And when in May 1985, Ronald Reagan declared a “national emergency” to deal with the “unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States” posed by “the policies and actions of the Government of Nicaragua,” the reaction in Congress and the media—and in much of Europe—was not ridicule, but rather praise for these principled and statesmanlike steps. All of this provides yet another indication of the level of Western intellectual culture.
