The Daily Hatch

C310-25A, President Reagan eating lunch at his desk in the oval office.1/26/81.

From Oct. 28, 1980, in Cleveland, here is part 7 of the Carter-Reagan Presidential Debate, as taped from WJKW, CBS. Amazing how things have changed…and yet stayed the same…in almost 30 years!!!

Oct 21, 1984 Presidential Debate President Reagan v Walter Mondale

Nuclear Freeze

MR. KALB: Mr. Mondale, in this general area, sir, of arms control, President Carter’s national security adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski, said, “A nuclear freeze is a hoax.” Yet the basis of your arms proposals, as I understand them, is a mutual and verifiable freeze on existing weapons systems. In your view, which specific weapons systems could be subject to a mutual and verifiable freeze, and which could not?

MR. MONDALE: Every system that is verifiable should be placed on the table for negotiations for an agreement. I would not agree to any negotiations or any agreement that involved conduct on the part of the Soviet Union that we couldn’t verify every day. I would not agree to any agreement in which the United States security interest was not fully recognized and supported. That’s why we say mutual and verifiable freezes.

Now, why do I support the freeze? Because this ever-rising arms race madness makes both nations less secure. It’s more difficult to defend this nation. It’s putting a hair-trigger on nuclear war. This administration, by going into the Star Wars system, is going to add a dangerous new escalation. We have to be tough on the Soviet Union, but I think the American people — —

MR. NEWMAN: Your time is up, Mr. Mondale.

MR. MONDALE: — — and the people of the Soviet Union want it to stop.

MR. NEWMAN: President Reagan, your rebuttal?

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, my rebuttal, once again, is that this invention that has just been created here of how I would go about rolling over for the Soviet Union — no, Mr. Mondale, my idea would be with that defensive weapon that we would sit down with them and then say, “Now, are you willing to join us? Here’s what we” — give them a demonstration and then say — “Here’s what we can do. Now, if you’re willing to join us in getting rid of all the nuclear weapons in the world, then we’ll give you this one, so that we would both know that no one can cheat; that we’re both got something that if anyone tries to cheat . . . .”

But when you keep star-warring it — I never suggested where the weapons should be or what kind; I’m not a scientist. I said, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff agreed with me, that it was time for us to turn our research ability to seeing if we could not find this kind of defensive weapon. And suddenly somebody says, “Oh, it’s got to be up there, and it’s Star Wars,” and so forth. I don’t know what it would be, but if we can come up with one, I think the world will be better off.

MR. NEWMAN: Mr. Mondale, your rebuttal.

MR. MONDALE: Well, that’s what a President’s supposed to know — where those weapons are going to be. If they’re space weapons, I assume they’ll be in space. [Laughter] If they’re antisatellite weapons, I assume they’re going to be aimed against satellites.

Now, this is the most dangerous technology that we possess. The Soviets try to spy on us, steal this stuff. And to give them technology of this kind, I disagree with. You haven’t just accepted research, Mr. President. You’ve set up a Strategic Defense Initiative, an agency, you’re beginning to test, you’re talking about deploying, you’re asking for a budget of some $30 billion for this purpose. This is an arms escalation. And we will be better off, far better off, if we stop right now, because we have more to lose in space then they do. If someday, somebody comes along with an answer, that’s something else. But that there would be an answer in our lifetime is unimaginable.

Why do we start things that we know the Soviets will match and make us all less secure? That’s what a President’s for.

MR. NEWMAN: Mr. Kondracke, your question to Mr. Mondale.
Strategic Weapons

MR. KONDRACKE: Mr. Mondale, you say that with respect to the Soviet Union you want to negotiate a mutual nuclear freeze, yet you would unilaterally give up the MX missile and the B – 1 bomber before the talks have even begun. And you have announced, in advance, that reaching an agreement with the Soviets is the most important thing in the world to you. Now, aren’t you giving away half the store before you even sit down to talk?

MR. MONDALE: No. As a matter of fact, we have a vast range of technology and weaponry right now that provides all the bargaining chips that we need. And I support the air launch cruise missile, the ground launch cruise missile, the Pershing missile, the Trident submarine, the D – 5 submarine, Stealth technology, the Midgetman — we have a whole range of technology. Why I disagree with the MX is that it’s a sitting duck. It’ll draw an attack. It puts a hair-trigger, and it is a dangerous, destabilizing weapon. And the B – 1 is similarly to be opposed, because for 15 years the Soviet Union has been preparing to meet the B – 1. The Secretary of Defense himself said it would be a suicide mission if it were built.

