"Fabricated the World as He Wanted to See It, in Ways Unprecedented at the Time but Which Have Become All Too Familiar in Years Since"

"But Reagan was also a brilliant politician. He had a performer's grasp of character and humor as well as an instinctive sense of when to micromanage. Several times in the book, Perlstein reproduces Reagan's own painstaking revisions to the work of his speechwriters, rewrites that often had little to do with content and everything to do with rhythm, cadence, rhetorical inflection. Even more than 40 years later, the folksy charm drips from the page. Reagan's acting career is often referenced through middlebrow fare like Knute Rockne, All American and kitsch like Bedtime for Bonzo, but his longest-running role was as the host of General Electric Theater. He was a pitchman, and it was this skill that he most effectively put to use in his post-acting life."

Jack Hamilton at Slate reviews Rick Perlstein's Reaganland: America's Right Turn, 1976-1980.