The President seems fit -but is he too detached?
His hair is thick and wavy; his rolling gait has just a hint of swagger. Since Ronald Reagan became President, his chest has actually grown broader by three inches, thanks to his lifting weights. Posing for a photograph out at his ranch, he looks rangy and hale, an ageless cowboy. On a podium with waving flags and floating balloons, he can mesmerize and uplift. But when he speaks extemporaneously, the effect can be more halting than inspirational. He has long been notorious for bungling facts. He often mangles syntax. Somehow, with a quip or a smile, he usually manages to fight free of his verbal tangles, leaving listeners only uneasy, not alarmed.
But last week's presidential debate, watched by at least 80 million television viewers and parsed by scores of journalists, greatly magnified Reagan's rhetorical failings. His hesitation seemed like uncertainty, his digressions like rambling. He suffered by comparison with his opponent, Walter Mondale, who is 17 years younger and was, on this evening at least, considerably quicker and more composed. To many viewers, the kindly, anecdote-dropping uncle suddenly seemed old and a little out of it. To others, even those willing to give him the benefit of the doubt about his age, he seemed somewhat blathery and ill at ease with the issues.
At 73, Reagan is the oldest President in U.S. history. At the end of a second term, he would be 77. Too old to be President? Before the debate, the question was hardly mentioned, so great were the Democrats' fears of a backlash. "Reagan created an issue that has not yet come up in this campaign -age!" exulted California's Tony Coelho, chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. "He looked old and acted old." Asked if Reagan was doddering in the debate, Coelho replied, "Well, he didn't quite drool."
Reagan at first tried to deflate the issue with quips. "I'll challenge him [Mondale] to an arm wrestle any time," he joked. Retorted Mondale: "We had a little brain wrestle on Sunday night." Reagan's physician, Dr. Daniel Ruge, volunteered that Reagan was "tired, everybody was tired" in the debate. Told of Ruge's comment by reporters, Reagan's response was defensive and somewhat baffling: "You got it wrong. He was tired."
With the age question dogging Reagan, the White House released the full results of a medical checkup on the President last May at Bethesda Naval Medical Center. The supervising examiner concluded that "Mr. Reagan is a mentally alert, robust man who appears younger than his stated age." The report noted some "diminished auditory acuity" (Reagan wears a small hearing aid in his right ear) and the presence of a small, benign polyp in his colon. The President takes weekly injections for allergies, but no other medicine. Reagan aides reminded reporters that Mondale takes three pills a day for high blood pressure.