Instead, I want to build the Midgetman, which is mobile and thus less vulnerable, contributing to stability, and a weapon that will give us security and contribute to an incentive for arms control. That’s why I’m for Stealth technology, to build a Stealth bomber — which I’ve supported for years — that can penetrate the Soviet air defense system without any hope that they can perceive where it is because their radar system is frustrated. In other words, a President has to make choices. This makes us stronger.

The final point is that we can use this money that we save on these weapons to spend on things that we really need. Our conventional strength in Europe is under strength. We need to strengthen that in order to assure our Western allies of our presence there, a strong defense, but also to diminish and reduce the likelihood of a commencement of a war and the use of nuclear weapons. It’s in this way, by making wise choices, that we’re stronger, we enhance the chances of arms control. Every President until this one has been able to do it, and this nation — or the world is more dangerous as a result.
Nuclear Freeze

MR. KONDRACKE: I want to follow up on Mr. Kalb’s question. It seems to me on the question of verifiability, that you do have some problems with the extent of the freeze. It seems to me, for example, that testing would be very difficult to verify because the Soviets encode their telemetry. Research would be impossible to verify. Numbers of warheads would be impossible to verify by satellite, except for with onsite inspection, and production of any weapon would be impossible to verify. Now, in view of that, what is going to be frozen?

MR. MONDALE: I will not agree to any arms control agreement, including a freeze, that’s not verifiable. Let’s take your warhead principle. The warhead principle — there have been counting rules for years. Whenever a weapon is tested we count the number of warheads on it, and whenever that warhead is used we count that number of warheads, whether they have that number or less on it, or not. These are standard rules. I will not agree to any production restrictions — or agreements, unless we have the ability to verify those agreements. I don’t trust the Russians. I believe that every agreement we reach must be verifiable, and I will not agree to anything that we cannot tell every day. In other words, we’ve got to be tough. But in order to stop this arms madness, we’ve got to push ahead with tough negotiations that are verifiable so that we know the Soviets are agreeing and living up to their agreement.

It has been 150 years since the beginning of the Civil War that started in April of 1861 at Ft Sumter.

Shelby Foote clip

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Excerpts from Mary Lee Orsini transcript

The following is a series of excerpts from a July 17 interview between Mary Lee Orsini and Sgt. Jim Dixon and Major Jackie Goodson of the Pulaski County sheriff’s office. The transcript was edited only for basic spelling.

Goodson: Here’s the thing, that Mary Lee Orsini knows that nobody else knows is where the gun is.
Orsini: Exactly, Yeah exactly, I know…
Goodson: Okay.
Orsini: No one’s ever been told. I never even told my mother that.
Goodson: Right. So we’re gonna go and see if we can locate that. If-if that’s possible then we can say that there’s no other motive for her telling the truth on this except what she says that she wants it all cleared up.
Orsini: Exactly.
Goodson: Because we got the gun where she says it happened.
Orsini: It’s a possibility that it will still be there, after all this time.
. . .
Goodson: Let me ask you one more time; because I think this is going to be a big thing. I mean I know you don’t want to get into a lot of details of it, but the motive of your reason behind that. And I’d like for you to explain that again to me. Cause I think that’s going to be a point where they’re either going to have to accept your response or they’re going to go out here and look for all the things. So I want to make it clear.
Orsini: There was nothing else that essentially. It was just that uh there was some misguidance by some people that directed me in the path of finances; I got in over my head and…
Goodson: What are some examples of what they would be?
Orsini: Uh, agreeing to uh, to doing different types of mortgages, that this would be paid off and I was in over my head I didn’t understand what they were really doing and then my husband was at a point with his business. He was saying take care of it, take care of it. He wasn’t really-really involved in all of and he expected me to just come home with the bill of sale. You know what I’m saying. He wanted it out of his hair. You know how you men are he didn’t like a lot of details you just want the woman to go clean up the mess, give it to me, I see policemen are different, y’all wanna hear all the details.
Goodson: I like details.
Dixon: (Laughs)
Orsini: Most men they wanna-they wanna know right here. At home, I bet you’re not detailed oriented you want to know two or three words. So that’s the way men are and that’s the way he operated one or two words it was clear it was over with it was solved. And I listened to some advice and had a convoluted, tangled up real estate mess. That I-that I ended up being messed up over.

Update
Mary Lee Orsini died at age 55

Posted by Traciy Curry-Reyes at 4:25 PM