Word: contra
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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While Vice President George Bush still retains a big lead among Republicans as the first choice for his party's presidential nomination, he has been hurt by the Iran-contra scandal. Fully 48% of all Americans (and 34% of Republicans) believe Bush was more deeply involved in Iranscam than he has so far told the American public. Bush's favorable image among Republicans and independents has fallen from 68% to 63% since a similar TIME poll last May. In that survey, Bush and Kansas Senator Robert Dole had the same 68% favorable rating; Dole has since dropped...
...factions in the Iranian government was no more than a rationale concocted by CIA Director William Casey. Lieut. Colonel Oliver North was instrumental in persuading the President to proceed; North's boss, former National Security Adviser John Poindexter, was aware that Iran arms profits were being diverted to Nicaraguan contras. Casey, too, knew of the diversion weeks before he has claimed he was told. Yet Ronald Reagan seemed "surprised" to learn last November of the contra connection...
Knowing that the report would exonerate Reagan of complicity in the contra connection, the Administration had been pressuring the Intelligence Committee to make its findings public. Taking their cue from the White House, many Republican lawmakers were demanding immediate disclosure. Democratic Senators contended that the current draft was still incomplete and full of inconsistencies. Moreover, 13 Administration officials -- including members of the CIA and the NSC -- had been allowed to inspect the text, deleting portions they deemed diplomatically sensitive or dangerous to national security. And since neither North nor Poindexter would testify, the findings were far from complete. Said...
...There are in fact contradictions and gaps in the draft version that was leaked. But the report does clarify some of the details of how the Iran- contra affair evolved. In December 1985, for instance, several of Reagan's top aides argued against sending U.S. arms to Iran. But, the report says, North may have won Reagan over with a memo warning, "If the program is terminated, then the hostages will...
...advanced by hard-liners. One group is urging that Reagan both announce he is moving toward early deployment of his Strategic Defense Initiative and greatly increase pressure on the Marxist Sandinistas in Nicaragua. The Central American initiative would mean asking for a huge increase in U.S. aid to the contra rebels and assigning American ground troops to support the guerrillas. "That would focus public debate on something useful to the country," says one adviser...