 If the members would take their seats, the president will be with us in a minute. I think Bob Lagomarsino told you that we would like, we'll call on two people at a time, so there will always be someone at the other microphone to ask his or her. Ladies and gentlemen, it's my high honor and great privilege to present to you the greatest president of our lifetime, President Ronald Reagan. Thank you all very much. Thank you Jack, Bob, Tranton, all of you here. First let me begin by noting that today is the first anniversary of Claudine Schneider's 39th birthday. No, you're not supposed to reveal anything like that, but having had some 37 of them myself, I thought we should recognize it. Happy birthday. Well, you and I usually meet in formal settings, but today we'll try to get beyond those barriers. There's a story that I'm sure most of you know, and I know that some, any of you my age know, and that's a World War II story about Chester Nimitz, the admiral, and General Douglas MacArthur in a small boat and rough waves, and the boat tipped over, and as they were struggling there to save themselves, Nimitz said to MacArthur, he said, I hope when we get out of this, if we do that you won't tell my men that I can't swim. Doug said, I won't tell your men you can't swim, but you won't tell mine I can't walk on water. But seriously, I do appreciate this opportunity to be with you. I know you'll be off to New York shortly to visit the site of the first Congress of the United States, which held its opening session in March of 1789. And believe me, being here with you, I feel some of that same camaraderie, that pride that Washington must have felt when he met with his officer corps, soldiers who had fought the revolution, and many of whom later went on to serve in that first Congress. What would have our country have been like without the leadership, the good sense, and the commitment of those individuals? It may be a little consolation, but I can't help but think that future generations are going to look at us in the same way, that this has been and continues to be a pivotal time for the United States. We've accomplished much in these last six years, and yet the challenges that remain are quite substantial. Most patriots of 200 years ago laid the foundation for generations of freedom, and our job is to focus on what needs to be done now to make certain that America in the next century is the prosperous and free land that we wanted to be. I know how hard it is to keep the long term in mind when you're on your way to mark up answering the phone and generally up to your elbows in alligators, but that's why we're here today, laying the foundation for the 21st century. John Adams perhaps had us in mind when he said to future generations, posterity, you will never know how much it cost the present generation to preserve your freedom. I hope you will make good use of it. If you do not, I shall repent it in heaven that I ever took half the pains to preserve it. Well I've had days like that myself, and on the other hand John Adams never had to face Sam Donaldson. But those men who met in that first Congress didn't let us down, and we're not going to let down those Americans who follow us. The first step won't surprise you, it's making certain that future Americans are not stuck with paying our bills. That means sticking to the Graham-Rudman Hollings commitment, and I've seen we've all got them on. The number for this year is 108, and the motto is no fudging. Lada and his colleagues on the Budget Committee have demonstrated an impressive resolve in this regard. We shouldn't let the Democrats off the hook. They should bring a budget blueprint to the markup table so the Democrats and Republicans alike can get legitimate budget writing underway. I just had the pleasure in the other room before we came in here of telling Sam Donaldson that that's what they should do. He had a few questions about that. I don't know how he got off of Iran, but he did. Well, every skirmish is part of the bigger battle, and I think it's becoming clear that holding the line isn't enough. Institutional long-term solutions are needed. To start with, could I mention here, the President's right to a meaningful veto must be restored. I'm talking about a line I don't think. I think the erosion of the presidential veto has weakened the safeguards and the system with its huge continuing resolutions. That's no longer working. It ain't a pretty sight. The porkers are loose, headed for the public trough and the take-home pay of every working person in America is in jeopardy. And with regard to that, I've often said, yes, you get buffeted about when you get between a hog and a bucket, but it has to be done. It's up to us to alert the public to the danger and to offer a way out. The greatest protection we can offer our citizens. President in future is a line item veto for the President of the United States. 43 governors have it, and I don't know why they should be ahead of the President. And consistent with this, and perhaps as part of the same vehicle, we need a constitutional amendment requiring Congress to balance the budget. If the big budget or big spenders on the hill continue to block progress, it's time for us to take our case to the people. Last Monday, I took a big step in that direction. I wrote a letter to the minority leader of the Montana State Senate, reminding him that if Montana would act on calling for a constitutional convention, this could spur the Congress to act on the balanced budget amendment. And we'll continue trying to look for ways to mobilize the public behind such an amendment. I'm told the other party has three creative ideas of that their own that they claim will bring down deficit spending. Three of them are tax, tax and tax. You and