Republicans love Ronald Reagan. That seems obvious, but the weird question is why. The liberal perspective sharply centers on President Reagan's actual ideology and how it resonated with others; it attributes his success as a president to his "greatness". Yet the obsession with Reagan involves more that just approval ratings. President Reagan was legitimately moderate in many areas and pragmatic; he was also classically able to compromise in Washington. Curbing government and dismantling regulations, Reagan has become the poster child of modern conservatism. Why have Republicans seemingly disregarded Reagan's ideals?

The famous 11th commandment of Ronald Reagan is: "Thou shalt not speak ill of any fellow Republican." Between Mitt Romney, Lindsey Graham, and several members of the Bush family, there certainly appears to be a lot of ill-speaking. The idea is simple; Republicans, to present a united front, should not attack each other. Well, so much for that. Even Paul Ryan, the speaker of the house and heading the GOP convention, does not support Trump.

First of all, Mr. Trump does not ostensibly believe in the principle. Secondly, the other Republican candidates certainly abandoned it early on in the presidential campaign. Even people claiming to support two republicanism do not hesitate to bash Trump. For instance, check out the #NeverTrump Campaign and see what voters are saying about the presumptive Republican nominee.

Perhaps we may believe that the modern, average Republican believes much more in the myth of Ronald Reagan than in the man himself. Current Republicans, who have participated in the campaign, have been ridiculously more radical than President Reagan was in the political scene. For example, compare the actual tax statistics between the Reagan era and the present. While he might have provided breaks for the average citizen, he was much critical on corporations than our modern tax plans were. Reagan's administration saw corporate rates over 51 percent in the low-million bracket, whereas current ones do not exceed 39 percent.

However, it is a little unfair to think that the Reagan obsession is complete hypocrisy. Trump is a very particular, and especially troubling case. Resisting the frightening rhetoric of Mr. Trump, as well some frankly un-democratic ideas, demands nothing short of pulling out all the stops. But is that sufficient cause to reject one of the Gipper's time-honored principles?

Either nobody perceives Donald Trump as a fellow Republican, or he is not one.