Simpson Assails Press Queries to Reagan

Assistant Minority Leader Alan K. Simpson (R-Wyo.) accused White House reporters Wednesday of doing a “sadistic little disservice to your country” by asking President Reagan questions about Iran for the sole purpose of “sticking it in his bazoo.”

After a meeting between Reagan and senators from both parties on the subject of aid to the Nicaraguan contras, Simpson was asked why he was “covering” for the President by talking and joking during reporters’ questioning of Reagan at a pre-meeting photo session.

“That’s a bunch of crap,” the Wyoming senator said.

In recent photo opportunities, Republican senators have begun speaking over Reagan’s responses, making them difficult to hear.

‘Good Old Fling’

“What kills me is . . . he’s there for a picture-taking session--and you have your good old fling, and that’s great,” Simpson said. “But you know very well that you’re not asking him things so you can get answers. You’re asking him things because you know he’s off balance and you’d like to stick it in his bazoo.”

Simpson aide Don Hardy said the senator meant by “off balance” that the President is “reeling from this (the Iran affair) like a boxer on the ropes.”

The senator declined to define “bazoo.” Webster’s New World Dictionary defines bazoo as the mouth or the nose.

Simpson said he was only “jazzing around” during the photo session with Reagan, during which he drowned out an exchange with the President by remarking that NBC correspondent Andrea Mitchell was wearing a pretty dress.

Report on Arms Profits

The questions to Reagan were about the Iran-contra affair, particularly a New York Times report that profits from the arms sale retained by middleman Manucher Ghorbanifar wound up in the hands of pro-Iranian terrorists holding the American hostages in Lebanon.

Simpson said the congressional investigating committees and the independent counsel “will find everything we need. And the continued babbling of asking the President what the hell he had this morning on Iran-contra, when we are waiting for those things, is actually a kind of a sadistic little disservice to your country.”

Simpson attributed reporters’ behavior to “frustration” at not being able to get answers on the Iran affair.

“The White House press corps is the cream of the crop. You’re like racehorses bred to race, but there isn’t any race,” he said.

“Why don’t you just admit that it’s just so damn frustrating for you you’re almost ready to lose your marbles.”