I know it won't affect the red ink because the liberals will then spend, spend and spend. And if that happens, the economy will go down, down and down. Just like it did the last time, they control both houses of the Congress. Well, my answer to the tax hikers and I hope I can count on you to back me up is three. No, no, no. We're not going to knock the legs out from under economic growth by draining resources from the private sector into the federal bureaucracy. No, we're not going to break faith with the American people. We'll pose high taxes and voted for us for that reason. And no, we will not thrash the historic 1986 overhaul out of the tax system, out of being. Last year, we went on the offensive to get the special interests out of the tax code. And now it's time to get them out of the budget. We can be proud that together we turned around the American economy. Liberal economists still can't believe it. But you know, economists, they're the only ones who see something working in practice and wonder if it would work in theory. President Calvin Coolidge, although he was known as Silent Cal, he had a lot to say. He observed that we must strive for thrift not only because it brings prosperity, but because it builds character in the people. This notion may have been scoffed at before the results of the great society came pouring in, but today it's clear that our country disregarded certain fundamental values at its peril. Today, we see individuals with the great social programs of the 60s and 70s were supposed to have helped, dispirited and immobilized by a total loss of self-worth and living in wretched conditions with little hope for anything else. Government policy, well-intentioned or not, has ended up depriving our most needy citizens of the strength of a family and the self-esteem of earning a living. In the months ahead, we Republicans should be in the forefront of a fight to reform from top to bottom the system that created and perpetrates this tragedy. A consensus, I think, is emerging about what should be done and whatever the final wording, let us pledge that we'll be aggressive and that the watchwords for welfare reform will be work and family. Benjamin Franklin, who played such a role in launching our republic, once wrote, I think the best way of doing good to the poor is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it. Well, it's taken a few years, but I think America's rediscovering some of the truth that Franklin was talking about. He also quoted, if you will not hear reason, she'll surely wrap your knuckles. They question my memory. I remember the day when old Ben told me that. Our forefathers, those who occupied that hall in New York that you will visit, were as brave as they were innovative and farsighted, and we can afford to be no less. We've already come a long way in these last six years. Together we've rebuilt our military power, which was permitted to seriously erode during the last decade. We've strengthened our alliances, and together we've launched a research program that could well usher our country and all a mankind in a safer time, an era when peace would depend on technology of defense and protection rather than weapons with which we threaten retaliation and mass destruction. We've mobilized some of this country's brightest minds for our Strategic Defense Initiative, and I'm gratified at the progress that's been made. There are those who oppose on principle any steps the United States might take that could have strategic implications. They may believe it's safer to stand still, but they're wrong, dead wrong. Sir Francis Bacon wrote long ago, He that will not apply new remedies must expect new evils, for time is the greatest innovator. Today we have no insurance against the accidental launch of a nuclear armed missile, or the possibility that such a missile could be obtained and launched by a fanatic or an unstable third world dictator. It's a bit difficult to understand those who would ignore this potential danger. If they think that by being nice guys the tread will go away, they don't need to take a cruise to Fantasy Island, they've already arrived. We believe that SDI, even if not a hundred percent effective, will offer a very high degree of protection. The more protection, the better. The question we must ask is what's wrong with a system that saves lives, a system of deterrence based increasingly on defense, which threatens no one rather than offense. Furthermore, SDI is a major stimulus to nuclear arms reduction. The less effective a ballistic missile, the more negotiable it becomes. With SDI on the scene, cheating becomes less likely, or threatening, making arms reduction agreements more likely. In short, SDI is totally consistent with the goals, the values, and the inspirations of the American people and our fellow democracies. We aren't going to see it grounded by a lack of courage to face the future, or a lack of vision in smoke filled rooms someplace here in Washington. While we're on the subject of arms reduction, let me just thank all of you for hanging tough these last few years. In Reykjavik we made a step forward, and then just a few weeks ago I believe a turning point was reached. The Soviets may have finally cotton the message. Their removal of a major obstacle, which has prevented deep reductions of U.S. and Soviet intermediate-range missiles following the principle of the zero option formula that we proposed six years ago, could well open the way to an historic agreement. I understand the caution on the part of many toward agreements with the Soviet Union, but let me assure you, as in all our dealings with them, realism has been and remains our guiding principle. I'm not a linguist, but I used a few words of Russian on the general secretary in our last