Dark History - 183: The MESSY Life of Ronald Reagan: Snitching, Scandals & DEADLY Decision

Episode Date: September 17, 2025

Hi friends, happy Wednesday! So the other day, I was googling jelly beans. Don’t ask why, I was in a mood. But I ended up falling down a rabbit hole, and suddenly… I was reading about Ronald Reagan.  Apparently, Reagan was *obsessed* with jelly beans. I guess he started eating them as a way to quit smoking. He swapped cigarettes for jelly beans. Inspired.  But once he was hooked, he never looked back. There were jelly beans on Air Force One. Jelly beans in the Oval Office. Jelly beans sent to space with astronauts, I am not joking.  At this point I stumbled onto a quote about his wife, Nancy Reagan, and let me just say...America may have called her the First Lady, but Hollywood had a slightly different title for her. If you know, you know. So today, I’ve got quite a story for you. Blow jobs, secret weapon deals, astrology, and a very intense power couple.  This man ignored a literal pandemic, while letting his wife schedule national security briefings based on his horoscope. So join me for the Dark History of Ronald Reagan. Let’s get into it. I sometimes talk about my Good Reads in the show. So here's the link if you want to check it out. IDK. lol: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/139701263-bailey ________ FOLLOW ME AROUND Tik Tok: https://bit.ly/3e3jL9v Instagram: http://bit.ly/2nbO4PR Facebook: http://bit.ly/2mdZtK6 Twitter: http://bit.ly/2yT4BLV Pinterest: http://bit.ly/2mVpXnY Youtube: http://bit.ly/1HGw3Og Snapchat: https://bit.ly/3cC0V9d Discord: https://discord.gg/BaileySarian RECOMMEND A STORY HERE: [e-mail] Business Related Emails: [e-mail] Business Related Mail: Bailey Sarian 4400 W. Riverside Dr., Ste 110-300 Burbank, CA 91505 ________ This podcast is Executive Produced by: Bailey Sarian and Joey Scavuzzo Head Writer: Katie Burris Research provided by: Elizabeth Hyman and Xander Elmore Special thank you to our Historical Consultant: Claire Potter, Professor of History emerita at The New School for Social Research, and author of the Political Junkie Substack Director: Brian Jaggers Edited by: Julien Perez Additional Editing: Maria Norris Hair: Angel Gonzalez Makeup: Roni Herrera ________ Shop my favorite bras and underwear at https://www.skims.com. After you place your order, be sure to let them know I sent you! Select "podcast" in the survey and be sure to select my show in the dropdown menu that follows. Get started today at https://www.stitchfix.com/darkhistory and get 20% off your first order when you buy five or more items.  Get focused. Ditch the Glitch with Zero Sugar and Zero Crash from Liquid I.V. Tear. Pour. Live More. Go to https://www.liquidiv.com and get 20% off your first order with code DARKHISTORY at checkout.  The best way to cook just got better. Go to https://www.hellofresh.com/DARKHISTORY10FM now to Get 10 Free Meals + a Free Item for Life! One per box with active subscription. Free meals applied as discount on first box, new subscribers only, varies by plan.

Listen, the other day I was Googling jelly beans, mind your own business. Anyways, I ended up falling down a rabbit hole, and suddenly I was reading about Ronald Reagan. Yeah, I got there. Apparently Reagan was obsessed with jelly beans. I guess he started eating them as a way to quit smoking. Instead of smoking, he instead reached for the jelly bean. But once he was hooked, he never looked back. There were jelly beans on Air Force One, jelly beans in the Oval Office.

Jellybean sent to space with astronauts, and I'm not joking. At this point, I stumbled on to a quote about his wife, Nancy Reagan, and let me just say, America may have called her the first lady, but Hollywood had a slightly different title for her. If you know, you know. So today, I've got quite a story for you. Blow jobs, secret weapon deals, astrology, and a very intense power couple. This man ignored a literal pandemic while letting his wife schedule national security briefings based on his horoscope.

So join me today for the dark history of Ronald Reagan. I know, it's about damn time, huh? Hi, friends. I hope you're having a wonderful date. today. My name is Bailey Sarian and I'd like to welcome you to my podcast, Dark History. Here, we believe history does not have to be boring. It might be tragic. Sometimes it's happy. But either way, it's our Dark History. Now before we get into it, don't forget to like and subscribe because I'm always posting new content for you. Hi. And let me know what you think down below in the comments section. Yeah, because, you know, I read comments at the end and I love hearing what you

these have to say. So now, exhale, let's get into it. Ronald Reagan. I feel like everyone's like grandparent, maybe even parent loved Ronald Reagan, right? And I was, I really didn't know too much about him. I've only heard bad things. So let me give you kind of like the rundown here. So Ronald Wilson Reagan. He was born on February 6, 1911 in the small town of Tampico, Illinois. to John and Nell Reagan. I guess the second his dad saw him, he apparently said, for a little bit of a fat Dutchman,

he makes a hell of a lot of noise. That's love. And boom, I guess from that very moment on, Ronald Reagan's nickname was Dutch. So his parents called him Dutch, his friends called him Dutch. He signed yearbooks as a Dutch.

As a teenager, Reagan was friendly, but the kind of friendly where you realize later, Like, you didn't really know anything about them. They're just nice, I guess. One friend put it like this. They said, Ronnie was always perfectly nice, but you could never get close to him. So he had this, like, polite but locked door energy.

Henry Kissinger, a politician, even said that Reagan was, quote, full of good cheer, but in the end, aloof. The repository of jokes that were recycled from conversation to conversation served as a protection against being blindsided. Reagan was the quintessential loner, end quote. I mean, he only had a few jokes. Eh, you know, okay. In 1928, Dutch enrolled at Eureka College in Eureka, Illinois.

