I just got back from my first trip of the year, the annual sojourn to the Ronald Reagan Library. There is something energizing about being amongst fellow Republicans and President Reagan admirers. There is something almost spiritual about the place, in beautiful scenic Simi Valley, overlooking the mountains all of the way to the water. Peaceful. I suppose the admiration and affection that conservatives feel for President Reagan is akin to what liberals feel for President Obama. His funeral was the closest I've felt to that, I suppose. I think being there reminds me of being a kid, too, the good part of growing up in the 1980s, at least. Look how it's inspired and driven me in my life.
Enroute, I finished up Peter Rodman's Presidential Command. Rodman passed away on our wedding day, and before even knowing this, I felt a kinship to him. He seemed like a decent man, and googling his obituaries upon completing the book, everyone said he was kind, earnest, and yes, decent. The book portrayed a fascinating, mostly first person account, of presidential foreign policy since Nixon. Fascinating for a public policy grad like me, even the more esoteric details on how a secretary of state's bureaucratically oriented perspective differs from the more executive-friendly National Security advisor. I finally bought Al Regnery's Upstream. Much of this I know, but I thought I'd benefit from some of the anecdotes and the short bios of some of the conservative forefathers who've inspired the movement that I am less familiar with.
I also saw two movies this week: Forgetting Sarah Marshall on DVD, and Death Defying Acts on Houdini. Both eh. I only saw the second because it was on the plane coming back from Southern California.
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