I'm Barbara Walters. Hugh Downs is off tonight and this is 2020.
From ABC News, around the world and into your home, the stories that taught your life.
With Hugh Downs and Barbara Walters.
This is 2020.
Tonight, Vice President Dan Quayle, he survived the torture of 88, is ready to run in 92.
But in between, endless criticism and ridicule.
Did you really say when you were in Latin America, I wish I spoke Latin?
Tonight, he answers back.
Doesn't that hurt you when you hear the jokes when people say, hey, you shouldn't be president?
All that stuff that went on week after week.
Does it hurt?
Yeah.
Quayle's first in-depth interview since the president's health problems last spring.
I think he's getting a bum rap in the press, pounding on him when he's doing a first class job.
Tonight, Dan Quayle answers his critics.
Then Marilyn Quayle with her husband.
Rare personal moments.
How do you combat it now when you hear jokes about him?
I mean, this man you'll love.
Well, you know what?
Those are easy.
Actually, we don't talk a lot about it.
The once president and Mrs. Quayle, as you've never seen them.
Barbara Walters, an intimate visit with the Quayles.
And a stunning new attitude about air disasters.
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They don't die in the initial crash.
They die because of the toxic fumes, the flames, and they can't get out of the airplane.
Now, frequent flyers are taking special classes.
How to survive a plane crash.
What to do.
How to act when you only have seconds to save your life.
There was this sort of sickening impact.
It was almost like a crutch.
You downs with advice from experts and actual survivors.
If your plane goes down, you can.
Live to tell about it.
Those stories tonight, October 18, 1991.
Last Tuesday, all eyes were glued to the U.S. Senate chamber.
Would Clarence Thomas get enough votes for confirmation?
If the vote had been tied, then all eyes would have gone to Vice President Quayle.
Casting a tie-breaking vote, and Quayle would have voted for Thomas,
is one of the few official duties of the vice president.
But even though Dan Quayle has been a very active and very visible vice president,
many people feel they still don't know who he really is.
And when President Bush was hospitalized last spring,
the what if question was on everybody's lips.
What if Dan Quayle became president?
What is the man really like?
Well, ten days ago, we went to Washington to interview Dan Quayle and his wife, Marilyn.
His wife, because Quayle says she's one of his top advisors.
By the way, this interview was to have gone last week,
but was postponed because of the Senate hearings.
And if anyone knows what it's like to survive a political firestorm, it's Dan Quayle.
New Orleans, August 16, 1988.
At a rally during the Republican convention, George Bush reveals his choice for a running mate.
The next vice president of the United States, Senator Dan Quayle of Indiana.
Dan who was the first reaction.
Bush had chosen a junior senator from Indiana who most Americans had never heard of.
Dan Quayle was 41 years old with a dozen years in Congress.
But his biggest campaign obstacle was his image.
He found himself repeatedly portrayed as a lightweight.
Live from New York, it's Saturday night!
Daddy, what did you bring me?
Let's see, I've got this National Security Council report on Afghanistan.
Why don't you read that and tell Daddy what it says?
Okay!
The comedians and the cartoonist had a field day.
But who was Dan Quayle?
James Danforth Quayle was born into a publishing family with solid conservative credentials.
He worked in the family newspapers while going to school and later went to law school at night.
That's where he met his future bride, Marilyn.
They practiced law together for two years before he ran for Congress and won in 1976.
He still spends a lot of time on Capitol Hill where he presides over the Senate and lobbies for the administration.
He's an active vice president who has traveled to 42 countries thus far.
To Asia, Latin America, Africa and Europe.
He's going to send a letter to you.
He meets with the president and his principal advisors for at least an hour every morning when they're both in town.
Within the administration, Quayle is known as a hard worker.
His approval ratings in the polls have been rising steadily, if slowly, over his 34 months in office.
But still as many as half of all Americans question his ability to be president.
Dan Quayle sees the polls as important because in politics, public perception is everything.
At the official vice presidential residence in northwest Washington, we talked about that.
I'm going to ask you all of the questions that I hear people asking behind your back or that people make jokes about.
Head at it.
Okay.