So when he went there, he majored in, like, economics and sociology. But it seems like he was there for the extracurriculars. Because this man was, like, in every club, drama club, football team, competitive swimming. student government. I mean, he was booked and busy. And at this point, Reagan was like a huge fan of FDR and proudly identified as a Democrat, which is wild because he would go down in history as the conservative poster boy of the 80s. I mean, he's, he's like a, he was like a god in conservative households. He graduated college in 1952 and he packed his bags and set off to find fame. Reagan, he up getting a job as a radio announcer in Iowa, he's doing sports commentary and like play-by-play

for football games, which must have been hard at the time because he actually wasn't like watching the games. He would recreate the action from telegraph reports and he would make up crowd noise and add dramatic pauses. It was a whole performance based off of a telegraph-like message. That's pretty hard to do, huh? Then in 1937, he has his big break. Ronald Reagan takes a screen test with Warner Brothers and boom, he gets a contract, a seven-year contract. Now, I guess it was said that he wasn't like an amazing actor or anything, but he had that wholesome, clean-cut look that people wanted on their screens. He was safe, approachable, friendly. In 1938, he's filming a movie called Brother Rat and a baby.

It's kind of giving babies day out, but not really, but kind of. I don't know, but he's in that movie, okay? So at this point he's 27. And one of the actresses he meets working on this movie is a woman named Jane Wyman. Now Jane is 21, so six years younger than him, but she's already been divorced twice. That's okay, that's okay.

She was ready for round three. She was grown now, she's changed. And apparently, I guess she was, like, obsessed with Reagan. According to one biography, she sees Reagan as, quote, true, perfect manhood personified. I guess Reagan is flattered, but not, like, 100% into it and just not really ready to commit. So Jane hits him with a very intense ultimatum. And you've seen that Netflix show. Ultimatum never works.

Jane threatens to kill herself if Reagan. did not marry her. What? Yeah. Which I'm assuming he said no, because then she takes a stash of pills and she downs them, just leaving behind a suicide note. To me, bras, ugh.

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No digging, no shifting, no rolling, no splitting you in half, you know what I'm saying? Uh, no weird, um, seams or anything under clothes, you know, it's just, it's doing what it needs to do. Basically, skim has figured out how to make intimates that you actually want to wear, which nice. Shop my favorite bras and underwear at skims.com. After you place your order, be sure to let them know I sent you. Select podcast in the survey and be sure to select my show in the drop-down menu that follows. It just helps us out, you know? It's like, hey, thanks. It gets, you know, yeah, that's all. Okay. Now let's get back to today's story. So Jane tries to end her life,

but she ends up waking up and she's at the hospital. She lived. She's like, God damn it. So Reagan came by to the hospital to see her and she was like, no, I don't want to see him. I don't want anything to do with him. Apparently she did this on purpose because it was like a tactic that had, quote, the desired effect. You know, if she turns them away, if she's not available, then he'll want her more. Whatever. It works because the next day Reagan shows up. He storms into the hospital and he demands to see Jane. So she lets him in. And by the time he left, they were officially engaged. I know. I was like, I can't imagine why she's been divorced twice. Not judging, but girl, come on. On January 26, 1940, Jane and Ronald get married. And the very next year, they have a daughter.

Marine. Marine Reagan. Okay, so that's great. Yay. But then World War II breaks out. Yeah, Buzzkill. And Ronald Reagan is called to active duty. You know, very scary, but Dutch got lucky. Apparently he had terrible eyesight, which meant that he could not go overseas. Instead, he was assigned to the first motion picture unit of the Army Air Force. forces. F-M-P-U, for short, which everyone called Fumpoo. So Fum-Poo was a military film studio run out of old Air Force buildings where they made over 400 military films during the war. So it's a film studio and all that stuff and they just make like propaganda films, recruitment films, training films, films about why to buy war bonds, films about army and war stuff and Ronald Reagan he was he was like the one acting in them it was like how not to blow yourself up with a grenade the movie you know I mean I'd take that versus going overseas geez so you know across the ocean while other soldiers were

dodging bullets Reagan was making movies which is fine except that years later Reagan would sometimes refer to his military experience as having been overseas. He seemed to confuse his movie reenactments of war with like actually being in war. Or maybe he didn't confuse it and he just wanted people to think that he actually was, you know, involved in the war. There was at least one time where he referred to a scene in a movie as something that happened in real life. I mean, I could, yeah. it gave him stories so he could like go and like to a party and be like yeah it was crazy I was like flying this plane and I was like just shooting all these people and what I just making up

stories and no one no one could fact check but like yeah he was never in combat is uh what I'm getting at he never left the U.S he was stationed in Culver City California very brave So it's 1941 and Reagan is a B-movie actor and also acting for the military. And at this time, he picks up another little side hustle. On September 17th, 1941, Ronald Reagan officially becomes an FBI informant. I know. Gasp. I was like, what? How did we get here? Listen, Reagan, Mr. Ronald Reagan, Mr. Dutch. becomes a snitch, and not just any snitch.

He's reporting directly to J. Edgar Hoover's Bureau about the threat of communist infiltration in Hollywood. Listen, America at this point is deep. They're super paranoid, okay? At that time, something called the Red Scare was like going on, it's gathering steam. It was like the satanic panic of, but with communism.

