Robyn Curnow was driving through Atlanta when she stopped at a red light behind a car with a bumper sticker that read: “I miss Ronald Reagan.”
And it made her wonder – do Americans really miss Reagan … or do they miss the simpler idea of America his presidency has come to represent? Because nostalgia has become one of the most powerful political drugs in the US. It doesn’t ask for accuracy. It offers comfort. It smooths over complexity and turns anxiety about the present into longing for the past.
In this episode of Searching for America, Robyn explores how nostalgia is shaping US politics – from Reagan’s mythologised 1980s and the fantasy of the 1950s, to Donald Trump’s mastery of “Make America Great Again”. She looks at how both the left and the right reach backwards when the present feels unstable, and why curated memory is often more persuasive than facts.
This isn’t really about Reagan. Or even about Trump. It’s about how Americans cope when the country no longer feels familiar – and why nostalgia, when weaponised, can be comforting, seductive … and dangerous.
Takeaways:
- Nostalgia in politics is often about the present, not the past.
- Trump’s slogan is a memory trigger, allowing personal projection.
- Political nostalgia can sanitise and simplify complex histories.
- Both the left and the right use nostalgia to connect with voters.
- Nostalgia can anaesthetise critical engagement with history.
Robyn Curnow’s podcast, “Searching for America”, examines the US from her outsider perspective – as a South African living in the American South.
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