Moscow State University: President Reagan's Address at Moscow State University - 5/31/88

[Applause] [Music] [Applause] well thank you reor lagunov and I want to thank all of you very much for a very warm welcome it's a great pleasure to be here at Moscow State University and I want to thank you all for turning out I know you must be very busy this week studying and taking your final examinations so let me just sayu vam USA [Applause] [Music] [Applause] Nancy couldn't make it today because she's visiting Leningrad which she tells me is a very beautiful city but she too says hello and wishes you all good luck let me say it's also a great pleasure to once again have this opportunity to speak directly to the people of the Soviet Union before I left Washington I received many heartfelt letters and telegrams asking me to carry here a simple message perhaps but also one of the most important business of this Summit it is a message of peace and Good Will and hope for a growing friendship and closeness between our two peoples as you know I've come to mind Moscow to meet with one of your most distinguished graduates in this our fourth summit General Secretary gorbachov and I have spent many hours together and I feel that we're getting to know each other well our discussions of course have been focused primarily on many of the important issues of the day issues I want to touch on with you in a few moments but first I want to take a little time to talk to you much as I would to any group of University students in the United States I want to talk not just of the realities of today but of the possibilities of Tomorrow standing here before a mural of your Revolution I want to talk about a very different Revolution that is taking place right now quietly sweeping the globe without Bloodshed or conflict its effects are peaceful but they will fundamentally alter our world world shatter old assumptions and reshape Our Lives it's easy to underestimate because it's not accompanied by banners or Fanfare it's been called the technological or information revolution and as its emblem one might take the tiny silicon chip no bigger than a fingerprint one of these chips has more computing power than a room full of old computers as part of an exchange program we now have an exhibition touring your country that shows how information technology is Transforming Our Lives replacing manual labor with robots forecasting weather for Farmers or mapping the genetic code of DNA for medical researchers these micro computers today Aid the design of everything from from houses to cars to spacecraft they even design better and faster computers they can translate English into Russian or enable the blind to read or help Michael Jackson produce on one synthesizer the sounds of a whole Orchestra linked by a network of satellites and Fiber Optic Cables one individual with a desktop computer and a telephone commands resources unavailable to the largest governments just a few years ago like a chrysalis we're emerging from the economy of the Industrial Revolution an economy confined to and limited by the Earth's physical resources into as one Economist titled his book the economy in mind in which there are no bounds on human imagination and the freedom to create is the most precious natural resour Source think of that little computer chip its value isn't in the sand from which it is made but in the microscopic architecture designed into it by ingenious human minds or take the example of the satellite relaying this broadcast around the world which replaces thousands of tons of copper mined from the earth and molded into wire in the new economy human invention increasingly makes physical resources obsolete we are breaking through the material conditions of existence to a world where man creates his own destiny even as we explore the most advanced reaches of science we're returning to the age-old wisdom of our culture a wisdom contained of in the book of The Genesis in the Bible in the beginning was the spirit and it was from this spirit that the material abundance of creation issued forth but progress is not for ordained the key is freedom freedom of thought Freedom of Information freedom of communication the renowned scientist scholar and founding father of this University mik linosa knew that it is common knowledge he said that the achievements of science are considerable and Rapid particularly once the Yoke of slavery is cast off and replaced by the freedom of philosophy you know one of the first contacts between your country and mine took place between Russian and American explorers the Americans were members of Cook's last Voyage on an expedition searching for an Arctic Passage on the island of unalaska They Came Upon the Russians who took them in and together with the native inhabitants held a prayer service on the ice the explorers of the modern era are the entrepreneurs men with vision with the courage to take risks and faith enough to Brave the unknown these entrepreneurs and their small Enterprises are responsible for almost all the e economic growth in the United States they are the prime movers of the technological revolution in fact one of the largest personal computer firms in the United States was started by two college students no older than you in the garage behind their home some people even in my own country look at the riot of experiment that is the free market and see only waste what of all the entrepreneurs that fail well many do particularly the successful ones often several times and if you ask them the secret of their success they'll tell you it's all that they learned in