Today In History: Trump Censures Scott Walker; Reagan Touts Ban On Chemical Weapons

April 4, 2017, is the 94th day of the year, with 271 days remaining. The moon is in a waxing gibbous phase, with illumination at 58 percent. Fun fact: The word “gibbous” first emerged in the 14th century and is rooted in the Latin word “gibbosus,” meaning “humpbacked.”

Trump speaks at Milwaukee campaign rally

One Monday in 2016 saw Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump visiting the Wisconsins capital, where his wife, Melania, and former Miss Wisconsin Melissa Young issuing opening remarks.

“We have to be smart,” Trump said to his audience. “We have to be vigilant. We have to be strong. And if we’re not, we’re not going to have a country. And we need borders, and we’re going to have borders. And we need great trade deals, and we’re going to make great trade deals.”

“But we can’t let Mexico and China — and any country you want to name — steal our business, steal our jobs, when you look at what’s happening in Wisconsin,” he continued. “The reason I beat your governor — and I beat him badly — was I just read off the statistics.”

Trump’s allusion to a triumph over Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker stemmed from Walker and Trump’s previous vying over the GOP nomination for presidential candidacy and Walker’s subsequent decision to back Ted Cruz’s campaign. The now-45th president of the United States had panned Walker for Wisconsin’s budget deficit and state debt, noting that he was reading statistics from “books” and that they “may be wrong,” but they were “very high” numbers. Walker fact-checked Trump via Twitter. Trump also criticized Walker for reportedly purloining Trump’s phrase regarding the “common sense conservative.”

Reagan calls for ban on chemical weaponry

Ronald Reagan, in his 23rd news conference broadcast live on radio and television in 1984, publicly called for an international ban on chemical weapons.

“In two weeks, I will send Vice President Bush to Geneva to present the 40-nation Conference on Disarmament a bold, American initiative for a comprehensive, worldwide ban on chemical weapons,” he announced. “Our proposal would prohibit the production, possession and use of chemical weapons.”

The president cited the “shortcoming of early chemical weapons treaties” in Afghanistan, southeast Asia and the conflict between Iran and Iraq to support his intentions, remarking that the use of “these terrible weapons also has serious implications for our own security.”

He also expressed a deep, personal regret that the Soviet Union “had not returned to the two negotiations on nuclear arms reductions — the START [Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty] and the INF [Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Tready] talks, which [the Soviet Union] walked away from [in 1983].”

A full list of nations with declared stockpiles of chemical weapons is available through the Arms Control Association, a national, nonpartisan membership organization dedicated to promoting a public understanding of and support for arms control policies.

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Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons via U.S. Government (1984)