if reagan had -- the sole contribution reagan made to the aids crisis was having dr.p as surgeon general, and that's to not why he was appoint but when the crisis was there at least dr. coop had the realism to sit behalf congressional committee and say that people should be using condoms to save their lives. that's his honorable act in history. it was not president reagan's, and it's a tremendous failing. i think ambivalence is a good condition for writing fiction and poetry. i'm not so sure -- history i don't know. had these tremendously mixed feelings about reagan. admired a lot of what reagan was doing in the 1980s, particularly in foreign policy, i was aghast at what was going on in my own world. i was burying my friends and we were waiting to hear kind words from reagan and it was a failing on his part. but people are -- they're made up of parts and i think on the whole reagan's record is going to be judged pretty favorably by history. i personally -- one thing the democrats love to do, and do it at their political peril, they love telling the american people how

and this time we're going to let ronald reagan be ronald reagan. >> the mantra let reagan be reagan isage of what we've got. the strongest thing, our best political asset is ronald reagan being himself, communicating with the american people. when he was showing his personality, his ideas and rhetoric, he generally succeeded. >> going into tonight, a new poll indicates the race continues to narrow. >> the audience out there will be looking at ronald reagan in a new way. i think in louisville, the myths or the mystique of the great communicator was dented, perhaps irreparably. >> president kennedy had to go days on end with very little sleep during the cuban missile crisis. is there any doubt you'd be able to function in such circumstances? >> not at all. and also, i will not make age an issue of this campaign. i am not going to exploit for political purposes my opponent's youth and inexperience. >> it brought down the hour, and it was his house by then. >> there were several times during his first term when i thought this man is not going to be re-elected president. i guess what i unde

and this time we're going to let ronald reagan be ronald reagan. >> the mantra let reagan be reagan ise of what we've got. the strongest thing, our best political asset is ronald reagan being himself, communicating with the american people. when he was showing his personality, his ideas and rhetoric, he generally succeeded. >> going into tonight, a new poll indicates the race continues to narrow. >> the audience out there will be looking at ronald reagan in a new way. i think in louisville, the myths or the mystique of the great communicator was dented, perhaps irreparably. >> president kennedy had to go days on end with very little sleep during the cuban missile crisis. is there any doubt you'd be able to function in such circumstances? >> not at all. and also, i will not make age an issue of this campaign. i am not going to exploit for political purposes my opponent's youth and inexperience. >> it brought down the hour, and it was his house by then. >> there were several times during his first term when i thought this man is not going to be re-elected president. i guess what i undere

he wanted to reform communism while reagan wanted to destroy it. reagan had a key insight.y of his insights were based on an application of common sense to situations where people did not always use a lot of common sense. he thought communism was ridiculous. he had dealt with communists in hollywood and thought they were stupid and not hard to defeat. he thought no one would choose to live under communism. people in the soviet union needed to be exposed to the way people lived in the united states to want to reject it. he had an idea that communism could collapse if things turn it to fall apart. in a lot of ways, i think he created pressures that made that more likely and made it happen sooner. the biggest one was the big hit between his first and second term. there is a lot of conservative mythology here. the second term was not the culmination of the first in relation to the soviets, but rather the repudiation. he had a huge military buildup and nuclear buildup in the first term. no negotiations. in the second term, that did not work for him. he wanted to make the world s

his latest book is ronald reagan. the biography claims he remains profoundly misunderstood politically and personally. it was called "one of the best books on american politics i have read in years." jacob weisberg, welcome. >> thank you, jeff. >> glor: misunderstood politically and personally by both sides of the aisle. >> i think so, i think so. and we could go into it. on the right, i think reagan is misunderstood as someone who was-- had very fixed principles and always lived by his principles. i think reagan's success as a politician was based very largely on how prag make the he was, how open to compromise. he once said when he was governor of california if he could get 70% of what he wanted from a legislature of the opposite party, he'd take it. and, you know, i think at this moment when politics is so polarized, it's interesting to look back on the reagan era as a time when the president was really ready to work with congress, and even though there was a lot of political conflict about all sorts of big issues,