their struggles along the way yes it's what they learned from failing like an athlete in competition or a scholar in pursuit of the truth experience is the greatest teacher and that's why it's so hard for government planners no matter how sophisticated to ever substitute for millions of individuals working night and day to make their dreams come true the fact is bureaucracies are a problem around the world there's an old story about a town it could be anywhere with a bureaucrat who was known to be a good for nothing but he somehow had always hung on to power so one day in a town meeting an old woman got up and said to him there is a folk Legend here where I come from that when a baby is born an angel comes down from heaven and kisses it on one part of its body if the angel kisses him on his hand he becomes a handyman if he kisses him on his forehead he becomes bright and clever and I've been trying to figure out where the angel kissed you so that you should sit there for so long and do [Music] nothing we are seeing the power of economic freedom spreading around the world places such as the Republic of Korea Singapore Taiwan have vaulted into the technological era barely ly pausing in the Industrial Age along the way low tax agricultural policies in the subcontinent mean that in some years India is now a next a net exporter of food perhaps most exciting are the winds of chains that are blowing over the People's Republic of China where one quarter of the world's population is now getting its first taste of economic freedom at the same time the growth of democracy has become one of the most powerful political movements of our age in Latin America in the 1970s only a third of the population lived under democratic government today over 90% does in the Philippines in the Republic of Korea free contested Democratic elections are the order of the day throughout the world free markets are the model for growth the democracy is the standard by which governments are measured we Americans make no secret of our belief in Freedom in fact it's something of a national Pastime every four years the American people choose a new president and 1988 is one of those years at one point there were 13 major candidates running in the two major parties not to mention all the others including the Socialist and libertarian candidates all trying to get my job about a, local television stations 8,500 radio stations and 1,700 daily newspapers each one an independent private Enterprise fiercely independent of the government report on the candidates Grill them in interviews and bring them together for debates in the end the people vote they decide who will be the next president but Freedom doesn't begin or end with elections go to any American town to take just an example and you will see dozens of churches representing many different beliefs in many places synagogues and mosques and you will see families of every conceivable nationality worshiping together go into any school room and there you will see children being taught the de decaration of Independence that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights among them life liberty and the pursuit of happiness that no government can justly deny the guarantees in their constitution for freedom of speech freedom of assembly and freedom of religion go into any courtroom and there will provide preside an independent judge beholden to no government power there every defendant has the right to a trial by a jury of his peers usually 12 men and women common citizens they are the ones the only ones who weigh the evidence and decide on guilt or innocence in that Court the accused is innocent until proven guilty and the word of a policeman or any official has no greater legal standing than the word of the accused go to any University campus and there you'll find an open sometimes heated discussion of the problems in American society and what can be done to correct them turn on the television and you will see the legislature conducting the business of government right there before the camera debating and voting on the legislation that will become the law of the land March in any demonstration and there are many of them the people's right of assembly is guaranteed in the Constitution and protected by the police go into any Union Hall where the members know their right to strike is protected by law as a matter of fact one of the many jobs I had before this one was being president of a union The Screen Actors Guild I led my union out on strike and I'm proud to say we won but freedom is more even than this freedom is the right to question and change the established way of doing things it is the continuing revolution of the marketplace it is the understanding that allows us to recognize shortcomings and seek Solutions it is the right to put forth an idea scoffed at by the experts and watch it catch fire among the people it is the right to stick to dream to follow your dream or stick to your country conscience even if you're the only one in a sea of doubters freedom is the recognition that no single person no single Authority or government has a monopoly on the truth but that every individual life is infinitely precious that every one of us put on this world has been put there for a reason and has something to offer America is a nation made up of hundreds of nationalities our ties to you are more than ones of good feeling they're ties of kinship in America you'll find Russians Armenians ukrainians peoples from Eastern Europe and Central Asia they come from every part of this vast continent from every continent to live in harmony seeking a