood on her own merit, I don’t remember. Probably a bit of both.
Mike G
“As uncomfortable as it is to talk about, and write about, abuse is part of this story. I first remember my mother hitting me when I was eight. It escalated as I got older and became a weekly, sometimes daily, event. The last time it happened was when I was in my second year of college.”
–Patti Davis (formerly Patricia Ann Reagan), talking about her mother Nancy Reagan, The Way I See It
“I laughed and was only sorry she wasn’t in it.”
–Michael Reagan, describing his delight as a teenager when Nancy’s Lincoln Continental rolled down a hill and was totaled, On the Outside Looking In
“I confronted her about listening in on one of my phone calls. She raised her hand to hit me, and I blocked her hand with my arm. She’s never tried to hit me before, but I have all these memories of watching her do it to you. I used to look in your room and see her slapping you, and I remember thinking that I was never going to let that happen to me.”
–Ron Reagan, Jr., explaining to his sister why he ran away from home after a confrontation with his mother, The Way I See It
“My parents have never gone for simple, state-of-the-art lies. They weave bizarre, incredulous tales and stick by them with fierce determination.”
–Patti Davis (formerly Patricia Ann Reagan), regarding what her parents told her about the circumstances of her birth seven months after her parents were married, The Way I See It
Corner Stone
Just as happy to see every single person associated with the Reagan administration pass on, to include CJ Roberts and James Jim “Jimmy-Boy” Webb.
Hell can’t burn hot enough, or long enough.
rikyrah
RIP Nancy Reagan
Mandalay
@Miss Bianca:
Not so. She may have been his true ideological soulmate but the reverse was definitely not true. In particular, acting on Haig’s advice, Reagan urged her to cede the Falklands after the Argentina invaded. Not surprisingly she diplomatically told Reagan to go fuck himself, and proceeded to force Argentina to surrender.
If he had been running this year Reagan would not have lasted as long as Scott Walker. He would have been openly despised as a spineless wimp.
Read the transcripts. Thatcher was ten time the man/warmonger that St. Ronnie ever was.
Bill E Pilgrim
Here’s the moment regarding her that stayed with me the most from those days. This was 1984 by the way, barely the end of his first of two terms.
The attempt to spin it away was almost more interesting. Watching that video it’s pretty clear which version is correct.
A highly influential person? Of that there is no doubt.
Corner Stone
And to include Cole’s favorite, Smilin’ Jack Kemp. May he be tormented forever and ever and ever. And ever.
Doug R
Franco’s still dead, ain’t he?
SiubhanDuinne
I was just looking to see what various current and former officials are saying in tribute, and came across this (sorry no link):
Wondering why George H. W. Bush and Bar haven’t yet seen fit to weigh in with a statement. Isn’t that something that would almost be pre-written and ready to go at a moment’s notice?
Anne Laurie
@Betty Cracker: Facts, as someone did not quite say, are sad things.
Nancy Davis Reagan lived a very public life, but outside of the ‘glamour’ it doesn’t seem to have been a happy one…
Germy
@SiubhanDuinne:
They’re getting their stories straight. Takes time.
Ruckus
@Baud:
No. I didn’t suggest that the dead can never be criticized for their actions in life, particularly when they are public figures. I always understood “don’t speak ill of the dead” as meaning “abandon the type of rhetoric you might use if the person were still living” because they are gone forever
How many people here haven’t thought about or thought Nancy was dead? Until she died and we find out about it. All of the things that this person were known for, especially things done to others, such as @delk:, get discussed. We shouldn’t think or talk ill of a person that so negatively affected people? Fuck that. I’m not on board.
Now let me talk of the inability to answer back. So what? How many of the people affected by Nancy could have said something that would have even been heard when she was alive, letting alone be answered or atoned for? I’m betting none.
SiubhanDuinne
@Mike G:
Wow, that’s pretty damning. Don’t know that I ever heard about physical abuse in the Reagan household.
SiubhanDuinne
@Germy:
ROFL!
MaryRC
@Mai.naem.mobile: Yes, Michael was adopted. Maureen was the natural daughter of Ron and Jane Wyman. I don’t think that Michael was estranged from the family so much as that Ron and Nancy kept both Michael and Maureen at a distance. Ron was a remote father to all his children — all 4 of his children have attested to that — and Nancy had no interest in bringing the children of his first marriage closer. Ron’s campaign literature for his California campaigns never mentioned his two oldest children for fear that this would remind the public that he was divorced; it was just the little nuclear family of Ron, Nancy, Patti and Ron Jr. Ron Jr was the apple of Nancy’s eye. She and Patti had the somewhat cliched 60’s relationship of uptight social-climbing mother who cares about appearances first and hippie rebellious free-spirit daughter.
Michael’s book about his family certainly had a sad title: On the Outside Looking In. I think that says everything.
