Category Archives: Ronald Reagan

Ronald Wilson Reagan (Part 91)

June 12, 2011 – 5:41 am

https://i0.wp.com/www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/photographs/large/C38364-20.jpg

President Reagan meeting with Anatoly Shcharansky, released dissident from the Soviet Union USSR, in the Oval Office. 12/10/86.

the first presidential debate between Ronald Reagan and Walter Mondale in 1984

Lee Edwards of the Heritage Foundation wrote an excellent article on Ronald Reagan and the events that transpired during the Reagan administration,  and I wanted to share it with you. Here is the fourth portion:

The measure cut all income tax rates by twenty-five percent, with a 5 percent cut coming that October, the next 10 percent in July 1982, and the final 10 percent in July 1983. The law also reduced the top income tax rate from 70 percent to 50 percent, indexed tax rates to offset the impact of inflation, and increased the tax exemption on estates and gifts. Conservatives have consistently argued that ERTA was a prime factor in the economic growth that prevailed throughout the 1980s.

There followed sixty straight months of economic growth, the longest uninterrupted period of expansion since the government began keeping such statistics in 1854. Nearly fifteen million new jobs were created — a total of eighteen million by the time Reagan left office. Just under $20 trillion worth of goods and services, measured in actual dollars, were produced from 1982 to 1987. To give some notion of how much that is, by the end of 1987 America was producing about seven and a one-half times more every year than it produced in John Kennedy’s last year as president.[viii]

The expansion was felt everywhere, as conservative economists had predicted, including in the government’s own income. Total federal receipts in 1982 were $618 billion. Five years later, federal receipts were just over $1 trillion, an increase of $398 billion. More than enough, one would have thought, to satisfy all but the most eager advocate of the welfare state.

And as Reagan had promised, the military benefited the most from the economic growth. In President Carter’s last budget, America spent just under $160 billion on national defense. In 1987, the Reagan administration spent $282 billion, more than twice as much on the military. During Reagan’s first seven years, he was able to expend over $1.5 trillion on national defense, “a staggering amount by anyone’s standards.”[ix]

By Everette Hatcher III | Comments (0)

Ronald Wilson Reagan (Part 87) (1981 Orsini McArthur murder case Part 11)

June 9, 2011 – 2:44 pm

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

https://i0.wp.com/www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/photographs/large/c310-25A.jpg

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.

Federal troops guarding the Chain Bridge which connects Arlington, VA and Washington, D.C.

Federal troops guarding the Chain Bridge which connects Arlington, VA and Washington, D.C.

Shelby Foote clip

__________________________________________________

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

 
 
 
By Everette Hatcher III | Comments (0)

Ronald Wilson Reagan (Part 90)

June 3, 2011 – 2:27 pm

https://i0.wp.com/www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/photographs/large/c36354-13A.jpg

President Reagan and Nancy Reagan present Pianist Vladimir Horowitz with the Medal of Freedom in the Roosevelt room. 7/28/86.

From Oct. 28, 1980 in Cleveland, here is part 10 of 11 of the Carter-Reagan Presidential Debate, as taped from WJKW-TV, CBS. This segment has the end of the debate, plus some analysis from the CBS News Staff. Part 11 will have news from WJKW, TV8 in Cleveland, about the debate.

Lee Edwards of the Heritage Foundation wrote an excellent article on Ronald Reagan and the events that transpired during the Reagan administration,  and I wanted to share it with you. Here is the third portion:

The first and most decisive step was tax reform. The top marginal rate on individual income was 70 percent, and Reagan, who had majored in economics in college and had read extensively in the field during the 1950s and 1960s, concluded that if you reduced tax rates and allowed people to spend or save more of what they earned, “they’ll be more industrious, they’ll have more incentive to work hard, and money they earn will add fuel to the great economic machine that energizes our national progress.” Some economists called this approach supply-side economics; “I call it common sense,” Reagan wrote in his 1990 autobiography.[iv]

As early as 1964 in his famous television speech for Barry Goldwater, Reagan had sharply criticized the high taxes and large subsidies demanded by America’s welfare state and warned, “No nation in history has ever survived a tax burden that reached one-third of its national income.” As governor of California, he had striven to reduce taxes, even sponsoring a tax limitation amendment to the state constitution which had been narrowly defeated. Reagan was a supply-sider, wrote Ed Meese, his long-time colleague, “long before the term was invented.”[v]

The conviction “that the size of the economic pie must be increased, not simply sliced differently” was fundamental to supply-siders. For Jack Kemp and others, this was a far more appealing message than the “balance the budget” imperative usually associated with Republicans. The “bibles” of this new economic gospel were Jude Wanniski’s The Way the World Works, published in 1978, and George Gilder’s Wealth and Poverty, published in 1981. It had first been proposed legislatively in 1977 by Kemp and Senator William Roth of Delaware with their 30 percent tax cut. But supply-side economics was far more than tax cuts — it envisioned a world “stripped of the tax preferences, subsidies and economic regulations” that were “strangling” the economy.[vi]

It would take fireside chats with the American people, deals with boll-weevil Democrats in the House of Representatives, pep talks with discouraged aides, and even near death from an attempted assassination, but on August 17, 1981, President Reagan signed the Economic Recovery Act (ERTA) into law. It was the tax reform Reagan had been urging for decades. Newsweek called it a “second New Deal potentially as profound in its import as the first was a half century ago.”[vii]

By Everette Hatcher III | Comments (0)

Ronald Wilson Reagan (Part 89)

June 1, 2011 – 12:15 am
“If you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here, to this gate. Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate. Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.” Arguably one of Reagan’s best television moments, he urged Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev to stop the communist hold over East Berlin and allow the country to unify under a democracy. Two years later, it happened in the dark of night.

From Oct. 28, 1980, in Cleveland, here is part 9 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!!!

