Lawmakers April 21 1983
Lawmakers April 21 1983
Lawmakers 4/21/1983
Lawmakers April 21 1983
DO NOT USE WETA Credit
Lawmakers April 21 1983
DO NOT USE sponsor credits
Lawmakers April 21 1983
Title sequence
Lawmakers April 21 1983
Paul Duke, Linda Wertheimer, and Cokie Roberts. Topics on program: Reagan takes defeats on tax policy and budget in Senate. Foreign policy a preoccupation in Congress. Beirut embassy bombing has Congress demanding more consultation on Lebanon policy. Foreign policy with Senator Nancy Landon Kassebaum (R - Kansas).
Lawmakers April 21 1983
Paul Duke introduces Linda Wertheimer with a report on Congress examining the MX missile programs. Reagan is advocating a basing program for the MX missile that constitutes a compromise with Congress.
Lawmakers April 21 1983
President Ronald Reagan at White House at podium, For more than a decade, each of four administrations made proposals for arms control and modernization. Unfortunately, each became embroiled in political controversy. The members of the Commission, the Secretary of Defense, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and I have all had to take fresh looks at our previous positions. But despite the wide range of views these groups have held in the past, we now have a program that has our unanimous support.
Lawmakers April 21 1983
Representative Robert H. Michel (R - Illinois) exiting White House. Michel says about the MX missile plan, As any one of any number of members in there can say, it s certainly not everything I would have liked to have, but taking all the arguments on balance, this is the best we can do.
Lawmakers April 21 1983
Representative Les Aspin (D - Wisconsin) says about the MX missile plan, It s very much like the Social Security issue in that regard - there is no good solution. You re really asking a question of is there something that is the least bad solution that is politically acceptable with enough people so that we can get it passed and get it through our bizarre system of government of checks and balances.
Lawmakers April 21 1983
Secretary of State George Shultz and Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger sitting at table to testify for Senate Committee. Weinberger testifying about the MX missile controversy, We have frequently embraced different solutions to this problem, all of us. But we all nevertheless shared the belief that if we looked long and hard we would find a single perfect solution and that that would be revealed. But now I think it is clear that this was an illusion.
Lawmakers April 21 1983
Secretary of State George Shultz testifying about the MX missile controversy, The question of how to modernize our strategic forces has been hotly debated for years now. The time has come to resolve it. As the Commission has shown us, it can only be accomplished if Americans of both parties work together with the attitude that we are partners on a common enterprise.
Lawmakers April 21 1983
Senator John Tower (R - Texas), Chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee on panel about MX missile, Indeed I am on record as having strenuously advocated the adoption of the very alternative General Scowcroft and he colleagues stated they would prefer under different circumstances. However, present circumstances being what they are, I feel compelled to concur in the bipartisan recommendations of the Scowcroft commission which has been adopted by the President.
Lawmakers April 21 1983
Senator Henry Jackson (D - Washington) about MX missile, I ve always felt that the Russians don t mark their missiles R for Republicans or D for Democrats. There has been a tradition in this country since the days of Franklin Roosevelt, that in the area of national security, Mr. Chairman, it requires the best input from our two great political parties.
Lawmakers April 21 1983
Senate Armed Services Committee meeting. Senator Carl Levin (D - Michigan) says about MX missile, Although this proposal doesn t close the window of vulnerability, although we ve been told over and over again by this administration and others, and by experts that nonsurviving warheads increase instability. The nonsurviving warheads add little deterrent. Despite all that, it is now being proposed that we spend $15 billion to install such a system. I believe it turns logic on its head.
Lawmakers April 21 1983
Senator J. James Exon (D - Nebraska) says about MX missile, It s astonishing to me that the committee may reverse its position in view of the overwhelming evidence previously before us that the MX should not be deployed without some chance of survivability. That might satisfy the supposedly wonderful bipartisan consensus but that does not necessarily guarantee that such a course of action will really enhance the national security interest of the United States and the Free World.
Lawmakers April 21 1983
Paul Duke and Linda Wertheimer discuss MX missile debate and nuclear arms. It's hard to refuse a compromise offered by Reagan.