reagan's previous speeches because they agreed that there was consensus that reagan was his own best speech writer. so, i see-- now, as reagan assumed office this happened most when he became governor of california and became president and, you know, he said things with more nuance than he did as a private citizen. and, but to some extent that change happened when he was running for president. >> if i could add quickly, on that tony dolan even says in various places, interviews and so forth, that when people asked him how did you write so well for reagan, he said because i went and read reagan. >> if you ever -- you should look at the westminster address and look at the dolan draft and then look what reagan does to it. and there are places where reagan will mark out four

paragraphs and a partial sentence, he'll link it to another sentence eight or nine paragraphs later and doggone it, if it doesn't read better and cut out things that unnecessarily offended people for no reason and read some of the things he wrote and passages that i've mentioned, it's just magic. henry. >> one point-- (inaudible). . >> i thought i was following your argument in your book about reagan, henry. >> you say that he was committed -- i love the section about leverage. >> right. >> and his capability and -- i guess i'm-- with perspective. you said arms control and

abolition. and he was still realistic to understand after you got rid of weapons, nuclear weapons, you still have to face a world you have to respond. what would you use to deter into that picture comes this whole concept that he had in his head, but aren't you -- in other words, it seems to me he's kind of saying that if you got rid of the weapons, you get rid of war. >> i'm not saying that. reagan definitely saw-- it's a rhetorical purpose. you build up so you don't have to fight. i see that as, well, we-- think how many nuclear weapons between the u.s. and the soviet union existed before the start treaty and how incredibly dangerous it's becoming again as the chinese are dramatically increasing the number of their nuclear weapons with who knows

what kind of command and control and decision making processes. you know, i think reagan recognizes those risks and consistently used an arms buildup. yes, he's for arms control, but to maintaining deterrents and to you, eloquently, how reagan thought you could have conventional forces and have adequate deterrents. and reagan against the advice of virtually everyone, wanted to share the fbi technology, and even wanted to demonstrate that which i thought it was an idea, he's an old liberal, classic liberal. and so, you know, for the panel on reassessing. the rhetorical whether it makes sense that you focused on

reagan's rhetoric. to what extent do you grapple with the effects of implementation of reagan era policies and to what extent does the development and implementation of policies reflect the ideals that reagan touted and so that's just an open question for anybody who wants to tackle that and a more specific question for ran tal because of course the iran communist party supported khomeini in the revolution. have you found any evidence that intel analysts or reagan were aware of that connection and if they were aware of that, why do you think that reagan didn't make more of a big deal about connecting the threats between the iranians and the revolution. >> and with the groups there with iranian communist party, talking about the -- so that goes back all the way, i've

written about the -- so intelligence community i have not come across a specific document with that threat assessment, but that was found within the larger frame of iran. reagan tended not to talk about because he was-- his main commitment was to israel and he brought up the 1980 campaign he wasn't trying to talk about iran and soviets partner, but he did say over and over again, what you found in all sorts of campaign documents that the soviets are behind everything, they're behind terrorism, they're behind hostage taking, behind the plo, behind lebanon and everything. i think if you're reading between the lines, you can see a type of wary assessment of

iran as a potential partner of the soviet union without wanting to declare that outtlt outright. and the demonization of iran and seeing iran as an enemy, i would say resulted in the tilt towards iraq and the united states started sharing geospatial and is progressively more helpful in the iraqi side and then by the time that bush is in office established a close relationship with the regime there. i think there's a sentence in which reagan's gives cover to these situations all as far as i can tell he was not involved in the iran-iraq war or persian gulf. >> do you want to add anything? >> yes, a great question. in thinking about what is the

