With the 100th anniversary of Ronald Reagan’s birth coming up in February, David Frum has a suggestion for how to approporiately honor his legacy:
Let me suggest something: A museum in Washington dedicated to the victims of communism.
The struggle against communism impelled American foreign policy for almost half a century. That struggle was also the central concern of Ronald Reagan’s political life. As much as Reagan cared about the geopolitics of the struggle, he cared even more about the human victims of communism’s brutal totalitarian ideology.
The countries of Eastern Europe are now memorializing their terrible experiences under communism.
A particularly impressive museum has opened in Budapest, Hungary. But Eastern Europe did not suffer alone. Cambodia, China, Cuba, Ethiopia and Afghanistan also have their stories to tell.
A “Ronald Reagan Museum of the Victims of Communism” in Washington would ensure that these stories were kept alive and made vivid for future generations.
I’d be all for it — as long as it’s privately funded.
