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Surprise!  

The wonder-working ways of Ronald Reagan never cease to amaze, but this one’s really quite something:

Reagan Freed Mandela!

Or so one right-wing crank would have you believe.

“After eight years of Ronald Reagan’s policies of “constructive engagement” that worked to prepare the volatile nation to peacefully embrace true self rule, apartheid fell.”

This is glorious news.  Most of the Nelson Mandela tributes flooding all media have a moment when they pause to educate the youngsters, gently breaking it to them that not everybody was on board with the ANC’s struggle against Apartheid .

And Reagan’s halo may have been diminished by reminders of what he actually did in this era – align with South Africa to prop up messianic witch burner Jonas Savimbi in Angola, put the ANC on the State Department’s terrorist list, all the while criticising Apartheid  [mildly] while disparaging its opponents, and resisting any action to do anything about it.

Chummy!  

The ever ongoing effort to prove Reagan’s saintly mastery of all things can never stop, lest a crack appear in the facade. Hordes of Gipperitists mobilized to brush off the threat posed by “The Butler” film, and racist actions and associates are cleaned up daily.

But this time at least it all had a happy ending:

“Nelson Mandela proved himself more than deserving of the opportunity Ronald Reagan and others had given him and his reborn nation.”