Lee Edwards of the Heritage Foundation wrote an excellent article on Ronald Reagan and the events that transpired during the Reagan administration,  and I wanted to share it with you. Here is the second portion:

Reagan needed every bit of this help. Internally, the nation faced a multitude of serious economic problems — double-digit inflation, high unemployment and a prime interest rate of 21.5 percent, the highest since the Civil War. Overseas problems had also proliferated — the energy crisis, the red-tinged Sandinistas in Nicaragua, the unbalanced SALT II treaty, the brutal Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, falling dominos in Africa, the American hostages in Iran. The Vietnam syndrome that permeated and obstructed U.S. foreign policy was reinforced by Carter’s maladroit actions and the malaise that he, not the American people, produced.

The new president and his top advisers were well aware that they had to act, and quickly. In presidential politics, as in the 100-yard dash, a quick start is everything.

Richard Wirthlin, the president’s pollster, had developed “a strategic outline of initial actions” to be taken during the administration’s first 180 days — from the inauguration until early August, when Congress usually recessed for a summer vacation.[i] The plan was based in large part on an address that Reagan had delivered the previous September before the International Business Council of Chicago. The candidate had proposed: strictly controlling the rate of growth of government spending, reducing personal income tax rates, revising government regulations, establishing a stable monetary policy, and following a consistent national economic policy.

Such a strategy seems obvious, but Democrats attacked it with abandon and, typically, big business mouthpieces like the National Association of Manufacturers complained because the plan didn’t cut business taxes enough. But research director Martin Anderson and the other numbers crunchers were content: they had produced a document (with projections through 1985) showing that Reagan could cut taxes, balance the budget and increase domestic growth if given the right kind of cooperation by Congress.[ii] The Wall Street Journal agreed, commenting that Reagan had “spelled out a prudent, gradual, responsible reordering of economic priorities.”[iii]

By Everette Hatcher III | Comments (0)

Ronald Wilson Reagan (Part 88) (Orsini case, part 12)

May 26, 2011 – 11:52 am

https://i0.wp.com/www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/photographs/large/C35252-11.jpg

President Reagan with actress Victoria Principal during a photo opportunity with the Arthritis Poster Child of the Year in the Oval Office. 5/29/86.

From Oct. 28, 1980 in Cleveland, here is part 8 of the Carter-Reagan Presidential Debate, as taped from WJKW-TV, CBS. Amazing how things have changed…and yet stayed the same…in almost 30 years!!!

__________________________________________

Lee Edwards of the Heritage Foundation wrote an excellent article on Ronald Reagan and I wanted to share it with you. Here is the first portion:

Ronald Reagan came to the presidency with several important political advantages. He had an express mandate from the American people who knew what he intended to do — cut income taxes from top to bottom, reduce the size of the federal government for the first time since the New Deal, and make the U.S. military Number One in the world. To help him in this revolutionary task, he had a Republican Senate and a feisty Republican minority in the House determined to avoid legislative gridlock.

And he had something else, something that neither Robert Taft nor Barry Goldwater could have counted on if either of them had been elected president — a vital, committed conservative movement. Reagan could turn to the Heritage Foundation, the American Enterprise Institute, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and other think tanks for ideas.

He could call on groups like the Committee for the Survival of a Free Congress, the American Conservative Union, the National Rifle Association and the National Tax Limitation Committee for political muscle.

He could staff his administration with professionals who had gotten their start in the movement. In the White House alone, there were conservatives Ed Meese, Richard V. Allen, Martin Anderson, Robert Carleson, Lyn Nofziger, Tony Dolan, and Kenneth Cribb, all in senior positions. And he could draw on the neoconservatives for respected foreign policy experts such as Jeane Kirkpatrick, Max Kampelman, Richard Perle, Kenneth Adelman, and Elliott Abrams.

Outside his administration, Reagan could depend on the support of opinion molders like columnists George Will, Patrick J. Buchanan, William F. Buckley, Jr., James J. Kilpatrick, and John Chamberlain. Will and Buchanan would become major television commentators before the end of the decade; Buckley, it seemed, had always been a major TV presence. Reagan could rely for guidance on the analytical skills of the editors and writers of a wide range of journals like National Review, Human Events, The American Spectator, Commentary, The Public Interest, The National Interest, and the editorial pages of The Wall Street Journal.

And thanks to direct mail, there was sufficient money to fund the activities of the conservative movement — and those of the Republican party, especially when Reagan signed the letter.

___________________________________________

The Orsini murder trial was very intense. Take a look at this story from the Arkansas Times.

Carol Griffee, 1937-2011

Posted by Leslie Newell Peacock on Tue, Jan 25, 2011 at 9:03 AM

imgres.jpg

 

Former Arkansas Gazette reporter and later independent journalist Carol Griffee died last night in hospice, we just learned from an e-mail from historian Michael Dougan.

“The Grif” was all business — she recently called Max to matter-of-factly inform him that she was dying and was putting her affairs in order — and in addition to her memorable work on the Vertac plant in Jacksonville and other environmental stories, colleagues remember her labors covering murderess Mary Lee Orsini. In her Gazette Project interview, Griffee told interviewer Michael Haddigan that she “should never have been involved in covering” the Orsini case. “It just made a total nervous wreck out of me. I [laughs] nearly lost it a couple of times.”
An excerpt from the Gazette Project interview on the Orsini case:

MH: Well, I want to make sure I ask you this question. There’s an often-told story about you coming to work and walking across the parking lot with a shotgun.
CG: Absolutely!
MH: What was that about?
CG: I carried a double-barreled shotgun.
MH: Was that . . .?
CG: I was being watched. No, this was just during the McArthur thing.
MH: Right.
CG: I was being watched, and I knew it.
MH: Who was watching you?
CG: I have a feeling it was Orsini, but I don’t really know for sure. But I was quite aware of it. Not only that, but there was one day when John Woodruff had to come to the house to get me out of my house, that’s how scared I was! [Laughs]

By Everette Hatcher III | Comments (0)

Ronald Wilson Reagan (Part 86) (1981 Orsini McArthur murder case Part 10)

May 24, 2011 – 11:27 pm

C283-12, President Reagan getting a haircut from Milton Pitts in the West Wing Barber Shop. 1/23/81.

https://i0.wp.com/www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/photographs/large/C283-12.jpg

From Oct. 28, 1980 in Cleveland, here is part 6 of the Carter-Reagan Presidential Debate, as taped from WJKW-TV, 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

MR. NEWMAN: Mr. President, your rebuttal.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, my rebuttal is I’ve heard the national debt blamed for a lot of things, but not for illegal immigration across our border — [laughter] — and it has nothing to do with it.

