Reagan was dumb as a doorknob but had relatively capable staff to shepherd his legislative efforts through Congress and build links across the aisle (and also trade arms for hostages and get caught up in scandals). Carter and his staff was... less then capable at managing relations in Congress and also happened to get into scandal.
And supposedly, President Reagan got along great with Speaker O’Neill.
Perhaps it’s . . .
Always your brother you fight with the most! Maybe O’Neill and a lot of other Democrats expected President Carter to be an easy mark and to approve whatever pet protects they had.
PS President Reagan was sometimes legit hard-of-hearing. Other times he used it to his advantage and just pretended to be.
OMG!
page 187 —
View attachment 907542
Ouch!
So, President Carter viewed breakfast meetings with Tip and other leaders of Congress as a chance to “spell out his agenda” ? ! ?
It’s worse than I thought. Would require a Herculean effort on the part of Tip O’Neill to make this work.
You mean, was Carter used to having a passive Georgia legislature when he was Governor for one term from Jan. 1971 to Jan. ‘75?
