Editing 78-04-B8 (section)

=== Transcript ===
We used to believe that if you built a better mouse trap the world would beat
a path to your door. Now if you build a better mouse trap the government comes
along with a better mouse. But maybe we've gone a step beyond that. The Federal
government has drawn up specifications on how to build a mouse trap. It must be
some trap. The plans and specifications all (20,000 words of them on 700 pages)
weight almost three-and-a-half pounds.

National Review magazine uncovered this next example of why an effort is being
made in Washington to make bureaucratic language a little more simple. In the
Social Security Handbook we read: "The term Substantial Gainful Activity is used
to describe a level of work activity that is substantial and gainful." We'd
never have figured that out by ourselves.

A crime note from Indianapolis is a head-scratcher. It seems that a would-be
bank robber goofed in his attempted holdup and had to make a hasty and emptyhanded
escape. It was reported this way. The would be robber was five feet six, weighed
about 130 pounds, was wearing a green felt hat with a yellow braided band, a black
shirt with pink embroidered figure, and gold-rimmed, tinted sunglasses. He managed
to melt into the crowd and elude the police. Makes you wonder what the crowd was
wearing.

On the subject of crime, I've called attention on these broadcasts to the damage
that has been done to our crime-fighting capacity by well meaning but misguided
people in recent years. In a kind of hysteria about supposed violation of our civil
liberties by the F.B.I. and C.I.A., we have caused police intelligence units around
the country to destroy millions of files on suspected subversives, terrorists and
other criminals. Now, the chief of our Secret Service has told a Senate subcommittee
that the Service has had to advise the President not to visit certain U.S. cities.
Police intelligence in those cities has been so handcuffed it is impossible to
evaluate possible trouble from radicals and terrorists.

Not by coincidence I'm sure the pro-Castro F.A.L.N. (a Puerto Rican terrorist
group) recently set off two bombs in New York. That makes the total 63 in that city
alone. Police have been unable to track down the bombers. You see, a few years ago
a New York mayor ordered the Police department to destroy intelligence files on
Puerto Rican extremists.

Are you disturbed by the rising cost of medical care? Let me suggest one way we
could start cutting back. There are 164 Regulatory Agencies for hospitals alone.
Twenty-five review admittance procedures. Thirty-one regulate patient safety.
Thirty-three ride herd on patients' rights. It costs hospitals $35 per patient just
to comply with the paperwork.

An unusual number of Congressmen are retiring this year. Possible reason? A
bill was passed allowing this Congress only to use this year's salary as the basis
for figuring pensions instead of averaging income for that purpose. This year's
salary was raised to $57,500. 

This is Ronald Reagan.

Thanks for listening.
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