But with regard to these high interest rates, too, at least give us the recognition of the fact that when you left office, Mr. Mondale, they were 21\1/2\ — the prime rate. It’s now 12\1/4\, and I predict it’ll be coming down a little more shortly. So, we’re trying to undo some of the things that your administration did. [Applause]

MR. NEWMAN: No applause, please.

Mr. Kalb, your question to President Reagan.
Armageddon

MR. KALB: Mr. President, I’d like to pick up this Armageddon theme. You’ve been quoted as saying that you do believe, deep down, that we are heading for some kind of biblical Armageddon. Your Pentagon and your Secretary of Defense have plans for the United States to fight and prevail in a nuclear war. Do you feel that we are now heading perhaps, for some kind of nuclear Armageddon? And do you feel that this country and the world could survive that kind of calamity?

THE PRESIDENT: Mr. Kalb, I think what has been hailed as something I’m supposedly, as President, discussing as principle is the recall of just some philosophical discussions with people who are interested in the same things; and that is the prophecies down through the years, the biblical prophecies of what would portend the coming of Armageddon, and so forth, and the fact that a number of theologians for the last decade or more have believed that this was true, that the prophecies are coming together that portend that. But no one knows whether Armageddon, those prophecies mean that Armageddon is a thousand years away or day after tomorrow. So, I have never seriously warned and said we must plan according to Armageddon.

Now, with regard to having to say whether we would try to survive in the event of a nuclear war, of course we would. But let me also point out that to several parliaments around the world, in Europe and in Asia, I have made a statement to each one of them, and I’ll repeat it here: A nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought. And that is why we are maintaining a deterrent and trying to achieve a deterrent capacity to where no one would believe that they could start such a war and escape with limited damage.

But the deterrent — and that’s what it is for — is also what led me to propose what is now being called the Star Wars concept, but propose that we research to see if there isn’t a defensive weapon that could defend against incoming missiles. And if such a defense could be found, wouldn’t it be far more humanitarian to say that now we can defend against a nuclear war by destroying missiles instead of slaughtering millions of people?
Strategic Defense Initiative

MR. KALB: Mr. President, when you made that proposal, the so-called Star Wars proposal, you said, if I’m not mistaken, that you would share this very super-sophisticated technology with the Soviet Union. After all of the distrust over the years, sir, that you have expressed towards the Soviet Union, do you really expect anyone to take seriously that offer that you would share the best of America’s technology in this weapons area with our principal adversary?

THE PRESIDENT: Why not? What if we did — and I hope we can; we’re still researching — what if we come up with a weapon that renders those missiles obsolete? There has never been a weapon invented in the history of man that has not led to a defensive, a counterweapon. But suppose we came up with that?

Now, some people have said, “Ah, that would make war imminent, because they would think that we could launch a first strike because we could defend against the enemy.” But why not do what I have offered to do and asked the Soviet Union to do? Say, “Look, here’s what we can do. We’ll even give it to you. Now, will you sit down with us and once and for all get rid, all of us, of these nuclear weapons and free mankind from that threat?” I think that would be the greatest use of a defensive weapon.

MR. KALB: Mr. Mondale, you’ve been very sharply critical of the President’s Strategic Defense Initiative. And yet, what is wrong with a major effort by this country to try to use its best technology to knock out as many incoming nuclear warheads as possible?

MR. MONDALE: First of all, let me sharply disagree with the President on sharing the most advanced, the most dangerous, the most important technology in America with the Soviet Union. We have had for many years, understandably, a system of restraints on high technology because the Soviets are behind us. And any research or development along the Star Wars schemes would inevitably involve our most advanced computers, our most advanced engineering. And the thought that we would share this with the Soviet Union is, in my opinion, a total non-STARTer. I would not let the Soviet Union get their hands on it at all.

Now, what’s wrong with Star Wars? There’s nothing wrong with the theory of it. If we could develop a principle that would say both sides could fire all their missiles and no one would get hurt, I suppose it’s a good idea. But the fact of it is we’re so far away from research that even comes close to that, that the Director of Engineering Research at the Defense Department said to get there we would have to solve eight problems, each of which are more difficult than the atomic bomb and the Manhattan project. It would cost something like a trillion dollars to test and deploy weapons.

The second thing is this all assumes that the Soviets wouldn’t respond in kind. And they always do. We don’t get behind. They won’t get behind. And that’s been the tragic story of the arms race. We have more at stake in space satellites than they do. If we could stop, right now, the testing and the deployment of these space weapons — and the President’s proposals go clear beyond research; if it was just research we wouldn’t have any argument, because maybe someday, somebody will think of something — but to commit this nation to a buildup of antisatellite and space weapons at this time, in their crude state, would bring about an arms race that’s very dangerous indeed.

One final point. The most dangerous aspect of this proposal is, for the first time, we would delegate to computers the decision as to whether to start a war. That’s dead wrong. There wouldn’t be time for a President to decide; it would be decided by these remote computers. It might be an oil fire, it might be a jet exhaust, the computer might decide it’s a missile — and off we go.

