I agree with you, kirk, on Reagan being rather shady in that respect.
There's also his arming Afghan freedom fighters against the Soviets, these freedom fighters later becoming our adversaries.
Also, this is more of a personal thought, but I don't feel that his active efforts against the USSR were completely necessary. I mean, they probably resulted in it falling more quickly, but odds are, I bet they would have run themselves into the ground quite effectively, considering their financial predicaments in the 80s, which were actually hindered even more so for some time by Gorbachev's well-meaning attempts to implement a more capitalistic system.
Well, that's what I gather of it from high school.