If you’re looking for a good biography of Ronald Reagan, skip John Patrick Diggins’ recent effort.

Despite the dust jacket statement that Reagan “deserves to be regarded as one of our three or four greatest presidents,” the liberal Diggins never makes that claim in the book itself.

Instead Diggins argues that Reagan deserves a critical reappraisal. Why? He was more of an Emersonian enthralled with the revolutionary rhetoric of Thomas Paine than with conservative ideas.

At one point, Diggins writes, “Whatever the political accomplishments of the Reagan years, the period from a moral perspective was downright confusing.”

Not as confusing as Diggins’ train of thought. Let’s take one page (p. 337) as an example.

We learn that “The S&L debacle suggests the unintended consequences of Reaganomics.” How so?

Capitalism, hailed for its aversion to public policy and willingness to compete and take risks, actually wanted government to minimize all contingency while S&L directors gambled with other people’s money.

Huh? How did capitalism adopt such human traits? What does that bizarre sentence have to do with Reaganomics?

We learn on the same page that the “Reagan eighties … came to called the Me decade,” even though that nickname actually described the 1970s.

Not content to offer just one odd time reference, Diggins later gives us this gem: “A short time after the Reagan era, the culture of avarice remained to reemerge in the film Pretty Woman.” Never mind the value of using a movie citation to bolster his case. Why did he choose a movie that hit theaters in 1990, two years after Reagan left the presidency?

If those three examples leave you scratching your head, prepare for many more bewildering moments if you decide to read the entire book.