The Presidency Is Not a Math Test
Neither of the old men running on a major ticket shows any sign of catastrophic senescence.
Updated at 9:47 a.m. ET on February 13, 2024.
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At the height of the Iran-Contra affair in 1986, featured a now-classic in which Ronald Reagan (played by Phil Hartman) doddered around the Oval Office whenever a journalist or tour group showed up, then snapped into evil-genius mode when they left the room. “Casey!” he barks at CIA Director William Casey. “The TOW missiles and grenade launchers will leave for South Africa at 0800 hours!” He performs lightning-quick mental arithmetic to improvise funding for a covert op. Those who lived through the second Reagan administration may remember the alarm at the president’s