Look, he's a pretty good vice president and he seems loyal and honest but you know, not really a heavyweight.
Doesn't that hurt you when you hear the jokes when people say, hey, he shouldn't be president?
All that stuff that went on week after week.
Does it hurt?
If you'd walked in my shoes, it'd hurt you too.
It'd hurt anybody.
But you've got to go on.
You've got a job to do.
And I'm doing the job.
But there are two polls that I'm interested in.
One, what does the president think?
And two, the American people will give a poll on election day.
You have made your share of gaps.
Do you feel now that you have to watch everything that you say because we the press are going to be there to say, aha, you know?
Look, everyone makes misstatements.
But I don't have the luxury that you and the media have.
You've got retakes.
I don't.
I'd like to have a few retakes.
Did you really say when you were in Latin America, I wish I spoke Latin?
That is not true.
I heard that it wasn't true.
Totally untrue.
And people think it is true.
You know, it's totally untrue and there's others like that that's just simply not true.
Matter of fact, that started out as a joke on the Johnny Carson show, according to my information.
Started out as a joke and then all of a sudden people said, oh, this is true.
But you know what, Barbara?
I have no doubt whatsoever in my mind.
I have been strengthened by what I've gone through.
But I like to repeat it, heck no.
But I have been strengthened because of what I've gone through.
Do you think that a handsome physical appearance, almost a boyish appearance, is a hindrance?
From my personal perspective, it's been a liability.
The office of vice president allows the Republican Party the biggest opportunity of lining up the future presidential candidate in 1996.
Suppose a small group of very influential Republican leaders came to you and said that it might be better if you stepped aside in favor of someone they thought would have a better chance of being president.
Would you step aside?
That's not going to happen.
How do you know?
Believe me, it's not going to happen.
One-on-one with the president, do you express differences?
Absolutely.
Do you feel free to speak up at cabinet meetings to express differences?
In the cabinet meetings I do this.
I try not to ever advance my particular viewpoint.
What I do is sometimes will correct a cabinet member if I think that they're wrong.
I will ask questions.
But I try not to get into the position of where I am making recommendations for the president.
I really don't want the cabinet to know what I tell the president.
After your 1980 Senate election victory, you were quoted as saying in an interview,
I know one committee I don't want, judiciary.
They're going to be dealing with all those issues.
Remember this?
Like abortion, busing, voting rights, prayer.
I'm not interested in those issues and I want to stay as far away from them as I can.
How do you feel about that statement today?
I don't know if it's a direct quote, but it's a reasonably accurate statement.
I will say that I said it.
Now, what did I mean?
I meant that there are other areas that I was more interested in.
One, labor and human resources committee.
And I chose that for, you might say this was being an opportunist,
but I chose it for political reasons.
And the reason I chose it is because no one else wanted that committee.
I would be chairman of a major subcommittee,
and it's one of the best decisions I made because not only did I get into the Job Training Partnership Act,
which I wrote, but I got involved with vocational education, adult literacy, disabled,
many issues that I had not spent a lot of time on in the past.
And also, it was a small committee.
You were a big chief in a small committee and other people and politicians got to see you.
It gave me a forum.
What's the most serious domestic problem facing this country today?
Jobs.
What is the most critical foreign policy issue?
Peace dash the proliferation of ballistic missiles and the potential of chemical,
nuclear, and biological weapons.
As a senator, you were known as one of the hardliners when it came to the Soviet Union.
Then as vice president, you were skeptical about Mr. Gorbachev.
Now, as a result of the events that have taken place,
what kind of advice would you give the president, would you give others on U.S. aid to the new republics?
Well, I was, and I still am a hardliner when it comes to the Soviet Union.
The Soviet Union has undergone dramatic changes.
I was skeptical of President Gorbachev, and I think for very good reasons.
He is still, and he will tell you this, he's a Leninist.
And Raisa Gorbachev is a Leninist.
They will tell you this.
Leninist.
They're still a dedicated communist.
I don't think I misjudged his ideology.
So it doesn't make a lot of sense to give aid where you're going to have a system that does not really undergo some rather radical changes.