I’m glad to see that the Washington Post tried to present a realistic warts-and-all portrayal of her here.
scav
Good part of this isn’t about the person in any case, good or bad. It’s more about the delusions, preconceptions, whatever of the living as projected onto a being. When the being dies, they’re no longer providing any confusing counter-examples so the mythos really takes over. This is just being done on a national stage, with larger myths. Ironic in that in this specific instance the being seemed genuinely as concerned with the surface accouterments, backdrops and conforming to cosy movie stereotypes as the target audience, but that’s an accident of happy codependence..
Anne Laurie
@SiubhanDuinne:
You *do* remember how much Nancy & Bar hated each other, right?
IIRC, Bar could barely contain her public glee when Nancy’s old man passed on; I suspect the Bush servants were discretely sent home for the rest of the day once Nancy’s death was announced, before someone could finish the pitcher of martinis…
Fair Economist
Ron Reagan just put out a clip of Nancy Reagan endorsing Hillary Clinton for 2016 (a little halfheartedly, but still..) to promote a forthcoming special on First Ladies. Shortly afterwards she dies.
Coincidence? I think not.
Technocrat
From “Oklahoma”, one of my favorite musicals, I am reminded of this:
Poor Judd is Dead
@Fair Economist:
Hillary couldn’t afford any loose ends! /CT
SiubhanDuinne
@Anne Laurie:
Honestly, no, I don’t. Or if I ever did know, I’ve managed to suppress the memory. But that whole twelve-year period of Reagan-Bush was so awful (and my personal life was pretty tumultuous, too, during that time) that I didn’t pay much attention and may easily have missed it.
Germy
@Fair Economist:
I thought that was a hoax story
JPL
@Doug R: Yes. Praise the lord.
If Cheney died before the election, I think turnout would be higher on the democratic side.
Amir Khalid
How classy people speak of the dead.
Nancy Reagan was no doubt a creature of the environment she worked her way into: politically and socially conservative, jealous of the privileges of wealth and status that she believed she and those like her had earned. And yes, morally blinkered about gay and HIV+ people and the poor and drug users and anyone else she thought deserved to suffer for their sins. But if there’s a point to not speaking ill of the dead, it’s surely to keep from dwelling on our reasons to be angry with them, which we can’t act upon anymore. We the living have enough on our plate.
Trooptrap Tripetrope
As a gay man who came of age at the dawn of the AIDS crisis, I have absolutely nothing good to say about this woman, but plenty that I will refrain from saying…for now.
MaryRC
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): Officially Ron and Nancy started dating in 1949 after his divorce in 1948, although I wouldn’t be surprised if this was a fabrication — studios were still spinning tales to protect their stars’ reputations then. But Nancy didn’t break up his marriage to Jane Wyman — it was Jane who ditched Ronnie. Supposedly Jane became bored with Ron’s new-found obsession with politics and Commies after becoming SAG president, although the death of their second daughter, who lived less than a day after she was born, also drove them apart.
Terri Newton
@Elie: AMEN!
Prescott Cactus
@delk:
Congrats and peace !
John Revolta
Well, I’ve never had any use for astrology but when you you look at how far Ron & Nancy got in life………I honestly don’t know how else to explain it
jl
If news report I heard this morning is true, I guess a person can say a little good about the dead.
Report said Nancy Reagan was a major moderating influence on her husband: backed him on talking with Gorbachev, recognizing that transformation of Soviet Union was a real thing, decision to pursue nuclear arms control talks, and other of the few good, but major, decisions that helped save the Reagan administration from being down there in total disaster with W.
Edit: which means it was still a disastrous turn down a very wrong road in terms of policy. You can probably count the major good decisions made by Reagan on one hand. They were important ones that saved his term from complete disgrace. But on domestic policy, a turn down a horrible road that ruined millions of lives, maybe not most with a bang (though plenty did end with bang with the racism and foul police policies) but with grinding destruction of livelihoods.
Anne Laurie
@SiubhanDuinne: The way Bar Bush saw it, Nancy was a two-bit gold digger who’d slept her way into marriage with a genial figurehead being manipulated by California money guys. She spent a ton of other people’s money dressing like a cheap slut and debasing the restrained antique style of the White House with gaudy tchotches peddled by non-WASP nancy-boys, and was publicly mesmerized by tasteless Mafia hangers-on and tv “celebrities”. Also, she was a terrible mother and a neglectful grandmother — no feeling for “family”!
Nancy, in turn, at her glitzy “kitchen cabinet” dinner parties with rich California businessmen / Wall Street kings / B-list Hollywood, mocked Bar as a fat ugly badly-dressed WASP tightwad who looked like her sweatily underachieving husband’s mother and was too stupid / unsightly for public tasks beyond writing thank-you notes and doing needlework.