And at the time, communism was like the scariest word in America. Okay, it was just like, you know, it's coming for you. It's coming for you. So everyone is on red alert for potential like secret communists lurking in plain sight. So at this time, people associated communism with artists and creative types for some reason. So Hollywood was like under a magnifying glass. So Reagan happened to be on the board of the Screen Actors Guild. The Screen Actors Guild, or SAG, maybe you've heard of that, is like a union and they protect, like, actors and all that stuff and the entertainment industry.

So he's on that. He's on the board. So he gets tapped by the FBI to, like, name names. Who's a communist? If you're on the board, you're very familiar with actors and everyone in the industry. So you have to, like, know of someone who may be a communist. So, um, Reagan, he starts passing info to the FBI on people that he suspected of being communist or sympathizers or just like a little two and two workers' rights.

Was he getting paid or something? I don't know. And here's the thing. Reagan never stopped, though. Like, throughout the 40s and even into the 50s, he kept those lines of communication open. and his FBI file was massive. He'd end up meeting with agents in private and then he would share what he heard at union meetings

and he would like express concern about quote the infiltration of communists into Hollywood. So Reagan, he was like always taking notes. He was paying attention and he was watching everyone from the inside. Now, to be fair, he believed he was like doing the patriotic thing He really hated communism. So during all this, Reagan, you know, he's still in Hollywood, he's still acting, he's still married to Jane, but he's getting paranoid.

He is no longer identifying as a Democrat. He's working nonstop, and his marriage was taken a hit. Things were not going smoothly. And professionally, he still hadn't had like a major breakthrough as an actor. You know, all actors want that breakthrough. Probably because he's like so busy and snitching on people. But yeah, so he's kind of bummed out. But Jane, his wife, she was thriving.

So Jane, she too was an actress, okay? And in 1948, she ends up winning best actress for a movie called Johnny Belinda. And like, woo, way to go. You know, you, woo! But this seemed to like really upset Reagan. and it was kind of bad for the marriage. I guess Reagan was just jealous. You know, he wanted to win something,

and he did not handle it well. He's the man in the relationship. How dare she win? And I guess this is really what was like the end of it for the two of them. Apparently a big complaint Jane had was that he was constantly talking. She said that he had, quote,

diarrhea of the mouth, end quote. One of their mutual friends said, Quote, Ronnie talked all the time. He was the authority on everything under the sun. You name it. End quote. The one thing I don't like about know-it-alls is they never know how annoying they are. You know what I'm saying?

They know everything, but they don't know how annoying they are. It's like, how are you missing that? Just something to think about. Anyhow, so according to one biography, this is when Jane, quote, ambushed him and demanded a divorce. and it got messy. Back then, you couldn't just, like, get a divorce without, like, an official reason. It was a big deal, and you had to cite irreconcilable differences, which, like, people still do you today.

For example, you could be like, he's a serial killer. That'd be a good reason to get a divorce. You know, you have to list why. And the rumor was, Jane was divorcing Ronald and what she listed down, Okay, on the documents was that Ronald Reagan was terrible in bed. Yeah, so that was her reasoning, and that's fair, and that's valid. He had already been overshadowed by her talent. Now she's out there winning Oscars and spreading rumors about his performance in the bedroom.

I mean, this was humiliating, and then it gets worse. Okay, there was this line in one of these, like, movies that Reagan was in. So he was playing like a wounded war vet. And in the movie, he's a wounded war vet who, like, lost his legs. Lieutenant Dan, yeah. And when he wakes up and he sees that they're gone, his character said, Where's the rest of me? Where's the rest of me?

Okay, not a big deal, right? But Jane, the ex-wife, she turned it into a penis joke. Yeah. After the divorce, it allegedly became like a running gag in Hollywood. People would, like, whisper this at parties. They'd be like, where's the rest of me? You get it? Because like, yeah, yeah.

And they weren't talking about his legs. They're talking about his wiener. You get it? Okay, yeah. Anyways, Jane is, she's just turning Reagan into like a joke in Hollywood. And Jane, she went on to have like a long, respected career. And then she even like made the jump to TV. Meanwhile, Reagan's acting career was kind of just dead in the water.

Yeah, nothing was going on there. I guess it wasn't because like Reagan was a bad actor. He just wasn't a good actor. You know what I'm saying? Like, he never quite hit that A-list level, and he never matched Jane, who was an actress. And listen, if there was one thing Ronald Reagan hated more than communist, it was being upstaged, especially by a woman. Oh, especially one who said he was bad in bed. He's like, yeah, well, your pussy's moist.

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That's stitchfix.com slash dark history. So Ronald Reagan is humiliated. He's divorced and his acting career seems to be dead. His ex-wife is winning Oscars, making jokes about his dick, and things are just not

looking good for, for Mr. Dutch, for Mr. Reagan. But then someone comes along that just changes his life. He meets Nancy. Have you heard of her, Nancy?

Listen, Paul over here, he decided to dress up as Miss Nancy Reagan, and I think you did a great job. I love the pussy bow. So it's 1949, and Reagan, he meets a woman named Nancy Davis. Now, she was also an actress, but she got like, um, I think. I guess she had a different set of skills that made her stand out. I'm not here to be vulgar, but I am here to be honest. Nancy had talent, and she used that talent to work her way to the top. And I guess everyone knew it.

It wasn't her dramatic range. It wasn't her filmography. Rumor had it. Nancy was known in Hollywood for giving a spectacular blow job. I know. And you're like, shut up, Bailey. Like, when'd you read that, like, on Reddit or whatever? No. This was like a well-known little situation from the old school, like, Hollywood circles. Everyone talked about it. And this was, it's sad to say, yeah, it's sad to say. Because back then, like, this was an important skill to have. At the time,

I mean, if you wanted to be an actress in Hollywood, you were harassed. You were exploited, you were manipulated, you would do anything just to, like, get in the door. And you would get locked in a room and some nasty, fat toad would, like, take his pants off and say, you know, handle it or whatever. And then you would because you wanted a job, you know? Jeez. So, like, giving a blowjob was seen by many as, like, a safer. alternative to, I don't know, being like raped or full on, like, sex. And also giving a blowjob, you didn't have to worry about getting pregnant or an STD.

