The 11th Commandment

There’s a whole lot of breaking Ronald Reagan’s 11the commandment going on these days by Messrs. Gingrich and Romney and others.

Reagan’s goal was to prevent a repeat of liberal Republicans attacks on Barry Goldwater which contributed to Goldwater's defeat in the 1964 presidential election.

Reagan’s 11^th commandment went like this, “Thou shall not speak ill of any fellow republicans.”

I had lunch one day with Reagan and heard him break his commandment.

I was chief of staff to U.S. States Senator James Buckley.  One day in the 1970s, I had the great pleasure of lunching with Reagan in a  restaurant near the White House.

Reagan was with a political aide and I was with my boss the senator, a strong conservative. I was his chief of staff.

Reagan brought up the name Jacob Javits, the senior senator from New York and probably the most liberal in the senate at the time. Javits was elected in the 60s and made the cover of liberal Time Magazine. “He’s bad. What are we going to do with

Javits?” Reagan asked.

I suggested the only person that could beat Javits at the time was Jack Kemp, a very popular Congressman from Buffalo, New York.  Every one agreed.  I

I talked to Kemp.  He said he would think it over.  He thought and concluded he had the safest seat in the state and didn’t want to lose it.  Had he run and defeated Javits, he easily could have been elected president if he had served one or two term in the senate.  He did make it to the White House as a member of George H.W. Bush’s cabinet.  Kemp was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009 by President Obama.

by Leonard Saffir is a journalist, author and Chairman of the Florida Hall of Fame and of PR on a Budget.

**The difference between what is going on today and this incident is that Reagan was conferencing with his team working for a solution to what he saw as a problem.  What we are now seeing is the GOP candidates ripping each other apart in public.  And the candidate who insists that he is one of Reagan’s inside men is perhaps the worst of the offenders.**