Reagan’s Pants

I was lucky enough to help cover the 1980 presidential election, including all the somewhat-repetitive buildup of campaign activity throughout the previous year, putting me within slapping distance of: Ronald Reagan (here, just pulling up his pants after getting out of the limo), Jimmy Carter & Rosalyn, Walter Mondale, John Anderson, Edward Kennedy, and the local boy from Kansas Bob Dole. I don’t remember the rest, but once the primaries and such got out of the way, the bigger names move to the front and continue their quests for power.

During these stopovers I may have also seen the Secret Service handing off the fabled “football” once. The little item was a satchel, supposedly containing the nuclear attack codes or whatever, which stayed with the President at all times. Spooky – if that’s what it was.

I also saw car loads of Washington pool journalists so jaded and exhausted they could hardly open their eyes to full daylight. Once, they piled out of the press plane at the airport, they piled in to a couple of convertibles and vans after the main motorcade left ahead of them. They would often let out cattle calls of “moo, moo” as they were led from one location to another.

At the airport once, someone played a slide whistle (like the clip below) as they sped off, adding a funny but sarcastic shrug to the assembly line of cities they must have flashed through that week. Everyone nearby and I laughed at the whistle at the time, but as a green kid I didn’t understood until later. I began to see signs like these that chipped away at my resolve, becoming more and more disillusioned the longer I tried to stay in….