Being an 80's child, I have a lot of things to say about Ronald Reagan. Some of those thing are complimentary, some of them are not. Some of them are conciliatory, some of them are derisive. And the rest of them are probably unprintable, and contain a lot of rude words.

However, you're going to get bored to tears listening to all kinds of remembrances over the next few weeks, as the media turns his sad, slow death from Alzheimers into the Story Of The Year. So let's just say that my views on him are complicated, worthy of a few columns, and not worth your time to read because I suspect you may already feel the same way. Especially if you were also an 80's child.

Instead, I'd like to take this time to talk about something a hell of a lot more important than a dead President.

I'd like to talk about the fact that this President ­ loved by some, loathed by others, and liked by many in spite of it all ­ died in a mental vacuum. In truth, he probably "died" some time ago, as the man who was Ronald Reagan stopped existing after a certain point. It's just that his body finally caught up with his brain.

Ronald Reagan died not knowing who he was, where he was, or what was going on around him. He died not knowing much of anything, come to think of it. He died shitting in his pants like a baby, and having to be fed like one, too. He couldn't talk or walk, he wasn't awake all that often, and he died an invalid, in a bed, completely helpless.

He died with people all around him that he couldn't recognize, anymore. And I suspect that, if he was still conscious of his surroundings, he may have died frightened for having been in a landscape where nothing was remembered, anymore.

Frightened. I can say a lot of things about Ronald Reagan, and what I think he may have been at one time or another, but "frightened" is not a word I like to associate with him. Even when he was shot, even when he was diagnosed with colon cancer, even when he was staring down the Soviets and their nuclear arsenal, I don't like to think that he was "frightened." Worried, maybe, but still possessed of a secure, self-affirming level of control, confidence and faith.

These things allowed him to deal with those situations, and handle them how he did. These things are what helped make him the man he was, and the President so many revere.

But while he might have lived that way, he did not die that way. He died from complications from Alzheimers ­ one of the cruelest diseases I can think of.

Recently, Nancy Reagan said that her husband was in "a distant place where I can no longer reach him."This is also a major part of the tragedy that befell him; He and his wife should have been able to live out their lives with their memories, and the family they shared them with. But such was not to be, given the cruelty of that condition: being whittled away, one piece at a time, as your brain turns into so much useless muck...

I can't think of a worse way for someone like Ronald Reagan to have passed away than from Alzheimers. Prior to his diagnosis, he was incredibly fit and active for a man his age, and he seemed to have planned to be working one ranch or another until they put him under. He also had a sharp wit and and an incredible way of getting his point across, and while I figure I wouldn't have agreed with a lot of what he'd have had to say, it would have been something to have had him as an elder statesman in his sunset years.

{I'd like to think he'd shit from a great height on this "War" on Terror, but he did give us the "War" on Drugs, too, so who knows...?}

But while we might mourn the death of this man ­ and some will cheer, of course ­ we should remember that Alzheimers is not unique to him. How many thousands of patients are there in the world, all at one stage of the disease or another? How many people wake up each day with a little less memory, a little less ability? A little less of what made them who and what they are?

There are a lot of them. More than you may suspect. And while there is no cure ­ while there may never be a cure ­ there are research avenues available. They may help slow down the damage, or even stop it. Maybe we could even reverse it, one happy day, and no one need ever die from this horrible, wasting sickness of the mind again.

But there's a problem: the research avenue I'm talking about ­ the one that shows the most potential ­ requires the use of Stem Cells, harvested from human embryos.

And, as you might expect, the American Right that revered and lauded Reagan are dead-set against using the tissue in experiments. This is because they're "pro-life," apparently, and as always this means that they are more concerned about life, itself, than the quality of that life. It's okay to crank out baby after baby into an urban nightmare, but let's not hear that "A"-word around these parts... unless it's "abstinence," of course...

Recently, President Bush allowed Federal money to go to researching the therapeutic properties of privately produced human embryonic stem cells. However, he will not reverse his decision on not funding the producing of those cells, which means there aren't as many cells available for the kind of testing they need to do.

This means that research into the matter is going to creep along at a snail's pace, and will not be as effective as it needs to be. This means a cure might be ages away, as opposed to years. This means that people who need some kind of hope are going to be denied it.

And this sucks, quite frankly.

It's time we got over this ridiculous fear of "baby farms," and the spectre of parents selling their fetuses for crack money. It's time we asked why we can't use those frozen embryos if all they're going to do is just sit there in the deep freeze, next to the chicken pot pies, until they all go "off." It's time the Baby Boomers, whose parents are now at the right age to be targeted by this cruel disease, asked why we aren't beating this menace into the ground with the research money, facilities and know-how that only our country can provide.

And it's time we all started asking that question ­ loudly ­ to the people who need to hear it the most.

Speaking out at a fund raising dinner for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, recently, Nancy Reagan called on the White House to fully support embryonic stem cell research. She's been a champion of it for some time, now, but the talk, this last May, was something of a public throwing down of the gauntlet for her. She said that too much time has been wasted talking about it, and it's time to do something.

I agree. And if there's anyone who might be able to get the American right to get its head out of the sand and face the future, I think Mrs. Reagan might be it. And if there's anything that would act as a catalyst for change, I think Ronald Reagan's passing might well be it, too. Especially if the Reagans now go public with the pain they've had to endure for the past ten years as their beloved husband and father slowly slipped away from them, one piece at a time.

At the same dinner, Nancy Reagan said "I just don't see how we can turn our backs on this... We have lost so much time already. I just really can't bear to lose any more." Maybe it's time we, too, stopped turning out backs to our elderly, and a possible cure for what ails them, just to please the consciences of an ever-shrinking minority of voters.

Wouldn't it be a Reagan Legacy we could all agree was worth celebrating if no one ever needed to be riddled with Alzheimers again?