Three Levels of Text  Read Reagan’s First Inaugural on your own.  Choose one passage in the text that you feel is important.  Level 1: Read aloud the passage you selected to the group.  Level 2: Say what you think about the passage (interpretation, connection to past experiences, etc).  Level 3: Say what Reagan sees as implications of his work

The Reagan Administration

Style:  Good natured, “ man ’ s man ”  Actor: can play a role  Great communicator  Assassination attempt: heroic

Ideas:  Government should be smaller  Taxes should be lower for everyone  Traditional Christian principles should be upheld

Budget Cuts  Could not cut Medicare or Social Security The elderly were a key support group.  Budget cuts mainly affected business regulation, programs for the poor Ex: school lunch programs Ex: nursing homes Ex: the environment

Tax Cuts  Cut taxes across the board 25%  Believed in “ supply side ”, or “ trickle down ” economics. Cut taxes on the wealthy They spend their money to create jobs The poor get jobs, work is rewarded

Problem:  Did not cut spending enough.  Result: Huge debt!  Reagan increased our debt more than all the presidents before him combined.

Spending Hike: Defense  Strategic Defense Initiative: “ Star Wars ”  Plan to develop space- based systems to shoot nuclear weapons out of the sky before they reach us.  Reagan ’ s idea, not rooted in science.

Wacky Ideas Work  Star Wars scared the Soviets.  They believed we could do it.  They couldn ’ t compete.  Led them to negotiate, seek reforms that led to the downfall of communism in the USSR and surrounding countries!

A Conservative Supreme Court  Appoints three justices: Antonin Scalia Anthony Kennedy Sandra O ’ Connor – 1 st female

Attempted Assassination  1981  John Hinckley shot and punctured Reagan’s lung after a speech in Washington D.C.  Reagan survives  3 others wounded

Challenger Disaster “And I want to say something to the schoolchildren of America who were watching the live coverage of the shuttle's take-off. I know it's hard to understand, but sometimes painful things like this happen. It's all part of the process of exploration and discovery. It's all part of taking a chance and expanding man's horizons. The future doesn't belong to the fainthearted; it belongs to the brave. The Challenger crew was pulling us into the future, and we'll continue to follow them.” -Reagan

Iran-Contra Affair  Reagan wants stop communism in Nicaragua.  Communists = Sandanistas  Anticommunists = Contras  Congress cuts off funding to Contras through the Boland amendment.  The Reagan administration secretly sells weapons to our enemies, Iran, to raise money to fund the Contras.  “ Teflon ” president, Bush pardons all.

1984 Re-election  Republicans:Reagan and H.W. Bush v.  Democrats: Walter Mondale and Geraldine Ferraro