In this sure to be controversial publication in the vein from the Forgotten Man, a political analyst argues that conservative icon Ronald Reagan had not been an foe of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the New Deal, but his true heir and the favorite program’s ultimate savior.

Conventional politics wisdom views the two many consequential presidents of the twentieth-century-FDR and Ronald Reagan-as ideological opposites. FDR can be hailed as the champion of big-government progressivism manifested in the New Deal..LEARNING MUCH MORE about Working Class Republican: Ronald Reagan and the Come back of Blue-Collar Conservatism Reagan is seen as the crusader for conservatism focused on small government and free marketplaces. But Henry Olsen argues that this assumption is definitely wrong.

In Ronald Reagan: New Deal Republican, Olsen contends which the historical record clearly implies that Franklin Roosevelt and the brand new Deal itself were more conventional than either Democrats or Republicans believe, which Ronald Reagan was more progressive than most modern Republicans understand. Olsen cuts through political mythology to create the record straight, disclosing how Reagan-a longtime Democrat until FDR’s successors lost his eyesight in the 1960s-noticed himself as FDR’s natural heir, carrying forward the basic promises of the brand new Deal: that each American deserves comfort, dignity, and respect provided they function to the best of their ability.

Olsen corrects faulty assumptions traveling today’s politics. Traditional Republican politics victories during the last thirty years have not been a rejection of the New Deal’s promises, he demonstrates, but instead a representation of the electorate’s desire to have their success-which Us citizens see as fulfilling the eyesight of the nation’s founding. For the good of all residents and the GOP, he implores Republicans to once again turn into a party of ‘FDR Conservatives’-to rediscover and support the essential components of FDR (and Reagan’s) vision.