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PASTOR GENERAL
1
S REPORT, JULY 27, 1984
PAGE 7
ON THE WORLD SCENE
CAMPAIGN
"gettin'
election
in which
come out
UNDERWAY; GENDER GAPS (TWO OF THEM) The presidential campaign is
serious" in the United States, leading up to the most pivotal
in many years. After the Democratic convention in San Francisco,
he was the focus of many personal attacks, President Reagan has
swinging. Here is a report from the July 26 ASSOCIATED PRESS:
A combative President Reagan, proclaiming "the election year has
begun,".•.complained that the Democrats were casting him as the
villain in a monster movie. "In 1980, they tried to make me
'Reagan the Barbarian.
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This year, it looks like the sequel is
'Reagan the Destroyer,'" he said. "Do you get the feeling--I do
--that they don
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t like me very much?" he asked in remarks pre
pared for delivery at a rally in a wealthy Republican enclave 12
miles north of Atlanta.
On the second leg of a trip designed to grab the political spot
light away from Democrats, the president also issued a fresh ap
peal to conservative Democrats to leave a party he contended has
become too liberal for mainstream Americans.
"Yours has been a great party," the president declared. "I was a
Democrat too, and I supported and campaigned for Franklin Roose
velt and Harry Truman because they were for a strong America, a
fair and decent America that would not shrink from its responsi
bilities in the world•••. But I think the current leadership of
the Democratic party.••went all the way to San Francisco and then
turned left," he contended.
"And they went � far left, they
have left the mainstream."•••
"Four years ago, a tyrant held our diplomats hostage," he de
clared. "Four years ago, our defense had deteriorated•••• Four
years ago, the Soviets took the free nation of Afghanistan for
their own. American prestige seemed like a memory. Well, four
years later America is a very different place. And the Democrats
keep saying it
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s my fault•••• Well, they've talked me into it.
I
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ll take the blame," he concluded.
At the Democratic convention, much attention was paid by the media to the
admittedly rousing speeches delivered by Governor Mario Cuomo of New York
and Jesse Jackson. There was precious little commentary on the full nature
of the content of their addresses, probably because most members of the
media fundamentally agreed with what was said. It took columnist Patrick
Buchanan (WASHINGTON TIMES, July 20) to dissect what these two up-and
coming powers of the Democratic Party really said.
Listening to the harangues at this convention, it is easy to
understand why Democrats object vehemently to President Reagan's
depiction of the Soviet Union as the "focus of evil in the world
today." To this convention assembled, the focus of evil today is
occupying the Oval Office••••
Consider Mario Cuomo's passionate polemic against Mr. Reagan,
which unleashed a pent-up river of enthusiasm from party and
press alike. Under Ronald Reagan, Mr. Cuomo declared, America