place where each cultural heritage is respected each is valued for its diverse strengths and Beauties and the richness it brings to our lives recently a few individuals and families have been allowed to visit relatives in the west we can only hope that it won't be long before all are allowed to do so and Ukrainian Americans Baltic Americans Armenian Americans can freely visit their homelands just as this Irish American visits his freedom it has been said makes people selfish and materialistic but Americans are one of the most religious peoples on Earth because they know that Liberty just as life itself is not earned but a gift from God they seek to share that gift with the world reason and experience said George Washington in his farewell address both forbid us to expect that National morality can Prevail in exclusion of religious principle and it is sub substantially true that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government democracy is less a system of government than it is a system to keep government limited unintrusive a system of constraints on power to keep politics and government secondary to the important things in life the true sources of value found only in family and faith but I hope you know I go on about these things not simply to extol the virtues of my own country but to speak to the true greatness of the heart and soul of your land who after all needs to tell the land of dfki about The Quest For Truth the home of Kandinsky and scriabin about imagination the rich and Noble culture of the the USC man of letters alisher navo about beauty and heart the great culture of your diverse land speaks with a glowing passion to all Humanity let me cite one of the most eloquent contemporary passages on human Freedom it comes not from the literature of America but from this country from one of the greatest writers of the 20th century Boris pastor in the novel Dr zvago he writes I think that if the Beast who sleeps in man could be held down by threats any kind of threat whether of jail or of Retribution after death then the highest emblem of humanity would be the lion tamer in the circus with his whip not the prophet who sacrificed himself but this is just the point what has for centri CES raised man above the me Beast is not the cudel but an inward music the irresistible power of unarmed truth the irresistible power of unarmed truth today the world looks expectedly to signs of change steps toward greater freedom in the Soviet Union we watch as and we hope as we see positive changes taking place there are some I know in your Society who fear that change will bring only disruption and discontinuity who fear to embrace the hope of the future sometimes it takes Faith it's like that scene in the cowboy movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid which some here in Moscow recently had a chance to see the posi is closing in in the two Outlaws Butch and Sundance who find themselves trapped on the edge of a Cliff with a sheer drop of hundreds of feet to the Raging Rapids below Butch turns to Sundance and says their only hope is to jump into the river below but Sundance refuses he says he'd rather fight it out with the posi even though they're hopelessly outnumbered but says that's suicide and urges him to jump but Sundance still refuses and finally admits I can't swim Butch breaks up laughing and says you crazy fool the fall will probably kill you by the way both Butch and Sundance made it in case you didn't see the movie I think what I've just been talking about is paroa and what its goals are but change would not mean rejection of the past like a tree growing strong through the seasons rooted in the earth and drawing life from the Sun so too positive change must be rooted in Traditional Values in the land in culture in family in community and it must take its life from the Eternal things from the source of all life which is Faith such change will lead to new understandings new opportunities to a broader future in which the tradition is not supplanted but Finds Its full flowering that is the future beckoning to your generation at the same time we should remember that reform that is not institutionalized will always be insecure such Freedom will always be looking over its shoulder a bird on a tether no matter how long the Rope can always be pulled back and that is why in my conversation with General Secretary gorbachov I have spoken of how important it is to institutionalize change to put guarantees on reform and we've been talking together about one sad reminder of a divided world the Berlin Wall it's time to remove the barriers that keep people apart I'm proposing an increased Exchange program of high school students between our countries General Secretary gorbachov mentioned on Sunday a wonderful phrase you have in Russian for this better to see something once than to hear about it a hundred times Mr gorbachov and I first began working on this in 1985 in our discussion today we agreed on working up to several thousand exchanges a year from each country in the near future but not everyone can travel across the continents and oceans words travel lighter and that's why we'd like to make available to this country more of our 11,000 magazines and periodicals and our television and radio shows that can be beamed off a satellite in seconds nothing would please us more than for the Soviet people to get to know us better and to understand our way of life just a few years ago few would have imagined the progress our two Nations have made together the INF treaty which general secretary gorbachov and I signed last December in Washington