What we want to do is to have more private to private discussions and negotiations rather than government to government.
Mr. Vice President, how do you feel about the, something that's starting in the West and seems to be continuing in this country,
and that is a limitation of the number of years congressmen and senators should serve?
You know, throw the rascals out.
Throw the rascals out.
I have been for that ever since I ran for public office.
How much limitation?
My preference is 12 years in the House, 12 years in the Senate.
That's 24 years, and that's a long time.
More and more the private lives, the intimate personal stories of public officials are being divulged.
Do you think that indiscretions, and a fair perhaps, other indiscretions, are a detriment to the capacity to govern?
No, not.
It depends on what it is.
When you get in public life, anybody that's thinking about getting into public life, let me just say this.
You're going to be an open book whether you want it or not.
Should it be a detriment to leadership?
One incident? Hardly.
A lot of incidents? Perhaps.
What was the best time of your life?
What was the worst?
Oh, in the category of best time of my life, I'd have to put a few.
I think the moment I met, and then the day that I married Marilyn, the day that I accepted Christ as my Savior,
the day that I was sworn in as the 44th Vice President of the United States of America.
Those are a few of the best moments of my life.
What was the worst time of your life?
When I was about 10, I guess, 10 or 11, my father had a disease called lupus.
It was very rare at the time.
He was in and out of the hospital for two years.
My mother and father had just adopted twins.
We got them when they were nine months old.
My father really was expected to die.
I'll never forget the time when I overheard my mother talking on the phone to a friend
where they said they packed Jim's stuff at the office today and put it in a closet,
which many probably wouldn't go back to work.
She went on about how she was afraid she was going to lose the twins because adoption,
that since she might be a single parent with two, that they might not be staying in the family.
Well, it didn't turn out that way, thank God.
My dad came back and he's living today.
He's in reasonably good health for someone his age, although he's undergoing a hip operation.
But that was a rather difficult moment when you're 10 or 11 years old
and you're expected to be a substitute father.
Let's talk about the best times and ask Mrs. Quayle to come in.
Great.
Marilyn Quayle has a reputation as a tough lady.
You'll see a different side of her tonight.
She's savvy, funny, and very vulnerable.
More when we come back.
I'd like to have a word with you, and that word is and.
It's a word you don't hear much if you're spending less than 10 grand on a car,
unless you're looking at Plymouth Sundance America.
It gives you an automatic transmission and air and a stereo
and a driver's airbag and the owner's choice protection plan.
And it's the only car that gives you those ands and 50 others for under 10 grand.
Now get a whiff.
She was sympathetic.
My gynecologist said she'd been through it and the irritation could be intense.
You couldn't cure a recurrent vaginal yeast infection fast enough.
She said a woman should first see a doctor for an initial diagnosis.
After that, with gynecology, you can cure yourself.
It's available full prescription strength without a prescription.
She said it would bring me early treatment and early cure.
Gynecologist's cure and mine.
I'm alive. Howard Weber.
I'm alive. Jessica Weber.
For a free list of cars with airbags, see your Allstate agent.
Imagine a rent-a-car company that offers special delivery right to your door.
That's Enterprise.
Enterprise, a special rent-a-car company that gives you special delivery.
So I'm in the grocery store and this really good-looking guy smiles at me and says,
Hi.
Hi. Kellogg's brand flakes?
Oh, um, well these aren't mine. My folks are visiting.
He didn't have to be embarrassed. I love Kellogg's brand flakes.
They have this nutty toasted wheat taste that is really great.
Anyway, I grab a box of Kellogg's brand flakes and say,
Gee, that's too bad. I was gonna compliment your good taste.
The toasted taste of Kellogg's brand flakes.
They're not what you expect.
Her videos are provocative.
Being nice.
Seductive.
Come on, let's go.
Now Madonna's causing a whole new commotion.
Okay.
In the network television premiere.
Who are you?
Shut up and kiss me.
Who's that girl? Saturday.
He's a hero to some, a scoundrel to others.
Now for the first time in five years, Oliver North sits down for a face-to-face interview.
A behind-the-scenes look at Ronald Reagan and the Iran-Contra affair.
