Not since Reagan has a president laid out the core values that make America free – and stood defiantly in defense of those values despite the ridicule and hostility of the elites, news media, academics and his political opponents.

President Reagan was focused on defending freedom from foreign threats – the Soviet Union and international communism. Reagan had a conversation in the late1940s over drinks with a Screen Actors Guild member who proclaimed himself a Stalinist. The actor said if the Stalinists won, Reagan would be imprisoned or shot. After this experience, the future president decided the Communist threat was real. He dedicated his life to defending freedom and defeating communism. Some four decades later, the Soviet Union disappeared. Over the course of this battle, Reagan’s speeches came back to the theme of freedom again and again.

President Trump has clearly had a similar epiphany. His Mount Rushmore speech was the clearest statement against a domestic threat to American freedom ever given by a modern national leader.

When President Trump said, “Our nation is witnessing a merciless campaign to wipe out our history, defame our heroes, erase our values and indoctrinate our children, ” he was guaranteeing the further bitter hostility of the propag