 any time when you want to start, sir. Go ahead. Okay. Mr. President, thank you for this interview. In view of what Mr. Gorbachev said to Senator Kennedy, as it's been reported, what do you think the prospects are this year for an agreement with the Soviets on an intermediate-range missile agreement? Well, I'm very hopeful that we can come to some agreement. This idea of separating out the intermediate-range weapons is, we think, a hopeful sign, and now he has not made the SDI in a condition with regard to that. There are some other things in that that are going to cause us to negotiate that we hope can be eliminated. He's kind of made the French and the English an element, and we don't think that we're in a position to negotiate for somebody else. And also the problem of the same kind of intermediate-range weapons being stationed east of the Urals is targeted on Asian targets. And these are the points that have to be worked out, but I'm just optimistic that since we've opened that subject and have made some progress on it that we can achieve that. Is the United States going to submit a counter-proposal that will deal with the British and French and the Asian question? Well, as a matter of fact, we have already, I think, made some proposals to them and haven't had a response yet. The suggestion of that story was that Gorbachev seemed to be saying that he didn't want to have a summit this year unless there was a prospect for a tangible agreement. What's your assessment of that? Is he trying to get out of the summit some way? I can't believe that about him. He was so willing for it, and even then he made the proposal that we have one in 87 in his country, which we agreed to. No, I have to believe that he's expressing a hope, and we are too. I would hope that we could make some progress without waiting for the next summit. Are you still holding for a June or July date? Well, we hope that it can be one of those dates, the earlier date, because of our election. It's going to be, I think, not too easy for us if we get closer to and get into the campaigning season, and so forth, and they're trying to have a summit. They've made one suggestion of a later date, but they haven't pursued it at all, and we've told them why we didn't feel we could do that. Were you surprised that the Soviets had sort of been holding SDI ransom for this kind of agreement, that he seems to have dropped that idea on intermediate range basis? Well, whether he dropped it or whether he never intended to be there, because if you remember the language that they agreed to in the agreement was something about seeking an interim agreement while we go forward with the other interim agreement on the intermediate range. So maybe he's just now confirming that he meant this all the time, but it is progress in our eyes. On the subject of Central America, can the Democratic resistance in Nicaragua survive without military aid, in your view, from the government? I don't see how they could go on permanently without having some aid, particularly in the face of the extensive aid that they're getting from the Soviet Union and Cuba regarding advanced weapons systems and so forth. They've got to be able to protect themselves. Some of your own allies in Congress say that it would be better to take the military aid question up or down rather than just let the freedom fighters wither on the vine with just non-lethal aid. Do you share that view, and are you going to go all out in this... I'm going to go all out to try and get them the kind of aid that they must have. Most of the stories that I have read and estimates I've seen would indicate that it's going to take a very long time for the Democratic resistance there to have any impact. Is this something that we should be starting on now which could be like a 20 years fight down there? I don't think it has to at all. I think, and this is what the Contadora process is aiming at, is what we suggested a year ago, just about a year ago now. And that is that the Sandinista government and their former allies who are now the Contras who fought the revolution against Samosa, that they come together with the church acting as a mediator, they have an armistice and come together and negotiate out how they can arrive at a consensus government that will be what they actually fought the revolution for. Remember that they appealed to the organization of American states for help back when they were fighting against Samosa and they got the help they asked for which was a request for Samosa to step down so the killing could stop. He did. But in return for that, they had given a program to the OAS of what their goals were. And it was democracy. It was a pluralistic government and human rights taken care of and freedom of the press and speech and labor unions and so forth. The Sandinistas then seized the revolution and took it away from the others and they have turned it into the totalitarian state that it is. But I think that the Sandinistas also are being hard-pressed because this thing that has been going on has given them great economic problems and they are totally dependent on the communist bloc for their survival. Well, do you think that it's possible in the White House to get some kind of a negotiated settlement between the Sandinistas and the people in the audience? That's what we've always said we want. Mr. President, on Haiti, your spokesman, there's been some talk about what's happened down there. Do you have any ideas about how to better bring across a democratic transformation and do you plan to resume aid to Haiti that was withheld because of human rights violations? Well, this group that now there's council that has stepped in has made it plain that what they want to do is make it possible now to have a government. In other words, they don't view themselves as the government. They're an interim force and they want to now establish democracy and a government that represents the will of the people. And we're perfectly willing and ready to help in