Why don’t we stop this madness now and draw a line and keep the heavens free from war? [Applause]

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

Courtesy of Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, LC-B8171-7951 DLC

President Lincoln with General McClellan and other officers at Antietam.
October 3, 1862

________________________________________

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: Let me-let me ask you-again I wanna impress on you, if this comes out; which probably will, there maybe some people out there if you did tell anybody, I’m not saying you did, cause you’re saying you didn’t tell anybody except your mother and people from in here in the last year. But if there’s anyone that you can think of that you did tell and then they may come forward. I don’t know if they will, but if they don’t…
Orsini: No I never…
Goodson: I could cause them it be better for them to come forward. Uh, but now let’s get it, cause I’d hate for somebody to sit out there going I know about this, is she gone tell on me or what an so on. It’s best to them and for you, and all this that we get it all out so if there’s anybody out there that you-that you talked to either prior to…
Orsini: No I was never honest with my lawyers. I was never-the lawyers never knew it, from Mr. MacArthur, to Lesenberry, Carpenter, to Donalan, to Adam and so on.
. . .
Dixon: In the occurrence, did you do anything or is there any one little piece of evidence that maybe only the police would know about and you know about. In other words it didn’t come out in any of these books, newspaper articles or TV.
Orsini: Oh yeah there was lots of things, there were a lot, and I think that was always initially my basis of false hope uh, uh there was a lot of erroneous evidence. For instance uh…
Dixon: Well can you give me an example or two of what was true evidence that you knew about?
Orsini: I’m not-I’m not understanding what you mean; because even the true evidence came out, you know what i’m saying, the true evidence came out. It just had a slant to it. You know that was…
Dixon: You’re saying it was misrepresented or misread?
. . .
Orsini: Well for one thing I knew the exact time that it occurred. It occurred, if I’m not mistaken at 1:05 in the morning. Cause I remember seeing a clock in the house and thinking that came out in trial it was a neighbor that said he she heard a bump at 11 something. It was things like that I always wondered where did they get that, you know. And then Dr. Malak came up with this far fetched theory, you know he came out with stuff I went to him one time, he called me to his office and asked me questions and some how we got on the subject of poisoning and we started talking about poisoning and when he testified he said I asked how to kill with arsenic poison and they wouldn’t-I wouldn’t even know anything about that. He got on the subject about how to autopsy people with I mean, I use to wonder.

By Everette Hatcher III | Comments (0)

Ronald Wilson Reagan (Part 85) (1981 Orsini McArthur murder case Part 9)

May 23, 2011 – 8:47 am

.

Harry Benson and the Reagans: Across Four Decades

Ronald and Nancy, 1966
From Oct. 28, 1980, here is part 4 of the Carter-Reagan Presidential Debate, as taped from CBS.
 
Oct 21, 1984 Presidential Debate President Reagan v Water Mondale

MR. NEWMAN: Ms. Geyer, your question to Mr. Mondale.
Illegal Immigration

MS. GEYER: Mr. Mondale, many analysts are now saying that actually our number one foreign policy problem today is one that remains almost totally unrecognized: massive illegal immigration from economically collapsing countries. They are saying that it is the only real territorial threat to the American nation-state. You, yourself, said in the 1970’s that we had a “hemorrhage on our borders.” Yet today you have backed off any immigration reform, such as the balanced and highly crafted Simpson-Mazzoli bill. Why? What would you do instead today, if anything?

MR. MONDALE: This is a very serious problem in our country, and it has to be dealt with. I object to that part of the Simpson-Mazzoli bill which I think is very unfair and would prove to be so. That is the part that requires employers to determine the citizenship of an employee before they’re hired. I’m convinced that the result of this would be that people who are Hispanic, people who have different languages or speak with an accent, would find it difficult to be employed. I think that’s wrong. We’ve never had citizenship tests in our country before, and I don’t think we should have a citizenship card today. That is counterproductive.

I do support the other aspects of the Simpson-Mazzoli bill that strengthen enforcement at the border, strengthen other ways of dealing with undocumented workers in this difficult area and dealing with the problem of settling people who have lived here for many, many years and do not have an established status.

I have further strongly recommended that this administration do something it has not done, and that is to strengthen enforcement at the border, strengthen the officials in this government that deal with undocumented workers, and to do so in a way that’s responsible and within the Constitution of the United States. We need an answer to this problem, but it must be an American answer that is consistent with justice and due process.

Everyone in this room, practically, here tonight, is an immigrant. We came here loving this nation, serving it, and it has served all of our most bountiful dreams. And one of those dreams is justice. And we need a measure — and I will support a measure — that brings about those objectives but avoids that one aspect that I think is very serious.

The second part is to maintain and improve relations with our friends to the south. We cannot solve this problem all on our own. And that’s why the failure of this administration to deal in an effective and a good-faith way with Mexico, with Costa Rica, with the other nations in trying to find a peaceful settlement to the dispute in Central America has undermined our capacity to effectively deal diplomatically in this area as well.

MS. GEYER: Sir, people as well-balanced and just as Father Theodore Hesburgh at Notre Dame, who headed the select commission on immigration, have pointed out repeatedly that there will be no immigration reform without employer sanctions, because it would be an unbalanced bill, and there would be simply no way to enforce it. However, putting that aside for the moment, your critics have also said repeatedly that you have not gone along with the bill or with any immigration reform because of the Hispanic groups — or Hispanic leadership groups — who actually do not represent what the Hispanic-Americans want, because polls show that they overwhelmingly want some kind of immigration reform. Can you say, or how can you justify your position on this? And how do you respond to the criticism that this is another, or that this is an example of your flip-flopping and giving in to special interest groups at the expense of the American nation?

MR. MONDALE: I think you’re right that the polls show that the majority of Hispanics want that bill, so I’m not doing it for political reasons. I’m doing it because all my life I’ve fought for a system of justice in this country, a system in which every American has a chance to achieve the fullness in life without discrimination. This bill imposes upon employers the responsibility of determining whether somebody who applies for a job is an American or not. And just inevitably, they’re going to be reluctant to hire Hispanics or people with a different accent.

If I were dealing with politics here, the polls show the American people want this. I am for reform in this area, for tough enforcement at the border, and for many other aspects of the Simpson-Mazzoli bill, but all my life I’ve fought for a fair nation. And despite the politics of it, I stand where I stand, and I think I’m right, and before this fight is over we’re going to come up with a better bill, a more effective bill that does not undermine the liberties of our people.