meeting, and he did smile. He changed the subject, but I said dover I, no probity I. Trust, but verify. Now trying to prove our sincerity, trying to prove our sincerity by making unilateral concessions or accepting unequal agreements, which seems to be the strategy of some members of our domestic opposition, is not the path to a safer world. If we can achieve an actual reduction in the number of nuclear weapons with our steadfast approach, history will record who the real champions of a more peaceful world really were, and it won't be the accommodationists. The bottom line remains that peace through strength is not a slogan, it's the only way to achieve a lasting peace. Finally I'd like to thank each of you, especially your leader Bob Michael, for standing firm for freedom in Central America during one of the more frustrated times of this or any administration. In the last four months we've endured an unrelenting barrage, and after months of a steady drumbeat by the opposition, a change of 18 votes in the House would have won the day for our stand against an ill-conceived moratorium plan that would pull the plug on those brave freedom fighters, and I call that kind of a moral victory. What we're facing is a strategic move by the Soviet Union. They're not pouring over a billion dollars of military aid into Nicaragua to secure their supply of fresh bananas. Liberals on the hill here may be able to keep the United States out of Central America, our own front yard, but their moaning and groaning certainly isn't going to keep the Soviets out. If the communists ever got a hold of some of those fellows, they'd do more than straighten their tie. The Kremlin will continue its adventurism, and the Sandinistas will continue to communize Nicaragua and apply pressure on its neighbors unless we make it clear that the cost will be too high. We can do that today without spilling the blood of our young servicemen just by helping the freedom fighters. The price of peace in this hemisphere and a secure southern border will be higher and much more heart-rending if we falter in the months ahead. As the current controversy fades, and it will, we must make certain the American people understand what the stakes are in Central America and see that the basic issues haven't changed since last year. We'll get those 18 votes. We'll win more than a moral victory and give democracy in the next generation of Americans a chance. We don't want to pass this problem on. Communists have a way of twisting words. They call their governments people's democracies. You know the difference between a democracy and a people's democracy? It's the same difference between a jacket and a straight jacket. On helping the freedom fighters, you've made all the difference, the fight you made in the House made possible on our Senate victory. But I couldn't conclude here without mentioning that I'll need your help again on an issue I noted at the start of this talk, protecting the family budget, not the federal budget. The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and The Washington Post all have found something very wrong with the current highway bill. And I say that if those three newspapers can agree, so can we. In fact, I just happened to remember a letter that Bob Dornan wrote me a while back signed by 150 of you in which you pledged to help me when I veto spending bills. Well today I'm going to take you up on it. Now those of you who care about 65 miles an hour believe me, so do I. So first help me sustain this veto and then let's clean up this bill and get it back to me in a week and I'll sign it within hours. I'm not totally against that, I'm just against that version of it and I think there's a better version that we can find and it won't break the bank. Now let's take a quick look at the agenda but as Newt Kingrich is already always reminding me we're a party of ideas. So I'd welcome your thoughts on all of this and Jack I understand that that's the end of the monologue and we're going to have a dialogue. Thank you Mr. President. We'll do our best to get as many questions in as possible. May I have the pleasure of just for the moment before the president answers questions of introducing a longtime friend of ours, a real champion of the Reagan agenda is Chief of Staff Senator Howard Baker. First question, Tom DeLay. Second question, Steve Gunnerson, then Joe DeGuardi. Mr. President, I'm Tom DeLay from Texas. I support your veto even though I have a project in that bill and we'll work to help you sustain that veto but I'd also like for you in your veto message to think about the things that we could not do in that highway bill that would have saved money like Davis Bacon and Section 13c and your staff could inform you about that but I'm actually here to talk about what I think is your upcoming trip to the nation and talking about excellence and I'm here to talk about competitiveness, not trade although that's a part of it but competitiveness given back to America. One of the problems that we have with competitiveness in America today is is governed the government policies of the last 20 or 30 years and I would hope Mr. President when you go out and talk about competitiveness we grab back the political rhetoric that UAW is doing and and their ads on television the protectionists are trying to do and the Democrats have grabbed away from us we're losing that battle we need to tell the American people because of spending tax policy environmental policy regulatory policy safety policy we are lowering their standard of living and we are lowering their opportunities to have jobs and I would hope Mr. President that you would talk to him in that vein and grab back the issue. Well I have and and I will in the future very much in our meetings at the economic