Oliver North live beginning Monday on Nightline.
During the 1988 presidential campaign, some people felt that Dan Quayle's wife Marilyn should be running for office.
She's smart and she has tried to reach out, but she has a reputation for being guarded with the press.
Well, that's not the Marilyn Quayle we found.
Marilyn and Dan Quayle will celebrate their 19th anniversary next month.
They have two boys, now 14 and 17, and a 12-year-old girl.
Mrs. Quayle has a reputation for determination.
She had her doctor induce labor for their first child so she wouldn't miss the bar examination.
She doesn't practice law now because of possible conflicts of interest,
but she has a full schedule in her role as second lady of the land.
She has concentrated on emergency preparedness and disaster relief.
She's also active in education efforts for breast cancer prevention.
She lost her mother to the disease.
We talked about living in the limelight, the pros and the cons of it.
Mrs. Quayle, we talked to your husband a great deal about the criticism and about the jokes.
And, okay, he has learned to take it and perhaps you have, but what does it do to a family?
How do you explain all this to your kids?
I think one of the fortunate things for us was our children literally had grown up in Washington,
so they were probably more used to the give and take of politics than others.
But it was difficult, believe me.
During the campaign, of course, we were traveling separate places.
I was keeping in touch with the kids you call home, and your son's been beaten up at school.
Really?
It's not easy.
Beaten up because his father is that serious?
Because of the, I think it was the frenzy the kids felt, it's okay.
Dad's getting beaten up on, so it's okay to beat up on the little boy.
It hurts mom a lot, doesn't it, still?
How do you combat it now when you hear jokes about him?
I mean, this man you'll love.
Well, you know what?
Those are easy.
Actually, we don't talk a lot about it, and sure, the kids would bring it up periodically,
but Barbara, you go on.
Mr. Vice President, this lady's crying.
I cry easily.
You know why she's crying?
Because of her kids.
Look, the kids are the ones that feel the pain the most.
Sure.
Did it hurt me?
Yes, but look, I asked for this job.
They didn't.
But they have done tremendous under the circumstances.
And as you can see, Marilyn is a very soft touch when it comes to her children.
This is the tough, tough iron lady that the media has described her as who cares deeply about her children,
and when her children are hurt, she's hurt.
But I will say we have become connoisseurs of the jokes.
The kids do watch, and our children are now teenagers.
They watch Saturday Night Live, and they watch some of the other shows, and some of the jokes are funny.
What do you find funny?
When they're not mean-spirited.
You've got to be able to laugh at yourself.
She may find them funny.
I don't find them funny at all.
But the kids will tell us, and they've learned that I guess the best lesson for all of us out of this is we have wonderful friends.
And you can pull through anything if you have your family and if you have friends that support you.
Anything you'd like to say to Jay Leno or Johnny Koss?
I'd like to have a little of the money that they've made off of me.
I think they ought to share.
College costs are coming up.
I'm sure that knowing their political philosophies, I think I do, that they ought to share a little bit of it, starting with their targets.
Don't hold your breath.
Don't hold your breath, is that right?
Mrs. Quell, your husband has said that you are one of his top advisors.
Yes?
Without a doubt.
He's the one to ask.
Well, I'd like to know from either of you.
One example, piece of advice that your husband has followed, maybe a piece of advice that your husband hasn't followed, but in what areas would you advise him?
That's not, I think any time you have a marriage like ours where we started out as partners, we were in law school together,
we started out as you might say business partners, professional partners, and fell in love, became married partners,
whereas I think in the past, well a spouse might be an advisor, you weren't allowed to admit it because the man always had to do it.
But I think that's changed.
Where the advice is still the same, the give and take is the same, it's the admission that it's there.
Can you think of a piece of advice that Mrs. Quell has given to you?
Well, she gives me advice all the time.
Not too much advice.
On political matters and non-political matters.
Can you give us any example?
Better not to.
She just gave me some advice not to.
Now the question is I'm thinking should I follow that advice or not follow it?
In this case, I'll follow it.
Thank you.
Now you're just going to sit there and be this weak vice president and have your wife tell you that you can't answer a question?
Absolutely.
