Leslie Stahl reporting on her 1986 farewell audience with the Gipper:
" Reagan was as shriveled as a kumquat. He was so frail, his skin so paper-thin. I could almost see the sunlight through the back of his withered neckÂ…His eyes were coated. Larry introduced us, but he had to shout. Had Reagan turned off his hearing aid?
" Â…Reagan didn't seem to know who I was. He gave me a distant look with those milky eyes and shook my hand weakly. Oh, my, he's gonzo, I thought.
"I have to go out on the lawn tonight and tell my countrymen that the president of the United States is a
doddering space cadet.
"My heart began to hammer with the import...I was aware of the delicacy with which I would have to write my script. But I was quite sure of my diagnosis."
Luckily, Leslie had her husband and eight year-old daughter in tow:
"Stahl tried to fill the silence, telling Reagan that her daughter used to tell everyone that the president works for her mommy, but after Reagan took office, she started saying that her mother worked for the president.
"'I wasn't above a little massaging. Was he so out of it that he couldn't appreciate a sweet story that reflected well on him? Guess so.'"
"
His pupils didn't even dilate. Nothing. No reaction.
"After Stahl mentioned that her husband, Aaron Latham, was a screenwriter, Reagan became animated, and pulled Latham to a couch to discuss a movie idea he had for a film in which he could star. Stahl recalls she was 'too astonished to move.'
"A few minutes later, the session was over.
"Reagan was now beaming, and after Stahl and her family left the Oval Office, Reagan chased after them and told her daughter, 'I worked for your mother, too.'"
Finger on the nuclear trigger?