so reagan had to constantly let the right know i know what i'm doing. >> reagan was being accused alreadyunism, but he hadn't forgotten the problems we have. europe was still divided, there was still a berlin wall. >> there's one sign the soviets can make that would be unmistakable, that would advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace. mr. gorbachev, open this gate. mr. gorbachev, tear down this wall. >> it was perfect. it was beautiful. he had to insist on keeping it in the speech. and he did it. don't let anybody tell you it was a staffer or anybody else that did that. >> meanwhile, in the soviet union gorbachev decides to do something bold and he says let's separate sdi from reducing the nuclear stockpile. once he does this, it opens up the possibility for a third summit. >> this week's summit may prove especially important, even historic. for the first time since the onset of the nuclear age, the united states and soviet union will sign a treaty reducing the number of nuclear missiles. >> it involved elimination of an entire class of weapons, intermediate range ballistic mis

but he is very much a reagan-conservative. jeff: what positions did reagan have?ed inan politics very late, he was already in his 50's before he got involved in it. younger,ted much biding his time. jeff: thank you very much. thank you for joining us, we will see you next time. ♪ mark: i am mark halperin. john: i am john heilemann. and with all due respect to bernie sanders and hillary clinton can we are looking tisnales andar parties and al talking points and rebuttal. ♪ mark: happy gotham city debate date, sports fans. john: we'll cover the brawl between hillary clinton and bernie sanders. prosecutor f

bush and ronald reagan.was turning against policies in iraq, failure to keep north korea from nuclear weapons and certainly barack obama he thinks did some of that, but so did the two bushes and to some extent ronald reagan. >> thank you for talking to us about this tonight. even before i heard the speech i knew i wanted to ask you what you thought of this. >> it will be fascinating to watch it unfold. >> thank you. we'll be right back. >>> last month a little girl from flint, michigan sent a letter to president obama. she told the president in her letter that meeting him quote would really lift people's spirits. well this week which marks two years since flint was lead poisoned because of the actions of the government, this week president obama wrote her back and said he's on his way. president obama has put a trip to flint, michigan on his schedule. he'll be there next week on wednesday. this will be his first trip to flint since the lead pointing crisis started there. he says he hopes to meet with officia

ronald reagan invited mr. gorbachev sat by the fire, and talked about his personal feelings, reducing fear and misunderstanding between the two nations. >> they met as human beings, regan had concentrated his attention on gorbachev as a person. he spent more time studying him than things to do with arms control. >> gorbachev was not at combative as he was with other officials recently. >> is it a good sign? >> i would think so. >> i was, when ronald reagan came out of his first meeting with gorbachev. he said, this is a new type of soviet union. >> the soviet leader was more negative. >> the more important problems, arms race and increasing hopes of peace, we didn't succeed in reaching at this meeting. of course, there are important disagreements that remain between us. >> president regan deserves credit for starting a dialogue with gorbachev. many here pronounced the summit a modest success, it failed to achieve significant progress on arms control. the first word that something was seriously wrong came from

reagan, in particular mrs.started a national conversation, when before, nobody talked about it. >> larry: it may be hard for you to remember, hillary, but ronald reagan didn't give a major speech about hiv/aids until 1987 years after it became a national epidemic. his refusal to talk about aids is one of the most memorable things about the '80s! right behind a young up-and-coming actor's star-making appearance in "the facts of life." mrs. garrett, i've been a police officer for three years, and before that i was a kid. i've heard just about everything. (cheers and applause) >> larry: i look exactly the same, you guys! (cheering) >> larry: hillary's comment caused a quick backlash from supporters in the l.g.b.t. community, and she offered statement an apology more swiftly than she could throw a desk chair at whatever staffer prepared her for this interview. but what will be the political implications of hillary's comment regarding the reagans? here with an in-depth look is our very own grace parra. >> hi, larry!

bush and ronald reagan.t policies in iraq, failure to keep north korea from nuclear weapons and certainly barack obama he thinks did some of that, but so did the two bushes and to some extent ronald reagan. >> thank you for talking to us about this tonight. even before i heard the speech i knew i wanted to ask you what you thought of this. >> it will be fascinating to watch it unfold. >> thank you. we'll be right back. billions are spent to confuse and, dare i say it, flummox the american public. "save 16% on car insurance." "switch now..." well at compare.com, we say enough's enough. so we constantly scrutinize millions of rates... answering the question once and for all, who has the lowest. just go to compare.com and get up to 50 free quotes. choose the lowest, and hit purchase. so you can get back to whatever it is you civilians do when you're not thinking about car insurance. compare.com we need to be ready for my name's scott strenfel and r i'm a meteorologist at pg&e. we make sure that our crews as wel

