Candice S. Miller: “as we mourn the loss of President Ronald Reagan, let us also celebrate the absolutely incredible life that he lived, a…”

“as we mourn the loss of President Ronald Reagan, let us also celebrate the absolutely incredible life that he lived, a life that had such a positive impact certainly on our Nation and, in fact, the entire world. Madam Speaker, I live in Macomb County, Michigan. That is the home of the so-called ``Reagan Democrats.'' That term really had its genesis in Macomb County and has become certainly part of our nomenclature. It describes a huge block of citizens, average Americans, principally ethnic, blue collar, who had voted Democratic for literally generations. And then along came Ronald Reagan, and he captured their hearts and he captured their minds with the power of his ideas and the vision for America, ideas that were powerful, yet very, very simple: that freedom is a universal right of every human being; ideas about personal responsibility and the fundamental values that built our Nation, and the eternally optimistic idea that America is a great Nation whose best days continually lie in our future. President Reagan never wavered, never backed down from his defense of freedom, of his belief that we could achieve peace through strength. Of course, his strong stand created countless critics, and yet today those critics must recognize the rightness of his cause and his methods. History has certainly proven him to be right.”