Ed and Ron were honored to have Joshua Gilder on the show. As former President Ronald Reagan’s senior speech writer, his first speech for the President won acclaim for the line “Go Ahead, Make My Day!” He co-authored two State of the Union addresses and contributed to many of the President’s televised speeches from the Oval Office. He wrote Mr. Reagan’s highly regarded 1988 Moscow Summit address to students at Moscow State University, which opens our show.
Ron Baker’s Questions: Segment One
Welcome to The Soul of Enterprise: Business in the Knowledge Economy, sponsored by Sage, transforming the way people think and work so that organizations can thrive. I'm Ron Baker, along with my good friend, and VeraSage Institute colleague, Ed Kless. On today's show, folks, we have former Reagan senior speechwriter, Joshua Gilder, who wrote the speech that you just heard a part of. How's it going, Ed?
Ed Kless
Other than the chills I just got by listening to the speech again, and having the author present with us, I'm doing great.
Ron
I know, this is great. Let me read Joshua Gilder into the show. He served as President Reagan’s senior speechwriter from early 1985 until mid-1988, and he is a founding director of the White House Writers Group. In 1989, he was appointed by President George Bush to be Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights, leaving in 1991 to help David Rockefeller write his autobiography. He's written two books, Ghost Image, which is a medical thriller novel, published in 2002, and his scientific history of the dramatic collaboration of Johannes Kepler and Tycho Brahe, Heavenly Intrigue, which was published in 2004, and he wrote with his wife. Joshua, welcome to The Soul of Enterprise.
Josh Gilder
Thanks for having me. It's great to be here.
Ron
It's an honor to have you. So tell us. I know you attended Sarah Lawrence College, you studied literature and music [and painting and theater]. How did you end up in the White House?
Okay. Ed's also theater. I'm sure you guys will have lots of talk about.
Well, I could talk to you for hours about your cousin [George Gilder] because he's been a 40 year mentor to me. In fact, his book, Knowledge and Power, he quoted me in it. And for me, that was an absolute thrill to be quoted from the one author that I admire the most. But Josh, I’ve got to ask you this, there's so many speeches I want to talk to you about, and Ed will have to carry this on, but give us the backstory to the Moscow State University speech. I know you flew over there in advance. I know you saw the setting, the bust of Lenin, the mural of the Russian Revolution. And you thought originally we’ve got to get rid of that. But then you change your mind. What was the backstory to that speech?
Well, hold that thought, Josh. I'm sure Ed's got follow-up questions for you on that.
Ed’s Questions: Segment Two
We are back with the author of the opening epigraph of our show, the [Ronald Reagan] Moscow State University speech. Josh, I wanted to ask you, when you were telling the backstory. Were you present at the speech when Reagan delivered it? Or were you gone by then?
So did it live up to exactly you thought it was going to be, based on the situation and the setting?
And one of the things I noticed in watching the speech again is that there were no applause lines, mostly because, clearly, most people were listening to it in translation. But then the applause at the end lasted last a good solid minute, maybe even a little bit more. They were genuinely touched by the speech.
Have you ever heard from anyone who was present at that speech? Any of the students who came back to you afterwards and talked to you about it?
I’m wondering—you said you watched the speech on television—if you have any recollection of the Q&A afterwards, because that's also out there. And I watched that as part of prep here. If you don't have anything to say about this, I totally understand. But two things that struck me, one, they say he's going to stay on for 15 minutes. And it was 35 minutes of Q&A. And second, is that this is late in Ronald Reagan's second term, where the story is now that he had, quote, “lost it.” And it's clear from his ability to take the Q&A that was going on there that there was no [mental decline], maybe he was a little bit slower than he was four years ago. But he was still on top of absolutely everything from policy standpoint. And from a rhetorical standpoint.
Well, rather than stuff one more question that would give you only a minute, I'm going to jump to our break and perhaps pick it up with you in the fourth segment.
Ron’s Questions: Segment Three
Welcome back, everybody. We're here with former Reagan senior speechwriter, Joshua Gilder. Josh, talking about the Moscow State University speech, you consulted with a Yakov Smirnov for that speech?
Did George [Gilder] look at the speech before it was delivered?
That's how George gets to say the most quoted economist by Reagan.
I know there's a picture of Reagan with a copy of Gilder’s book [Wealth and Poverty, 1981 first edition]. I think he gave it to every one of his cabinet members.
My dad read the Playboy interview with Gilder and told me, “You need to read this guy's book,” and I kind of poo-pooed it because I had just read Milton Friedman’s [Free to Choose], and he finally bought me a copy. I read it in one sitting; it changed my life. It just turned everything I was learning in college upside down in terms of economics. I have to ask you this, too, about what Marlin Fitzwater [Reagan’s Press Secretary] said about the speech. And this, of course, is in Three Days in Moscow, by Bret Baier, who I know talked with you about the speech. Fitzwater said, “If anybody would ever appreciate Lenin having to spend an hour and a half looking at the backside of Ronald Reagan, it would be the president.” I thought that was a great line. And, Josh, you wrote the Vatican speech, which I think was delivered about a week before the Berlin Wall speech that Peter Robinson had a big part in [Episode #320]. And you had a line in there that I do think is really good: “The freedom that God gave us all when he gave us a free will.” How was that received?
Except the Moscow State University speech flew through [approval process] pretty easily, didn't it?
Josh, I think the Moscow State University is Reagan's best speech. I’ll just go on the record saying that, but outside of that one, what is your favorite Reagan speech?
You got to write the victory lap speech, I love it.
Fantastic. Unfortunately, we're up against it. And Josh, Ed's going to take you home, but I just want to say thank you so much. This is, like I said, a bucket list item for me to have you on.
Ed’s Questions: Fourth Segment
We are back with the founding director of the White House Writers Group, Joshua Gilder. Josh, I want to ask you, following up from the speech. How do you think Russia has done? Do you think they've just shrugged off one autocracy for another?
Well, we got about four minutes left. I want to try to add a little levity to this. How do you think Ronald Reagan would have used Twitter?
Maybe he would have put out the stuff that the speech writers wrote that the State Department ripped out.
Yeah, he would have responded, “It's more complicated than that,” and then posted a link to a big long speech. Random curiosity question. Did you watch any of the series, The Americans?
Any thoughts on it? You didn’t stick with it, so you must not have gotten too much into it?
Yeah, I just re-watched that about a month ago. In fact, Ron and I have talked about it. William F. Buckley said it was the best movie he’s ever seen. Totally unfair question, we've got 90 seconds left. What did you think of your cousin's article, The Huawei Test [George Gilder].
Okay. Well, we'll have to have you back on because it deserves its own show.
Well, this has just been absolutely great, we're so pleased to have you on and wanted to thank you again for coming on today and sharing this with our audience. As we said to Peter Robinson as well, it's like living with history. So we really appreciate it.
All right, Ron, what do we have coming up next week.
Ron Baker
Next week we have John Tammany, author of They're Both Wrong, so that'll be really interesting.
Ed
All right, well, I'll see you in 167 hours.
Bonus Content is Available As Well
Did you know that each week after our live show, Ron and Ed take to the microphone for a bonus show? Typically, this bonus show is an extension of the live show topic (sometimes even with the same guest) and a few other pieces of news, current events, or things that have caught our attention.
Click the “FANATIC” image to learn more about pricing and member benefits.