we start with ronald reagan from 1988. [applause] ronald reagan: thank you. thank you very much. i am delighted to be here. what a crowd. it looks like the index of larry speak's book. [applause] president reagan: it is good to see your incoming president, jerry o'leary. in his book, larry said that jerry would line his coat pockets of pastries. jerry denies it. earlier tonight, just to be safe i told him, keep his hands off dinner roll. larry said preparing me for the conference was like reinventing the wheel. that is not true. i was around when the wheel was invented, and it was easy. [applause] president reagan: even howard baker is writing a book about me. it is called three by five, the measure of a presidency. [laughter] president reagan: mike in his book he said that i had a short attention span. i was going to reply, but let's move on to something else. [laughter] [applause] president reagan: now, i forgot to acknowledge yakov smirnov, i have heard him before, he is a very funny man. i just have an idea -- why don't you and i have fun? how would you like to go to the summ

but the new people -- reagan, when i did the surveys i would put reagan in, as i recall. i stopped doing them, but ronald reagan's in the top, not weak as -- not because i enjoyed what he did or i thought he did the right thing, but he did do what he set out to do. he made a movement and there were a number of people who went on with him and and that sense he was effective as a president. , so i would not ask him. i thought the task was to combat who had been an effective president, he was not one of my favorite people. i think a lot of what he accomplished was extremely problematic. some people might suggest bush. if sean were here, he would've probably said george w. bush. he wrote a whole article about it, so we would have known his answer already. you know, that is a candidate but it is too soon to tell, you know? we do not know which things he will be given credit for 100 years from now, 50 years from now, it depends upon how things turn out. i feel more comfortable talking about people from the 19th century. next in, maybe not. the resignation, vietnam, paris peace

reagan: i agree. ofn people want to be free soviet or cuban domination, the united states should be willing to provide weapons to any men that want to fight. howard: do you believe there should be a blockade of cuba, a complete one? mr. reagan: i suggest that is a hypothetical. it was based on this thing we both have said. that is that only the president and a few people have knowledge of all the options. with regard to afghanistan, the president, i think, lowered the credibility of the united states when he made, in diplomatic language, what was a serious warning to the soviets not to invade afghanistan. he used the term serious consequences will follow. he knew we had no way to back that out. there was not anything we could do. we were not ready to put in troops and chased them out. so they invaded, and the world is still standing here just as we are still standing. just like they did with the blockade in cuba. we accepted it. was thatid at the time we ought to have a plan. we ought to have a strate

when i people, reagan, do these surveys very often i would put reagan, as i recall, i stop doing them, but reagan in the top, not because i thought that he did the right thing, but he did do what he set out to do, and he made if movement and there were a number of people that went along with them, so in that sense he was effective as a president, so i would not cast him. i told the task was to think about, for the less, who had been an effective president, not my favorite people. he was not one of my favorite people, and i think what he accomplishes was extremely problematic. the modern people, some people might suggest bush. i think if sean were here, he .robably would've said w she wrote a whole article about that. we would've known his answer already. that is the candidate that it is soon to tell. we do not know who'll be given credit 100 years ago, 50 years from now, it depends on how things turn out, but i feel comfortable talking about people from the 19th century. i would like to go back that far. nixon, maybe not. vietnam,nation, the paris with the peace talks and so forth, ju

we start with ronald reagan from 1988. [applause] ronald reagan: thank you. thank you very much. i am delighted to be here. what a crowd. it looks like the index of larry's book. [applause] reagan: it is good to see your incoming president, jerry o'leary. in his book, larry said that jerry would line his coat pockets of pastries. jerry denies it. earlier tonight, just to be safe i told him, keep his hands off of my general -- my dinner roll. larry said preparing me for the conference was like reinventing the wheel. that is not true. i was around when the wheel was invented, and it was easy. [applause] even howardagan: baker is writing a book about me. it is called three by five, the measure of a presidency. [laughter] hintdent reagan: mike, and -- and his book he said that i had a short attention span. let'sgoing to reply, but move on to something else. [laughter] [applause] president reagan: now, i forgot , iacknowledge yakov smirnov have heard him before, he is a very funny man. i just have an idea -- why don't you and i have fun? how would you like to go to the summit as my in