I mean, you could still get an SDD in your mouth. But, like, you know, it was seen as like this substitute that worked for everyone at the time. Anyways, back then, though, it was nasty, okay? and so you know Nancy did she did her thing and she was she people called her the throat goat I know I know now my brain was like okay one of my this is like off topic one of my favorite teas tea you know tea it's called throat coat and I was like oh is this inspired by her it really soes the throat highly recommend so uh back to Ronald Reagan. Listen, he's fresh off a brutal divorce. He's emotionally bruised, ego in shambles,

and along comes Nancy, a woman who knew exactly how to make a man feel like a king. But I will say this because Reagan, low-key, it was said that he, I'm sorry if this is like gross or vulgar or whatever, but it was said that Reagan had a small wiener, so it probably made the whole like oral thing a little bit easier for her. You know what I'm saying? For my BJ queens out there? Because the big ones can hurt your throat. The small ones, it's like a little gummy worm in your mouth.

Just nibble on it. And then you're good. So she probably made him feel really good. Trying to be positive here. Around this time, Reagan gets a job as the president of SAG, aka the Screen Actors Guild. And I guess like this was the first. time Reagan got a taste of like politics. So he started working closely with the Department of

Labor, the state of California, and he was still working with the FBI. Okay? Low key though. He sat in on hearings. He signed loyalty pledges and he quietly blacklisted tons of actors, screenwriters and directors who were rumored to be left leaning. And this was like kind of laying the groundwork for his eventual political career. The unique thing about Reagan was that he was strategic. He was a master at having power without looking like he had power. So he could, like, he could smile. He could tell a funny story.

He could walk out of the room, having just fired someone, and they would be, they would be like, oh my God, yeah, like, he's a great guy. I love that guy. There was something, he was just likeable. Basically, thanks to his connections as an informant, Reagan was back on track with, like, a powerful job, and Nancy, she liked that. She liked that a lot. So, you know, they started dating, and then in 1952, they got married. There's rumors out there.

Like, people actually think that Nancy is the reason Reagan became a conservative because her dad was a huge conservative. and Reagan basically did like, it was said whatever Nancy told him to do. I don't know. Based off what I just said, it seems like he was kind of going that way. But that's just what they say. Nancy was the one person that he trusted the most. She managed his schedule. She managed his diet, his public image, everything.

She was like his manager. She wasn't like just a wife. She was his handler. his PR, his manager, his agent. She was everything. Now just because Reagan was like SAG president, it didn't mean he was getting better roles. Honestly, his career was, it was dead, you know. But once again, Dutch gets lucky. In 1954, TV is America's new It Girl. Oh, forget the movies. It's all about television, the new toy. And Reagan was in the right place at the right time because he gets a cushy job hosting a show called General Electric Theater. Yes, General Electric like the

appliance company, like the shitty dishwasher you have. I had one of those dishwashers and it was shit. I'm just, yeah, I said it. Anyways, they were like a major part of, you know, the military industrial complex afterwards. Anyways, G&E did a lot, okay? So now they're doing TV. So this show that Reagan was on, it was kind of like reality TV. He would be filmed visiting American factories

to look at new products and basically sell viewers on why they should buy this new toaster. And America loved it. Oh, they loved it. We love buying stuff, huh? This show ran for eight years And by the end of it, Ronald Reagan was a household name.

Between 1954 and 1962, he visited GE plants in 39 states and hundreds of thousands of people. And I mean, he was good at it because all those years as, like, president of the Screen Actors Guild had already put him in rooms with, like, important people. So he was just like, again, a good talker. People liked him. He was buddy-buddy with the Department of Labor officials. He was friends with Californian politicians, the studios, union leaders. Everyone liked the guy. And he was positioning himself perfectly to be a politician.

But he never, like straight up, talked about politics. He would like, you know, skirt around it. He'd be like, I love freedom. Freedom is great. American values Love that Hard work Yeah

But that's like as deep as he went You know He never talked about like Taxes, war inequality Anything like that Basically he was like I'm not a politician

I'm just a concerned outsider With a great smile Buy this toaster Now on top of all that His look People loved his look because he had this rugged western man, man of the people kind of vibe. Now, he loved to dress like a cowboy.

Oh, yes, full-blown denim shirts, leather boots, posing on horses like the Marlboro Man. And this became like the classic Reagan look. People were like, well, he's like a true American, a real cowboy. Yeha. But, you know, like, realistically, honestly, he wasn't a cowboy. He just like played one on TV one time. So, and that was like his new identity. Well, not one time a couple of times, because back in the 50s, he had done a bunch of westerns and B-movies.

One of them was called Cattle Queen of Montana. And in it he wore a cowboy hat and like he wrote a horse. And Hollywood trained him to walk and talk like a cowboy. So he basically went full, like, method, and he just never dropped the act. I think he liked it. For some reason, guys, I hate to stereotype here. But I feel like a lot of guys just kind of love the idea of being a cowboy. What's that about?

Let me know down below. Maybe it's just the guys I've met. But there's something. They, like, want to be a cowboy. What is that? Anyways, so Reagan, he was, he, at some point he realizes like it was really good for his brand because he became like a symbol of America. So all of this could see attention of a famous conservative writer and TV host named William F. Buckley. So William sees potential in Reagan and he starts sending him like all these books, pamphlets, and speeches about like politics.