summit I think you'd be all be interested to know that the first time after we began to show the recovery and our economic plan was in place here I walked in and it was an unusual greeting that I got and those eyes up to then I was the new kid in school and all of a sudden they just in unison asked me to explain the American miracle to them and I did my best to explain it but you're right I think that that they competitiveness is going to also be part of them following in what we've done and yet even though that may make them better in their economies it'll be better for us because they will be better able to afford the things that we make and so forth their standards will go up and approach ours and we're going to we're going to continue trying to do that. Thank you. Steve Gunderson. Mr. President, Congress and Steve Gunderson from Wisconsin many of us in here represent rural parts of this country and through the help of yourself our leadership and the campaign committee we can tell you unlike the Senate that not one rural Republican who ran for reelection in 86 was defeated but I'm here today on behalf of many of us I think who are asking for your help as we look to the future to understand there is a transition going on in rural America and when we talk about competition competitiveness and we recognize that transition very frankly we are asking for the leadership of you as the president and the White House in providing some real initiatives in terms of economic development in rural America most of our initiatives that Tom Coleman, Ed Madigan and Bob Smith and others have developed actually don't even cost money it's just changing formulas to get rural America a fair shake and I'm here to ask for your help in that regard. I think all of us need each other's help in this in coming up with a program that will get agriculture back out there in the marketplace instead of where it has been for so many years the and I've asked for a complete study of how we can do this and not with by pulling the rug out from under with agriculture for so long has now been a well they're farming government more than they're farming the land but we have now a worldwide situation of the world producing more in agriculture than the world can consume and yet we've got a program that is encouraged increasingly that very overproduction but one of the greatest I could go on here about the fallacies in our present program but when I tell you that the overwhelming majority of the money $26 billion last year went to farmers who had an average income of around $200,000 a year and assets of about $900,000 now that's not exactly a program that is to help the family farm out of some temporary hard times but we do need to review this entire program and that's what we're doing to try and come up with a proposal that will rely on the marketplace and then at the same time if there are people that are going to have to turn in other directions we should stand by ready to help them with training and everything that would be needed to set them on a different course I have 19 names on my list not trying to turn anybody off but for the convenience of our colleagues please make your question as brief as possible so that we can get as many questions in Joe DiGuardi, Pat Swindall, Joe DiGuardi, New York thank you Mr. President I think we all realize that there's a serious lack of financial accountability here in Washington the public is not getting a good count you mentioned fudging you mentioned the budget process today we are still using the Mickey Mouse cash basis accounting system and budget system that we took New York City off of in 1975 as a price for the bailout today 37 states employ a capital budget yet the United States of America the world's largest financial enterprise does not last September you and your chief of staff then said that high on your priority list and the agenda would be budget reform and a capital budget have you changed that view no we're trying for a budget reform because I think you all would have to agree with me the budgeting process here at the national level compared to that of most of the states in the union is just Mickey Mouse and I don't think a state would put up with it now we have a capital budget in California when I was governor but I do have to tell you one phase of it that that is that for any of the bond issues and that capital side the people had to vote on them and the people determined whether they wanted what was being offered enough to vote on it and actually it took more than a 50 plus one vote to achieve that bond issue but that has to be looked at and we have a system right now in which by bookkeeping tricks with some of the trust funds that can't be used for anything else but a specific purpose the deficit is really worse than it appears and it's time we quit kidding ourselves and the people and got right down to what are we spending and what are we taking in the various measures that are over budget one example many examples come to mind one in specific I was the 500 million dollar homeless bill that this congress passed is one of its first acts certainly that should have been vetoed in my judgment and so my question to you is may we have that commitment and secondly why have we not had that consistency in the past well I'm going to try to do that I know that there are sometimes bills that you you wobble about on as to whether you sign them or not but I also I also have to say that I have been prevented from vetoing a lot of things that would have been vetoed because of the practice of the continuing resolution where the only thing you can do is shut the government down and veto the whole thing and again I say give me a crack at vetoing the things in there that should be vetoed the line item veto