Patty said: I don't understand. Reagan is the complete opposite of Obama. Reagan wanted to get rid of government impacting people's lives, Obama wants the contrary. How could Obama supporters support Reagan? The only thing they have in common is that they are good speakers.

Ryan Smith said: Ronald Reagan was a great president. As is shown in the video, he said "Yes we can" many times. He was a true leader and great patriot. Barack Obama is also a true American but his version of "Yes we can" only shows a following of the past when he is trying to claim that it is about the future. Obama's "Yes we can" is part of his image as a "false idol" who uses words of great leaders for his own punch lines. It's all words and banter for his campaign; the greatest marketing scheme in the history of United States presidential elections. If you want someone that has any chance of being in Reagan's league, vote with McCain.

trish said: Dave - Here's an American History lesson for YOU. G. W. got 50,456,002 votes which was 47.87%, while Vice President Gore received 50,999,897 48.38% which was a difference of 543,895 votes in AL GORE'S favor. I do agree with you though, you should have to pass an American History test before you're allowed to vote (or at least before you make dumbass easily researched posts on websites).

trish said: Come on ya'll he wanted to make ketchup a vegetable!

franklin by dominican republic said: todos los latinos aqui tenemos la libertad de poner un cambio en nuestra vidad al igual que en este pais , slo le pido que a todos los jovenes , latinos en general piense en que SI SE PUEDE , Y con obama haremos el cambio ,, levanta tu voz , letanva tu animo y apoya a este candidato para que junto a el haguemos el cambio. arriba obama y arriba los latinos

daniel said: great speech. and he left it at that. then came bush. thank God that era will come to an end. four words left. f*** bush and reagan.

Ralph said: Leaders can inspire and Reagan inspire American's whether you believe in politics. Wouldn't great t believe in your leaders and government again. Obama can lead us in a better direction, give hope and inspiration. I want hope and inspiration in our leaders, not just the same. CHANGE WE CAN BELIEVE IN.

Laura said: REAGAN WAS WRONG!! Reaganites are bamboozled fools -- and so are Obamites. Government is we the people. Government is us. And I refuse to believe that we are the problem, as Reagan was so fond of saying. The government isn't on my back and has never been on my back -- corporations, on the other hand, are on my back. Corporations are destroying my freedoms, destroying my future and destroying my health and quality of life. Government isn't the problem. Corporations and unregulated free trade Capitalism are the problems. Reagan, like all conservatives, believed that freedom means freedom for corporations to pollute. Freedom for corporations to sell unsafe products. Freedom for corporations to exploit workers, and freedom of corporations to dictate policies in Washington, write our laws and dictate how our tax dollars are spent. Who has seen their taxes fall since the Reagan years? ONLY the rich and corporations. Obama will continue to do what has been doing throughout his political career: giving us more of the same.

Kevin Nicus said: I find myself engaged for the first time in my adult life (I'm 32) by Obama's message of hope and change. While Reagan was Obama's ideological opposite, he was elected because he gave America hope and promised change (as evidenced by his speech). "We are not as divided as our politics suggest," indeed - the basic, inherent decency and fairness of the American form of democracy unites us in theory, if not practice, and that's why both Reagan's and Obama's speech resonate so deeply with me. I was too young to understand the national circumstances that elected Reagan to oust Carter, but listening to Reagan's speech now, at a time when I actually fear that my beautiful country is drifting farther and farther away from what I think America should truly stand for, I think I may finally have at least an inkling. Republicans and Democrats (and Whigs, Federalists and what-have-you before them) should still remember that this a nation of merit. The original Republican platform was not the platform of the rich or the established - it was simply the platform that preached true equality for all Americans. The Bush presidency has perverted this simple concept and made it unrecognizable, but it would behoove all of us to remember why people voted as Republicans in the first place. The thing I find most offensive about George W. Bush and his handlers isn't the blatant favoritism, the nearly comical incompetence or the utter lack of basic human decency. Rather, it's the fact that I have been forced to reevaluate my own conception of what it means to be a Republican or a Democrat. I don't like government and I don't like the idea that I need the government to intervene directly in my affairs (the traditional Democratic philosophy), but Obama's activism is still preferable to Republican favoritism. I'm an ex-Republican, and I'm voting for Obama. I may not agree with all of his ideas about the role of the government (in point of fact, I agree with very few of them), but he understands what it means to be an American. I can trust him to be true to the American ideal, and that's worth more than all the taxes, social programs and general intrusiveness of his proposed admistration times a thousand. Barack Obama is the avatar of what America stands for - a nation of hope. I believe that and will remember it when I cast my vote.

Matt said: I think what this shows is that inspiring language about our own abilities has no real connection to policy and outcome. Obama and Reagan couldn't be farther apart politically. The excitement over Obama proves either: 1) politics doesn't matter, speeches do, or 2) speeches don't matter, politics does. I'm rather agnostic between the two.