text: conservative freedom, the rebirth of conservatism, the reagan revolution and after? please help:   how do those topics prove this thesis:   thesis: "the story of freedom is not a mythic saga with predetermined beginning and conclusion, but an open ended history of accomplishment and failure, a record of people forever contending about the crucial ideas of their political culture."  i read all 13 chapters and understood but now this is my last one and i'm stuck on it:  the story of american freedom  by eric foner   please try to explain/help... appreciated! eric, dammit, if you want me to tell you all this; then i have to write a book, as well.  i used to be a republican and i lived most of my life in washington, dc from the truman years to the nixon years.  all my family were civil servants in one capacity or another.  the conservatism we see today is nothing like the conservatism in the days of reagan or before: it is all about dirty politics and hate mongering.   the good conservative people of our nation who have family values and inspire the american ideal, are being manipulated by the republican party to no good end.  i was alive in the late 40's and 50's and i remember the reagan years quite well:  they were not that good. working people were struggling during the reagan years with higher gas prices, food costs, and higher retail prices.  this era was not a good one.    reagan was not st. reagan; he was a man who had a great cabinet, a lot of charisma, and great common sense.    he also had a nutter for a wife who tried to control everything he did and after he was shot he was really not up to governing the us so nancy was allowed to have too much power.    by the way reagan was not a conservative and his thoughts were much more liberal than anyone today would imagine.  he was an actor from hollywood who had tons or problems with his family and did not treat his adoptive won well (nancy again).   reagan (when he was pres. of the screen actors guild) had the courage to fight the mccarthy gestapo when they were tearing at the gates of hollywood and the entertainment industry and ruining a lot of reagan's constituents. not many people stood up to mccarthy (who was the ultra conservative of his day) but reagan did.  i often wonder if reagan was alive today and had all his faculties; what he would say....he would not like being the icon of the repulican party as it is today...i think he would be more of a arnold schwarzenegger type republican and reagan was all about honor.  he would not have put up with the carl rove types for 5 minutes.