Mrs. Quell, is it true that you learned to lip read?
Yes.
Under what circumstances?
My sister, who's two years younger than I, is severely hearing impaired, and I went with Sally to class and learned to lip read right along with her.
So you can hear, you can read secret conversations.
But I know that she lip reads.
Yeah, but the other people don't.
That's right, other people don't.
But I do.
It's not a secret now.
The whole world knows now.
You've had some difficult times yourself since your husband took office.
Last summer you had a hysterectomy because of a possibility of cervical cancer.
I wondered, did that fight in you?
Did that change, that brush with cancer change your thinking at all?
I'm one of the lucky ones.
It really reinvigorated the role I've been playing in breast cancer awareness because cancer is one of those diseases where if you know the facts and get something early, you have a real chance of survival.
I was lucky.
It was not the best summer we've ever had, but I'm fine.
Were you frightened?
A little bit.
But we were told that they thought they had detected it early enough that it wouldn't be a problem.
But you never know, and you certainly don't know until after the surgery.
Mrs. Quayle, yours is, I understand, a very religious family.
Do you believe in the literal interpretation of the Bible?
Yes.
Noah, the ark, the rains, the flood, the two by two?
Yes.
It's been reported that you have a running dialogue with God.
Have you read that?
Yes.
Do you?
And if so, would you tell me what is meant by that?
When you're, I feel that when you're a Christian, you're trying to live your life as God would have you live it.
And he's always there, so you can always talk to him.
And I spend a lot of time mentally just talking things out.
It's very comforting.
Do you, Mr. Vice President?
Yes.
We pray to God every day.
We pray together as a family at night, and we ask for guidance.
I want to ask you about some of the questions today that are the most controversial that affect families.
In many schools today, teenage boys are being taught how to use condoms.
You have two teenage sons.
How do you feel about this?
I've spent time talking to the boys about their responsibilities to themselves, sexual responsibility,
and that marriage is really the most important thing if you're going to commit yourself to someone.
And that's where the care comes in.
What about the question of schools giving out condoms to teenagers?
I don't think it's the role of schools, no.
The country is fiercely divided on the question of abortion.
Could you give us your specific views and if there is any area in which you disagree with each other?
It's yours.
Well, my view has always been that I've been opposed to abortion.
I always have been.
I think the exception of life and mother, rape and incest.
The exceptions for you are rape and incest.
And life and mother.
And life and the mother.
Do you agree with your husband's definition and the exceptions?
Yes.
What if your daughter who is now what? 12?
One day she's a teenager with all the best advice you gave her.
Something happens.
She comes home and says that she's going to have an unwanted child.
What do you think about the way that people are being treated?
People have to take responsibility for their actions.
And that is a part of life.
And if you feel you are mature enough to go through sexual act,
there is always the possibility of having a child and one must take responsibility for that.
No, it wouldn't be easy.
And it wouldn't be easy on her.
It wouldn't be easy on any of us.
But you don't take one mistake and compound it by taking a life.
So you would want the child in that case to have the baby.
Yes.
Would you like to see the Supreme Court reverse its decision on the doctrine of Roe versus Wade?
Yes.
I think the court eventually will.
What do you like most about Marilyn Coyle?
What would you change if you could?
Be careful.
Actually, I think I fell in love with Marilyn.
It's almost what you would say love at first sight.
And I'm lucky she's put up with me for almost 19 years.
You was generous about him.
Is there anything about the Vice President, about your husband,
that you would like to see just a little different?
He could pick up his clothes a little more often.
Not that bad.
Mrs. Coyle, you've been very honest in this interview, so tell me the truth.
Do you want your husband to be President of the United States?
Being a mother and being a very private person, you look at things in different ways.
From the standpoint of would he be a very good President?
Yes.
Could he lead this country forward and make a difference?
Yes.
Do I want my family exposed to even greater limelight than they are now
and possibly greater hurt?
No.
So it's mixed.
I'll give you the final word.
Do you think that you would be a good President of the United States?
Do you have the confidence now?
Do you think you have the knowledge?
Do you think you have the wisdom?
Do you think you could make it?
Absolutely.