MS. GEYER: Mr. President, you, too, have said that our borders are out of control. Yet this fall you allowed the Simpson-Mazzoli bill — which would at least have minimally protected our borders and the rights of citizenship — because of a relatively unimportant issue of reimbursement to the States for legalized aliens. Given that, may I ask what priority can we expect you to give this forgotten national security element? How sincere are you in your efforts to control, in effect, the nation-state that is the United States?

THE PRESIDENT: Georgie Anne, we, believe me, supported the Simpson-Mazzoli bill strongly — and the bill that came out of the Senate. However, there were things added in in the House side that we felt made it less of a good bill; as a matter of fact, made it a bad bill. And in conference — we stayed with them in conference all the way to where even Senator Simpson did not want the bill in the manner in which it would come out of the conference committee. There were a number of things in there that weakened that bill. I can’t go into detail about them here.

But it is true our borders are out of control. It is also true that this has been a situation on our borders back through a number of administrations. And I supported this bill. I believe in the idea of amnesty for those who have put down roots and who have lived here even though sometime back they may have entered illegally. With regard to the employer sanctions, we must have that not only to ensure that we can identify the illegal aliens, but also, while some keep protesting about what it would do to employers, there is another employer that we shouldn’t be so concerned about, and these are employers down through the years who have encouraged the illegal entry into this country because they then hire these individuals and hire them at starvation wages and with none of the benefits that we think are normal and natural for workers in our country, and the individuals can’t complain because of their illegal status. We don’t think that those people should be allowed to continue operating free.

And this was why the provisions that we had in with regard to sanctions, and so forth — and I’m going to do everything I can, and all of us in the administration are, to join in again when Congress is back at it to get an immigration bill that will give us, once again, control of our borders.

And with regard to friendship below the border and with the countries down there, yes, no administration that I know has established the relationship that we have with our Latin friends. But as long as they have an economy that leaves so many people in dire poverty and unemployment, they are going to seek that employment across our borders. And we work with those other countries.

MS. GEYER: Mr. President, the experts also say that the situation today is terribly different quantitatively — qualitatively different from what it has been in the past because of the gigantic population growth. For instance, Mexico’s population will go from about 60 million today to 120 million at the turn of the century. Many of these people will be coming into the United States not as citizens, but as illegal workers. You have repeatedly said recently that you believe that Armageddon, the destruction of the world, may be imminent in our times. Do you ever feel that we are in for an Armageddon or a situation, a time of anarchy, regarding the population explosion in the world?

THE PRESIDENT: No. As a matter of fact, the population explosion, if you look at the actual figures, has been vastly exaggerated — over exaggerated. As a matter of fact, there are some pretty scientific and solid figures about how much space there still is in the world and how many more people we can have. It’s almost like going back to the Malthusian theory, when even then they were saying that everyone would starve with the limited population they had then. But the problem of population growth is one, here, with regard to our immigration. And we have been the safety valve, whether we wanted to or not, with the illegal entry here, in Mexico, where their population is increasing and they don’t have an economy that can absorb them and provide the jobs. And this is what we’re trying to work out, not only to protect our own borders but to have some kind of fairness and recognition of that problem.

MR. NEWMAN: Mr. Mondale, your rebuttal?

MR. MONDALE: One of the biggest problems today is that the countries to our south are so desperately poor that these people who will almost lose their lives if they don’t come north, come north despite all the risks. And if we’re going to find a permanent, fundamental answer to this, it goes to American economic and trade policies that permit these nations to have a chance to get on their own two feet and to get prosperity, so that they can have jobs for themselves and their people. And that’s why this enormous national debt, engineered by this administration, is harming these countries in fueling this immigration. These high interest rates — real rates that have doubled under this administration — have had the same effect on Mexico and so on, and the cost of repaying those debts is so enormous that it results in massive unemployment, hardship, and heartache. And that drives our friends to the south up into our region, and we need to end those deficits as well.

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

Former slaves were photographed

These former slaves were photographed at Fish ...

These former slaves were photographed at Fish Hall, a Hilton Head, S.C., plantation owned by the family of Emma Pope, the wife of Confederate General Thomas Drayton. The plantation was taken over by Union forces following the Northern victory over Drayton’s forces in the Battle of Port Royal in November 1861. The workers in this photo were still planting, harvesting and ginning cotton but were now keeping the profits

________________________________________

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.

