White House Diaries

Thursday, February 27, 1986

View the President's Schedule

A meeting with bipartisan Reps. & Senators. They were warm in their praise for our handling of the Philippine crisis. Then we moved onto defense & Nicaragua. I threw my best pitch. We’ll have to wait to see if we scored.

Then we had a visitor Pres. Biya of Cameroon. He’s quite a fella. He’s literally doing what we’ve been doing. His country has one of the highest per capita incomes in Africa. With a free, pvt. enterprise agriculture his co. has become food sufficient—a rarity in Africa. We had a good meeting & clinched a solid friendship. The schedule was the usual—lunch & departure statements.

In the afternoon Bill Casey came in to recommend a deputy. His present man is leaving to try the pvt. sector. Then I met the Council of Ec. A dvisors—Beryl Sprinkles very good staff. We had a little fun & then some picture taking.

Bob Tuttle came in with a list of new appointees to be approved. Don R. gave me the news—the Stock mkt. closed at 1713.98 an all time high. Also there is a hassle at Fed. Reserve. By 4 to 3 the board wants to lower the discount rate. Paul Volker (Chmn.) is opposed—feels it will lower the value of our overvalued $ too much. They are going to give him a week to make his case if he can. Then it was Admin. time. Nancy came over because it began with intro. of the new Easter Seal Poster child—an 8 yr. old Quadriplegic & his family. Then the Hubbard family—proprietors of “CONUS” which is going to create an added network by supplying news T.V. to 34 stations by satellite.

Jim Santini came in for photos—he was a Dem. Congressman—he’s now a Repub. & is going to go for Paul Laxalts seat in the Sen. Finally a big reception in the East Room for 300 people members of 2 Conservative groups NCPAC & FMS—contributions to Repub. & Conservative groups.