Reply #91: Well he was. Were his policies good for Germany and the world, of course not.

[bklyncowgirl]

I once met someone who as a POW was forced to attend a Hitler rally. He said that the mood and the crowd was mesmerizing and even though he couldn't understand a word that Hitler was saying, he had to force himself to remember where he was, who he was, and above all keep his right hand at his side and not join the chorus of Sieg Heil.

There's a difference between admitting that a political figure has certain abilities and agreeing with whatever they said or did. Obama admires Reagan's ability to sense the mood of the electorate and ride that mood to a presidency that was successful in that it attained its objectives but in the long run bad for the country.

I see nothing wrong with Obama's analysis.