Orsini: The only suspicion is when we pulled out of the driveway, there was his truck sitting in the driveway. And uh, you this is one of things when you go to trial and expect everybody to tell the truth and about half the witnesses got there told the story that wasn’t true and you’re wondering why people, you’re, you’re the bad guy why aren’t they telling the truth. But several times my husband’s partner Vernon had picked my husband up. My husband had a real big engine in that truck. And there was times it wouldn’t turn over and he had to have it started, now since we moved in that house in September he’d never been there. But several time we lived in Emerald Garden, Vernon would come by and get Ron until they could do something with the starter he had problems with that wouldn’t, he’d hit a dead spot, I don’t remember all the circumstances.
Goodson: So your daughter questioned that when y’all got ready to leave?
Orsini: She said you know, what’s Daddy’s truck doing there or something to that effect. And I said well Vernon probably came and got him. And so she being a 14 year old, and had a pretty innocent mind, pretty sheltered mind at that time didn’t have any suspicions.
. . .
Goodson: Okay now when did you do, use the screwdriver?
Orsini: Uh, when I left the upstairs I went back-downstairs, I guess my mind was racing, I don’t remember my mindset, I don’t think I had one that night except insanity. Uh you know I got the screwdriver, if I recall the screwdriver was just lying there, uh…
Goodson: When you put the stuff in the car?
Orsini: I saw the screwdriver, yes, the best I can remember I saw the screwdriver and I thought well I’m gonna go over here and act like I’m opening this door, and then at the door there was already marks on the door, well it took me more, well it wasn’t marks it was like a mark or two, and it took me more tries to do what I’d seen my husband do real easily a day or two before.
. . .
Dixon: I think what he is asking you is did you reveal this to anyone that you know? A close friend, relative?
Orsini: Oh no no,
Dixon: Co-worker?
Orsini: The only person um, no, no. Absolutely not. The only person, I told my mother right before she died. My mother was ill and my mother died in 1999 and I told her the truth cause I thought she deserved the truth. And my mother said Mary please don’t make things any worse for the family than what they already are. And so I told her then that I needed to take care of it. That it needed to be resolved. Uh and uh, when I got up here there were a lot of things that just weighed on me, constantly. And I talked to the chaplain about it and uh we had a tremendous chaplain and he said he would help me resolve it. That’s when Wackenhut still had us up here. And he went to the warden. Uh I believe twice, and…
. . .
Goodson: With your story and what evidence and all that. Uh, what, now probably what I want to hear now is why you decided after 21 years to um to tell the truth of the matter.
Orsini: Um, well I tried to since 1996. You know ’96 was first told my mother and uh she asked me again not to say anything and in ’99 I talked to her about it right before she died and she begged me not to do it. And my daughter is successful, she’s married, and she’s living away from Arka, away from Little Rock. And um uh, you know my family’s suffered a lot and their families suffered a lot. And my mother-in-law died last year without me resolving this with her, and I was crazy about my mother-in-law.
Goodson: Is that Ron’s mother?
Orsini: Uh, huh. She died a year ago January, or this January. Maybe it was last January; it hasn’t been very long that she died. And uh, you know you just have to make things right.
Goodson: It’s a burden to carry ain’t it?
Orsini: You have to make things right.
. . .
Goodson: Why-what made you decide to send one to Chris Piazza?
Orsini: You know why-you probably wouldn’t believe me if I told you. Can I turn the tape off a minute or two I really don’t want…
Goodson: I’d rather you-I’d rather you, I’d rather you be upfront on all it. Cause if we turn it off it will look we…
Orsini: I’m being upfront. It’s just that a lot of people might misinterpret what I’m gonna say. Anytime that I would pray the Lord just kept having heaviness on my heart about this. I was praying and you know Chris Piazza just came to my mind. And I wrestled with it a couple of days and wrote the letter out a couple of days, couple of times. You know I just became grateful for him, for um for pursuing it. Not letting me get by and diligently pursuing the initial case and not being afraid to let me get-to go after doing his job.
Goodson: He’s a well respected…
Orsini: Yeah and even though during the time that there was false evidence used at the trial and I, and I wrestled through the court because there was a lot of false evidence used at my trial to convict me. They even used a lot of lies. What you know God is just, and he’s in Proverbs it says, “The sense-the sentence is just in the hands of the king.” And that means when the judge gives you a sentence it’s just; regardless of what that sentence is. And so I knew that it looked like the time he was promoting a career and all that stuff and that’s how your mind can think. But he was really-he was representing the state of Arkansas justly. So I uh, I wrote him a letter and I let a friend of mine who was here, who-I’ve openly confessed this here in prison.
. . .

 
By Everette Hatcher III | Comments (0)

Picture of Arnold Schwarzeneggar’s son with mother Mildred Baena

May 18, 2011 – 6:37 am

 How does a young Arnold compare in looks to his son?

A young Arnold Schwarzenegger (15 photos)
 
Picture: Mildred Baena and son to Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Mildred Baena PicturesThe mother of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s love child has been named as Mildred Baena by US media outlets.The LA Times revealed Tuesday Arnold Schwarzenegger had the child ten years ago to his long time employee who was revealed as Mildred Baena hours later.Outlets linked to a Myspace page of Mildred Baena with pictures of her son.50-year-old Mildred Baena had worked for Schwarzenegger and wife Maria Shriver for the last 20 years and only left her job last year in the Schwarzenegger mansion.Housekeeper Mildred Baena was confirmed as the mother of Schwarzenegger’s ten year old love child this evening after severl sources confrimed to Radar Online. The news organizations were able to see Mildred Baena Myspace page.“They (Mildred Baena and Arnold Schwarzenegger) have a son together,” one source said when shown a picture of Mildred Baena.“I understand and deserve the feelings of anger and disappointment among my friends and family,” Schwarzenegger said on Tuesday to the LA Times, hours before Mildred Baena was revealed as the mother.

“There are no excuses and I take full responsibility for the hurt I have caused. I have apologized to Maria, my children and my family. I am truly sorry.”

Maria Shriver said of the news made public about her husband and former housekeeper, Ms Mildred Baena: “This is a painful and heartbreaking time.”

__________________
I have written many times about Arnold Schwarzenegger before. Here are just a few of the times:1. President Reagan having a photo taken with Arnold Schwarzenegger at the Republican National Convention in Dallas, Texas. 8/23/84.2.Here is a video clip of Arnold Schwarzenegger using an Airlight
Broom as a prop for “cleaning house” in the California Recall
Election as seen on CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, ect in 2003. The
Airlight Broom is manufactured by Little Rock Broom Works.3. I heard John Fund of the Wall Street Journal speak in Little Rock on April 27, 2011 and in his speech he mentioned the struggle that Arnold Schwarzenegger had with the envirnomentalists in California. I took time to repeat a lot of the facts about that in my blog post that day.4. At that same luncheon on April 27th that I mentioned earlier, one subject that John Fund brought up was the red tape that Arnold Schwarzenegger had to deal with in California. I wrote about that too.5. St. James Palace has confirmed  that Kate Middleton and Prince William – or, more officially, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge – will be visiting California from July 8-10 this summer. Former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is expected to greet the Royals as they touch down.6. Which is better for setting up a business: California or Texas? Arnold Schwarzenegger is mentioned in this post too.7. Arnold Schwarzenegger is fond of quoting Milton Friedman but he rejected fiscal conservative idea to cut spending.8. Pictures of Arnold Schwarzenegger and Maria Shriver through the years. Video clip of them at Ronald Reagan’s funeral.