He's kind of like grooming him a little bit to like, hey, you should like get into politics, nudge, nudge. So this William guy, he like sees potential in Reagan and he's like, hey, this guy could be the future of the Republican Party. I mean, yeah, whatever. He didn't, he doesn't have any political training, but he can be trained. I mean, he's clean cut, charismatic. America loves the guy. He looks like America. if it was a person, I don't know.

So Buckley starts grooming him, not sexually. General Electric Theater, it ends in 1962, and then they go on to make shitty appliances that I will never let go of because I paid so much for a dishwasher, and it fucking sucked, okay? You guys, you hear me, GE? I'm still mad about it.

Okay. But, um, that show ends in 1962. But by this point, it doesn't matter because, like, Reagan is a full-time speaker and he's preparing for his political career. He's got hype people around him. Like, dude, you could do this. People love you. You're like a real American. You're a great talker. You look great. Like, yeah, yeah, yeah. So everyone's hyping him up and he's like, okay, yeah, I'm going to fucking do it. So in 1964, Reagan goes on TV and he's, and he's, you know, gives a speech for a guy named Barry Goldwater who was running for president. Now, something about Reagan, okay? People love this speech, and it really got the crowd, like, fired up. He has faith that you and I have the ability and the dignity and the right to make our own decisions and determine our own destiny. Thank you very much. People didn't even remember Barry Goldwater, but they remembered Reagan's speech. Now, the speech, it was called A Time for Choosing, and it made voters feel like this election was the most important decision of their lives. You know, during the speech, he was basically like, you can vote with the Democrats who will take your money and take your guns, or you can be an American patriot.

You know, which one are you? He kind of hinted that social programs were a gateway drug to communism, which, again, everyone hated that word and it just freaked them out. So letters started pouring in. Donation skyrocketed. One report said his speech raised $8 million overnight for Goldwater. So Goldwater, he lost the election, you know, in the end, but Reagan, you know, he won. Not the election, but he won the hearts of conservative America. They were like, yeah, forget this Goldwater guy.

What's up with this Reagan guy? We like him. This is our guy. The funny thing was, Reagan, he, like, didn't write the speech that he gave. It was written for him, but because he's an actor or whatever, he delivered it like it was the climax of a movie or something, you know? It's all about delivery. If you have, like, just a sentence and you can deliver it in a very dramatic, whatever way, you'll, yeah, you know, you get it. My delivery sucks sometimes.

I try. But he was good at it. So after all this, he's like, you know what, you guys? I'm going to run for governor. Today's episode is sponsored by Liquid Ivy. When September rolls around, I randomly get this like bursts of motivation. I'm like, okay, it's happening. I'm going to wake up early.

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Two years later, in 1966, Reagan runs for governor of California, which is kind of crazy because he still wasn't a politician. But honestly, like, he was running, so now he was, you know. He didn't let that stop him. He actually spun it as like a positive. So that was like part of his thing, you know? When he campaigned, he was like, yeah, I'm the outsider. I'm not a politician. I'm going to come in and I'm going to clean up the mess in Sacramento.

I'm going to do what the politicians are not doing. Yeah, and we always fall for it when they're like, I'm for the people. So the people around him, like the California Republican Party, they really saw him as a puppet, just like, you know, a pretty face with good timing who they could kind of manipulate, mold, create the perfect politician. But honestly, like, Reagan kind of knew exactly what he was doing. honestly Reagan is kind of confusing because like on the surface he comes off is just like the like oh shucks I'm just like a widow actor I don't know you know and that's how he came off in public but behind closed doors he was doing his homework okay he wasn't dumb he knew what he was doing and in the end it paid off because Reagan he won in a landslide so his plan. was to cut spending, crack down on student protesters, and be very tough on crime. But the honeymoon period ended pretty quick when he called in the National Guard to break up protests at UC Berkeley, with like literal tanks. It was called the 1969 People's Park protest, and it was essentially a battle between the university and the local community over a piece of land.

Students and the local community wanted it to be like a nice park. The university was like, no, it's our land. It escalated pretty quick and became about something bigger. Freedom of the people versus big institutional power. With Vietnam happening in the background, it just got ugly fast. And Ronald sent the National Guard in to occupy Berkeley. It just really wasn't needed. Well, one person ended up.

ended up dying and it was extremely violent and for a second it looked like this whole like Reagan era was going to be you know pretty short-lived but it wasn't obviously he got re-elected in 1970 because people they really liked him even when like people didn't agree with him they saw him as just like this cool down-to-earth guy with a great smile and a cowboy feel and There's something about his voice that's just kind of calming in a way. It's been quite a journey this decade, and we held together through some stormy seas. And at the end, together, we're reaching our destination. You know, the people they loved his whole aesthetic, the cowboy image, oh, also the perfect relationship he had with his wife.

They lived in a modest but glamorous ranch-style home in the Pacific Palisades in California. They had two kids and they lived this like picture perfect life, you know? The American dream. Then in 1980, Ronald Reagan runs for president of the United States. Do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do. And, you know how every president has like a slogan and all that stuff? Yeah, it's like, America is fun or we can do it. Well, guess what his slogan was?

In 1980, Ronald Reagan's slogan was, Let's Make America Great Again. Isn't that crazy? Come on. Isn't that weird? This, okay, just shows how unoriginal we are, huh? Throughout the ears. Jesus, Christ.

Yeah, okay. So that was a slogan. Ronald and his running mate, George H.W. Bush, use this phrase on buttons and posters in their campaign. against President Jimmy Carter. A little side note, fun fact, Bill Clinton started his 1992 campaign with the pledge to make America great again.