and whose instruments of ratification we will exchange tomorrow the first true nuclear arms reduction treaty in history calling for the elimination of an entire class of US and Soviet nuclear missiles and just 16 days ago we saw the beginning of your withdrawal from Afghanistan which gives us hope that soon the fighting may end and the healing May begin and that that suffering country may find self-determination unity and peace at long last it's my fervent hope that our constructive cooperation on these issues will be carried on to address the continuing destruction of conflicts in many regions of the globe and that the serious discussions that led to the Geneva accords on Afghanistan will help lead to Solutions in southern Africa Ethiopia Cambodia the Persian Gulf and Central America I have often said Nations do not distrust each other because they are armed they are armed because they distrust each other if this globe is to live in peace and prosper if it is to embrace all the possibilities of the technological Revolution ution then Nations must renounce once and for all the right to an expansionist foreign policy peace between nations must be an enduring goal not a tactical stage in a continuing conflict I've been told that there's a popular song in your country perhaps you know it whose evocative refrain asks the question do the Russians want a war in answer it says go ask that silence lingering in the air above the Birch and popler there beneath those trees the soldiers lie go ask my mother ask my wife then you will have to ask no more do the Russians want a war but what of your one-time allies what of those embra who embraced you on the Elba what if we to ask the watery Graves of the Pacific or the European battlefields where America's fall and were buried far from home what if we were to ask their mothers sisters and Sons do Americans want war ask us to and you'll find the same answer the same longing in every heart people do not make Wars governments do and no mother would ever ever willingly sacrifice her sons for territorial gain for economic advantage for ideology a people free to choose will always choose peace Americans seek always to make friends of old antagonists after a colonial Revolution with Britain we have cemented for all ages the ties of kinship between our Nations after a terrible civil war between North and South we healed our wounds and found true Unity as a nation we fought two world wars in my lifetime against Germany and one with Japan but now the Federal Republic of Germany and Japan are two of our closest allies and Friends some people point to the trade disputes between us as a sign of strain but there the frictions of all families and the family of free Nations is a big and vital and sometimes boisterous one I can tell you that nothing would please my heart more than in my life time to see American and Soviet diplomats grappling with the problem of trade disputes between America and a growing exuberant exporting Soviet Union that had opened up to economic freedom and growth and as important as these official peopl to- people exchanges are nothing would please me more than for them to become unnecessary to see travel between East and West become so routine that University students in the Soviet Union could take a month off in the summer and just like students in the west do now put packs on their backs and travel from country to country in Europe and with barely a passport check in between nothing would please me more than to see the day that a concert promoter in say England could call up a Soviet rock group without going through any government agency and have them playing in Liverpool next night is this just a dream perhaps but it is a dream that is our responsibility to have come true your generation is living in one of the most exciting hopeful times in Soviet history it is a time when the first breath of Freedom stirs the air and the heart beats to The Accelerated rhythm of Hope when the accumulated spiritual energies of alongside vience yearn to break free I am reminded of the famous passage near the end of goal's dead so Souls comparing his Nation to a speeding triker gogul asks what will be its destination but he writes there was no answer save the bell pouring forth marvelous sound we do not know what the conclusion of this will be of this journey but we're hopeful that the promise of Reform will be fulfilled in this Moscow spring this May 1988 we may be allowed that hope that freedom like the fresh green sapling planted over tolstoy's grave will Blossom forth at last in the rich fertile soil of your people and culture we may be allowed to hope that the marvelous sound of a new openness will keep Rising through ringing through leading to a new world of reconciliation friendship and peace thank you all very much and D vasod God bless you [Music] [Applause] thank [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] you [Applause] [Music] [Applause] uh dear friends Mr President has kindly agreed to answer your question but since he doesn't have too much time only 15 minutes so those who uh have questions please ask them [Music] this is a student from the history faculty and and he says that uh he would very he's happy to welcome you on behalf of the students of the university and uh the first question is that the Improvement in the relations between the two countries have come about during your tenure as president and in this regard he would like to ask the following question uh it is very important uh to get a handle on the question of arms control and specifically the limitation of strategic arms do you