9. I wrote a post on American Exceptionalism and put in a video clip of Arnold Schwarzenegger doing the introduction to an episode of “Free to Choose.”

10. Will Maria Shriver’s marriage survive Arnold Schwarzenegger’s admission of  infidelity? I hope so (Part 1).

11. Will Maria Shriver’s marriage survive Arnold Schwarzenegger’s admission of infidelity? I hope so (Part 2)

12. Will Maria Shriver’s marriage survive Arnold Schwarzenegger’s admission of infidelity? I hope so (Part 3 )

13. Will Maria Shriver’s marriage survive Arnold Schwarzenegger’s admission of infidelity? I hope so (Part  4)

14. Will Maria Shriver’s marriage survive Arnold Schwarzenegger’s admission of infidelity? I hope so (Part  5)

15. Will Maria Shriver’s marriage survive Arnold Schwarzenegger’s admission of infidelity? I hope so (Part  6)

In this series “Will Maria Shriver’s marriage survive Arnold Schwarzenegger’s admission of infidelity? I hope so,” there has been a great reaction to it by the public. I have included articles from “Family Life” of Little Rock, Arkansas about how to recover from an infidelity. I have also included info on how to take part in a “Weekend to Remember,” where you can hear “Family Life” speakers with your spouse. The only hope for Maria’s marriage will come from the power of Christ in her life to forgive. “A Family Life Conference” would be a great first step. Below is some info on that:  

In just one November weekend, for example, more than 6,200 people attended 10 Weekend to Remember® marriage getaways around the country. Here are a couple quotes from those who went:

We are moving from a place of being ready to divorce to looking forward to growing together through Christ. This has given us important tools to do so.

We’ve been walking separate roads for many years. Infidelity was the final straw leading us to divorce. I was filling out the papers two days before we came to this event. Over the course of the weekend we found each other, wrote love letters that will be kept as reminders of our true love for each other. I granted forgiveness that my husband really needed. We are going to burn the divorce papers when we get home!

In today’s culture, the issues of marriage and family are open doors for the gospel–the Good News of Christ. Because people want their marriages and families to succeed.  

Benefits of Attending a Weekend to Remember


By Everette Hatcher III | Also posted in Current Events, Milton Friedman | Comments (0)

Pictures in happier times of Arnold Schwarzenegger and Maria Shriver

May 17, 2011 – 8:13 am
https://i0.wp.com/www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/photographs/large/c23742-34.jpg
President Reagan having a photo taken with Arnold Schwarzenegger at the Republican National Convention in Dallas, Texas. 8/23/84

Thatcher, Schwarzenegger, Scott Baio at Reagan Funeral

A clip from Ronald Reagan’s funeral at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library.

Arnold Schwarzenegger Has A Secret Love-Child With Former Employee

Former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has admitted to fathering a child with a member of his household staff more than a decade ago, prompting the announcement that he as his wife Maria Shriver are separating.

According to the Los Angeles Times, Shriver moved out of the family’s Brentwood mansion earlier this year, after Schwarzenegger told her about the other child. Their split comes after being married for 25 years.

The former governor spoke to the times in a statement saying, “After leaving the governor’s office I told my wife about this event, which occurred over a decade ago. I understand and deserve the feelings of anger and disappointment among my friends and family. There are no excuses and I take full responsibility for the hurt I have caused. I have apologized to Maria, my children and my family. I am truly sorry. I ask that the media respect my wife and children through this extremely difficult time. While I deserve your attention and criticism, my family does not.”

The former staff member left Schwarzenegger’s family back in January. She had been working for the couple for 20 years.

 
Maria Shriver poses with then-boyfriend Arnold Schwarzenegger as he poses with his newly acquired certificate of U.S. citizenship in 1983.

Image: AP Photo
The couple’s wedding day, 25 years ago: April 26, 1986.

Image: Douglas C. Pizac / AP Photo
Schwarzenegger and Shriver pose together as he receives his star on the Walk of Fame in 1987.

________________________________

 The governor
The governor of California, the actor Arnold Schwarzenegger, signs a book of remembrance, in front of an official portrait of the former US president. Reagan was elected as California’s governor in 1966 and served two terms, leaving office in 1974. Photograph: Rich Pedroncelli/AP  Ronald Reagan’s death

 
The governor

Image: Stephan Savoia / AP Photo
Despite rumors on the campaign trail that Schwarzenegger groped other women, the couple is all smiles as he wins the free-for-all California Governor’s race on Oct. 7, 2003.

 Image: Rick Bowmer) / AP Photo
And now he’s the Governator. Schwarzenegger and Shriver kiss after he is sworn in on Nov. 17, 2003.

 Image: Kevork Djansezian / AP Photo
Schwarzenegger and Shriver pose on the red carpet at the 62nd Annual Golden Globe Awards on Jan. 16, 2005.

 Image: Mark J. Terrill / AP Photo
The couple celebrated as Schwarzenegger won his second term in office on Nov. 7, 2006.

Image: Rich Pedroncelli / AP Photo
The couple’s four children—daughter Katherine, son Patrick, daughter Christina, and son Christopher—joined their parents and grandmother Eunice Kennedy Shriver onstage at Schwarzenegger’s second inauguration in 2007.

 Image: Chris Pizzello / AP Photo
The couple received the Family Visionary Award by Habitat for Humanity on Oct. 1, 2008.

Image: Pablo Martinez Monsivais / AP Photo
In Washington, the couple attended a dinner hosted by President Obama in Feb. 2009. Only a year earlier, Shriver famously endorsed Obama while Schwarzenegger endorsed McCain.

 Image: Cliff Owen, Pool / AP Photo
The couple sat stone-faced next to Shriver’s brother, Timothy Shriver, at the funeral Mass for their father, R. Sargent Shriver, on Jan. 22, 2011.

Image: Chelsea Lauren / FilmMagic / Getty Images
Schwarzenegger and Shriver had to start their lives over after he left office in 2011. They pose here post-State House, at the Hoop Heroes Salute launch party on Feb. 18, 2011.

