Reagan Interview

Reagan Remembered Interview

01/29/2013

University of Phoenix

HIS135

Dr. Baron Smith

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* For this assignment, I chose to interview one of my co-workers who was politically active during the Reagan era and could provide me with some insight into those years.

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* Question 1: What was the New Right and what were some of their main principles?

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* Answer: The New Right refers to a movement, founded by conservative Republicans, who came together in the 1970’s to form a political foundation that took advantage of existing Republican networks in order to become an effective political force.

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* The main principles or ideologies of the New Right, when compared to the Old Right, dealt more with social issues such as abortion and homosexuality in the media. Since the New Right was a conservative group, abortion and homosexuality were seen as immoral and therefore, were not accepted; in fact the formation of the New Right is believed to have been a direct reaction to the Supreme Court ruling on Roe v. Wade that gave women the right to have an abortion. The New right saw this as a step in the wrong direction for the United States and decided to band together in order to eradicate these types of social issues from society.

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* Question 2: Can you describe how the end of the Cold War came about and what role Ronald Reagan played in it?

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* Answer: There are actually a few different schools of thought when it comes to who exactly was most responsible for the end of the Cold War. In the end I think it came down to having the two right people in office at the right time that were willing to work together. Reagan and the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev met in Geneva with a sense of mutual distrust, and rightfully so since both countries had been racing to stockpile massive nuclear arsenals, something around 25,000 nuclear warheads a piece. Once the two were able to get past...