think that it will be possible for you and the general secretary to get a treaty on the limitation of strategic arms during the time that you are still president well the Arms Treaty that is being negotiated now is the so-called start treaty and it is based on taking the intercontinental ballistic missiles and reducing them by half down to parity between our two countries now this is a much more complicated treaty than the INF treaty the intermediate range treaty which we have signed and which our two governments have ratified and is now in effect so there are many things still to be settled that you and we have had negotiators in Geneva for months working on various points of this treaty once we had hoped that maybe like the INF treaty we would have been able to sign it here at this Summit meeting uh it is not completed there are still some points that are being debated we are both hopeful that it can be uh finished before I leave office which is in the coming January but I assure you that if it isn't I assure you that I will have impressed on my successor that we must carry on until it is signed my dream has always been that once we've started down this road we can look forward to a day you can look forward to a day when there will no be no more nuclear weapons in the world at all Al let be sure for if you like I can interpret the question is the uh universities uh influence public opinion and uh the student wonders how the uh youths have changed uh since the days when you were students up till now wait a minute how you have changed since the era of my own youth or uh how just students have changed the youths have changed you were a student at your time they were uh one type now they have changed well I know there was a period in our country when there was a very great change for the worst when I was governor of California I could start a riot just by going to a campus but that has all changed and uh I could be looking out at an American student body as well as I'm looking out here and would not be able to tell the difference between you uh I think that back in our day I did happen to go to school get my college education in a unique time it was the time of the Great Depression when in a country like our own there was 25% unemployment the bottom seemed to fall out of everything but U we had I think what maybe I should be telling you from my point here because I graduated in 1932 uh that I should tell you that when you get to be my age you're going to be surprised how much you recall the feelings you had in these days here and that uh how easy it is to understand the young people because of your own having been young once you know an awful lot more about being young than you do about being old and uh I think there is a seriousness I think there's a sense of responsibility that young people have and I think that there's an awareness on on the part of most of you about what you want the your adulthood to be and what the country you live in you want it to be and I have a great deal of faith I said the other day to 708 76 students they were half American and half Russian they had held a conference here and in Finland and then in the United States and I faced them just the other day and I had to say I couldn't tell the difference looking at them which were which but I said one line to them I said if I believe that if all the young people of the world today could get to know each other there would never be another war and I think that of you I think that of the other students that I've addressed in other in other plac places and of course I know also that you're young and uh therefore there are certain things that uh at times take precedence I'll illustrate one myself 25 years after I graduated my alma mat brought me back to the school and gave me an honorary degree and I had to tell them they compounded a sense of guilt I had nursed for 25 years because I always thought the first degree they gave me was honorary you're great carry [Music] [Applause] [Music] on uh Mr President you have uh just mentioned that uh you welcome uh the efforts aimed at the settlement of the uh aghani questions and it might uh promote the settlement of other Regional uh confs what conflicts do you needan Central American conflict Southeast Asian or uh South Africa uh I am grateful in advance for your well for example in South Africa where Nam Namibia has been promised its independence as an Nation another new African nation but it is impossible because of a civil war going on in another country there and that Civil War is being fought on one side by some 30 to 40,000 Cuban troops who have gone from the Americas over there and are fighting on one side uh with one kind of authoritative government when that country was freed from being a colony and given its independence one faction seized power and made itself the government of that nation and leaders of another seemingly majority of the people had wanted simply the people to have the right to choose the government that they would that they wanted and that is the Civil War that is going on but what we believe is that that those foreign soldiers should get out and let them settle it let them the citizens of that Nation settle their problems and the same is true in in well in Nicaragua Nicaragua has been Nicaragua made a promise they had a dictator there was a revolution there was an organization uh that and was aided by others in the revolution and they appealed to the organization of American states for help in getting the dictator to step down Stop The Killing and he did but the organization of American states had asked what are