The greatest leader is not necessarily the one who does the greatest things. He is the one that gets people to do the greatest things”-Ronald Reagan
“We do not ask you to believe in our ability to bring change, rather, we ask you to believe in yours”- Barack Obama
The year was 1980, the United States appeared to be a nation in decline. Americans were being held hostage in Iran, record high inflation rates plunged the economy into a recession, and the communist Soviet Union aggressively and threatened the very concept of peace and freedom worldwide, especially in Afghanistan. In a decade that had brought our country Vietnam and Watergate, many believed our great nation’s greatest days were behind us but a former actor and governor from California had a very different idea. Ronald Reagan believed that our greatest days were yet to come and out of this struggle we would appear stronger than ever. Fast forward 30 years. The year was 2008 and the United States found itself in a similar place. The subprime mortgage crisis created the worst economic situation since the Great Depression, and the growing threat of communist China threatened the very idea of peace and freedom worldwide. In a decade that brought our nation the horrific attacks on September 11th and the wars in the middle east, many believed our nation’s greatest days were once again behind us, but a senator from Hawaii with a funny sounding name had a different idea. Barack Obama knew from the great leaders of the past, that our greatest days were yet to come and out of this struggle we would appear stronger than ever. Both were right. While presidents Barack Obama and Ronald Reagan were different people from different times with different perspectives, these two honorable statesmen spent their first four years attempting to rebuild the wounded nation, and in their second campaigns, used similar tactics of hope and optimism.
I like how you start out with “the year was” but I feel when you go into talking about 2008, you should start with something a bit different. I would suggest saying something like “close to three decades later…” and then then say how there were a similar line of crises so you both compare the two and introduce the background of the topic
Your thesis is well organized. Try to limit the redundancy of the word “different”- consider the revision to expand beyond the differences in basic structures such as their physical person- “although these presidents differed in their political backgrounds and perspectives during respective times in office, they share (insert rhetoric qualities you will be analyzing)”
This is an interesting comparison. For us, the difference between 1980 and the late 2000s seems like a lot, but 100 years from now when people analyze policy, they will make the same comparison you are!