It has been the go-to question for Republican candidates ever since former President Ronald Reagan crushed Jimmy Carter in 1980 by asking, “Ask yourself: Are you better off than you were four years ago?”
Now, as the country deals with scary national security threats, an underground effort among conservatives is moving to adapt Reagan’s economic question to the Ebola and Islamic State crises.
Pushed by conservatives, the question is just as simple: “Ask yourself this: Are you more likely to be infected or beheaded than you were six years ago?”
One conservative activist called the Reagan redux the “it question,” adding, “it might be funny if not so true.”
Paul Bedard, the Washington Examiner’s “Washington Secrets” columnist, can be contacted at [email protected].
