Happy Birthday, Mr. President. You are missed.

"I learned from my father the value of hard work and ambition, andmaybe a little something about telling a story. From my mother,I learned the value of prayer, how to have dreams and believeI could make them come true... I was raised to believe that Godhas a plan for everyone and that seemingly random twists of fateare all part of His plan. My mother... told me that everythingin life happened for a purpose. She said all things were part ofGod's plan, even the most disheartening setbacks, and in the end,everything worked out for the best. If something went wrong, shesaid, you didn't let it get you down: You stepped away from it,stepped over it, and moved on." ---Ronald Reagan


"So now we declare 'war on poverty'... Now, do they honestlyexpect us to believe that if we add $1 billion to the $45 millionwe are spending... one more program to the 30-odd we have---andremember, this new program doesn't replace any, it just duplicatesexisting programs---do they believe that poverty is suddenlygoing to disappear by magic?... Yet anytime you and I questionthe schemes of the do-gooders, we are denounced as being againsttheir humanitarian goals. They say we are always 'against' things,never 'for' anything. Well, the trouble with our liberal friendsis not that they are ignorant, but that they know so much thatisn't so." ---Ronald Reagan

"And I hope that someday your children and grandchildren will tellof the time that a certain president came to town at the end ofa long journey and asked their parents and grandparents to joinhim in setting America on the course to the new millennium---andthat a century of peace, prosperity, opportunity, and hopefollowed. So, if I could ask you just one last time: Tomorrow,when mountains greet the dawn, would you go out there and winone for the Gipper?" ---Ronald Reagan


"I've spoken of the shining city all my political life, butI don't know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when Isaid it. But in my mind it was a tall proud city built on rocksstronger than oceans, wind swept, God blessed and teeming withpeople of all kinds living in harmony and peace, a city with freeports that hummed with commerce and creativity, and if there hadto be city walls the walls had doors and the doors were open toanyone with the will and the heart to get here... And how standsthe city on this winter night? More prosperous, more secureand happier than it was eight years ago. But more than that;after two hundred years, two centuries, she still stands strongand true on the granite ridge, and her glow has held steady nomatter what storm. And she's still a beacon, still a magnetfor all who must have freedom, for all the pilgrims from allthe lost places who are hurtling through the darkness, towardhome. We've done our part. And as I walk into the city streets,a final word to the men and women of the Reagan revolution, themen and women across America who for eight years did the workthat brought America back. My friends: We did it. We weren't justmarking time, we made a difference. We made the city stronger,we made the city freer, and we left her in good hands. All inall, not bad. Not bad at all. And so, good-bye. God bless you,and God bless the United States of America." ---Ronald Reagan