we start with ronald reagan from 1988. [applause] ronald reagan: thank you. thank you. thank you very much. please. thank you all. i am delighted to be here. my, what a crowd. looks like the index of larry's big book. [laughter] [applause] ronald reagan: it is good to see norm sandler and your incoming president, jerry o'leary. in his book, larry said that jerry used to fill his coat pockets with pastries. jerry denies it. earlier tonight, just to be safe i told him, keep his hands off , my dinner roll. [laughter] larry also said that preparing me for a press conference was like reinventing the wheel. that is not true. i was around when the wheel was invented, and it was easier. [laughter] [applause] baker reagan: even howard is writing a book about me. it is called "three by five, the measure of a presidency." [laughter] mike, mike devers in his book said that i had a short attention span. i was going to reply to that, but what the hell, let's move on to something else. [laughter] [applause] ronald reagan: now, i forgot to acknowledge yakov smirnov. i have heard him be

so i grew up in a reagan hating culture. and so going back and doing this book for me was really eye opening in a lot of ways. i haven't gone all the way to the other side but i do think that most of the prejudices i had growing up about reagan were in one way or another wrong. and i've come to think he was both a much better president in many respects than i ever would have thought and also just sort of a more appealing person. i mean, it's hard to spend a lot of time around reagan. i don't know if clair would agree but he becomes hard not to like because he has a genuine sense of humor. he's nice to people. everyone around him seems to have liked him. he almost uniquely among presidents didn't seem to have a huge ego or inflated sense of his own abilities and you kind of spend time around him and get to be a little bit sympathetic with him. >> the other one who i have not studied myself but is grant. we mentioned grant in passing as someone who for years was in the scandal, r, gilded age corruption, perhaps reconstruction,

we start with ronald reagan from 1988. [applause] pres. reagan: thank you. thank you very much. thank you all. i am delighted to be here. my, what a crowd. looks like the index of larry's book. [laughter] [applause] pres. reagan: it is good to see your incoming president, jerry o'leary. in his book,arry said that jerry used to line his coat pockets of pastries. jerry denies it. earlier tonight, just to be safe i told him, keep his hands off my dinner roll. [laughter] said preparing me for a purse conference was like reinventing the wheel. that is not true. i was around when the wheel was invented, and it was easy. [laughter] [applause] pres. reagan: even howard baker is writing a book about me. it is called "three by five, the measure of a presidency." [laughter] pres. reagan: mike, in his book, said that i had a short attention span. i was going to reply to that, but what the hell, let's move on to something else. [laughter] [applause] pres. reagan: now, i forgot to acknowledge yakov smirnov. i have heard him before, he is a very funny man. i just have an idea -- why don't you

reagan: i can't wait. >> thank you.you both have agreed there be no time limits to what you have to say. you will have an open discussion. i will reserve the chairman's privilege of asking a question if i want to change the subject. towards the end we will accept questions from the audience. after that there will be brief closing statements. ambassador bush, everyone including your opponent has congratulated you on your victory in pennsylvania yesterday. in the course of the program face the nation sunday you said you hoped to win because you had adopted the strategy of hammering away at the differences between you and mr. reagan. one difference you mentioned was you said in your words, mr. reagan was overpromising the american people. could you explain that? mr. bush: it was meet the press. secondly. i made the point what we must do is defeat jimmy carter. i got that into focus. i want to get these differences out with the governor so the voters can make a good determination. i hope that is what has happened in pennsyl

reagan run in '76 and '80 as an insurgent force. he was promising to bring the republican party significantly to the right. nobody knew if that kind of campaign would work at national level. if it was going to work, everybody knew that reagan would need every single conservative vote in the country. george wallace voters had been a very specific kind of conservative for the previous four presidential elections. in 1980 with george wallace finally and completely out of presidential running for the first time in 20 years, there was a strategic decision made to try to make sure the republican nominee in 1980 would be able to mop up votes from any of the people left in the country who had favored segregationist candidate who might have felt in 1980 like they didn't have candidate anymore now that wallace wasn't running again for the first time in two decades. ronald reagan didn't go campaign in his home state of california after he won the nomination. he didn't rush off to some swing state. reagan's first stop after the convention, the

reagan brought it down to the 28%. by the way we had increase in tax revenues rates went down, and economy did so well. we deregulated key industries in the economy. reagan got control of inflation pulling back on money supply. what ronald reagan's theme was he said in 1980 and 1984, government is not the solution. government is the problem. that is exactly the opposite philosophy that barack obama is at. barack obama and his economists believe that whatever the problem is in the united states around the world, there is a government solution for it. it just hasn't worked out very well. deirdre: they're also expensive. former reagan economist steve moore. >> you know what the? that's a great point. the democrats used to criticize for requiring began increasing debt $2 trillion over eight years. obama increased debt by 9 trillion. deirdre: those numbers a few trillion between friends adds up. steve, thank you as always. steve moore. >> thanks, deirdre. deirdre: donald trump left his event in california. we're monitoring