Also, per the ‘little people’ in their orbits, Nancy was a publicity-hungry passive-aggressive pain in the neck, but Bar was a stone-cold rhymes-with-witch who made Livia Soprano look like Mother Teresa — ‘caricatures’ both women were always happy to publicly ‘deplore’.
Their husbands didn’t exactly see eye-to-eye either, of course, and the post-glory days when both men’s camps did their best to throw all blame for Iran-Contra on the other guy didn’t exactly improve the situation.
stinger
@delk: Oh, that’s outstanding news! So very glad to hear it.
jl
@Anne Laurie: Sounds delightful. I never understood the Reagan magic BS.
I remember watching a bunch of GOP pundits, hacks, and political celebs on TV doing a rapturous and worshipful reading of selections from Ronnie Reagan’s personal letters. They were astonished at the great man’s wisdom, class, charity and generosity.
I thought the letters revealed an arrogant, conceited, bigoted fool. And surprisingly snobbish for a supposed regular guy politician with the common touch. But I guess tastes differ. And I guess he could put on an act, if not a particularly good one.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@delk: The best news I’ve heard all day.
Amir Khalid makes the excellent point of how speaking ill of the dead is harder on us than on them, to offer my interpretation of what he said. I will decline to ignore the great harm the Reagans did to the US, it’s residents, and indeed the world, however, just because Mrs. Reagan died.
In my family, grudges are to be nurtured carefully. Just saying. Seriously, AK, you point is pitch perfect, It’s just beyond my current abilities.
SiubhanDuinne
@Amir Khalid:
You are such a good person, Amir. Thank you for reminding the rest of us how to be decent people.
Zinsky
@Anne Laurie: This may be the best summary of Nancy’s life I have read yet. People do forget what an utter failure she was as a mother, which at the end of the day, is the most important job a woman can have here on earth. digby was extraordinarily gracious in her coverage of the passing of this footnote to history.
MaryRC
@SiubhanDuinne: The Bushes and Reagans were never close and there are many stories of the Reagans snubbing the Bushes during Ron’s presidency, and keeping them at arm’s length. But there seemed to be real animosity between Nancy and Barbara. In the first media encounters after Bush became president, Barbara made some sly digs at the contrast between Nancy’s fondness for expensive designer clothes and her own more simple down-to-earth tastes (as she played it). If anything could make me feel sympathetic towards Nancy, it would be Barbara throwing shade at her.
bystander
I have nothing but bad things to say about her. I’ve never seen the slightest redeeming feature about her. Why would I start today?
Rand Careaga
@SiubhanDuinne: Strange how these things work (the thought of Nancy R “slamming” into your mind unbidden days prior to her death). I had a similar experience in 1974 the day before a celebrity death. In my case it was Ed Sullivan. Ed Sullivan?? Measured against this episode are all the high-profile peg-outs that passed with nary a premonitory twitch on my end, and the sudden and arbitrary popping-ups to my attention of such people who then went on to live for years thereafter. I’d accordingly hesitate to draw any woo-woo conclusions from this visitation, but it’s nice that you thought to document it.
Corner Stone
@Zinsky:
Hmmmm…hmmmm…
Elie
@Amir Khalid:
Well said and something that I will remember. We DO have a lot on our plate that is bad, but thanks be, let us not be completely blinded to the good that many have given their very lives for in order that we raise the bar on what it means to live effectively….
Corner Stone
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
Both of my grandmothers understood the true art of holding a grudge. My maternal grandmother could’ve taught a doctoral class on it. Did it get her anywhere? Absolutely not. She would have considered the question laughable, before she attempted to spit whiskey into your eye.
justawriter
my favorite button of the 80s
Technocrat
@Corner Stone:
Funny…my grandmother traveled from Oklahoma to Philadelphia – packing a sixgun, mind you – in pursuit of a man who had done her wrong.
Maybe grudges were just more popular back then. I mean without Instagram and such, what else was there to do?
Steve in the ATL
@Zinsky: I miss Bartcop.
Miss Bianca
@justawriter:
Somehow, I knew what this was going to be before I even looked at it. It was my favorite, too.
ETA: Well, that and “Go Reds. Smash State.”
Ruckus
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
Agreed.
I’m not saying we have to speak ill of the dead, but why is it that we should never. Some have earned that. In Italy in late April 1945 people not only spoke ill of the dead they spit on, stoned and hung several who had already been shot.
ETA Is it that we are supposed to be better? OK that is understandable, but I still believe that some do not deserve our silence. Maybe it seems better if you didn’t get harmed directly but do I need to say why that is wrong?
Prescott Cactus
@Ruckus:
Where I worked we spoke of going to a funeral of an “unliked” so that you could stick a pin in them (from your union button) to make sure they were really dead.
@Digby:
When it’s our loved one, we all set the dogma aside. I’d have chainsawed every yew tree in the world, environment be damned.
