MEETING WITH THE PRESIDENT AND NON-WASHINGTON EDITORS AND NEWS DIRECTORS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000101020060-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 28, 2010
• Sequence Number: 60
• Publication Date: January 29, 1980
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/28: CIA-RDP90-00552R000101020060-3 1980
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NON-PARTICIPANTS UNTIL
3:00 P.M., WEDNESDAY,
JANUARY 30, 1980
Meeting with the President
and
Non-Washington Editors and News Directors
(AT 2:02 P.M. EST)
STAT
THE PRESIDENT: First of all, let me welcome you to the
White House. I know you have had a good briefing this morning and
have some more scheduled for this afternoon. The most important thing,
I think, that has happened in the last two days has been my submission
to the Congress of a very tight budget for fiscal year 1981. This is
a budget that cuts the deficit substantially,75 percent below what it
was when I was elected President. As a matter of fact, when I came
into office the deficit was about 4.6 percent of the gross national
product, and the 1981 fiscal year budget has reduced that 4.6 percent
down to six-tenths of one percent.
This has been in spite of severe-pressures to continue
wasteful spending in our country. As a matter of fact, the House is
now considering a very wasteful inflationary pork barrel water
projects bill which would cost the taxpayers about 54.3 billion, and
include about 125 water projects that are not needed in my opinion;
the total value of which would be about $2.5 billion. Many of these
projects have not even been assessed by either the Department of
Interior or by the Corps of Engineers. They have just been added in
to build up a very large and wasteful bill that has projects covering
about 70 percent of all the congressional districts in the nation.
This is a bill that also opens up a Pandora's box for
possible wasteful spending in the future because it includes complete
federal financing, for instance, for our local water systems. This
is something that has always in the past been the responsibility of
local governments with some federal assistance. This could cost about
$10 billion more in the future if it establishes a precedent.
I intend to oppose these kinds of threats to our federal
budget, and believe that we have an attitude in our nation that will
support my position on these restrictive spending measures. The budget
does include adequate financing for defense. It includes a very
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Congress will consider it rapidly. But I think that that outline
is probably adequate for the present time. Yes sir?
MR. MILLETT: Last week TVA Chairman Dave Freeman urged
all. TVA employees, including the directors, to continue their long
tradition of avoiding partisan politics. He was answered the next
day by Director Bob Clements, who endorsed you. Both of them are
your appointees. Do you have any comments?
THE PRESIDENT: No. I think it would be ill-advised
to get the TVA involved in partisan politics. It just happens that
all three members now have been appointed by me. They were not
chosen, as you know, on a political basis. I think they are all
qualified persons. We have tried to work very closely with TVA.
In fact, just recently, Doug Costle, Director of the Environmental
Protection Agency, went down to meet with Dave Freeman and others
to work out for the future a better means by which the TVA could
not only provide necessary services for an entire region of the
nation, including where I live, but also could set an example for
conservation efforts and also for the honoring of requirements on
the protection of the quality of air and water.
But I think it would be better for the TVA to avoid
any involvement in partisan politics. Yes, ma'am?
MS. THORNTON: In response to your State of the Union
address last week, on the CIA: do you think Congress is going to
be willing to revamp their reporting role in light of the recent
circumstances?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, I think so. We obviously don't want
to wipe out all restraints on the intelligence agencies. We want to
be accountable, not only to the Congress but to the American people.
Obviously I have to have the ultimate responsibility for any
violations of propriety that might be threatened by the intelligence
agencies. But I think there has been an excessive requirement for
reporting in the past. There has been an excessive requirement for
the revelation of highly-sensitive documents. And there has been an
excessive restraint on what the CIA and other intelligence groups
could do.
But we will be very cautious, as we evolve this new
charter, not to permit any improprieties by the CIA in the future.
The Executive Order that I issued after I had been in office for
about a year or so, is the basis for the kind of charter principles
that we personally favor. I will be meeting, by the way, with the
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Intelligence Committee members tomorrow, some of them, to iron
out any remaining differences of opinion between my own Administration
and the Congress. But I think there is a fairly good meeting of the
minds'already on what originally seemed to be some very sharp
divisions of opinion. Yes sir?
MR. NEAL: Mr. President, in view of our having drawn
the line, so to speak, in the Middle East, can you reassure us,
everyone in the nation, that we do indeed have what it takes militarily
to draw that line and to make it stick?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, we can protect our interests there.
Obviously we don't intend, and never have claimed to have the ability
unilaterally to defeat any threat to that region with ease. What we
called for was an analysis by all of those nations who are there who
might be threatened. We will cooperate with them as they request and
as they desire, to strengthen their own defense capabilities.
Secondly, we will be coordinating our efforts with
nations who are not located in the region but who are heavily
dependent, even more than we are, on an uninterrupted supply of
oil from that region. Third, we will be arousing the consciousness
of the other nations in the world to condemn any threat to the peace
of that region. And the last thing is that we will be increasing
both our own military capability and our own military presence in
the region surrounding southwest Asia, the Persian Gulf and the
Middle East.
But I don't think it would be accurate for me to
claim that at this time, or in the future, we expect to have enough
military strength and enough military presence there to defend the
region unilaterally, absent the kind of cooperation that I have
described to you. Yes sir?
MR. CHILES: Mr. President, we have heard Mr. Aaron:
he spoke of the Persian Gulf area, and he spoke of sacrifices that the
American public is going to be called on to make in the long-term
future. Can you enumerate any of those sacrifices?
THE PRESIDENT: What kind of channels did you say?
I couldn't quite hear you.
MR. CHILES: The challenge to the American people --
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I think the sacrifices have already
been delineated fairly well by me. It will require some commitment
to an increased defense capability. It will require Americans to help
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