To Newsweek’s Jonathan Alter, Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan have much in common. Both, he wrote recently, were twice elected president, enjoyed high job-approval ratings, and endured second-term scandals which threatened their administrations.

Give me a break. To suggest any similarity between Mr. Reagan and Mr. Clinton is ludicrous, although, given the collapse of Mr. Clinton’s favorable rating, it is hardly surprising that Friends of Bill are desperate to borrow credibility from any source they can.

Mr. Reagan was a man of unshakable principles and big ideas. He believed that the federal government was too big, too powerful, and too intrusive; that power should be returned to the states, localities and individuals; that taxes were too high; that our military strength had been seriously eroded and needed to be rebuilt.

And Mr. Reagan put his beliefs into action. He forced through Congress the first across-the-board tax cut in memory, tamed America’s double-digit inflation and interest rates, rebuilt America’s armed strength, while restoring the nation’s confidence and morale. He also ended the Cold War, freeing millions formerly imprisoned behind the Iron Curtain and helping spark an economic boom whose effects we are feeling even today.

Mr. Clinton’s only big idea – the socialization of American medicine – was rejected overwhelmingly by the American people. Since then he has championed only inconsequential causes like public school uniforms, midnight basketball and child safety-seat mandates for no other reason than that they poll well. Some leader.

Everyone who knew Mr. Reagan or even dealt with him – from those who shared his ideology to liberal Democrats such as Tip O’Neill – concede that whether you agreed or disagreed with his political views, Mr. Reagan was a good and decent man. Mr. Reagan’s political opponents often savaged him, but he turned away their criticisms with a smile and a quick, often self-deprecating, wit.

Mr. Clinton’s character is a facade: The I-feel-your-pain man from Hope is really a petty and vindictive adolescent. He believes destroying his enemies is acceptable behavior. Worse yet, he hasn’t the political courage to do his dirty work himself. Instead, he sends out private investigators to dig up dirt on his critics, and James Carville, Sidney Blumenthal & Co. to destroy their reputations. History will judge Mr. Clinton to be the man who turned Teddy Roosevelt’s bully pulpit into the pulpit of a bully.

Mr. Clinton’s penchant for trashing his critics is not limited to those who stand directly in his way; indeed, Mr. Clinton has made his contempt for Mr. Reagan known in evident ways. Imagine, for instance, Ed Meese’s suggesting that Mr. Reagan hire the lawyer who defended Sirhan Sirhan. Mr. Reagan would have thrown Mr. Meese out of the Oval Office, knowing that to hire Sirhan Sirhan’s mouthpiece would be deeply hurtful and insulting to Ethel Kennedy, the Kennedy family and all decent Americans who remembered and revered Bobby Kennedy. Yet Mr. Clinton hired presidential counsel Greg Craig, one of John Hinckley’s attorneys, a deliberate slap in the face of Mrs. Reagan and the Reagan children.

Consider also in 1996, when he was running for reelection, Mr. Clinton coldly and calculatedly used in a TV commercial footage of the assassination attempt on Mr. Reagan. Mrs. Reagan called the White House twice to ask that the distasteful commercial be taken off the air, but Mr. Clinton never returned her calls.

It is little wonder that Mr. Clinton and his people dislike Mr. Reagan so intensely, lie about his record, and attack his presidency as a “Decade of Greed.” His character, his political courage and consistency, and his enormous accomplishments are an indictment of Mr. Clinton, his apologists, and his enablers.

In short, Mr. Reagan was a man of character, which no pundit can refute. Mr. Clinton is not. It is unconscionable to think that Mr. Reagan could be charged with raping a campaign supporter, or sexually harassing a White House volunteer, or having sex with an intern; with Mr. Clinton, who bears proudly the torch of modern-day feminism, such stories are ordinary.

I returned recently from a couple of days at the Reagan Library attending a conference of campaign and administration alumni and a tour of the Reagan Ranch, courtesy of the Young America’s Foundation. The hope brimming from the former staffers gathered about was palpable. Their enthusiasm for Mr. Reagan and his ideas had not waned in the decade since he left office. I can hardly imagine such a reception in Little Rock 10 years after our provocateur in chief leaves office.

Thankfully, history will render Mr. Alter’s assessment of the two presidents incorrect. A decade after he left office, Mr. Reagan’s reputation continues to rise. A recent poll ranked him among the great 20th century presidents. He was. Mr. Reagan’s legacy will be one of honor and good intentions, fitting for the man Jack Kemp called “the last Great Lion of the 20th century.” In the final analysis, no matter what Mr. Clinton does for the rest of his life, the first paragraph of his obituary will mention Monica Lewinsky, impeachment and disgrace.

I can only pray that Mr. Reagan survives the Clinton presidency, if only so that the country can avoid the spectacle of an accused rapist and proven liar using a great man’s funeral to promote himself and polish his image. Remember Ron Brown’s funeral – a smiling, joking Mr. Clinton turning somber and wiping away crocodile tears when he spotted a TV camera? Mr. Reagan deserves better, much better, than an embarrassing display of counterfeit emotion from a sociopath like Mr. Clinton.

When history looks back on the 20th century, what words of inspiration will they draw from our presidents? From Franklin Roosevelt, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” From Harry Truman, “The buck stops here.” From Ronald Reagan, standing at the Berlin Wall, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.” And from Mr. Clinton, Cohiba in hand, “It tastes good.”

That guy is in the same league as Mr. Reagan? I am reminded of the remarks of an esteemed Texas senator, from whom I would like to borrow loosely: I knew Ronald Reagan. He was a friend of mine. And Bubba ain’t no Ronald Reagan.

Craig Shirley is a GOP consultant.

LOAD-DATE: April 13, 1999

LANGUAGE: ENGLISH

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