LanceThruster
Here’s what comes to mind everytime Nancy Reagan is the topic.
When the Gorbachev’s visited the White House for the first time, Nancy went out of her way to show Raisa Gorbachev just how superior the American lifestyle was to the Soviet one because we had better things. All I could think of was how boorish would a host have to be to try to “one-up” a guest for the sake of one’s ego.
eemom
meh. I’m a devout believer in speaking ill of the evil dead, but don’t care enough to bother in Nancy’s case.
Now, someone like Cheney — if he ever actually does die — I shall deliver a personal GFY to anyone on the innertoobz who utters such pious platitudes.
Don'tBeAStranger
This classic SNL clip probably says all you need to know about Barbara Bush and Nancy Reagan.
http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/barbara-and-nancy/n9736
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@Ruckus: Nah, I think the custom developed because usually, if you spoke ill of the dead, it was almost certain to get back to the grieving family members.
Ruckus
@Prescott Cactus:
Yes.
Me, mine and no one else. We deserve to be saved from some disease but others don’t. Why is her husband’s death from Alzheimer’s different than someone who dies of HIV? Both of them are still dead, although the Alzheimer’s sufferer was most likely old enough to die of something else anyway, while the HIV sufferer most likely wasn’t. Full disclosure, dad died of Alzheimer’s. At slightly over the average male lifespan at the time. Reagan lasted about ten yrs longer than the average. And could have easily been suffering from Alzheimer’s the last few yrs of his term.
Ruckus
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism:
It shouldn’t? Why should they live in a safe bubble of denial?
Sorry, I’ve seen and felt a lot of grief at family members dying, from 6 month old babies to 95 yr oldsters and all ages in-between. But none of them were famous or powerful and their living and dying affected the same limited number of people.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Ruckus:
I’m not entirely persuaded it wasn’t in both terms, but he was such an (often useful to all very not noce people) idiot, it’s hard to make a distinction. Mr. and Mrs. Reagan were both very unkind people. Period. Eric U’s comment is the first of its kind I’ve ever seen and is indeed sad.
Alzheimer’s takes a terrible toll on families and caregivers within those families. But it’s telling that Nancy Reagan only took an interest when it affected her personally.
Scamp Dog
@Eric U.: Huh? I’m boggled. I always figured the over-the-top anti-Communism was sincere. And it’s even harder to imagine he’d confess something like that to anyone. Could you tell us more about this meeting?
Ruckus
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
Mr. and Mrs. Reagan were both very unkind people. Period.
That may be one reason that they tried to appear and talked of appearances as being very important. It all you saw was how impressive they tried to look you might not recognize the truth. I’ve always understood dressing up and acting like that is the only way things should be, is a way to hide that you are a phony, a disguise if you will. That may be from my working class background or my exposure to phonies at an early age. Mittens and family gives me the same vibe, we are better than you, look how we dress and how you do. And as I get older and more get the fuck off my lawn, I find that most wealthy people strike me the same way. Next year I go to my 50th HS reunion and I’ll do the same as the last one, the 10th. We were supposed to dress up, fancy dresses/suits. I wore a long sleeve shirt and 501 Levis, with sneakers. I was the most comfortably dressed and within minutes of arrival all ties/jackets, heels etc were off. That stuff, dressing up to impress never has for me. And yes later on I owned a tux for work banquets. But I got paid for that.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@Ruckus: Not what I’m saying.
You don’t speak ill of the local guy in the casket so that you don’t disrupt the mourning of his family, your neighbors. Don’t bring feuds into the funeral, don’t start a fight at the wake, don’t use the eulogy to take revenge for whatever grudge lies in your past or dredge up old gossip (much as the genealogist in me would like to have heard said gossip).
It’s not the dead guy you’re being polite to. It’s everyone else in town.
I see no reason to take the sort of custom that keeps small towns and similar-sized gatherings of people (churches, large workplaces, etc.) from blowing up and expand it to someone whose social milieu I will never come into contact with.
sm*t cl*de
@SiubhanDuinne:
Prez Carter has now outlived his inoperable cancer, and remains on-track to outlive the Guinea worm.
Anne Laurie
@Technocrat:
… or else the descendents of people who can really nourish a grudge are a natural fit for the Balloon-Juice milieu?
redshirt
My Nancy Reagan collage is now at peak value.
It really is stellar.
Bids start at $20,000.
PJ
@Mandalay: She also privately urged Gorbachev to invade East Germany when the Berlin Wall was coming down. On the whole, she was a much bigger fan of dictatorship than democracy.
brantl
I am so happy this miserable old bat is finally dead. ‘Nuff said.
redshirt
It’s a stupendous collage. Featuring Nancy Reagan dress dolls as well as a general milieu of “Just Say No”.