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Historians will argue over his record, but if there's one clear thing about Ronald Reagan's legacy it was his uncanny ability to fashion simple but powerful messages and convey them with force and believability. Where other leaders came up short, Reagan was able to lift the mood of a country.
Reagan took office at a time when the country was experiencing high interest rates, elevated inflation, sluggish growth and a raging Cold War. These problems had led to a widespread feeling of hopelessness, that America faced inevitable decline in a new era of growth limitations. Still, as Margaret Thatcher once noted, Reagan "achieved the most difficult of all political tasks: changing attitudes and perceptions about what is possible."
More than anything else, it was Reagan's exceptional communication skills that enabled him to gain control of the political agenda and change the temperature of the time.
What were those skills? Reagan understood the emotional drivers of his audience. People will usually remember how y ou made them feel, rather than what y ou said. On taking office, Reagan saw that the American people were largely pessimistic about the direction the country -was taking. He saw the need to replace that pessimism with optimism. He used plain language and made excellent use of images to restore people's faith in their country's prospects and in the dream of boundless opportunity built on individual effort. His famous use of the term, "It's morning in America," was one such device used with great effect.
Reagan never made a pretense of having scientific knowledge or a grasp of policy details. He understood that when you want to impact people's opinions...