 

By Everette Hatcher III | Comments (0)

Arnold Schwarzenegger’s affair

May 17, 2011 – 6:38 am

 Arnold Schwarzenegger Fathered Child with Household Staffer

(5/17/2011) Arnold Schwarzenegger releases statement about fathering a child with a longtime member of his household staff. | http://WNNfans.com | http://twitter.com/abcWNN

Arnold Schwarzenegger

Arnold Schwarzenegger

Arnold Schwarzenegger speaks at the Israel 63rd Independence Day Celebration hosted by the Consulate General of Israel in Los Angeles, Tuesday, May 10, 2011. Schwarzenegger was honored at the event.

______________________

I am personally sad about this turn of events. I know that Arnold and Maria both love their family, and I truly hope they can resolve this and put their family back together again. It is true that Christ did allow for divorce in the case of adultery. Matthew 19:8-9: Jesus said, “Moses provided for divorce as a concession to your hard heartedness, but it is not part of God’s original plan. I’m holding you to the original plan, and holding you liable for adultery if you divorce your faithful wife and then marry someone else. I make an exception in cases where the spouse has committed adultery.”

 However, since Christ is willing to forgive those who repent, shouldn’t we be willing to forgive our spouse?

___________________________________

The Associated Press reported this morning:

Former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has acknowledged that he fathered a child with a member of his household staff, a revelation that apparently prompted wife Maria Shriver to leave the couple’s home before they announced their separation last week.

Schwarzenegger and Shriver jointly announced May 9 that they were splitting up after 25 years of marriage. Yet, Shriver moved out of the family’s Brentwood mansion earlier in the year after Schwarzenegger acknowledged the child is his, The Los Angeles Times reported Tuesday.

“After leaving the governor’s office I told my wife about this event, which occurred over a decade ago,” Schwarzenegger told the Times in a statement that also was sent to The Associated Press early Tuesday. “I understand and deserve the feelings of anger and disappointment among my friends and family. There are no excuses and I take full responsibility for the hurt I have caused. I have apologized to Maria, my children and my family. I am truly sorry.

“I ask that the media respect my wife and children through this extremely difficult time,” the statement concluded. “While I deserve your attention and criticism, my family does not.”

Schwarzenegger’s representatives did not comment further. A spokesman for the former first lady told the Times she had no comment.

The Times did not publish the former staffer’s name nor that of her child but said the woman worked for the family for 20 years and retired in January.

In an interview Monday before Schwarzenegger issued his statement, the former staffer said another man — her husband at the time — was the child’s father. When the Times later informed the woman of the governor’s statement, she declined to comment further.

The child was born before Schwarzenegger began his seven-year stint in public office.

Shriver stood by her husband during his 2003 gubernatorial campaign after the Los Angeles Times reported accusations that he had a history of groping women. Schwarzenegger later said he “behaved badly sometimes.”

In his first public comments since the couple announced their breakup, Schwarzenegger said last week that he and Shriver “both love each other very much.”

“We are very fortunate that we have four extraordinary children and we’re taking one day at a time,” he said at a Los Angeles event marking Israeli independence. Their children range in age from 13 to 21.

Since his term as California governor ended in early January, Schwarzenegger, 63, has hopscotched around the world, his wife nowhere in sight. While the “Terminator” star appeared confident about the future since exiting politics, cutting movie deals and fashioning himself as a global spokesman for green energy, Shriver, known for her confidence, seemed unsettled.

Shriver, 55, maintained her own identity when her husband entered politics, though she gave up her job at NBC. Their union was often tested in Sacramento, where the former action star contended with a rough seven years of legislative gridlock, a budget crisis and lingering questions about his fidelity.

____________________________

I have written many times about Arnold Schwarzenegger before. Here are just a few of the times:

1. President Reagan having a photo taken with Arnold Schwarzenegger at the Republican National Convention in Dallas, Texas. 8/23/84.

2.Here is a video clip of Arnold Schwarzenegger using an Airlight
Broom as a prop for “cleaning house” in the California Recall
Election as seen on CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, ect in 2003. The
Airlight Broom is manufactured by Little Rock Broom Works.

3. I heard John Fund of the Wall Street Journal speak in Little Rock on April 27, 2011 and in his speech he mentioned the struggle that Arnold Schwarzenegger had with the envirnomentalists in California. I took time to repeat a lot of the facts about that in my blog post that day.

4. At that same luncheon on April 27th that I mentioned earlier, one subject that John Fund brought up was the red tape that Arnold Schwarzenegger had to deal with in California. I wrote about that too.

5. St. James Palace has confirmed  that Kate Middleton and Prince William – or, more officially, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge – will be visiting California from July 8-10 this summer. Former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is expected to greet the Royals as they touch down.

6. Which is better for setting up a business: California or Texas? Arnold Schwarzenegger is mentioned in this post too.

7. Arnold Schwarzenegger is fond of quoting Milton Friedman but he rejected fiscal conservative idea to cut spending.

8. Pictures of Arnold Schwarzenegger and Maria Shriver through the years. Video clip of them at Ronald Reagan’s funeral.

9. I wrote a post on American Exceptionalism and put in a video clip of Arnold Schwarzenegger doing the introduction to an episode of “Free to Choose.”

10. Will Maria Shriver’s marriage survive Arnold Schwarzenegger’s admission of  infidelity? I hope so (Part 1).

Photos and Pictures - Arnold Schwarzenegger and Maria Shriver with family at a day with

 
Photo of Arnold Schwarzenegger, Maria Shriver and their family at the Los Angeles Premiere of “The Benchwarmers,” presented by Columbia Pictures.

Arnold Schwarzenegger, Maria Shriver and their family photoArnold Schwarzenegger, Maria Shriver and their family

Weekend to Remember – No Greater Love

Family Life’s “Weekend to Remember” Marriage Conference. This video contains clips from the “No Greater Love” movie.

By Everette Hatcher III | Also posted in Milton Friedman | Comments (0)