president reagan had put together a less aggressive deficit-reduction plan.e didn't think it went far enough. my bipartisan plan was attacked for being dangerous and causing draconian cuts to the defense budget. i knew it was realistic and a responsible approach. i didn't back down. we were forced to vote that year, may 2, 1984, in the budget committee, we forced a vote on the senate floor and that particular year we were not successful. this effort required the senate and the nation to have a debate about a growing defense budget. we started that debate, including the waste and inefficiency in the pentagon and the growing fiscal -- federal fiscal deficits. despite the weeks-long pressure from conservatives in the reagan administration, i did not back down because i knew the policy was on my side. in this process, i stood up to pressure from president reagan, defense secretary caspar weinberger, secretary barry goldwater, senator john tower, chairman of the committee, and many others. i remember a meeting it he white house where i reminded the president that

that reagan suffers dementia symptoms in his second term, and a white house intern has to convince reagan he is an actor playing the president. in 1995, president reagan was wildly lauded when he helped teach the nation about alzheimer's, in his open letter to the american people. i now begin the journey that will lead me into the sunset of my life. i know that for america, there will always be a bright dawn ahead. >> people aren't flocking to the movie theaters to watch something funny on alzheimer's. >> reporter: joe is the new director of the hollywood reporter. >> if you combine alzheimer's which isn't a funny topic, and then combine the president of the united states that the republican party adores so much, ronald reagan, it's really a recipe for disaster. >> reporter: in her letter, davis suggested ferrell visit a dementia facility as she has. i didn't find anything comedic there, and my hope would be that if you're a decent human being, you wouldn't either. and tonight will ferrell backing out. his representative saying, he is not pursuing this project. cynthia mcfadden, nbc news,

president obama trashed ronald reagan and-- >> i don't think trashing ronald reagan.ashing ronald reagan. i simply think historically the democrats and republicans have different ideas of how an economy can be robust, we've seen failures and robust in both presidencies. and i don't that someone who stepped in a recession, unemployment rate almost double and we've seen sustained month after month job growth due to, i think a lot of the policies that the president proposed to put forth. stuart: okay. >> and democrats working with republicans on that in the past, i don't think that's a failure of president obama, i think it's a success, quite frankly, when we-- creating jobs. stuart: listen to this. >> temporary i think-- >> josh earnests the white house president secretary. this is what he had to say about weak economic growth, roll that tape. >> there's no denying there are a wide of variety of economic indicators that would be stronger if republicans in congress had seized the initiative three or four years ago and made critical investments in our infrastructure. stua

reagan, but let me make my point. as much as we want to bring that defense budget down, and i do, as much as we want to get rid of weapons systems that don't boy us defense, and i will, as much as we need a tough new system of bidding, of testing, of warranties, as much as we need arms control to help also bring down pressure, the inescapable fact is that the soviet union is a powerful military nation using its power irresponsibly, and the president of the united states has to do everything he can to manage that budget sensibly and wise wisely but he cannot fail to discharge the national security interests of our country. >> will you give me a percentage figure? >> i would be at about 4%. >> i'm at about 6%. my two colleagues on the right here i feel, and i've been talking about this for the past week, would cut our defense establishment beyond all reality. i have prosecute opposed cutting about $15 million out. it would be on the division air defense of bradley fighting vehicle and rapid deployment for certain parts

michael reagan, lessons my father taught me. the strength, integrity and faith of ronald reagan. of your father. one of the reasons i got involved in politics. and i'm driven crazy by how many people throw around your father's name. >> oh, really? >> it's got to drive you batty. >> are you? >> if i had a penny for every time they mentioned my father's name, i'd own this show. it's really interesting to watch it all happen. we wrneren't looking for abraha lincoln when we elected my father. we were looking for a leader. we were lucky to have my father for the years we had my father and the great job he did. i've talked to so many liberals. one of them came up to me one day and said, i miss your father. i said you miss my father? you voted against him every time he ran for election. i know, but i was with some friends the other night and i miss your father because he had a good soul. and what's this country is missing today is that soul. i think i really write about that in the book. >> you talk about that and the time on the ranch where your father would teach you how to ride, how

