BOB DOLE : 1995 Clinton's Comeback

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As we approach the eve of the August 10, 1990, Arab League Summit; I thought this a good time for us to go back, with the help of the PBS Documentary series "Frontline", to the summer of circumstances that led to the invasion of Kuwait by Iraq.  So, we will relive the summer months prior to the invasion as we listen to the "Frontline: The Gulf War" Documentary sum up the issues between Iraq and Kuwait that escalated into the invasion. How Saddam Hussein mislead Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, who in turn assured President Bush that an invasion was not imminent. 

Then we will listen in on a Documentary on Former Secretary of State James Baker, as he describes going to the Soviet Union and bringing them into the coalition which in a lot of ways marked the true end of the Cold War. 

All of this while tensions mount and the world moves closer to war, and the United States starts negotiating with King Fahd of Saudi Arabia, to move more than 200,000 United States Military troops to the Persian Gulf to insure that Iraq will not make moves toward any other neighbors in the region. 

Then we will go to the coverage of the Arab League Summit where the Arab Nations stand with the United States against the aggression of Saddam Hussein against Kuwait. It is a united Arab League, with just a couple of hold outs. 

We want to recognize  "The Gulf War by Frontline" a documentary on the war, we used a long segment for this podcast to go through how the war started, and we recognize  "James Baker President-Maker Real Stories " Documentary for the use of the long segment from their documentary as well. Links to both documentaries are provided in the chapters. The use of these documentary segments was for educational purposes and we claim no copyright to those  materials or the use of any other materials in our broadcasts . 

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After we put together our tribute episode in memory of Former Canadian Prime Minister, Brian Mulroney, that had included a short tribute honoring my Step Father, Larry Bulmer, I thought about the World Heritage site I had visited and Larry talked about in the short segment I used in the show.

I figured most people probably know nothing about the Buffalo Jump nor the World Heritage site in Alberta , known as Head Smashed-In Buffalo Jump History Center.  I figured here is a chance to tell that story and a couple of more I learned while traveling across Canada in 1996 with my Step-father and Mother.  It was one of two trips I consider the trips of a lifetime, Western Canada and , our earlier covered, trip to the Florida Keys.

While it is impossible to really recreate a vacation from nearly 30 years ago, I thought I would highlight a couple of things we visited that really stood out. In this episode we will take you to the Canadian Province of Alberta, to visit the Head Smashed-In Buffalo Jump History Center, the tiny Mountain mining town of Frank, where one of Canada's most well known disasters took place when a Rockslide consumed the tiny town in 1903, and we will look back at the building of the Canadian Pacific Railroad, the cross country railroad that really brought unity to the nation. My Step-Father grew up around railroads because his father was a Railroad station manager in several towns along the line and because of that Larry  was always "a lover of all things trains".

So, I hope you will enjoy this short trip across Canada, the only other country I have grown to love, and consider as sort of a second home.

If you would like to learn more about the Head Smashed in Buffalo Jump History Center its website is https://headsmashedin.ca/

and if you would like to learn more about the disaster at Frank's Slide its website is here
https://frankslide.ca/

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Brian Mulroney was a great friend to American Presidents, and one of the big four leaders who helped bring down Communism in the 1980s. He helped George Bush in the Gulf War and was the leader who pushed for the freeing of Nelson Mandela in South Africa. He was a man who played an outsized role in his times as the leader of our great northern neighbor. 

Brian Mulroney died on February 29, 2024. In his Obituary The New York Times wrote of him: 

" Mr. Mulroney was known as the Canadian leader who led the country into the North American Free Trade Agreement, with the United States and Mexico, a pact signed in December 1992, and as the author of an overhaul of Canada’s tax regime.... He prided himself on being a confidant of Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush; on promoting a thaw between Moscow and Washington in the closing days of the Cold War; and on going much further than either the United States or Britain in imposing sanctions against white-ruled South Africa to press for the release of Nelson Mandela and the dismantling of apartheid." 

“I am a centrist, a modern one open to all discussions,” Mr. Mulroney said during the 1984 campaign.  Mr. Mulroney proposed a goods-and-services tax,  he successfully negotiated the NAFTA accord, and tried but failed to bring about a national unity with Quebec and get them to sign on to the country's constitution.  That failure would eventually lead to splits in his own Conservative Party and his resignation and their total wipe out in the election just after he left office. 

In this episode we look back at the life and leadership of Brian Mulroney, and listen to perhaps the speeches that are today how most Americans remember him. The great friend of Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher , George H. W. Bush, and his Queen, Elizabeth 2.  He gave the eulogies to three of them, and spoke on television during the period of mourning for Prime Minister Thatcher, this episode will feature those speeches and one of the interviews, plus we will hear from Canadian leaders, the Canadian news coverage of his passing, and an interview with the man himself on the George Stroumboulopoulos Show. 

As we bid farewell to this great friend of the United States.  Our host will also pay tribute to his own Step-Father, Charles "Larry " Bulmer, who was a member of the Canadian Air Force for 35 years and then worked with NATO, and we will hear him briefly retell the story of our host's family trip to the Head Smashed-In Buffalo Jump National Park in the Alberta Province of Canada.  It was a trip our host said was one to remember. If you would like to learn more about the Head Smashed-In Buffalo Jump World Heritage site here is the link https://headsmashedin.ca/ 

We hope this is a fitting tribute to a legendary man, Prime Minister Brian Mulroney 

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One of the United States' closest allies is the nation of Canada and during this period it had one of its greatest statesman at the helm of Government, Prime Minister Brian Mulroney. He stood with Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher and Pope John Paul 2 as they worked to end the scourge of Communism in the late  1980s and continued on to aid President Bush as Communism fell. He formed great friendships with all of these leaders. 

