On Sunday, the world grieved the loss of one of America’s classiest and most admirable women, Nancy Reagan.
In a country full of Hillary Clintons and Michelle Obamas, Nancy Reagan’s eight years in the White House from 1981 to 1989, stands far above the others.
And it’s easy to see why Nancy is unparalleled when it comes to being one of the most widely-respected First Ladies our nation has ever had.
I’ve always loved the ever-classy Nancy Reagan, but after learning a bit more about her extraordinary life, my respect for this woman has grown all the more.
Nancy’s life was spectacular, but President Obama doesn’t even have the decency to show his face at her funeral. Michelle Obama announced that she would be going, but why she won’t bring her husband is beyond me. Instead, he’s going to Austin for the South by Southwest (SXSW®) conference and festival as a keynote speaker. It’s horrible.
Here are three reasons why Michelle Obama and Hillary Clinton will never be Nancy Reagan:
1. Nancy Reagan adored her husband and faithfully stood by his side until the very end, their lifetime of love inspired thousands.
Nancy’s lifelong love affair with President Reagan was simply undeniable. The adorable lovebirds met on November 15, 1949, while working in Hollywood. Nancy was a beautiful young actress and as fate would have it, Reagan was the president of the Screen Actors Guild and had divorced one year prior, due to his first wife’s humiliating affair.
According to BBC, Ronald was still getting over his divorce from actress Jane Wyman, with whom he had two children, when he met Nancy. By 3:00am on their first date, they were already planning their next. The two began going steady and were instantly inseparable.
“I don’t know if it was exactly love at first sight, but it was pretty close,” Nancy told reporters in a recent interview.
Three years later, Reagan casually popped the question with the words, “Let’s get married,” one night over dinner at their favorite restaurant, which Nancy simply replied, “Let’s”. They married on March 4, 1952, at the Little Brown Church in the Valley in Studio City, Ca. It was a secret ceremony designed to avoid the press, and had only two attendees.
Observers described Ronald and Nancy Reagan’s relationship as “intimate.” As President and First Lady, the Reagans were reported to display their affection frequently, with one press secretary noting,
“They never took each other for granted. They never stopped courting.”
In 1998, while her husband was afflicted with Alzheimer’s disease, Nancy became Ronald’s primary caretaker and seldom left his side. Nancy told Vanity Fair,
“Our relationship is very special. We were very much in love and still are. When I say my life began with Ronnie, well, it’s true. It did. I can’t imagine life without him.”
With her leading man gradually slipping away, Nancy Reagan became more fiercely protective than ever; managing what she termed Ronald Reagan’s “long goodbye”.
Ronald’s death on June 5, 2004, ended what Charlton Heston once described as “the greatest love affair in the history of the American presidency.”
When asked if she missed ‘Ronnie’, Nancy expressed that it hadn’t gotten easier, instead, she missed him all the more with each passing day. Watch the full emotional interview below:
As one obituary noted, Nancy Reagan “considered her most important role promoting the political, physical and mental well-being of Ronald Reagan. Launching one of history’s most extraordinary partnerships with their 1952 marriage, she became his closest advisor, wielding her influence to defend his interests and advance his goals.”
2. Nancy Reagan Brought The American People Together and Didn’t Take Her Role As First Lady Lightly.
An excellent hostess, Nancy Reagan was careful to plan every dinner and event in advance. She absolutely insisted on being involved from start to finish, from the seating charts, to music selections and speeches. In order to ensure that the purpose of every event was clearly accomplished, Nancy Reagan was always the first to arrive and the last to leave.
As First Lady, Nancy visited veterans, the elderly, and the handicapped, and worked with a number of charities.
In 1982, Nancy Reagan was asked by a schoolgirl what to do when offered drugs; Nancy responded “Just say no.” Those three little words launched the “Just Say No” drug awareness campaign, which was her primary project and major initiative as First Lady. Her campaign focused on drug education and informing the youth of the danger of drug abuse.