reagan? >> well, i don't believe the alternative to inflation is recession. i think that's old-fashioned economics. i don't think that you have to trade unemployment and incidentally, president carter as a candidate said that he would never fight inflation by using unemployment. president carter in his present economic message has said that as part of his fight against inflation, unemployment is going to be allowed to go up 1% to 1.5% to two percentage points. this is self-destructive because for every percentage point you add to the unemployment rolls you add $25 billion to $29 billion to the federal deficit. both in the loss of revenue from those no longer working and in the benefits that go out to them. no, i would do the things i have talked about, regard the cutting of government and i can point to experience in the same situation. when i became governor of california it was just like the federal government. bankrupt. and with a deficit, a mounting deficit. and i know that some of these

you know, as you know, i'm a reagan conservative.ally, when i was a teenager, i was active in democrat politics, and then i started hearing the voice of that former california governor who articulated an agenda of principles, of less government, less taxes, traditional values and a strong military, and i was drawn to the republican party. and throughout my career in washington, d.c. and now here as governor of indiana, those have been the principles that have really animated my service. and i've sought to support them at every turn, but also i've looked for opportunities to support men and women who have the courage to stand on those reagan principles, and i see ted cruz as a principled conservative who's dedicated his career to advocating the reagan agenda. i'm pleased to support him. now, greg, you know from my career i know a little bit about taking on the big spenders in washington d.c. i was doing that more than a decade ago when we saw runaway federal spending by both parties. i really admire the way ted cruz has been willing t

reagan: that is indeed a major difference. i still believe firmly and think there is some difference of opinion about figures. four times in this century we have had across-the-board tax cut's. the government even in the first year got increased revenue, not less. governmentevenue for and of course government was smaller than. $109 million. according to the figure than the got $1.1overnment billion additional revenue in the income tax. me point something out. george mentioned the difference. under jimmy carter the tax burden of the gross national product has reached the highest level in the history of our nation. under the revised budget the total federal taxes are projected at $628 billion. one of would be individual income tax. 115 percent increase in the tax since he took office. over the next 10 years, if things are changed it is estimated the total tax increase on the people of america will be one and a half trillion dollars. rather than the bill i support, the idea of a 10% cut across the board administered over a three-

even the reagan foundation. they said in part, we find it disgust that a film would be considered by mr. ferrell or anyone else. >> when james brolin portrayed him, the family put some much pressure on show time they pulled it. >> they will get behind the film and get it to the light of day. >>> a teenager in hawaii was arrested for attacking a well known monk seal on a beach in kauai. it was captured on surveillance camera. the seal, is said to be okay. she is pregnant and believed to be 17 years old and has been tracked for years, survived shark bites and being hit by a boat propeller and has net scars. he faces a year in prison and/or a $50 fine. >>> and roman coins dating back to 230 a.d. were found in spain. they were inside of a roman jug. no word on what this incredible fine could be worth today. >>> still on "action news," normal check of the forecast for you, as we look outside. sky 6 hd showing you gray skies down the shore in atlantic city. meteorologist, melissa magee has an update from accuweather w

conley and reagan said no. we asked george walker bush to come in and he said yes and spoke at a big civic center in birmingham which was the republican city at the time. we went to the civic center and i was sitting at a table and near me was his nerdy young man with blond hair and he said why don't you tell us what you think of george bush's speech and i said well, okay. i will do that. i took notes as bush spoke. then when the speech was done, the nerdy young man and turned to me and said what did you think? i said he is a nice young man and very bright but needs organization and sense of style. it is obvious that wasn't rehearsed and it needs to be. and he said my name is karl rove and i work for him. how would you like to meet him? i went up and shook hands with him and he invited me to houston to come meet him and his wife in january. i flew to houston in january and came to the house in a three-piece suit. very formal. mr. bush came to the door and in a t-shirt and said if you get out of that vest i will

we start with ronald reagan from 1988. [applause] you.dent reagan: thank [applause] thank you.plause] thank you very much. please. thank you all. i am delighted to be here. my, what a crowd. looks like the index of the book. [laughter] [applause] it is good to see norm, and your incoming president, jerry o'leary. in his book, jerry said used to fill his coat pockets with pastry. jerry denies it. just to be safe, i told him to keep his hands off my dinner roll. [laughter] larry also said that preparing me for a press conference was like reinventing the wheel. it is not true. i was around when the wheel was invented. and it was easier. [laughter] [applause] but even howard baker is writing a book about me. it is called "the measure of a president." [laughter] [applause] mike, in his book, said i had a short attention span. but letreply to that, us move on to something else. [laughter] [applause] now, i forgot to acknowledge jacob smirnov. i have heard him before. he is a very funny man. i just have an idea here. why don't you and i have a little fun? how would you like to go to t

