Bush Would Preserve Prosperity, Reagan Says

President Reagan claimed credit Saturday for restoring national prosperity and moving the world closer to peace but warned that the gains could be lost unless Vice President George Bush is elected to succeed him.

The President appeared at a fund-raising rally for Rep. Robert J. Lagomarsino (R-Ojai) before returning to the seclusion of his ranch to resume his vacation.

“Our economy and our national defenses are strong, but they are also under threat,” Reagan told several hundred GOP contributors at the event, which raised $200,000.

“They’re threatened by those who want to use the law to engineer changes in our nation that the American people do not need and do not want and that would hurt,” he added.

“Our liberal friends seem to love to fiddle around making government even bigger. . . . Before you know it, they’ve fiddled around so much that they’ve sent the ship of state into dry-dock,” Reagan charged.

Earlier, during his weekly radio address, the President said his military buildup during the early 1980s was responsible in part for a more peaceful global climate.

“Peace is gaining ground,” he said, citing the cease-fire in the Iran-Iraq war, withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan and hopeful developments in the civil war in Angola.

“Contrast these successes with the tragic situation in Nicaragua,” Reagan said. “It’s been almost two years since Congress has approved any military aid to the brave freedom fighters there. . . . There is still time to turn the tide in Nicaragua.”

Responding on behalf of congressional Democrats to Reagan’s broadcast, Sen. John Glenn (D-Ohio) charged that Reagan’s veto of the $299.6-billion defense authorization bill put at “grave risk” the modernization of the nation’s nuclear and conventional forces as well as a pay raise needed to keep experienced manpower in the services.

“The President turned his back on many of his top national security advisers, including Secretary of Defense (Frank C.) Carlucci and National Security Adviser (Colin L.) Powell, who urged him not to veto the bill,” Glenn said. “Instead, he chose to listen to political advisers and pollsters and the pleas of candidate Bush. In doing so, he put presidential politics ahead of this nation’s security.”