I believe that together we can make America great again. Jesus, can they think of something else here? Reagan tells Americans that he's in favor of lower taxes, which are going to become his famous trickle-down economics. You see, at this point, the economy is in, like, it's in rough shape. Inflation is going up. Gas is practically a luxury item. And worst of all, there are 52 American hostages trapped in Iran.

Listen, okay, I guess back in 1979, the U.S. Embassy in Iran was stormed, and 66 hostages were taken. Some were released, but there were 52. who were stuck. And at the time, it was like the topic of conversation. And this was happening at the same time as the election was going on. Now, the president at the time, President Carter, he was getting tons of heat for like not securing like these hostages and getting them safely back to America. I mean, he was apparently trying, but like nothing was working. And to the people, they're like, you know, what are you doing? You need to get like these people back. So it just wasn't a good look for him. And then every night on TV, nightline, they were like...

Day 142 of the Iran hostage crisis. And it starts to look like this hostage situation could cost President Carter the election. You know, if he doesn't free the hostages, he'll probably lose. But if he can prove himself and get them back, you know, that would that would really help. It would look pretty damn good. Now, Reagan and his team, they knew this, and they had an idea. They're like, what if we get Nancy out there to suck their dicks and then release the hostages? No? Okay. They had a different idea. What if they could convince Iran not to release the hostages until Reagan was in office? So in 1980, Reagan's campaign allegedly,

sends people to secretly meet with Iranian representatives. The rumor is that it's a few former CIA guys and Reagan, like, insiders. So allegedly, they met with Iranian officials in Paris in October of 1980. They were essentially like, bonjour, don't release the hostages yet. We'll give you a better, like, weapons deal if you wait until Reagan, is in office. What do you say? Huh? I'll show you a titty. Now supposedly, allegedly, I don't know, Iran agrees. I guess, allegedly, they hated President Carter and, um, you know,

they were probably interested in whatever deal was on the table. So, a little behind the scenes, little action happens. So cut to election day. It's November 4th, 1980. Reagan, he absolutely crushes Carter in one of the biggest blowouts in the U.S. history. He wins 44 states. So Ronald Reagan was sworn in on January 20th, 1981, and literally 20 minutes. After he has officially made the president, Iran releases all 52 American hostages. Yeah, everyone was like, well, how about that timing, huh? What's that about?

I don't know. Okay. The new president had not been in office an hour when the former hostages became free men and women again. Congress, they ended up launching an investigation in the early 90s to see if Reagan's team had, in fact, negotiated with Iran. But they, according to them, they never found any proof. All of Reagan's people, including the future president

George Bush Sr., denied everything. But multiple eyewitnesses claim they saw members of Reagan's team in Paris. And some of them took polygraph tests and passed. And then a few former Iranian officials claimed that the deal did in fact happen. But listen, like everyone involved either disappeared, changed their story, or they mysteriously got very, very quiet. But whatever happened, it made the moment, Reagan took office feel like a victory.

You know, to the people and whatnot, they're like, wow, Reagan came in and he did it. Wow, you know? It was like he was destined to be there. Meanwhile, poor President Carter became that guy who couldn't free the hostages. It was pretty brutal. It was sad.

So, Reagan is in. But that little, like, secret weapons deal with Iran, it ends up like coming back to haunt him. A couple years later, he gets hit with something called the Iran-Contra affair. I know. Iran-Contra kind of sounds like a dance move or like something you would do in a Zumba class. But it's not. It's something way worse. Now, apparently, Reagan's administration was secretly selling weapons to Iran, which was a big no-no. It was literally illegal. Iran was under an arms embargo, which meant no-wept. been sales were allowed. But Reagan's people were like, what if we just do it anyway and not tell

anyone? So they ended up shipping missiles to Iran. Then Iran would pay back in cash. Like millions of dollars were rolling in. And then you think the government would like deposit that money into something. Maybe they'd build a school, schools, a park, do something good with the money or something, you know, but of course not. No, no, no, they did not. Instead, Reagan's team, they took that money and they funneled it to Nicaragua. I know, I know. We went from blowjobs to the Nicaragua. What are we doing? I know. Look, I was confused. I was like, how did we get here? I looked it up, right? And Iran is like 8,000 miles away from Nicaragua. So what's the connection?

Well, apparently, Reagan was freaking out because Nicaragua was being ruled by this leftist group. They weren't communist, but they were like friends with communist countries. So to Reagan, it was like, you know, tomato, tomato, same thing. Bad, communist. straight to jail. So he decides he has to intervene and send money to this extreme rebel group in Nicaragua to basically fund a guerrilla war and destabilize the country. In his mind, this was saving Nicaragua from communism. So then you're thinking, because I know I was thinking, I was like, why the hell are they even getting into Nicaragua's business? Like I don't get it. Like they don't have

nukes, they don't have oil. So why are they there? Why are they doing this? Well, because of communist paranoia. I wasn't satisfied with that answer, but that's what I'm told is the answer. Reagan thought that like all it would take was for one country to flip and become communist for it to then spread like dominoes, not the pizza. So he needed to, to take Nicaragua down through like the Contras. So this Contras group was violent. They got the job done, but it was messy. And at this point, Congress is like,

this is a bad look. So they pass a law that makes it illegal for the Contras to be supported with American money. So to make things more complicated, Reagan was like, hey, loophole, why don't we just use like the money that we, the weapons money from Iran, why don't we use that to pay for all of this?

