KINDRED SPIRITS? Thompson, Reagan
He's an actor, a Republican, and even has the support of wicked '80s spinster Michael Deaver—it didn't take long for the press and prominent Republicans to start comparing presumed '08 presidential candidate Fred Thompson to Ronald Reagan. Is it apt? After the jump, Radar digs deeper than the superficial similarities to uncover some startling common ground—and proximity to Kevin Bacon and David Hasselhoff—between the conservative saint and Law & Order's top crank.
Reagan: son of a shoe salesman
Thompson: son of a used-car salesman
Reagan: Dutch (after his father called him "a fat little Dutchman")
Thompson: Moose, for his size (he's 6'5")
Reagan: "Life is just one grand sweet song, so start the music"
Thompson: "The lazier a man is, the more he plans to do tomorrow"
Reagan: knocked up Nancy, married her
Thompson: knocked up his high school girlfriend, married her
Reagan: played Andy McCain, a courageous radio reporter crusading against corruption in Love is on the Air
Thompson: played himself as the lawyer of a courageous Tennessee woman crusading against corruption in Marie
Reagan: Two. He was in The Young Doctors with Eddie Albert; Eddie Albert was in The Big Picture with Kevin Bacon
Thompson: Two. He was in White Sands with John Lafayette; John Lafayette was in Loverboy with Kevin Bacon
Thompson: Three. He was in Necessary Roughness with Jason Bateman; Jason Bateman was in The Fantastic World of D.C. Collins with Gary Coleman; Gary Coleman was in a Diff'rent Strokes episode with David Hasselhoff
Reagan: One. If the Hoff is to be believed, he and Reagan worked together in bringing down the Berlin Wall
Reagan: George "The Gipper" Gipp in Knute Rockne, All-American
Thompson: Arthur Branch, D.A.
Reagan: Chimp-befriending professor in Bedtime for Bonzo
Thompson: Mein Kampf-thumping neo-Nazi on TV's Wiseguy
Reagan: Yes, was a GE spokesman and host of the popular General Electric Theater television program; fired after his outspoken political views became a liability for the company
Thompson: Yes, lobbied for General Electric in the 1970s; now works for GE subsidiary (NBC)
Reagan: covertly worked to undermine the controversial Haitian leader
Thompson: was hired by Arisitide to convince the U.S. government to support his return to power following a coup in 1991
Reagan's chief of staff
Thompson's mentor
On Reagan (who had been a rival for the 1968 Republican presidential nomination): "Reagan is not one that wears well ... Reagan on a personal basis, is terrible. He just isn't pleasant to be around"
On Thompson (who was the Republican counsel for the Senate Watergate Committee): "Oh shit, he's dumb as hell"
Reagan: played hardball with the Soviets and abandoned SALT II
Thompson: played sidekick to Lou Gossett, Jr., in Iron Eagle III
Reagan: Laying out a vision for the modern conservative movement in his "A Time for Choosing" speech, 1964: "You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on Earth, or we will sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness"
Thompson: Laying down the law with feuding race car drivers Cole Trickle and Rowdy Burns in Days of Thunder, 1990: "If you want to become a greasy spot on a country road, go ahead. I don't give a shit, and I don't think anybody else does. But you're not going to do it on my racetrack.... You trade paint one more time, I'll black flag the two of you"
Is this the truth you were skirting??
Question: How did Howard Baker describe the then-unknown Fred Thompson to Richard Nixon prior to the beginning of the Watergate hearings?
Answer: "a Tennessee lawyer with brass balls"
Fred Thompson, the next President of the US, might have been unknown to the nation, but fellow Tennessean Howard Baker had certainly heard of Fred's cojones. As it turned out, Fred the real lawyer got to ask the question that sealed Richard Nixon's fate. The existence of tape recordings made with Nixon's White House bugging devices was made public. From the Watergate hearings transcripts via CNN:
In July of 1973, Fred Thompson, then a Republican attorney for the Senate Watergate committee, (and now a Republican senator from Tennessee), called on a surprise witness, Alexander Butterfield. Butterfield was a former aide to White House chief of staff H.R. Haldeman. The exchange:
Thompson: "Mr. Butterfield, are you aware of the installation of any listening devices in the Oval Office of the President?"
Butterfield: "I was aware of listening devices, yes sir.
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