she brought in jim bakker abdomen others not hard line conservatives, willing to compromise.ere so many echoes we see in the kursurnt campaigns. she loved gossip and fun. i got to know an actor, went to the reagan library, spoke there. talked to her on the phone recently. i did talk to her when margaret thatcher died a few years ago. she was very frail and didn't want to go out in public. she was unable to move around very easily. but she remained plugged in until almost the very end. was an extraordinary impact figure in american political and social lives. >> i think there are those who would suggest that she was also his number one protector. if anybody went after him, you had to go through nancy to firing of the white house chief of staff. don regan. memorably, she went around the president, eventually vice president bush had to tell don regan that he was fired for hanging up on the first lady, if you can imagine. i don't think there's been a more powerful first lady, at least in modern history. hanging up in anger against the first lady. but she brought people in. she br

and mike was there as -- along with the triumphant jim bakker. he and nancy talked all the time. she looked to him and they sort of figured out together, how do we make sure we take -- we get the best out of this, allow him to have his best, not overburden him? he was along in years and you want to reserve his reservoirs of strength for big things not the trivial things that come across a president's desk. >> stand by for a moment, david. jeffrey lorde, the former reagan white house political director, is joining us as well. >> sure. >> jeffrey, you knew nancy reagan and also knew the former, late president of the united states. what goes through your mind at this moment? >> you know, listening to david -- wolf, i was a young associate director of political affairs. some of the things -- i would see her mostly at public events and that sort of thing. two instances stand out. on one occasion in the fall of 1986, a pretty hard-fought presidential campaign, those of us in the white house political office had set up a series of trips for the president, stops across the country. he's

she brought in jim bakker abdomen others not hard line conservatives, willing to compromise. in the kurpt surnt campaigns. she loved gossip and fun. i got to know an actor, went to the reagan library, spoke there. talked to her on the phone recently. i did talk to her when margaret thatcher died a few years ago. she was very frail and didn't want to go out in public. she was unable to move around very easily. but she remained plugged in until almost the very end. was an extraordinary impact social lives. >> i think there are those who would suggest that she was also his number one protector. if anybody went after him, you had to go through nancy to get to him. >> in fact, that led to the firing of the white house chief of staff. don regan. memorably, she went around the president, eventually vice president bush had to tell don regan that he was fired for hanging up on the first lady, if you can imagine. i don't think there's been a more powerful first lady, at least in modern history. hanging up in anger against the first lady. but she brought people in. she brought in democrats, the late

of course, jim bakker brought into the circle. she did have a huge impact on changing white house staff. and before that, the campaign staff. but she always had her antenna out. and that ron reagan alluded to that. she understood the people who were not there to serve ronald reagan. he did not. he was so genial and really liked everyone. he didn't have that kind of political antenna. but she did. and she protected him. and she was really the chief protector, and she reached out as well to democrats, to the late robert strauss, to others, to come in and talk to him so that he would not be isolated in the white house. she was really responsible also for the exit of donald regan, who was largely blamed for a lot of the problems, not just hanging up on the first lady, which is something one doesn't do. but also for letting the iran contra affair happen right under his nose. >> and tom, don't you think that nancy reagan's reputation and the way this country felt about her really changed over the years? in the early years, people were t

she put jim bakker in the first place. is she never wanted hague for secretary of state.e schultz from the first. >> how did we regard her recommendations? >> he took her seriously. when people came and said your wife is manipulating things behind the scenes, he never criticized her. because he knew she was protecting him. she was a much better judge of character than he was. >> was it a concerted action. would he say, fine, not to bring up a house of cards analogy but where the company is open. you take that on. you talk to this guy. >> i think more tasic. he couldn't fire people. his father was an alcoholic who lost many a job. and it was too painful for ronald reagan to think of actually firing someone. so she had to do it. >> had to do it or that was something she was easier doing? >> no. she had to do it. >> she didn't enjoy it? >> no. she said to me once, bob, don't say i was tough. say i was strong. i had to be strong for ronnie. because he liked everybody. and he didn't want to believe that people could be working for themselves, trying to upstage him or just not

we moved from motown, from detroit, michigan to charlotte, north carolina, pineville with jim and tammy faye bakkerow bebe and cece became a duet. >> that's going to be quite a show to see. >> it is. >> got to get my ticket. thank you for joining us. >> always a pleasure. >> you can see that story on our website, too, a tt what the show will be about. coming up in july, did you say? >> july 1st to august 28th. >> all right, at the arena stage. >> all right, thank you, barbara and bebe, of course. >>> today, if you want to get a jump-start on your child's college tuition, you may want to head to the computer today, because it is the deadline to enroll in the virginia 529 prepaid program. it lets families prepay for tuition for all of the commonwealth's two and four-year public schools. now, if you enroll by today, you don't have to pay until may. >>> this may be the craziest video of the day. take a look. a gopro camera catches a skydiver spiraling out of control. you may not believe what the diver has to say about his next adventure. >>> hi, i'm social media editor brittany johnson. the picking up