any way we can to bring that about. As I say, we're ready to work with them and do what we can to be of help. Does that include resuming the aid? Of what? Resuming the aid to them that was withheld. I haven't had a chance to talk to anyone about that. We're in the process of reviewing that. Let me see what the new government is. On the question of the Philippines, officials in your government have called for both sides in the Philippine government to work together now after the election. And you just said a few minutes ago in your response to a question that this validates the two-party system there, how do you want them to work together? Do you want them to form a coalition government? And what do you have in mind? Well, no, I would think we have the same thing in our home country. We have a strong two-party system here. And the people make their decision at the ballot box on which party or members of the party get elected or not. And I would foresee that now that there really is a two-party system obviously proven with millions of people going to the polls and voting on both sides, that this is the beginning of what could be the answer to their formal government. Doesn't that mean then that you would accept Marcos winning this or Kino winning? You're not talking about them joining a coalition government. No, I'm talking about whoever wins and the other party doesn't go out of existence. It waits for future elections. You called for free and fair elections. How does the United States respond to these reports of fraud from our observers? And can Marcos ever again make a claim to legitimacy after this? Well, I'm going to wait until I have a chance to talk to our observers who are over there. I haven't as yet. Whether there is enough evidence that you can really keep on pointing the finger or not, I don't know. I'm sure, you know, even elections in our own country, there are some evidences of fraud in places and areas. And I don't know the extent of this over there, but also, do we have any evidence that it's all been one-sided or has this been sort of the election tactics that have been followed there? But what we want is, once the Filipino people have made their decision and a government has been chosen, then we would like to have the same relationship, the historic relationship we've had with the people of the Philippines and with their government. If I could turn to domestic subjects, the budget. Your former budget director, David Stockman, said recently that the deficit wasn't only caused by big-spending liberal Democrats, but by Republicans as well, including yourself. You've been president for five years and under you the deficit is doubled. What's your response to Stockman's comment? Well, my memory doesn't track with his because every year that I've been here we have tried to get the elimination of some programs, reduction of others, putting together a programs. If we had gotten what we asked for in 1981 with regard to the domestic budget, the deficit would be $50 billion less than it is right now. So all of this talk that we did this, all those years back over the last half century when I was making speeches about deficit spending and all, the truth of the matter is deficit spending was a deliberate practice of the party in power. The party in power, which has been there for years with only here and there one or two terms out, was the Democratic Party. And beginning with the war on poverty, the middle 60s and on, this was where the runaway that we'd always talked about. I've always said that it couldn't, that an inflation. You couldn't let them go on without having them break the bounds and start running away. Now, if the escalation started in this 15 years between 1965 and 1980, and the escalation went to the budget going up to roughly five times what it was in 1965, but the deficit was 38 times what it was in 1965. And 1981, our first year here, we were on their budget, not ours. You come in several months into the fiscal year and you will find there again a big increase and it's going on that way. And the only answer is finally what we're trying to do is to have a plan, and this one is a five-year plan, to eliminate once and for all the deficit. With all due respect, sir, every year you've been in office. You proposed a plan, five-year plans. I recall the first one in your speech in Chicago in 1980 in September saying we'd get to zero. And we haven't. Why should people be any more confident we're going to get there now after five years in office when the situation's gotten worse? I know, you gentlemen have delighted in writing about that ever since, frequently. The truth of the matter is, long before the election, I had made public the fact that the plan would not work at the time that I said it would because of the rapid change here in the economic situation in Washington. The runaway inflation, the runaway interest rates, all of those things started. And suddenly the economists who had helped me and given me this plan said, no, it can't do it now. It's going to take longer than that, but we stuck to the same plan and now for 38 months we have had the greatest recovery that we've ever had in the last 50 years. And so I have to think that the plan wasn't at fault. Mr. President, during this period, Congress has repeatedly not done what you've asked in domestic spending and as a result we have this very big deficit. Why is there any reason to think that Congress is going to do something differently this time when for five years when you've been a popular president they haven't? Because they realize now that the explosion has occurred, that the deficit has been institutionalized. It is a part of the whole system of the way the government was set up as is explained by those figures of five times increase in the budget but 38 times increase in the deficit. Now, I think they are aware. There isn't anyone up there that is advocating deficit spending. They're all talking that the deficit must be curbed. The only argument now is