if you don't like the veto you can override it and I can only tell you that as a governor in eight years I line item to 943 items and was never overridden once thank you uh Fred Grandi Frank Wolf Fred Grandi of Iowa yes thank you mr president right I wanted to know if you could give the conference some idea of what your administration expects to see from the contra movement in Central America between now when they receive the 40 million and next fall when the administration will probably ask this congress for more money is there a blueprint for progress that you see and does it involve perhaps the orias proposal Costa Rica's initiating well we've been greatly encouraged by just what has been taking place although you don't see much about that there's a quite a disinformation network by the Sandinista government and it does manage to get its story and its side in much of the American media you don't see the victories in the other side but the contras who there was a time when they really were just kind of scattered hit and running but they now apparently have a plan that is based on true guerrilla tactics but aimed at specific targets and targets of strategic and economic importance to the Sandinistas and they have been quite successful recently as I say you don't hear about them but knocking out power combines bridges and things of this kind which they hadn't been doing before you've got to remember that in the military a guerrilla fight guerrilla fighters you have to have at least a 10 to 1 superiority in numbers in the regular military to to successfully curb them so the number we shouldn't overlook that fact we've got about 12,000 of them already across the border in there but they are better trained and now have a better strategic program and I expect to see that continuing and rolling on and it's the only pressure I believe that along with the rest of us and their neighbors is going to have any chance of bringing anything of a nonviolent solution. Mr. President the country of Romania has been persecuting the evangelical church they've been turning bibles into toilet paper they've been persecuting the catholic church I would ask two questions one would you direct the state department to come out and oppose most favorite nation status for the barbaric country of Romania their secret police are more repressive than a kgp the second question is this there's a law in the books now that prohibits the importation of goods made by slave labor in the soviet union into the united states syransky has identified many products that are made by slave labor in the russia that come into the united states would you urge your treasury department to enforce the law to prohibit the importation of goods like chess sets and wood carvings that come in from the soviet union that made by slave labor yes and we we have been talking about that and we'll continue to talk about it and on the other one romania we have a ticklish problem there many of the things you say about sosescu that the dictator there are absolutely true on the other hand the thing that we've sort of wanted to encourage a little bit is the fact that he is the only head of one of the satellite states there that is going his own way and kind of thumbing his nose at the soviet union and getting away with it and we'd like to hope that maybe we could persuade him to improve his domestic policies at the same time that he continues showing that example to the other satellite states of being able to stand up to the soviets which he is doing march uh rakama uh larry craig marches from new jersey larry's from Idaho mr president i want to congratulate you for your statement on the welfare reform and i hope you pursue that vigorously i know you will uh i don't exactly have a question but i have little opportunity to get messages to you so i want to i want to uh get a message to you which i have repeated before both to you and the and the new york times and that is on the subject of medicare reform i appreciate what you've done in supporting dr bowen's proposal but i must suggest that based on the temper of the of my district as i see it this subject of medicare and the cost of long-term care which is really part two is a growing political issue and i would hope that under your leadership that the republican party can get ahead of that issue before the 1988 campaign i think it will become an issue that will dwarf the flap over social security colas and will be a live political tinderbox of an issue in 88 if you have any comments yes march let me tell you that we are we were faced with a dilemma and we argued both ways about what we were going to do with this this plan of catastrophic illness and so for and some wanted to wait until we could have a complete plan and then move we thought that at least to get that chunk of catastrophic protection for all of our over 65 people was worth moving but at the same time we are continuing to study and and to work with private insurance companies to find out how we can meet these other problems and you know joe six pack out there in his family he's got a a threat of catastrophic illness or injury too and uh we want to find a way to help them but we are working to see what we can do on the whole package thank you very much mr president larry craig of idaho let me thank you very much for your letter to the legislators in montana last week it was well received and greatly appreciated bob smith of oregon and i charlie stenholms of texas and tom carper will this week introduce a bipartisan balanced budget amendment to the constitution last year we had 230 cosponsors we think we will have as many or more this year it is critical for you to continue your open and public support of this issue as we fight the graham rudman battle and the budget