So it's not coming from us, it's coming from that. Yeah? And that's why it was called Iran Contra. Look, it was a whole thing, okay? It was a whole thing. The public finds out about it, okay? People are reporting on it and people are pissed. Reagan goes on TV in November of 1986

And he tells the people like he had no idea this was happening. He's like, mistakes were made. I blacked out, my bad. But people weren't buying it, especially because the guy who was running the entire operation was caught shredding documents in his office the second the story hit the news. So after this, Reagan's approval rating plummets.

So while all of this Iran-Contra situation is happening, happening. Something else is brewing. A full-blown pandemic. Tell me, tell me, tell me, why does a dinner always sneak up on you like a jump scare? It'll be like the middle of the night, I'm, you know, 7.30 I'm editing or something, and then I realize like, I'm hungry. So I go down in the fridge, open it up. I'm like, okay, I got pickles, ketchup, and lettuce. I guess I can make that into a meal somehow, you know? And listen, realistically, I can't live off of pickles, even though I'd love to, and I've definitely tried. But that's when I turn to Hello Fresh. Oh yeah, if you don't know, Hello Fresh is a meal kit delivery service that sends pre-portioned

fresh ingredients and step-by-step chef crafted recipes straight to your door. So instead of figuring out like what's for dinner, you actually get to choose from their weekly menu, everything gets delivered to you. And you cook it at home without like the shopping, the planning, the waste of it all, you know? And they've just made their biggest menu upgrade ever. We're talking double the menu with over 100 recipe options every single week. That's bigger portions to keep everyone satisfied, seasonal dishes, and recipes from around the world. Wow. And now you get steak and seafood recipes every week for no extra cost. 91% of customers say they feel healthier after eating HelloFresh.

And nine out of 10 say dinner is just plain more delicious. And honestly, I agree. It's way better than pickles and ketchup. The best way to cook just got better. Go to Hellofresh.com slash dark history 10FM now to get 10 free meals plus a free item for life. Wow. One per box with active subscription. Free meals applied

as discount on first box. New subscribers only varies by plan. That's hellofresh.com slash dark history 10 FM to get 10 free meals plus a free item for life. So in 1981, like the same year Reagan

takes office, doctors start reporting cases of this strange but very deadly disease. Now, it was mostly affecting gay men in major cities. Now, nobody knew what it was, but people, they were getting really sick, really fast. When the first cases of what would later be called, AIDS appeared in 1981, doctors knew they were looking at something terrifying. By 1987, 95% of those diagnosed were dead. 95%.

Now, at first, the illness wasn't even, like, officially named. The CDC didn't start using the acronym AIDS until September of 1982. Before that, doctors and media actually referred to it as grid, which stood for gay-related immune deficiency or gay cancer or gay plague. Yes, some people were calling it that. It was an epidemic, but people looked down on it like this. niche gay problem that they didn't think could, um, affect them. Honestly, people just, like, were not taking it seriously at all, including the president,

Mr. Reagan. He totally ignored it. Now, meanwhile, the numbers were skyrocketing. In 1982 alone, thousands of Americans were infected, but President Ronald Reagan remained publicly silent. Now, years would go by. He wouldn't even even even, acknowledged the crisis until September 17th, 1985. And by this point, 12,529 Americans had already died, including one of his best friends, an actor named Rock Hudson. Now it wasn't until April 1st, 1987,

that Reagan gave a formal speech on AIDS, calling it, quote, public health enemy number one. But by then, over 40,000, 40,000 Americans had died. Thankfully, funding had grown from 8 million in 1981 to 416 million in 1987, but only after Congress nearly doubled what Reagan proposed, which means that the real push for AIDS funding didn't come from Reagan, but from Congress. It was just pretty disappointing. Now, when people asked Reagan how schools should teach kids about AIDS, he just told them to push abstinence, end quote, the values of right and wrong, end quote.

And then on March 30th, just a couple weeks after his 70th birthday, Reagan gets shot in an assassination attempt. Yeah. So he was leaving a hotel in D.C. when 25-year-old John Hinckley Jr. opened fire. Now, the wildest part is that this John guy, he wasn't even trying to make a political statement. He was literally just trying to impress the actress Jody Foster. I know. I know. What? We should do a murder mystery on that. But he was like a Jody Foster stalker who tried to kill Ronald Reagan.

It's bizarre. Reagan was hit by a ricocheted bullet that was lodged in, inch from his heart. So when he got to the hospital, he told his surgeons, quote, I hope you're all Republicans, I quote. I would be like, I hope you're all surgeons, okay? Like, I don't know, okay, whatever, all right.

So Reagan's life was saved, but from that point on, Miss Nancy, she became obsessed with Reagan's safety. Now yes, she's really been in the background of all this, but now she was like, you know, like a, I don't want to say stage mom, but like overprotective for sure. So Nancy, she was consulting, like, astrologers about, like, when is the best time Reagan should leave on a trip? Or when should he, like, schedule meetings?

And she even had, like, a special phone installed on his desk so that she could reach him at any time if there was some kind of, like, horoscope update that he needed to know. Yeah, she's, like, calling him up. She's like, hi, sweetie, did you eat your sandwich? Also, avoid talking to Russia today. The moon is in Scorpio, okay? The craziest thing is that by the time Reagan leaves office in 1989, his approval totally recovered and was up to 63%,

which was pretty impressive, considering it dipped all the way down to 35% at one point. So it was kind of up. It was like no matter what he did, how bad he messed up, people just loved Reagan. He was so good at looking like he was in control. In 2004, he passed away at the age of 93 after a 10-year battle with Alzheimer's. And when he died, people didn't just mourn a president. It's like they were mourning a god. But even with Reagan being long gone, he's still hanging around like, you know, a big family.

stain on the white underpants of America, a stain that just does not come out in the wash. He really left his mark on America, okay? And here are all the things we can thank him for that are still around today. Maybe you've heard of trickle-down economics? Basically, he cut taxes for the wealthy in the 80s with the idea that money would trickle down to the rest of us. Maybe the notice, but it didn't. There was no trickling happening. Instead, the wealth gap exploded, and by the end of his presidency, the richest 1% owned nearly 40% of the nation's wealth. And Reagan's massive tax cuts, combined with record military spending, sent the national debt soaring from $997 billion to $2.9 trillion by the time he left office. And then, of course, we have the Just Say No, you know, the war on drugs, dare.

