Sam Tannenhaus

He said, they came to me.

They needed him.

These are two people.

really talented politicians from the Southwest, Goldwater, Arizona, Reagan, Southern California, and remember, Republican Party and all US politics back then was situated in the East Coast.

It was dominated by the press and media and

party leaders in the East Coast.

Here are these two guys coming out of what one of Buckley's disciples, Kevin Phillips, called the Sun Belt, invented that term.

Here are these guys coming along and they know they have to present themselves as national figures.

Buckley would talk to them.

He never tried to tell them what to think or what to say.

He trusted them, but he was able to introduce them around.

When Reagan gave a talk at Yale after he was elected governor, Buckley led him to the campus.

Buckley was famous at Yale.

Reagan was a little nervous.

He's not an Ivy League guy.

All that stuff Steve still held back then, even more so.

You know, universities with their private clubs and inner sanctums, and Buckley belonged to them all.

But he was able to bring the conservatives in.

He did the same thing with the movement.

And it's interesting what you say about Pat Buchanan, too, because I thought of you, and I sent you that famous quote of Buchanan's speech, and