“The Republican Party, which achieved its greatest vigor in this century during the presidential terms of Ronald Reagan, now seems in the sere and yellow leaf.” – Russell Kirk, February 27, 1991, the day before President George Bush declared victory with Operation Desert Storm. Scholars Bradley J. Birzer and Adam Fuller reflect on Russell Kirk’s [...]
“This is going to be a grim job for all of us, to put it mildly, but it’s… important. We owe those victims our best work, whether we rescue anyone alive or only recover remains.”— James Greer in Commander in Chief I am sure that I am not alone among The Imaginative Conservative community in [...]
As he personally drafted his first inaugural address on a yellow legal pad, President-elect Ronald Reagan set as a primary goal restoring America to its former greatness. Reagan saw that America had lost faith in itself, as a result of the Carter years, the Watergate scandal, President Nixon’s forced resignation, and the loss of the [...]
You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on Earth, or we will sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness. Editor’s Note: Ronald Reagan delivered the following televised speech on October 27, 1964, in support of [...]
David Brooks, the in-house Republican at the New York Times, recently wrote an angry column aimed at conservatives (whom he dubbed “right-wing radicals,” among other unfriendly epithets). Elsewhere it has been pointed out, in essence, that someone like Mr. Brooks who pronounced Barack Obama suited for high office on account of the amazingly sharp crease in [...]
Will we, before it is too late, use the vitality and the magic of the marketplace to save this way of life, or will we one day face our children, and our children’s children when they ask us where we were and what we were doing on the day that freedom was lost? Ronald Reagan [...]
Ronald Reagan’s personal qualities do not fully explain his appeal to American conservatives. Reagan gained their favor not so much because of his personality and communication skills but because conservatives liked and believed what he said. His message was more important than the messenger. Perhaps the most important fact to assimilate about modern American conservatism [...]
“History is no captive of some inevitable force. History is made by men and women of vision and courage.” —Ronald Reagan […]
General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5MDFX-dNtsM Delivered June 12, 1987 Chancellor Kohl, Governing Mayor Diepgen, ladies and gentlemen: Twenty-four years ago, [...]
President Ronald Reagan delivered the following radio address to the nation on April 2, 1983. Books on the topic of this essay may be found in The Imaginative Conservative Bookstore. We hope you will join us in The Imaginative Conservative community. The Imaginative Conservative is an on-line journal for those who seek the True, the [...]
I urge you to beware the temptation of pride—the temptation of blithely declaring yourselves above it all and label both sides equally at fault, to ignore the facts of history and the aggressive impulses of an evil empire, to simply call the arms race a giant misunderstanding and thereby remove yourself from the struggle between [...]
While many across the political spectrum would like to discover the secret of Ronald Reagan’s success, some conservatives, believing the fortieth president a high priest of the American civil religion, have dismissed him as a barely closeted progressive who blithely saw the good in all. After all, it is always morning in America… While one might [...]
The heartfelt and inspirational December 23, 1981 Christmas Address to the nation from the late, great, President Ronald Reagan. The Imaginative Conservative applies the principle of appreciation to the discussion of culture and politics—we approach dialogue with magnanimity rather than with mere civility. Will you help us remain a refreshing oasis in the increasingly contentious arena [...]
On July 19, 1988, Bruce Springsteen played a concert in East Berlin, telling the crowd: “I came to play rock ‘n’ roll for you East Berliners in the hope that one day all the barriers will be torn down.” The program included Bob Dylan’s “Chimes of Freedom.” An East German concertgoer recalled: “What I got [...]