relationship between rhetoric and affects, of ascribing or a narrative of the world and what does that do on a practical level, right? and so, i would-- very much agree and individual citizens, not everyone was concerned with the minute details, particularly, the fbi or "star wars" or regions of the world and everything about reagan's rhetorical more broadly that he did want to accomplish, develop a part of the nation and students and classes, i show them the 1984 convention film and that starts out with individuals being interviewed and saying i see myself in this vision that he describes. it's a vision that some americans cannot see themselves in. but i think that that vision and that narrative encapsulates

these policy proposals. even if you have a public that maybe doesn't care about fbi on a technical level, ne they do see themselves as a part of this anti-communist narrative such as elizabeth was talking about so i think that's where the nexxis and the rhetoric on pail policy comes in. and rhetoric can be a producer, and a part of narrative even if they don't care about the money. >> let me add one other thing, in a way rhetoric can become the ideology. i'm thinking of the most famous line in the first inaugural address, in this present crisis government is not the solution, government is the problem. but that has-- that became just orthodox conservative policy and in an essay on the first inaugural.

i've written how major figures and conservativism referred to that as doctrine and the introductory phrase, in this present crisis was largely lost in that and it became simply an anti-government philosophy. think of how different that is from the environmentalism of richard nixon, for example, or even the montreal accords that were-- that were created that were negotiated during the reagan administration that dealt with the ozone crisis. that was a pragmatic conservativism that those words helped transform into simply an anti-government conservative. >> richard marshall, if i could get back to fdi. this is a question for anybody that wants to answer. how much was-- did reagan truly believe in the technologies and behind sdi and

how much a rhetoric of getting the bargaining position in establishing a position of strength in the negotiations? is there a way to know that? does anyone have an answer? >> well, again, from the 1970's, he-- i mean, at norad. >> interested in that. >> when he realized this was a thing, he became very interested in what was technology. and what you see in his handwriting and that he wrote for the sdi speech, shows that he thinks this can be. it's a dream that he's talking about. he's saying, and he believes in america and america's ability to create, to develop, so all of that, i think, for him it was a real thing and part of the reason -- he thought it was

a real thing that could bring about real-- >> if he would have thought of it as just a strategy, even bigger arms agreement. reagan was really good on larger ideological questions, but minute technical questions, you're right. he had faith in the scientists and he didn't need a lot of other details. go ahead. >> grace, university of connecticut. so, this is a question for anybody who wants to take it, but in rhetoric, there's always an audience and so i was wondering how each of you -- it seems implicitly for many of you, you're kind of assuming the audience is an american public, but who do you-- for each of you think is the audience of the rhetoric that

you're talking about? >> well, for my project, what i anticipate as part of a larger project that analyzes core images and metaphors described, so, for iran specifically, i think that the metaphor that is used of strategic picture, right, of this one big battle, everyone's on one side or the other side and so part of that audience question has to do with, how does that core image get picked up by press outlets or by other positions or the political opposition as well as reagan and his team himself? so there's a question of not just audience, but who is the audience. how are they receiving it and how are they recirculating the ideas if they agree. if my project that's what i'm tracking. how do these go across multiple context. in terms of audience, there are

dozens of figures that you could name, but clearly for my case study, the primary audience would be the american people as well as the international scene because reagan is sending messages to iran why he would consider a red line. he's also sending messages to american eye lies -- american allies, and the bigger question, once they're to wider american foreign policy. >> the soviet rhetoric named at audiences and he needs to maintain support for the arms buildion and at the end of his presidency, maintain support for the arms control agreementles against conservative opposition at the time, many conservatives were very skeptical and some of that's tactical as i said moving to the nuclear movement. there's a european movement and he's especially concerned with

the germans, and putting this in to the germans is the linchpin, to get rid of the intermediate range of the nuclear weapons which is incredibly dangerous. he's obviously speaking to the soviets, he's saying things that were true, but that presidents never said because he wants to get their attention, but he's also speaking to the people of warsaw pact and we know from their reaction, which was about half a second after the end of the soviet union, they have to join n.a.t.o., how effective that message was in combination with their own experience. so, i think that those are the four crucial audiences. there's a statement about reagan he doesn't need a pollster because he has an intuitive understanding of the american people and he has a sophisticated understanding offed audience and multiple

