Nancy Reagan talks about 'Ronnie'

LOS ANGELES, California (CNN) -- Nancy Reagan saw to the publication of her late husband Ronald's diaries because she felt it was important that people know more about the former president.
I just thought that there was so much in this diary that people didn't know about Ronnie, and that they really should know about Ronnie, she told CNN's Larry King Live in an interview broadcast Thursday.

And for history's sake, it's so important.
Three years after his death, Reagan's presidential musings, recorded in five handwritten volumes, have been collected in a new book, The Reagan Diaries, edited by historian Douglas Brinkley.
He did not write it for history, Nancy Reagan said.

He wrote it for himself. As a matter of fact, he used all the material that was in the diary to write his autobiography. It would remind him of things.

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She said one example of something people did not know about her husband was that he prayed for John Hinckley, the man who shot him in 1981.
As I remember, he said, 'I can't ask for God to look after me if I am not ready to forgive this man,' Nancy Reagan said.
She said her husband had a deep relationship with former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev.

From the moment they first sat down with each other there was a connection. You could see it. You could feel it, she said.

She said Gorby comforted her at her husband's funeral in Washington.
He's been so sweet to me, she said of Gorbachev. .

.. He came to Blair House to see me and he stood there at the door, and I looked up, and there he was with his arms outstretched.

And I went over to him and he hugged me. And we just stood there. It was so sweet.

However, she said she had problems with Gorbachev's wife, Raisa. Everybody did, she quipped, blaming the friction on the Russian woman's fanatical dedication to socialism.
One woman who had Ronald Reagan's utmost respect was former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, Nancy Reagan said.

She was a strong woman, very strong woman, she said.
She said the president was hurt during the Iran-Contra scandal.
For the first time in his life, he had the feeling that people didn't trust him.

And that was hard, she said.
She said she tried to talk him out of visiting a cemetery in Germany that held Nazi soldiers' graves, for which he was sharply criticized. But she said he told her that these men had paid the ultimate price and they should be forgiven.

Reagan said her husband never swore, and there are no curse words in the diaries. And the former Hollywood actor remained a big movie fan, but did not like crude scenes.
The Reagans were married for 52 years before his death in June 2004, after a decade-long battle with Alzheimer's disease.

She said she still misses him deeply.
I do feel spiritually connected to him, very strongly so, she said.
There are people who told me that it gets much easier.

Well, maybe for them, but not for me, she said.
Asked if she were happy, Nancy Reagan said, I can't say I'm happy, no.
I'm lonely because I don't have him, and, you know, everywhere I look there's a reminder of him, which is the way I want it, really, in the house.

I have pictures all around, she said.
Many of Reagan's entries refer to his deep feelings for his wife and how much he disliked being separated from her.
I knew, of course, that he said a lot of those things to me, but it's very touching to see that he wrote them, she told King.

The former first lady said she, too, kept sort of a diary during their White House years. But she told King her writings will not be published because she considers them too personal.