Internet myth re Reagan & George W. Bush

E-mails are still circulating with this myth:

David Emery's Urban Legends Blog
By David Emery, About.com Guide to Urban Legends since 1997
G.W. Bush a 'Ne'er-Do-Well'
Monday August 20, 2007

Via Museum of Hoaxes: An alleged quote from Ronald Reagan's diaries purportedly revealing his none-too-favorable assessment of G.W. Bush's abilities is currently making the Internet rounds (example here). It goes like this:

Direct quote from the just published REAGAN DIARIES.

The entry is dated May 17, 1986.

"A moment I've been dreading. George brought his ne're-do-well son around this morning and asked me to find the kid a job. Not the political one who lives in Florida. The one who hangs around here all the time looking shiftless. This so-called kid is already almost 40 and has never had a real job. Maybe I'll call Kinsley over at The New Republic and see if they'll hire him as a contributing editor or something. That looks like easy work."

It wasn't hard to track the passage back to its original source and prove it inauthentic. "The quotation is pulled from an article titled 'My Lunch with Reagan' by Michael Kinsley in the New Republic (vol. 237, issue 1, 7/2/07)," notes Museum of Hoaxes curator Alex Boese. "And, not surprisingly, the quotation is taken out of context. In its original context it's easy to tell that it's meant as a joke."