This is an awfully long goodbye.

Reagan worship: "'I think when somebody dies there's a tendency for the press to view them through rose-colored glasses. It's only polite,' says Alex Jones, director of the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University. 'But I think they're doing a great disservice by making this totally positive and uncritical coverage. In fact, Ronald Reagan was a very controversial president, and journalists should be trying to offer something that resembles an honest look back at Reagan's administration.' "

I was astonished that the remembrance was encompassing almost an entire week; it seemed slightly excessive to me. Especially considering this week of remembrance, mourning and the state funeral was carefully planned by Reagan people. I did not know that a president can choose between a state funeral and a private one. Probably because Nixon was the only president to die during my lifetime (or at least the lifetime I can remember - I can't recall anything about Johnson), and I just assumed his funeral was private because he had resigned.

I feel a little less crazy after reading this article. While I understand that he was a genuinely nice and funny man, and I do not begrudge him the affection many feel toward him, I've been remembering those 8 years of his presidency quite differently than the way the media has been presenting it this week. I hope that we will soon be hearing an honest and balanced commentary on Mr. Reagan's presidency and legacy, including both his strengths and his weaknesses, his successes along with his failures. It's what he, and we, deserve.

May he rest in peace, at last.