All the Republican critics of President Obama’s handling of Iran have resorted to the old Gipper offense. Mostly what they are saying is Obama should “do what Reagan did”. Richard Cohen, and I can’t believe I am saying this, sets the record straight on this:

Some of Obama’s critics have faulted him for not doing what Ronald Reagan (belatedly) did following the fraudulent election in the Philippines in 1986. After some dithering, Reagan virtually forced President Ferdinand Marcos into exile. How neat. How not a precedent for Iran.

Marcos was, to exhume a dandy Cold War phrase, an “American lackey.” The Philippines itself was a former American colony. We knew the country. Hell, at one time, we virtually owned it.

The equivalent would be Obama having to break up a prison riot, and he should do what Reagan did to stop a school yard fight. There is no comparing the two items. But this is to be expected from a party that has raised Ronald Reagan to the level of a deity.