In an article largely focused on the then-emerging trend of actors seeking political office James Bacon not only mentioned Reagan’s obvious-yet-still-undeclared campaign for CA Governor, he matter-of-factly dropped two other comments that I’ve not heard before and that may supply fodder for future research/writing.
The first was that:
Public opinion polls among Republicans have put [Reagan ] out in front as a GOP candidate for governor. A poor second in the polls was GOP Sen. Thomas Kuchel who since has announced he’s content to stay in the U.S. Senate.
If memory serves me correctly, I thought all the “smart
money” was prognosticating that Kuchel would “surely” defeat Reagan if only he
would run. This makes it sound
suspiciously like Kuchel may have decided not to run precisely because he
already knew there was a good chance he couldn’t beat Reagan. If that’s right, it’s got to make you wonder
even more about all the Republican big wigs talking about how people like Michele
Bachmann and Rick Santorum “can’t” beat Obama…about how we’ve just got to run
Gingrich or Romney because they’ve got that elusive quality of “electability, a trait which--curiously enough--often inheres in Republicans who fail to get elected (e.g.,
John McCain)
The rise of Ronald Reagan in politics reads like a movie script. First he was a liberal Democrat and a militant leader during his long tenure as head of the Screen Actors Guild. Then he switched to Republicanism. “George Murphy made me see the light,” he says.
I’ve heard some speculation
that Loyal Davis, adoptive father of Reagan’s second wife Nancy, was
instrumental in pulling Reagan into the conservative political fold…but I’ve
never heard Murphy mentioned in this regard.
This might be an interesting rabbit trail to pursue. Can anyone else out there shed light on the
Murphy-Reagan connection?
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