Word: speech
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Biden ridiculed Shultz's prepared remarks, suggesting that the Secretary's speech reminded him of the cries of "Go slow" that tried to put the brakes on the U.S. civil rights movement in the 1960s. Shultz, reading between the lines, said he "hated to hear a U.S. Senator call for violence." Biden erupted, his voice reaching heights of calculated fury. Jabbing the manuscript of Shultz's testimony with his index finger, he shouted, "I'm ashamed of this country that puts out a policy like this that says nothing, nothing! It says, 'Continue the same.' We put no timetable...
Missing from the speech was any sense that the Administration's touted reassessment of its South African policy had produced much of anything. That process began at a National Security Council meeting in June, after South Africa declared its current state of emergency, cracking down on dissent and the press. The President vented his frustration with the Administration's inability to articulate its South African policy. "I know what we're against," he said. "Can we state exactly what we're for down there?" But from the outset, there was the unshakable conviction that sanctions would only hurt those they...
After a ten-page draft of the speech written by Communications Director Pat Buchanan was circulated a week ago, State Department bureaucrats argued that it should be canceled. So did White House political operatives, and Chief of Staff Donald Regan eventually agreed. National Security Adviser John Poindexter, on the other hand, contended that even without concrete measures, the speech would put more pressure on Pretoria. A tentative decision had been made to scuttle the speech before Shultz arrived for a meeting with the President. The Secretary took Poindexter's side; he wanted a clear statement of support for the policies...
...more," he said afterward. "I had hoped the President would take this occasion for an extraordinary message to the world." Republican Senator Nancy Kassebaum of Kansas, a respected voice on African policy, seemed to speak for many fellow Republicans. "I was deeply disappointed with the President's speech," she said. "It gave no new direction." The day after the speech, in what could be described as a ritual sacrifice, Shultz testified for four hours in a crowded Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing room. The Secretary went out of his way to suggest that the Administration was not inflexible...
...going ahead with his speech when he had nothing new to say, Reagan fed Congress's appetite for acting on its own. Indeed, if the President is lagging behind the public parade on South Africa, Congress is out ahead. In June, the House passed by a voice vote a sweeping bill that calls for the U.S. and most American companies to withdraw their assets from South Africa. The amendment, sponsored by California Democrat Ronald Dellums, gives companies 180 days to pack up and leave, a withdrawal that would involve $1.3 billion in direct investment. New loans would be halted...