the goals of the Revolution and they were given in writing and they were the goals of a pluralistic society of the right of of unions and freedom of speech and press and so forth and free elections a pluralistic society and then the one group that was the best organized among the revolutionaries seized power exiled many of the other leaders and has its own government which violated every one of the promises that had been made and here again we want we're trying to encourage the giving back those or the making those promises come true and letting the people of that particular country uh decide their their fate student from the facy of journalist uh esteemed Mr President I'm very much anxious and concerned about the destiny of 310 Soviet soldiers uh being missing in Afghanistan can you and are you willing to help in their Surge and their return to the mother very much so we would like nothing like nothing better than that uh as student from the law faculty the realization of the alen unalienable rights of citizens uh guaranteed by the Constitution uh faces certain problems for example uh the right of uh people to uh have arms or for example uh the problem uh appears an evil appears uh whether uh spread of pornography or narcotics is compatible with these rights do you believe that these problems are just are unavoid unavoidable uh problems connected with democracy or they could be avoided well if I understand you correctly this is this is a question about the inalienable rights of the people does that include the right to do criminal acts and um U for example in the use of drugs and so forth uh [Music] no no we have a set of laws I think what is significant and different about our system is that every country has a constitution and most constitutions or practically all of the Constitutions in the world are documents in which the government tells the people what the people can do our constitution is different and the difference is in three words it almost escapes everyone the three words are we the people our constitution is a document in which we the people tell the government what its powers are and it can have no powers other than those listed in that document but very carefully at the same time the people give the government the power with regard to those things which they think would be destructive to society to the family to the individual and so forth infringements on their rights and thus the government can enforce the laws but they that has all been dictated by the people [Music] questioning [Music] I wish I your language uh Mr President from history I know that people who have been connected with great power with big posts uh say goodbye leave these posts with great difficulty since your term of office is coming to an end uh what sentiments do you experience and whether you feel like if hypothetically you can uh just uh stay for another term well I'll tell you something it was um I think it was a kind of a revenge against Franklin Delano Roosevelt who was elected four times the only President there had kind of grown a tradition in our country about two terms that tradition was started by Washington our first president only because there was great talk at the formation of our country that we might become a monarchy and we had just freed ourselves from a monarchy so when the second term was over George Washington stepped down and said he would do it stepping down so that there would not get to be the kind of idea of an inherited aristocracy well succeeding presidents many of them didn't get a chance at second term and they did one term and were gone but uh that tradition kind of remained but it was just a tradition and then Roosevelt ran the four times died died very early in his fourth term and suddenly in the atmosphere at that time they added an amendment to the Constitution that presidents could only serve two terms when I get out of office I can't do this while I'm in office because it'll look if I'm selfishly doing it for myself when I get out of office I'm going to travel around what I call the mashed potato circuit that is the after dinner speaking and the speaking to luncheon groups and so forth I'm going to travel around and try to convince the people of our country that they should wipe out that amendment to the Constitution because it was an interference with the Democratic rights of the people the people should be allowed to vote for who they wanted to vote for for as many times as they want to vote for him and that it is they who are being denied a right but you see I will no longer be president then so I can I can do that and talk for that there are a few other things I'm going to try to uh convince the people to impress upon our Congress the things that should be done I've always described it that if if in Hollywood when I was there if you didn't sing or dance you wound up as an after dinner speaker and uh I didn't sing or dance so uh I have a hunch that I will be out on the speaking circuit telling about a few things that I didn't get done in government but urging the people to tell the Congress they wanted them done is [Applause] that a student from the biological faculty Mr President I heard that a group of American Indians have come here because they couldn't meet you uh in the United States of America if uh you fail to meet them here will you be able to improve to correct it and to meet them back in United States I didn't know that they had asked to see me if if they've come here or whether to see them there i' be I'd be very happy to see them uh let me tell you just a little something about the American Indian In Our Land