Peter Schweizer, author of Reagan’s War: The Epic Story of His Forty-Year Struggle and Final Triumph Over Communism, told Breitbart News,
“This is going to strike a lot of people as very provocative, but at this point in time and history, if you were to compare who has had a bigger impact on American history, Nancy Reagan or Hillary Clinton, you would have to say that Nancy Reagan had a much larger impact on American history.”
3. Nancy Reagan was a true woman of strength and embodied everything a First Lady should.
Unlike many First Ladies of our day, Nancy didn’t give in to peer pressure or feel the need to perform. She didn’t care if she went against the feminist agenda for being “too wifely, too fashion conscious, too conservative, and too much of a 1950s’ traditionalist in the edgier, post-sixties, 1980s.”
Nancy didn’t care what the feminist media outlets were saying — because she was too busy helping her husband run the United States of America. She didn’t believe Presidency meant that her husband would lead the country while she sat at the White House and drank tea. Much like everything else in their lives, the Reagans believed they would lead America best while hand-in-hand, together.
Nancy didn’t have to delete controversial correspondence (cough cough, Hillary, cough cough), or hide her husband’s scandalous affairs — because there were none. By serving and supporting her husband, Nancy in turn, served and supported America.
Nancy Reagan was petite in size but she was a giant in stature. Her noble character and quiet confidence made her the pillar of strength that Ronald needed.
As many have said, “Ronald Reagan won the Cold War but it was Nancy Reagan who made it happen.”
Reagan was determined to win the Cold War without any bloodshed — an ambition that was laughable when he first took office in 1981. With his over-arching goal on the back-burner, Reagan devoted his first term to fixing the U.S. economy, rebuilding our military, and restoring relations with our allies.
Critics were outraged when Reagan finally pursued a policy of peace and arms reduction with the Soviet Union. Reporters mocked, “How could he pursue peace with a nation he had just months before called an evil empire?”
Nancy was the voice louder than the critics and stronger than the ignorant mockers. More than anyone else, Nancy played a major diplomatic role in bringing the Soviet Union to the negotiating table.
In September 1984, Reagan took the first step towards peace. He invited Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko to visit the White House for a small working luncheon. It was the first time a Soviet official was publicly received at the White House, and sent a signal that Reagan would have a different approach to the USSR in his second term.
Nancy had been privately encouraging the president in this direction for some time, and worked behind the scenes with White House security and staff and to make it happen. They arranged for Mrs. Reagan to have her own, separate role in the monumental event.
A beaming Mrs. Reagan welcomed Gromyko to the White House at a reception prior to the lunch. When she greeted Gromyko, he leaned down to her and said, “Does your husband believe in peace?”
She responded, “Yes, of course.”
Gromkyo responded, “Then whisper ‘peace’ in your husband’s ear every night.”
Without falling prey to his manipulative comment, Mrs. Reagan replied, “I will. And I’ll also whisper it in your ear.”
It’s been said that Gromyko repeated the story many times over the years. It was a clear and unmistakable message coming from President’s Reagan’s closest and most influential adviser — his wife — that they had turned a new page in the relationship.
The rest is history. Nancy’s direct influence and encouragement ushered in a new era of peace that the modern world had never seen.
As Peter Schweizer so perfectly put it, Nancy Reagan “was a very savvy and astute person, and when Ronald Reagan faced opposition, sometimes even within the Republican Party itself, Nancy Reagan was there with him, and I think you could say had he not been married to such a strong, well-equipped woman for the time, you could say that American history would be different than what it is today, and world history would be different than it would be today.”
Many Americans will think of Nancy Reagan as just a pretty, supportive wife in ‘Reagan red’ designer clothing. But the truth is, Nancy Reagan is one of America’s greatest heroines. As the old saying goes, “Behind every great man there’s an even greater woman.” Without Nancy Reagan, the world would cease to exist as we know it.
“A woman is like a tea bag, you can not tell how strong she is until you put her in hot water.” Nancy Reagan
There has never been, and will never be, a classier First Lady than Mrs. Nancy Reagan. America needs more women like her, please share if you agree! And please join us in prayer for the Reagan family as they grieve their tremendous loss.
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