Is there one Reagan speech where he's NOT using a teleprompter?

[K8-EEE]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ew5JxpR7tMg

Not only using it but HOLDING PAPERS HE NEVER LOOKS AT LIKE FOR A PROP.

WTF is the difference between reading off paper and reading off a teleprompter? Do the wingnuts want them to hold stone tablets or....or write on their hands?

EXCELLENT SPEECH btw, Reagan "REALIZING" that he OOOPS sold weapons illegally to islamo-fascists. OOOPS!! Don't you hate it when that happens?

[Cirque du So-What]

1. Well, there was that one time...

when he ad-libbed a 'joke' about having signed legislation 'outlawing Russia' and that bombing would begin in five minutes. HI-fucking-LAR-eee-yus, eh? On second thought, that may have been scripted too.

[Gaedel]

2. Not sure about later

I don't know exactly when Alzheimer's began affecting Reagan.

He did have a reputation as a great "off-the-cuff" speaker.

Even his enemies in Hollywood acknowledged that he was a very precise, technical actor who always had his lines memorized and "hit his marks" on the set exactly on cue. He wasn't a great dramatic actor, but was very reliable and predictable.

[HopeHoops]

3. He couldn't remember his own name OR that of our country without a teleprompter.

I am well aware that Alzheimer's is not a joke. My grandmother and my mother-in-law both had it and lived long enough for it to reach advanced stages. My grandmother didn't know who I was anymore and my mother-in-law didn't know my wife was her daughter. Curiously, she never forgot my name but had no idea why I was related to her.

That said, the "jokes" about Reagan having Alzheimer's in his first term weren't really jokes. He showed all the signs despite official denials. The 84 debates really provided complete proof. If you didn't see them, Reagan would start rambling (off topic) and had to be cut off by the moderator on several occasions, not because he was going over time to make a point but simply because he was babbling on a tangent. The weirdest of them was when he started talking about driving down the coast with Nancy and looking out over the ocean. If you tried to put it in context, one would think it related to something since 1980, which of course is impossible anyway since he wouldn't be driving. Years later, Nancy revealed that it probably was a memory from shortly after they were married.

Tip O'Neil said that when he would go into the Oval Office to discuss issues with Reagan that he had a file box (prepared by his staff each day) with a card explaining his position on every major issue. He had to look up the correct card before he could answer a question.

Anyway, Reagan's case, the teleprompter was probably as necessary as a walker is to some people. He was still an asshole.