Deck 16: The Reagan Years

Question 1

Regan's advocacy of his beliefs was powerful and persuasive because his ideas

A) Were thoroughly researched and backed with evidence
B) Were simple enough to be treated like items of faith
C) Took into account the changes of the 1960s and 70s
D) Were progressive and forward-thinking

Answer 1

B

Question 2

The Reagan White House

A) Was run entirely by the president, who kept a close eye on details
B) Was managed by Reagan's advisors, who were carefully chosen by him
C) Was dependent on the few aides who had the ear of the resident, as he was largely hands-off
D) Had a reputation for being hard-working and tough

Answer 2

C

Question 3

Reagan combatted the programs of the Great Society by

A) Slashing funding to social welfare programs
B) Using the Justice Department to fight them in court
C) Ordering heads of government agencies to not enforce regulations
D) All of the above

Answer 3

D

Question 4

Reagan's economic plans, dubbed supply-side economics, were based on the belief that

A) An unfettered economy would produce a balanced budget based on sustained growth
B) Reducing foreign aid commitments was key to balancing the budget
C) Taxes needed to be increased to increase military funding
D) A closed economy that could be fully controlled by the federal government was key to lower taxes

Question 5

The practical problem with implementing Stockman's supply-side economics was that

A) Reagan refused to boost military spending
B) The Federal Reserve refused to tighten interest rates to reduce inflation
C) The American people didn't favor lower taxes
D) Congress refused to slash Social Security and Medicare

Question 6

The only exception to the economic strength of the mid-1980s was

A) The weak housing market
B) Low consumer spending
C) Still-high inflation
D) High deficit spending

Question 7

The Reagan Doctrine focused on

A) Detente with communism
B) Rolling back America's foreign policy commitments
C) America's right to intervene anywhere in the world to combat communist insurgency
D) Focusing American foreign policy on the Western Hemisphere

Question 8

-This map shows

A) How intensively Reagan adopted an interventionist foreign policy
B) That the majority of interventions under Reagan happened in the Caribbean
C) That Reagan was limiting American foreign policy commitments
D) That Americans were less and less concerned with the threat of communism

Question 9

In 1984, Walter Mondale hoped to challenge Reagan on

A) Foreign policy
B) The economy
C) Policies on race
D) All of the above

Question 10

One member of Congress nicknamed Reagan "the Teflon president," meaning that

A) He was slippery and tricky
B) He was rough and unlikable
C) Nothing, even his mistakes, stuck to him
D) He was bad for the environment

Question 11

The Iran part of the Iran-Contra scandal was an attempt to

A) Supply Israel with arms to defend itself against Iran
B) Convince Iran to release its American hostages
C) Get Iran to intervene in favor of the release of American hostages in Lebanon
D) Support a coup against the Khomeini government in Iran

Question 12

The National Security Council was attempting to get third-country funding for the Nicaraguan Contras because

A) The Boland Amendment forbade the US from funding them directly
B) Reagan was against funding the Contras
C) The Contras were communist sympathizers, and therefore could not be funded publicly by the US
D) The Contras were misusing the money they were given

Question 13

The Iran-Contra affair revealed that

A) Reagan was not in control of the actions of members of his administration
B) Congress was out to get the President
C) Reagan was totally willing to break the law
D) Limited budgets had forced Reagan officials to get creative with funding

Question 14

The AIDS epidemic initially struck _______ the hardest

A) Poor people
B) Black people
C) White men
D) Gay men

Question 15

The long-term consequences of Reagan's tax policies included

A) Massive increases in federal deficit spending
B) Cheaper imports which hurt American businesses
C) Higher interest rates to enable the government to borrow money
D) All of the above

Question 16

The trend toward a two-tiered society was accelerated by

A) The loss of high-wage jobs that disappeared or moved overseas
B) The growth in low-wage jobs that paid below the poverty level
C) The movement of jobs out of cities to suburbs
D) All of the above

Question 17

The weaknesses in the American economy were revealed to the American people by

A) The Iran-Contra scandal
B) The rapidly increasing national debt
C) The stock market crash of 1987
D) Reagan's increasingly obvious incapacitation

Question 18

Mikhail Gorbachev took over the Soviet Union in 1985, determined to

A) Reduce the Soviet military budget in order to revitalize the Soviet economy
B) Double down on the Cold War
C) Begin working to spread Communism around the world again
D) Return to earlier policies of Communism in one country

Question 19

-This image shows Reagan with _______, the relationship that rescued his presidency.

A) Mikhail Gorbachev
B) Leonid Brezhnev
C) Margaret Thatcher
D) Oliver North

Question 20

The negative consequence of Reagan's approach to the presidency as an acting role was that

A) It was not believable
B) It detached him from the reality of governance
C) It allowed him more freedom to work behind the scenes
D) It forced him to choose skilled, capable advisors