reagan. he said please, let reagan win. he was so far behind reagan, by the time election took place, it was big victory, he easy victory for reagan. that is what happens. you aim your fire at that person. i have only done it once for hillary. that was two months ago, right? because of that bernie did well. i was best thing that ever happened to bernie because i hit her and bill so hard, when she used that phony little thing she said, that she -- >> donald trump speaking if rome new york, taking yet another swipe at the gop establishment, saying it is a rigged system and railing against what could be a contested gop convention in july. he is speaking to supporters in rome, utica, new york. this is about four hours north of new york city. this is upstate new york. a lot of manufacturing jobs lost. he brought up those numbers to the crowd. he knows the crowd. he knew what to say to get them riled up. he also again after, he calls him lyin' ted cruz. mr. trump swinging through new york. now upst

i doubt it because ronald reagan, ronald reagan was a very affable, he was always optimistic, morning in america. david: that's true. that's true. >> he was optimism. donald trump's message is negative. >> i'm somewhat with adolpho, one thing to keep in mind, hillary clinton is also extremely unfavorable. this may well be election where americans are faced with the choice between two candidates they have strongly unfavorable views between. may be the case you have a lot of voters stay in their own partisan camp even though they really dislike their own party's nominee. >> absolutely true. david: thank you both. appreciate it. melissa: lyin' ted, low energy jeb, little marco, who can forget those. just a few names donald trump has given rivals to the white house. he says he has another one waiting in the wings. >> you have a name picked out for hillary? >> we already used lyin', already used for ted. i think i have come up with a pretty good name. i have come up with pretty good names during the campaign. we have a pretty good one. we'll try it out here first in about a month. melissa:

"true reagan, what made ronald reagan great."and some people throwing his name around probably voted against him or would have if they were old enough to at the time. is who was true reagan? >> this is the book that tells the story reagan couldn't tell himself about who he was. he was a man who was completely buttoned up, he was a gentleman of an earlier age. he identified more with the founding fathers than the politicians of his era and their values and so he believed that his presidency was more about america than about ronald reagan. you know, he left the white house the same man he came in as and he had that saying on his desk "there's no limit to what a man can achieve if he doesn't care who gets the credit" so he never talked about himself. he kept it all inside. this is the book that reveals that mystery. i hear so many people saying i want to be like reagan, of course a lot of politicians want to win massively like reagan won massively but they don't understand what made the man. he never would have been the pantheon of

that help them get on the ticket with reagan. reagan was watching. he said i did know the guy could speak that well. it was because he read rehears rehearsed. >> we want a winner to lead our party to victory in the fall. the american people, regardless of party, want a winner in the white house after four years of jimmy carter fumbling, incompetent leadership. we have -- [cheers and applause] we have such a winner, and his name is ronald reagan. [cheers and applause] >> but every once in a while he would not persons between kosovo. the best speech in the world is delivered badly is about speech. sometimes a bad speech delivered very well is a good speech regardless of how badly written it is. delivery is a bottom line for me when i work with clients. one of the things i do so deliver the speech today before i let them look at it. so they can hear it first and then they can look at it. so they can see the rhythm, the phrasing because that's really important. when do you know when the speech doesn't work? it's usually pretty obvious. i'm lucky it rarel

and the reagan camp got very close on this. this new rule that they came up with where they were really trying to box ford in on this vice president thing, that rule had been passed by the rules committee the week before the convention but then it got to the convention floor and the whole thing fell apart. reagan adviser ed meese said it was basically curtains after that. "that was pretty much the end of our campaign until the end of president ford's acceptance." another reagan staffer said, "when we lost on that, we knew we were dead." so it was convention rule 16c that basically ended ronald reagan's bid for president in 1976. if the republican race this year does end up being decided at the convention, the rules will once again be cue. that's why candidates are hiring convention gurus who are going to understand how the rules get made and rules work. even though the rules themselves are malleable and will not get decided until the convention, itself. we've come to understand there are no set in stone rules for conventions, t