[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 16]
[House]
[Page 23731]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



     PROTECTING THE AMERICAN PEOPLE, PART OF RONALD REAGAN'S DREAM

  (Mr. ROHRABACHER asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, back in the 1980's I had the honor of 
being one of Ronald Reagan's speech writers and worked with him closely 
in developing some of the ideas that were under attack then but 
nowadays seem to have come to fruition. And it is difficult for me to 
come here today and to just especially in light of what Edmond Morris 
has written about the President and is writing about the President, 
saying about President Reagan, but I think we should all remember that 
Ronald Reagan had a vision and set America in motion to do things that 
have put us in an era of prosperity and an era of peace.
  I was there when Ronald Reagan, for example, launched the program 
aimed at developing a missile defense system for the United States of 
America. Everybody said that it could not be done. He was ridiculed. He 
wanted a system that, if someone were shooting a missile at us were 
armed with an atomic bomb, a nuclear warhead, that we could have 
protected from that, thus saving millions of Americans. And they said 
it could not be done. They ridiculed him, and of course this weekend I 
am proud to announce that we have had another successful test of an 
anti-missile system to protect the American people, part of Ronald 
Reagan's dream.

                          ____________________