battle because we think it will lend credibility as the other side attempts to destroy the process and we really appreciate your effort thank you very much believe me and then we will lean on the senate we've come close once before and uh my my letter to montana was the hope that it would help uh raise the temperature with regard to that whole measure here because i would certainly prefer us doing it here than absolutely the constitutional convention route called by the states thank you manuel lujan and um dan coach okay dan coach thank you al mccannellis dan coach mr president dan coach from indiana i am a strong supporter of contra aid and i think we uh face a grave danger of renewing that aid by voting the house and senate for next year's funding if some things aren't done in the next few months i would just suggest we look at two things one a some from a public relations standpoint if nothing else proposal of conditions under which the united states would negotiate with a dead firm deadline set for the sandanistas either to comply or not comply before the vote so that we can go home and say we tried that we've set these conditions they rejected them secondly somehow utilizing the very effective talents of president duarte to come up here and explain again what he's doing in his country what the threat is to his country we have a success there democratization of that country he is very effective and perhaps you can work with him and bringing him here explaining the story so that we have something to talk about in that next vote well that's a that's a very good idea and a thing to think about but again there's thing that i said about the inability to get our story across some time ago there were three uh people in nicaragua up here one of them was an evangelist a black preacher who called attention to the fact that he doesn't have any ears anymore they were cut off while he was in jail in nicaragua he was only arrested for preaching that's all he hadn't done anything else the other two had been former members of the sandanista government and couldn't stand it and walked away over the state department they brought a cache of of weapons that they had uncovered and so forth to show what was going on down there and they all spoke and told of their experiences and this minister speaking telling of his and i was there and afterwards to say a few words of thanks to them the entire audience was the washington press corps and then that night i turned on the news waiting to see well they showed me saying a few words of thanks and so forth to three fellows sitting on the stand the people never got to hear one word of what those three men had to tell so if you weren't in the room nobody else in the country knew the horrible stories they had to tell we've got to do better about that i called a catholic bishop who came back to iowa he was hailed in the press as having led some refugees out of nicaragua across the honduran border but before they got to the border they were attacked by the countries i called him when he got back to iowa told him who who i wasn't what i wanted to know and said i'd read this story well he said that's entirely wrong he said yes i was leading them out we were attacked by the sand anistas and the contras rescued us but that story's never appeared publicly al mccannis helen betley mr president uh i'd like to talk to you about the highway bill in my four plus years here i think i voted for one appropriation bill in continuing resolution in keeping with the california spirit you will this bill is uh 86.3 billion dollars of which 2.1 billion comes from general revenue the balance comes from the highway trust fund which is a user's fund the problem that has been explained to me and there seems to be a difference of opinion on this between those in the transportation field and those in the department of transportation but the highway trust fund would be drawn down too rapidly and that if the project of five years the bill of five years would continue to be funded that they would be back for general revenue funding because the trust fund would be exhausted i have a vested interest in this because in my part of california we have over 300 miles of interstate highways and i will confess to you that i have one project pilot project due to the fact that we had 1200 accidents of 60 plus deaths on this one highway in in three years according to caltrans but the important part here is i would ask you to revisit this based upon the fact that it is highway trust fund money a user fee we want to revisit it as i say we want a better bill than this one but and let me just tell you that some of you have got particular problems in your own uh district about this bill i shouldn't be talking my hometown of los angeles one of the things i've got against the certain features of the bill that don't belong in there i think allowed them to do with transit los angeles would get 14 percent of the total amount of the money for its proposed subway and i don't think los angeles needs the people of vermont and new hampshire and so forth to help get their workers on time mr president we have become a debtor nation the we have the biggest debt of all the industrialized countries today and of course that's because of our deficit spending why don't we or have we at any point insisted that the nato countries and for eastern countries pay for the cost of our troops overseas because this is a big part of over a hundred billion dollars of our spending well i think one of our problems with say the nato allies and some of these other places is that they just uh there would be lost without us that and at the same time we have to recognize in return that what would be the situation of the united states if europe fell if we didn't have a