In this episode we hear about some of that, including the former Prime Ministers reminiscence about giving President Bush's eulogy many years after the Gulf War,  and then we will watch him step up to the microphone to stand with President Bush as he began the coalition building that was necessary to stop the naked aggression of Saddam Hussein. 

This episode will feature that press conference from Kennebunkport, Maine. 

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In this episode we sit in on the President's press Conference on August 9, 1990. At this point he has been busy assembling the World LEaders that he will need to begin the process of forcing Saddam Hussein from Kuwait. 

This press conference is an interesting look at how the President deals with the press and it shows President Bush at his best. 

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It is the day after the invasion of Kuwait by the Iraqi Army under the orders of it's dictator Saddam Hussein. We will listen in to the NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw as they recount the events of the 24 hours after the initial invasion for the public. We will hear from the Kuwaiti citizens as they recount the events as they unfolded. In chilling detail, they tell the tale of living in a peaceful tranquil Kuwait, in the period of time that many were just coming off their vacations, to wake up with jets and tanks running through their streets. 
We then will head off to Colorado with President Bush on an already planned meeting that will include British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher who will advise Bush that military action may be required if Saddam Hussein does not leave Kuwait. 

And he has no intention of leaving. 

It is here in this episode that we set the stage for the battles and the War to come. 

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In this Special Edition of our show we are adding a third installment to the special series we ran in January looking back at the life and career of Senator Mitch McConnell, the longest serving Republican Leader in the history of the Senate. In our special series in January we profiled the leader and his historic role over the past 40 years in the Senate. We even labeled him as the Senator of the Century. It would be hard to find an argument against the statement. He totally changed the direction of the Federal Judiciary especially the Supreme Court. 

We added this episode due to the announcement that he would be stepping down in November after the 2024 election as the Senate Republican Leader. This announcement caught us here off-guard and we look at it with some level of actual fear. As far as we are concerned Senator Mitch McConnell has led not only with integrity, he has often been the only adult in Washington D.C. on either side of the aisle. In an era of midget sized leadership from literally almost every position in Government he has been a giant and often he has alone been the one voice of reason at the helm and without him there it is almost scary where things may actually go for our republic. 

In this episode, we will look at last week’s announcement and this episode will feature the full Senate floor speech by Mitch McConnell. 

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In this episode, we will examine one of the most important pieces of civil rights legislation passed since the 1960s. It was the Americans with Disabilities Act, and it insured for all Americans the basic right to equal access to all of American Life. It is hard to believe that there was actually a day when people with disabilities were forced to stay home, hidden from the rest of society. They were often discriminated against in employment opportunities, in restaurants, and other public places, and they had to figure out how to make do in a world designed to leave them behind. 

That all changed with the stroke of George H. W. Bush's pen. He pushed for the law and worked to see it passed even though one of his strongest allies, the  American business community was staunchly against it due to the costs it would have to bare.  Strangely, George Bush would have allies in this fight, allies from unlikely sources, and places. 

He had the help of Senator Tom Harkin, a Democrat from Iowa, whose own brother was deaf, and he would have the help of an old nemesis he had had to battle to find himself in the Presidency at all. His old 1988 primary opponent, Senator Bob Dole of Kansas.  Dole, a veteran of World War 2, had been gravely injured in Italy toward the end of the war. He had lost a kidney, was paralyzed from the neck down for nearly a year, spent 36 months in an Army hospital, and lost the use of his right arm, and some of the feeling in his left hand as a result of his war wounds. 

Bob Dole had a daily reminder of the sacrifice he and others had made for their country in war. He also knew what it was like to go from being an able bodied person to an American with a Disability, and he wanted to even the playing field for all of  them. Dole wanted to give them the opportunity for a better life and it was through this effort that Bush and Dole would work together for a cause so much larger than themselves.  A cause that has helped millions of disabled Americans forge for themselves the full blessings of American Life. It is quite a story, and we try to tell it from the start to the sunny , hot day in July of 1990 when George H. W. Bush signed the Americans with Disabilities Act into law on the White House Lawn with Senators Tom Harkin and Bob Dole by his side. It was an amazing day. 

But just as the sun set on this amazing accomplishment in domestic civil rights, a war would explode onto the scene on the other side of the world that would demand the President's attention, and set the example on how to handle conflicts every President and leader could learn from.  Iraq would invade Kuwait.  

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In this episode we close out our podcast coverage of the 2024 South Carolina Presidential Primary. We will listen in to the concession speech of former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley and the victory address from former President Donald Trump. We will also hear remarks from South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster, and our two Senators Tim Scott, and Lindsey Graham. 

It is that always fun moment when we get to hear from the candidates themselves for that brief moment when they get to savor victory or put a spin on defeat before going to the next states, as Willie Nelson sang  they will be "On the Road Again" 

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Feedspot released yesterday, February 26, 2024, our ranking at number 1  of the 70 Best American History Podcasts of 2024. 

https://podcasts.feedspot.com/american_history_podcasts/  Here is the List

We are enormously proud to have been listed in that position and we thought we would have a little fun on our victory lap in this episode, but most importantly, we are enormously grateful to all of you who have tuned in for the past nearly four years and 12 Seasons. It has been an honor, and a pleasure to tell these stories and have some fun with you too. 

Thank you again!!!

Randal Wallace
Host: "Randal Wallace Presents" and "The Richard Nixon Experience" Podcasts originally titled "Bridging the Political Gap" 


We want to recognize TOSCDOV, and his video "Trump Can't Win" from YOUTUBE for some of the clips used in our reel, also the WWE and "Ric Flair"  for a segment in the clip reel.  

Again, I am honored that you have tuned in and lifted us into the top spot in American History Podcasts.  

Questions or comments at  , [email protected] ,  https://twitter.com/randal_wallace   , and http://www.randalwallace.com/
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