| 1981: | President Reagan phones L.A. Times theatre critic Dan Sullivan and asks him to plug his friend Buddy Ebsen's new play. Sullivan is stunned, but rallies and ends up berating Reagan for cutting funding to the arts, and tells him that there might be some boondoggles in the Department of Defense. Reagan tells him that there were some, "and we've caught them." |
| 1982: | Reagan complains about TV coverage of the nation's economic condition. "Is it news that some fellow out in South Succotash someplace has just been laid off, that he should be interviewed nationwide?" Lane Kirkland of the AFL-CIO later says, "South Succotash, with its population of nearly eleven million, must be a considerable place." |
| 1986: | Reagan appears on TV with a map that shows countries in Central America turning red, to warn that Nicaragua could become "a second Cuba" or even "a second Lybia" right on America's "doorstep". |
| 1988: | Reagan claims, for the second time, that Nicaragua has invaded Honduras, and sends 3200 troops there as a show of strength. There are reports that many of the weapons sent with the troops get left behind. |
| 1988: | Reagan vetoes a civil rights bill. It is overridden. |