we have provided millions of acres of land for what I call the preservations or the reservations I should say they they from the beginning announced that they wanted to maintain their way of life as they had always lived there in the desert in the plains and so forth and we set up these reservations so they could and have a Bureau of Indian Affairs to help take care of them at the same time we provide education for them schools on the reservations and they are free also to leave the reservations and be American citizens among the rest of us and many do some still prefer however that way of that early way of life and we've done everything we can to meet their demands as to what they how they want to live uh maybe we made a mistake maybe we should not have humored him in that wanting to stay in that kind of primitive lifestyle maybe we should have said no come join us be citizens uh along with the rest of us as I say many have many have been very successful and uh I'm very pleased to to meet with them talk with them at any time and see what their grievances are or what they feel they might be you'd be surprised some of them became very wealthy because some of those reservations uh were overlaying great pools of oil and you can get very rich pumping oil and uh so I don't know what their complaint might be [Music] yes for Mr President uh I'm very much tantalized since yesterday evening by the question why did you receive yesterday uh did you receive and where did you invite yesterday uh just refusing so dissident and the second part of the question is uh just what are your impressions from Soviet people and among these uh just dissents you have uh invited a former collaborator with the fascists who was a policeman serving for fascists well think that's one I don't know about or maybe the information is hasn't been all given out on that but you have to understand that Americans come from every corner of the world I received a letter from a man that calls something to my attention recently he said you can go to live in France but you cannot become a Frenchman you can go to live in Germany you cannot become a German or a Turk or a Greek or whatever but he said anyone from any corner of the world can come to live in America and become an American you have to realize that we are a people that have made up of every strain nationality and race of the world and the result is that when people in our country think someone is being mistreated or treated unjustly uh in another country these are people who still feel that kinship to that country because that is their Heritage in America whenever you meet someone new and become friends one of the first things you tell each other is what your bloodline is for example I when I'm asked I have to say Irish English and Scotch English and scotch on my mother's side Irish on my father's side but uh all of them have that well when you take unto yourself a wife you do not stop loving your mother so there in Americans all feel a kind of a kinship to that country that their parents or their grandparents or even some great-grandparents came from you don't lose that that contact so what I have come and what I have brought to the general secretary and I must say he has been very Cooperative about I have brought lists of names that have been brought to me that are from people that are relatives or friends that know that they or believe that this individual is being mistreated here in this country and they want him to be allowed to immigrate to our country uh some are separated families uh one that I met in this the other day was born in the same time I was he um was born of Russian parents who had uh moved to uh uh America or way back in the early 1900s and he was born in 1911 and then sometime later the family moved back to Russia now he's grown has a son he's an American citizen but they wanted to go back to America and they're being denied on the grounds that well they can go back to America but his son married a Russian young lady and they want to keep her from going back well the whole family said no we're not going to leave her alone here she's a member of the family now back well that that kind of a case is brought to me personally so I bring it to the general secretary and as I say I must say he has been most helpful and most agreeable about correcting these things now I'm not blaming you I'm blaming bureaucracy we have the same type of thing happen in our own country and every once in a while somebody has to get the bureaucracy by the neck and shake it loose and say stop doing what you're doing and um this is this is the type of thing and the names that we have brought and it is a list of names all of which have been brought to me personally by either relatives or or close friends and Associates thank you very [Music] much you were all very kind I thank you very much and I hope I answered the questions correctly nobody asked me what it was going to feel like to not be president anymore uh I have some understanding because after I'd been governor for 8 years and then stepped down I want to tell you what it's like we'd only been home a few days and someone invited us out to dinner Nancy and I both went out got in the back seat of the car and waited for somebody to get in the front and drive us toind staying in Moscow we would like to congratulate you with a souvenir depicting to Moscow oh that is beautiful thank you very much thank [Music] you thank [Music] you [Music] [Applause] only

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Length: 62min 27sec (3747 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 21 2009