"I Feel That We Lost the Struggle at That Time, and I Think the Biggest Reason Is Ronald Reagan"

"But whatever you think about his intelligence, what's unquestionable is that Reagan had extraordinary emotional intelligence. He could sense the temperature of a room, and tell them a story and make them feel good. And that’s more fun, right? It's more fun to feel good than feel bad. That's part of our human state. And also that's what leaders are for. Leaders are for calling people to their better angels, for helping guide them to a kind of sterner, more mature sense of what we need to do. To me, Reagan’s brand of leadership was what I call 'a liturgy of absolution.' He absolved Americans almost in a priestly role to contend with sin. Who wouldn't want that? But the consequences of that absolution are all around us today. The inability to contend with climate change. The inability to call elites to account who wrecked the economy in 2008. The inability to reckon with the times when we fall short."


David Dayen in Salon talks with Rick Perlstein about Perlstein's new book, The Invisible Bridge: The Fall of Nixon and the Rise of Reagan.


Michael Kimmage reviews The Invisible Bridge in The New Republic.


As does Frank Rich in The New York Times.


Harold Pollack in The American Prospect interviews Perlstein.