nato and europe was overrun uh the only thing is that we get an advantage when we whittle back on the foreign aid military aid that that kind of aid to other countries uh we it's very costly to us for example a country like turkey it only costs a few thousand dollars a year for them to provide a military man and provide the security there in their area that otherwise we would feel maybe in our strategic plan we would have to provide it would be 10 times as much for us to have to provide military there so the more that we can encourage them to do this by us providing some financial aid to help them do it the more money we save by not being forced to position american troops in all those places it's breaking us be writer nebraska mr president some of us are concerned that the administration perhaps yourself have proposed to go to zero for intermediate range nuclear missiles in western europe and that the commitment of the western european nations for conventional forces to meet the soviet threat has not been demonstrated perhaps could not be demonstrated uh and this made a couple uh the united states from western european defense it could hurt western european chances of survival and hurt the united states as well what can you say to us that might reassure us that in fact we do not intend to go down to zero for this kind of nuclear missile well ultimately i would hope that we would go down to zero for all kinds of nuclear weapons i think there is something immoral in the whole world a world that a few only a few years ago had all kinds of combat rules about protecting civilians in the innocent and not making war on the non-combatants and now we suddenly turn to the place where we place our security as dependent on a weapon whose principal target would be the non-combatants and the wiping out of cities in the and the population and i would like to see it done away with ultimately but not in the sense as i say doing as i said in my remarks doing anything unilaterally and i would like to point out that yes the european countries and the balance between us and the soviet union all of us conventional weapons is very much on the other way but i don't like ever talking in advance about negotiating principles but i know enough to know that mr gorbachev has a very real and great economic problem and that economic problem has been magnified by their continued buildup and i don't have in mind eliminating all of those weapons in europe and then leaving them with that conventional superiority and i know it would be very costly for us to overcome them but it's also very costly for them and they know that the combined european countries in the united states if we were forced to it can do it to a far better extent than they can so what is at stake here is if we can go forward with the reducing of those weapons at the same time that we say to them to the soviet union you can have your choice you can join us in reducing down to equality in conventional weapons or you can engage us in an arms race you can't win now make your choice and i think with their economic situation this is what i think is a bargaining point on our side but no we would never let them remain with that great advantage bob doran j roads newt gingrich mr president we painted this room for you six years ago and i'm glad to see you here your ultra-experienced excellent chief of staff said that we should do this once a month and i think we should mr president i have in my hand the letter which you addressed in the body of your remarks i'm not going to release it to the press suffice it to say every one of our leaders up there but one is on this letter making you veto proof you call it the shotgun behind the door i took a head count two of the people on this letter are already in heaven mr brian and mr grotberg and 18 others have gone back to the private sector they're all doing very well that leaves you a shortfall because we had three over the third we needed shortfall of 17 there are 23 freshmen it's up to you sir to work those 23 freshmen now you mentioned los angeles orange county has everything in the bill that we asked for including a million dollar project around anaheim stadium for my district this is going to hurt me i'm getting very good press right now we had a two hour discussion with my staff last night mr president i will and it hurts a lot support your veto and i hope there are more to come let's put a task force together to pair the transportation bill back to what you think is acceptable under a responsible budget god bless you i'm with you i'll take you and thank you mr president i'm j road from arizona i want to thank you for being here with us this morning this has been fascinating mr president i know that you know how it's vitally important it is to the united states that we have a strong and economically sound state of mexico unfortunately mr president outside of of our border states is very difficult for us to get that message across i think it's extremely important that the people in this room and the people of this country begin to understand just exactly what's at stake for us in mexico and i would plead with you to to help lead us in that direction i'm asking you please help us tell the story about mexico believe me from the very first day i was ever here or even when i was just a president elect i established a relationship with the then president and now with this new one we're on a first name basis and i have believed that that border is one of the canadian border these should become meeting places not lines of division between us and if we and then as you know first year i was here i made a trip to latin america i just have to believe that in the past we fumbled the ball too many times we've gone with the best of intentions with some