White House Diaries

Thursday, January 9, 1986

View the President's Schedule

Usual staff & N.S.C. session. Unemp. is down to 6.8% total & 6.9% for just civilians. John Rousselot came in to report on meetings of “Canada-U.S. Permanent Joint board on Defense.” He is Chmn. of the U.S. section. We’re having some problems over the Northwest Passage. We claim it is international waters—the Canadians say it is under their sovereignty & we must ask permission every time a ship goes through.

A good meeting with the leadership of the Asian-American Voters coalition. They represent 5 mil. citizens of Asian origin. They have the highest standard of living of any immigrant group in Am. We need to find more govt. appointments for them.

Met with 2 Congressmen Bill Hendon & Bob Smith. Bill is way out yonder on the issue of M.I.A.’s. He claims Mil. Intelligence has all sorts of proof that Vietnam is holding live prisoners but the bureaucracy is covering it up from even the Sec. of Defense etc. After they’d gone I turned George Bush loose on it—to check out some of his stories—one of which involved me in a meeting—which never took place. Geo. reported back after lunch. I’m afraid Bill is off his rocker—even Bob (who said nothing in our meeting) told Geo. he cant go along with Bill on his rantings.

At the end of the afternoon a lovely young 13 yr. old Girl Scout & her family came by. She is the all time nat. champion at selling Girl Scout cookies. She had 7 flavors so instead of choosing I bought all 7. She really was a delight & I can see why she sells—you cant turn her down.

Then 12 newcomers to the W.H. press corps came by for intros & pictures. Finally Larry Barrett of Time Inc. came to say goodbye. He’s now their Nat. Pol. editor.