Dont miss Fred Kaplans

Don’t miss Fred Kaplan’s piece in Slate on the interplay between Reagan and Gorbachev, how Reagan did play a key role in triggering, though not causing, the end of the Cold War — though not in precisely the way his hagiographers imply. It’s a good piece, with illustrative quotes from declassified documents. Also take a look at this piece by Sid Blumenthal in Salon, which looks at this dimension of Reagan’s presidency from a distinct though complementary perspective.