Reagan’s October Surprise

For years, the secret hostage deal between Ronald Reagan's camp and Iran's Islamic dictatorship that sealed the Republican candidate's 1980 victory over President Jimmy Carter was dismissed as a "conspiracy theory." But with Carter now in a hospice, former Texas politician Ben Barnes finally decided to go public with his stunning story. Barnes has revealed to the New York Times that in summer 1980 he and his mentor, former Texas Governor John Connally, made a quiet trip to several Middle East capitals, during which they delIvered a traitorous message to various Arab leaders. If Iran's ruing mullahs did not release the captive U.S. hostages until after Reagan won the election, he would reward them with a better deal than Carter. After his Middle East trip, Connally immediately reported back to William Casey, the chairman of Reagan's campaign and his future CIA director. (Casey was also a disciple of the equally nefarious spymaster Allen Dulles.)

Indeed Reagan did eventually deliver after his election victory. Iran released the hostages just minutes after Carter left the White House and President Reagan secretly authorized a weapons shipment to Iran.

The October "surprise" -- really an act of treason -- not only made Reagan president, it changed the course of American and world history.

Meanwhile, what can you say about the New York Times and our supposed media watchdogs? Barnes gave this eye-popping story many years ago to Tom Johnson, the publisher of the Los Angeles Times and later the head of CNN. Johnson stayed mum about it.

And the New York Times, while reporting Barnes's shocking revelation, repeated the threadbare lie that Lee Harvey Oswald assassinated President Kennedy and wounded Connally, who was riding that fateful day in JFK's limousine. So the NYT finally exposes one conspiracy while continuing to cover up another one. Pathetic.

President Reagan and William Casey