Nancy Reagan's slogan might have looked cute on a poster, but in practice it was a nightmare. Under Reagan, the prison population doubled from about $329,000 in 1980 to over $627,000 by 1988. There were these harsh, mandatory minimum sentences, which meant that people, especially from black and brown communities, were locked up for decades over minor, like, nonviolent drug offenses. Now, that stain is still here today because, like, the United States has the highest incarceration rate in the world. We did it. We actually talked about it. I know. We've talked about a lot of things here.

We did a dark history episode called Crack versus Cocaine, where we talked about the DARE campaign and how much harm it did. So if you're interested in learning more about that, I would say check out that episode. Reagan throughout his presidency, he loved to talk about quote-unquote welfare queens, which was this completely racist term that made people view poor black women as cheats living off of taxpayer money. His administration slash social programs by billions, and at the same time, he ramped up incarceration, which just locked systemic racism deeper into place. And we already know how much he screwed over the gay community. When AIDS hit, his silence cost people, a lot of people, their lives.

Now, to be fair, Reagan did do some good things. He helped bring an end to the 46-year Cold War without a single gunshot, and he was a big supporter of NASA. People say Reagan paved the way for, like, the next wave of presidents and corruption. And if you squint, you can, like, draw a straight line from Reagan's America to, well, the mess we're kind of, we're still in today. It's insane. Look, today's episode was just kind of like, you know, there's, we could talk on and on and on about Reagan. There was so much that happened when he was a president.

But here were just some highlights, I guess. Anyways, let me know if you want a part two of a Reagan episode. I never know. Maybe you do. I don't know. Okay, listen, enough about politics. Next time, we are bringing it back to one of Dark History's favorite subjects, witches. We're talking seances.

spectral vomit, government surveillance, and your favorite American witch trial, Salem. And our last witch, she was put on trial during World War II. These women were accused, hunted, and somehow they survived. Tune in next time for The Dark History of the Witches Who Got Away. Next week, we're dark, so there won't be a new upload, but we'll be back on October 1st. Now, I'd love to hear your guys' reactions to today's story,

so make sure to leave a comment below so I could see what you guys are saying, and your comment might even be featured in a future episode. Now, let's read a couple of comments that you guys have left me. Just here, 9-999, 9-9, 9, 9, 9, left us a comment saying, quote, thank you so much, Bailey, for being a virtual friend in these dark times. I am an animal shelter work. and your content helps me hit a reset and find my calm on the worst of days. Never stop spreading your love and light, end quote.

Aw, thank you. That was really sweet of you to say. Aw, sorry. That's so nice. You guys are just so nice and I appreciate it so much. I'm happy I can give you some kind of pick me up on your tough days. I mean, working with animals. I'm sure it's fun, but also really,

challenging and sad and I can't imagine you know oh so thank you for working hard to take care of those little guys we appreciate the animal lovers on this show don't we joan yes thank you so much for your message it really means a lot i appreciate you thank you Sheila rogers 6210 left us a comment saying quote fun fact crows are so smart that it is illegal to own a crow in all 50s States of America. What? Really? Is that true? Oh shit, girl, you're going to get out of here. I don't own Joan. She's here on her own free will, but I do, I know what you're talking about because I went on a deep dive all about crows because I have a ton of crows that hang out where I live. And I know that they like remember faces, they'll bring you little gifts if

you're nice to them, of course. And I always like leave little stuff for. them. I don't know. I just like them. I think, I don't know. I feel like they have my back. You know, I love it. Uh, okay, but that's interesting. Why can't you own a crow? Okay, whatever. You guys must have like some kind of superpower that they don't want us to know the government. There's want us to know about the superpowers you guys have. That's probably what it is. Maria Bergman Vaz left us an episode suggestion on our Nero episode saying, quote, Love your Roman outfits and you. Definitely do an episode on Caligula.

He was off the charts of insanity. Maria, girl, yes. I know. I've been reading about Caligula for like years off and on and I don't know why I haven't done an episode about him, but he was totally nuts. Like, crazier than Nero. And Nero was pretty freaking crazy.

Apparently he had a ship where he had like wild orgies, And that's always really what's stuck with me the most. I bet cleaning the ship was kind of a mess. Anyways, you guys seem to really love hearing about like the crazy little dictators lately. So I'll work on that. Thank you for your suggestion and I'll get on. Okay, we're done here. I love you guys so much for watching and engaging and commenting and all that.

keep on commenting because maybe you'll be featured in a future episode. Hey, did you know that you can actually join me over on my YouTube where you can watch these episodes on Thursday? Yeah, after the podcast airs. And while you're there, you can also catch my murder, mystery, and makeup. And don't forget to subscribe. Please, why not? And hey, if you don't know, Dark History is an audio boom original.

A special thank you to our expert, Claire Potter, Professor of History Emerita at the New School for Social Research, an author of the Political Junky Substack. And I'm your host, Bailey Sarian. I hope you have a good day today. You make good choices, and I'll be talking to you guys later. Goodbye. Ah!