President Reagan The Role Of A Lifetime

by Cannon, Lou

• ISBN13: 9781891620911
• ISBN10: 1891620916
• Edition: Revised
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2000-03-31
• Publisher: PublicAffairs

Summary

Hailed by the New Yorker as "a superlative study of a president and his presidency," Lou Cannon'sPresident Reaganremains the definitive account of our most significant presidency in the last fifty years. Ronald Wilson Reagan, the first actor to be elected president, turned in the performance of a lifetime. But that performance concealed the complexities of the man, baffling most who came in contact with him. Who was the man behind the makeup? Only Lou Cannon, who covered Reagan through his political career, can tell us. The keenest Reagan-watcher of them all, he has been the only author to reveal the nature of a man both shrewd and oblivious. Based on hundreds of interviews with the president, the First Lady, and hundreds of the administration's major figures, President Reagan takes us behind the scenes of the Oval Office. Cannon leads us through all of Reagan's roles, from the affable cowboy to the self-styled family man; from the politician who denounced big government to the president who created the largest peace-time deficit; from the statesman who reviled the Soviet government to the Great Communicator who helped end the cold war.

Author Biography

Lou Cannon covered Ronald Reagan for more than twenty-five years, first as a reporter for the San Jose Mercury News and later as the Washington Post White House correspondent. Cannon is the author of two previously published books on Reagan and, most recently, Official Negligence: How Rodney King and the Riots Changed Los Angeles and the LAPD. He lives in Summerland, California, just five miles outside of Santa Barbara.

Table of Contents

Preface To The 1991 Edition	ix
Preface To The 2000 Edition	xi
Back to the Future	1	(15)
A Reagan Portrait	16	(4)
The Acting Politician	20	(11)
The Acting President	31	(14)
Offstage Influences	45	(21)
Heroic Dreams	66	(12)
Halcyon Days	78	(17)
Kidding on the Square	95	(20)
Hail to the Chief	115	(26)
Passive President	141	(31)
The Loner	172	(24)
Staying the Course	196	(44)
Focus of Evil	240	(49)
Freedom Fighters	289	(50)
Lost in Lebanon	339	(63)
An Actor Abroad	402	(32)
Morning Again in America	434	(54)
Turning Point	488	(33)
Darkness at Noon	521	(59)
Struggles at Twilight	580	(83)
The New Era	663	(48)
Visions and Legacies	711	(54)
Notes	765	(55)
Bibliography	820	(15)
Acknowledgments	835	(7)
Index	842