The following podcast contains explicit language.

Hello and welcome to Whistle Stop, a podcast of the presidency. I'm John Dickerson of CBS this morning.

The 70-year-old patient lay threaded through the tubes of a George Washington University hospital pet,

recovering from a gunshot that had pierced his lung. He'd lost half

his blood in an internal hemorrhage, and he was still weak. But he was not so spent that he could

not whisper along with his Irish Catholic visitor who had knelt to pray for him. They said the 23rd

Psalm, the Lord is my shepherd I shall not want. he maketh me to lie down in green pastures.

The bullet had come within an inch of the patient's heart. Death had been closer than all but

the tightest circle of his intimates had known. That circle had to be tight because the exterior

circle of interested parties was large, a country of nearly 300 million who had elected the patient,

the 40th President of the United States, just four months earlier. Had he died, the man kneeling in prayer

would have been the next in line after the vice president to replace him. When Speaker of the House

Tip O'Neill had finished praying, he hauled himself back up and bent his six-foot-three,

300-pound frame over the bed

and kissed President Ronald Reagan on the forehead. I'd better be going, he said. I don't want to tire you out.

This is the story of Tip and the Gipper, bitter enemies, political rivals, and friends.

We'll get to it in a minute, but first a word from our sponsor.

If you're just starting out in politics, the cliche and bromide book you receive on your first day

contains a story about cooperation between two politicians that leads the section in that book on

bipartisanship.

Now, this would be the volume of cliche and bromide

published before the current volume where there is no chapter on bipartisanship. Editors determined

...