THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, November 5, 1994 TAG: 9411050636
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Guy Friddell
LENGTH: Medium: 61 lines
In eight years in the White House, President Reagan never achieved the cutting, trenchant style with which his wife, Nancy, dressed down Oliver North, the GOP candidate for the U.S. Senate.
Nor has any other of a dozen distinguished critics of North matched her icy fury.
``I'll be happy to tell you about Ollie North,'' she told a crowd of 650 in New York. ``I know Oliver North has a great deal of trouble separating fact from fancy.
``And he lied to my husband and he lied about my husband, kept things from him that he should not have kept from him, and that's what I think about Ollie North.''
In a news conference, North, retreating, said: ``My mother told me a long time ago never to get into a fight with a lady.''
Certainly not one as deft with the cleaver as Nancy Reagan.
Virginia GOP Chairman Patrick M. McSweeney did his unctuous best to dismiss her charge.
``My impression of Mrs. Reagan is that she's the keeper of the flame, she's the protector of the legacy, and anything that would besmirch the legacy, I think she's going to take on, as a devoted, loyal wife would,'' McSweeney said.
Oh c'mon, gentlemen, is Nancy Reagan right or wrong in saying North lied?
Increasingly, states will be sending women to seats in the U.S. Senate, as independent senatorial candidate J. Marshall Coleman pointed out.
Would North, who defied terrorists, dance around behind his mama's skirts to avoid answering women in the Senate - if he wins?
As for McSweeney, he belittles Nancy Reagan as a woman, brushing off her assertion by implying that she has no other course, as a loyal, loving wife, than to protect her man, right or wrong.
Did or didn't North lie?
Nancy Reagan's words certainly had the ring of conviction.
And tending to support her is material recently released by the National Archives from North's Iran-Contra criminal prosecution:
Documents stating that he lied to FBI agents about his Iran-Contra role less than four months before the scandal broke.
Evidence that he misled President Reagan about whether two wealthy conservatives had made donations to the Contras during a time when Congress had banned aid to the rebels.
North has acknowledged he played a role in helping supply the Contras with money and arms during a two-year ban imposed by Congress, but he maintains that he acted with the backing of his superiors, including Reagan.
Independent Counsel Lawrence Welsh told The Associated Press that he is glad the material is being released.
North campaigns against ``Washington insiders.'' But in the bowels of the White House, he ran a grand con for the Contras.
Oliver North was the ultimate insider.
KEYWORDS: SENATE RACE CANDIDATE CAMPAIGN by CNB