which way and they would like to do it in two ways that I think are ducking their responsibility and that is to eliminate our defense build-up and the build-up wouldn't have been necessary if they'd been doing what they should have been doing in the years before we got here. Eliminating that and increasing taxes and they refuse to look at the fact that every time in modern history here that we have reduced the rates, government revenues and prosperity have increased and every time you raise the taxes you threaten another recession, the end of our recovery and these are the only main arguments they're giving us against our proposal for the budget. If I can take up on that, your own polls show on defense that a majority of Americans think that deficit spending is about where it should be. How do you plan to overcome public skepticism and some on Capitol Hill to win approval of this defense budget request at the same time you say that defense spending has brought the Soviets to the bargaining table? Because the people have been hearing a drumbeat, a constant drumbeat of propaganda about defense scandals and defense spending and that it is all wasted and so forth and there's only one way left to go direct to the people and tell them the truth. There wasn't any $600 toilet seat and all those cartoons that run every other week in the paper with Cap Weinberger in a toilet seat around his neck, that's the same price that TWA and Delta and United Pay. It is a molded cover for the entire toilet system and yes it does cost about that much. Now the same thing is true of the $400 hammer. We bought 82,000 hammers and they cost between $6.5 and $7.80 a piece but one invoice came in with one hammer buried in the invoice with a $435 price tag behind it and it was found immediately by a man in the Navy who brought the attention of his superiors and that was changed and we never paid $435 for a hammer but there's the third one, the $6,000 coffee maker. Again, that's the same thing that is in all the great commercial transports and we're having it made for our planes that would carry 365 surface men they might be up there for 10 hours in flight and it's an entire hot cooking system and actually we're getting it for a little bit less than the commercial airlines are paying. Even if those have been exaggerated do you think that Secretary Weinberger has done all that he could do to cut inefficiency at the Pentagon and you've got a commission that you appointed apparently you must think there's something more to be done than what CAP's done. No, for one thing one of the reasons that we appointed that commission was yes CAP has been busy and has known there are reorganizing things that have to be done and he's been working at that and made great progress you'd be amazed at ships that are coming in and planes and so forth ahead of schedule and under budget rather than having an hour car lay but we decided that in the face of this propaganda there was only one answer bring in an outside commission and let them look at the whole thing and then come back and tell us and tell publicly what they have found. I'm quite sure that they will come in with some recommendations of changes that could be made maybe organizationally but I'm also confident that they will help us in trying to make the people understand I'm sure that they will come in with an honest account of what has been accomplished. Now right now the budget we're asking for in defense or 87 that budget is below the projection that President Carter had made as to what the military budget would require in 1987 and we're below that level we have made over a five-year period the savings that we are making will result in 295 billion dollars less than the bill would be if the things hadn't been done that Secretary Weinberger has done already. Can I ask one political question and another topic that you might... Can we make this the last question? Can we do that? Recently your vice presidents come under fire even from some of your most ardent supporters for attacking Governor Cuomo the way he's did it. Do you think that George Bush is pressing too hard too early for the presidential nomination? No, I don't. I think that whatever he does is being viewed by many as all a part of that many of the things that he's done he's done every year for the last five years certain annual things where he has appeared and then suddenly for the first time he gets hailed and that this he's doing and how come he is going to speak to this group and so forth and as I say he's been speaking to him every year. You agree with what he said about Governor Cuomo? Well, I'm not going to comment on that and reopen a feud or not but I've been very satisfied with the conduct of the vice president. Thank you. I think he's been doing a fine job. If I could just add one follow-up to that are you pleased with the way the competition is going in your own party that succeeds you? Bush and Kemp going at it, Hammer and Tong like that? You see, that's what's wrong with having a 22nd amendment. Everybody automatically, the minute the 84 election is over everybody starts saying what are we going to do in 88 and focusing a spotlight on them. I think that it's almost forced on anyone if they're interested in that direction but I don't know what we can do to change it. We told Larry and your chief of staff we won't ask any more questions but if you want to come out for repeal the 22nd amendment and say you'd run again right now it would be one hell of a story. No president can ever come out with himself in mind. I think it's got to be held for whoever's going to be the next president but I do think this, that we ought to take a serious look and see if we haven't interfered with the democratic rights of the people. They can elect a senator for 40 years or a congressman, something of this kind for as long as they want to. Why don't they have the right to vote for whoever they want to vote for? Thank you, sir. All right. What? Your death can be done without a...