You're splitting hairs because you know you can't support your argument. You know, along with all of the more erudite readers here, that "post hoc" in this reference is short for "post hoc ergo propter hoc," and it is a logical fallacy.
It is a logical fallacy to suggest that something that happens later
must be the result of the thing that preceded it. But inductive reasoning relies on trying to figure out cause and effect by watching how things play out. If I see lightning then hear thunder, I can speculate the lightning caused the thunder. If there's a plausible mechanism for that, and the apparent cause-and-effect plays out often enough and consistently enough, my confidence in that can logically grow.
When it comes to analyzing historical figures, we don't get thousands of repetitions to judge from, so we can never be as confident in our belief that, say, race drove Reagan's politics as we are that lightning causes thunder. We're stuck at the "tentative" stage permanently. But certainly the real-world events look like we'd expect they would if Reagan's politics were driven in significant part by race.
It didn't have to be that way. It would be a lot harder to argue this point if, say, Reagan had always been a Republican, rather than leaving the GOP just as the white racists Democrats were leaving over civil rights. It would be almost impossible to argue it if Reagan, despite leaving the Democrats, had been one of the Republicans who was honorable enough to stand up for the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. It would be tougher to argue the point if his gun-rights stance hadn't switched opposite the switch of black political leaders. Or if he'd, say, come out in favor of affirmative action, or other controversial positions supported by black political leaders. Or if he'd repudiated the "States Rights" rallying cry that had been such a consistent prop of white supremacists since antebellum times. There are so very many ways Reagan's life could have disrupted this argument. But, with remarkable consistency, none of them played out.
Coincidence? Possibly. I don't believe so, though. I think the reason he looks so very much like a racist is either because he was one, or because he was cleverly playing the part of one, knowing what great appeal there was for such a figure among conservative white Democrats feeling alienated by a party that suddenly gave a crap about black people.
and being a bit of pedantic a-hole, too).
I'm totally tempted to change my nic to "Pedantic A-Hole".
Reagan in 1964, and in 1984 and in 1954 for all I know, believed in 10th Amendment and states rights.
And he believed those things did nothing to bar much more dramatic pro-white liberal actions during the early part of the New Deal, including truly radical reforms like Social Security or the WPA. Then, "coincidentally," liberalism started fighting for the black man, too, and suddenly the 10th amendment and states rights compelled his exit from the Democrats.
