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to reach it. But there's lots to be cut in the federal budget that we could do with less programs. I'm not suggesting that Ronald Reagan -- and I said that to them -- knows really what to do. “And he's a man,” as I put it, “of very modest intelligence, and I certainly would not support his being in a position of authority. I think he isn't capable. But I'm not one of those who condemns him because he made that proposal.”

In the same way they condemned McGovern. I don't happen to like McGovern. I told them that, too. I voted for the guy, I don't like him, what are you going to do? He made that proposal of $1000 a year for every family of four. I said, “We've done something like that. In the last tax rebate we gave people a refund on taxes when they had paid no taxes at all. It's a negative income tax concept. I didn't hear anybody yelling at that time.” And then I said, “The best illustration would be Charlie Wilson of GM when he said, ‘What's good for GM is good for the country.’ When you think about it, what's wrong with that statement?” I said, “But the papers, the editorial writers, decided they were going to get him and they read things into that statement that made him look silly.” And I said, “I knocked hell out of Charlie Wilson at the time, too. It's good politics. But in truth, it's not a bad statement.”

The original statement actually added the words, “and vice versa.”