audience. >> and truly agreed that one example that he was talking about for the evil empire. there's a story about how-- a story about how behind the iron curtain in priso -- found out about it because the guards let the -- and the soviet sources and taps out from isolation on the prison walls like they did, oh, my gosh, the president of the united states called it an evil empire, keep fighting. this is just one story, but we know many where it mattered and it helped to create, really these conditions and they were fighting inside the iron curtain and the pressure that the united states was leading the west to do outside. so i think it's really, really important to keep the multiple

audiences in mind and reagan did. >> i would add very briefly, several people have noted the importance of looking at the archives and i think there are multiple audiences at play, but looking at particular moments in speeches particular audiences and the desire to reach specific ones. and reagan's speaking, one of the best descriptions of that in the process of writing that speech is in peggy noonan and she wanted the american people watching at home, that speech was precisely coincideded with the 8 a.m. news cycle on the east coast and that's why-- they went through with french officials and the americans said it had to be. and she had a process to write

the president would describe what the u.s. army rangers did, so the teenagers who were eating their rice crispies would pause and stop and say that really happened. because at this moment in u.s. foreign policy, right, post vietnam and how we see our vision in the world in this particular moment. that was a very specific audience that noonen was trying to reach and multiple ripple effects out in the campaign film and a passage that's still played. and thinking about the multiple audiences, the rhetorical purposes in individual speech. >> we're at the very end so i want to say one more thing, use my role as moderator here. i think reagan was also in a way, speaking from the past to future america, and i want to point to two passages, one in

the first inaugural and one in the great westminster speech where he spoke to us about the importance of our democracy. he's in the first inaugural, he talked about the transition of power as a miracle that almost no other country in the world could claim. i think reagan, if he were here today he would say that we should remember that miracle and protect it. and at the end of the westminster speech, he spoke of the moment when -- at the very end of the second world war when churchill lost an election and he praised him for recognizing the importance of democratic norms and leaving power and noting that he came back again later on, it seems to me that the greatest importance of reagan ultimately and this is rhetoric, is for that defense of democratic values as central to the american story and his belief that ideas could move mountains

and they did in the cold war and perhaps they can again. thank you very much. [applause] >> my name is rachel olson and we're standing in front of the burlington depot in red cloud, nebraska where the railroad arrived in 1879. later in 1882, it was the stop for burlington railroad. this was an important stop for homesteader travelling to nebraska. 8-- 18 passenger trains daily and this is where they arrived for the divide. we're in front of the jl miner

house located a block away from the childer home. and as a child would have spent a lot of time in the house because she was good friends with the miner children, admired julia miner, the family matriarch and got to know their domestic workers who worked here as a teenager. she would have got to know anna, as a family trying to homestead on the great plains and this later inspired the most famous novel my antonia. you'll see a parlor followed by a formal dining room, and walk through into the kitchen where there is a small bedroom that anna pavelka was employed in. and a hallway that served as a parlor for julia miner to

entertainment guests, where she played piano and see julia and miner's bedroom that served also as a mr. miner's office. it developed in the kind of 20 years that would have of included cather's childhood her and she would have witnessed a town in the making. so the businesses and services that we take for granted as always being available in our hometown or in our community as she grew up and that evolution of the town made a strong impress on cather that later came out in her writing. we are standing in front of the pavel ka farm stead. this is where anna and john

raised their 10 children and where they farmed and also the site where willa and anna were reunited in during a trip. and it was the inspiration for ka cather to write my antonia, and this far stead is far different than the dugout that many homesteaders lived in in the 1880's, just like anna did with her family, but a great reputation of the farm life that she endeavored to capture in her novel. ♪♪ >> week nights at 9:00 eastern, c-span's encore presentation of our 10-part