A guest post today from another new addition to the West Wing Writers team, David Litt:
As a 22 year-old, I’ve always associated the phrase “Evil Empire,” with the New York Yankees, not the USSR. I’m embarrassed to say that I had never even read President Reagan’s “Evil Empire” speech. I’d meant to, but, like The Brothers Karamazov and the fourth season of Weeds, I just hadn’t gotten around to it.
But Iran got the lion’s share of coverage in yesterday’s press conference, and with John McCain (and others) arguing Barack Obama should adopt an “Evil Empire” attitude, it seemed like a good time to take a first look at the speech.
It didn’t surprise me to find that the speech was extremely well written (kudos to you, White House Writers Group), or that it bridged the gap between policy and values. But three things did surprise me. Here they are:
1) The Speech was About Atheism, Not Communism
I didn’t realize Reagan delivered the speech at a 1983 meeting of the National Association of Evangelicals, and that the subject was, first and foremost, religion. When he described the clash between superpowers, Reagan quoted Whitaker Chambers, who said that the West would succeed “only provided that its faith in God and the freedom He enjoins is as great as communism’s faith in Man.” In other words, the USSR isn’t evil because it’s a Communist country. It’s evil because it’s an atheist country.
Ironically, most of Reagan’s speech was about how we should become more theocratic – in other words, more like modern-day Iran. Prayer in schools, government control over women’s bodies, and using the law to promote orthodox views of sex and morality: with the Soviet Union as a foil, these things must have looked like principles. With Iran, they’d look more like concessions.
2) The Speech Was About Policy, Not “Showing Strength”
There was a specific reason Reagan said what he said, when he said it: a proposed nuclear freeze. In fact, Reagan ended his speech by asking his audience to consider his arguments “in your discussions of the nuclear freeze proposals.”
Reagan’s speech effectively mobilized opposition, and stopped the nuclear freeze movement in its tracks. We can argue whether that was a good policy idea or not, but the point is that it was a policy idea.
In the current case, what policy would Obama’s adoption of Evil Empire rhetoric serve? Obama’s current approach is the one with policy in mind – he’s worried Iran might use the “evil” characterization as an excuse to crack down even harder on protestors.
3) The Speech Was About a New Type of Diplomacy, Not a Return to the Past
Reagan reminded his audience that his view of the Soviets “doesn’t mean we should isolate ourselves and refuse to seek an understanding with them.” In other words, the values that guided past policies weren’t all bad. At the same time, however, he argued for a departure from Carter’s detente. He was demanding a new approach.
In yesterday’s press conference, Obama reminded us that George W. Bush’s values weren’t wrong either, that we must “bear witness to the courage and dignity of the Iranian people, and to a remarkable opening within Iranian society,” and “deplore violence wherever it takes place.” But like Reagan, he’s arguing for a new direction, swinging the pendulum away from Bush-era disengagement.
Like any historical document, there is something timeless about the Evil Empire speech. But as a historical document, it seems anachronistic. Put it this way: in 1983, Apple released the Lisa, a computer with a five-megahertz processor.
At the time, it was revolutionary. The hardware – the personal computer – is relevant today, but we can all be grateful that it’s been updated a lot since then.
If you look at the “hardware” of Reagan’s speech – emphasizing our fundamental differences, staying grounded in policy, and arguing for a new diplomatic approach – it’s clear that Obama is the one looking to give Reagan an update. His critics are still using the Lisa.
