as i pointed out elsewhere, reagan avoided perjuring himself to evade indictment for willfully violating federal law while testifying before a grand jury and the walsh iran/contra investigation by consistently claiming an inablity to recall a number of things one would expect him to be able to remember considering his determination to support the contras in their war against the legitimate government of nicaragua.

it might be easier to dismiss reagan's faulty memory in light of his history of alzheimer's disease IF  he hadn't done exactly the same thing at age 51 in 1962 when required to testify before a us grand jury investigating federal anti-trust law violations as well as complicity by contravening union regulations regarding a waiver extended to mca (a major hollywood talent agency) which substantially benefited both reagan and  lou wasserman (his agent) while reagan was president of the screen actors guild  in 1952.  

anyone who has ever testified or given a deposition will quickly recognize the transparency of reagan's claim to have no recollection of the details of something in which he clearly participated much to the detriment of the union members he was obligated to protect.  an overview of reagan's 'testimony'  can be found here: Link

comparing the relative harm done to the country by dealing with the rogue state of iran in order to support a clandestine military campaign contrary to official policy a in direct violation of a congressional ban against doing so with clinton having consensual sex with an adult woman is nothing short of ludicrous.

clinton wouldnt have been impeached either if hed (dishonestly) claimed he couldnt recall. 

the walsh iran/contra report arrives at a different conclusion.  chapter 27 paints a pretty sad picture of a president stubbornly insisting on engaging in activities for which the president couldnt be prosecuted--unlike those with whom he conspired--but very likely could have been impeached...if only he hadnt managed to 'not recall' his activities.

this isnt some deluded fantasy nor an uninformed 'surface level' misaprehension on my part.

both quotes below are taken directly from the walsh report:

3 In his written answers to interrogatories requested by Independent Counsel and the Grand Jury, Reagan stated that he did not monitor the details of the Iran arms sales and had no specific knowledge of such key matters as North's role or Secord's role. The President said he did not authorize any profits from the sale of arms to Iran and that he was unaware that there were excess proceeds and that some of them were diverted to aid the contras.

When the Iran initiative was exposed on November 3, 1986, the President convened a series of meetings with his top national security advisers and permitted the creation of a false account of the Iran arms sales to be disseminated to members of Congress and the American people.4 These false accounts denied the President's knowledge and authorization of the initial sales from Israeli stocks of U.S.-made TOW and HAWK missiles to Iran in August, September and November of 1985. Attorney General Edwin Meese III and others were concerned that those sales violated the Arms Export Control Act and the National Security Act of 1947.5 Previously withheld notes by participants in the November 12 and November 24, 1986, meetings constituted evidence of an effort to cover up the true facts of the President's authorization of the 1985 Iran arms sales. But the discovery of the notes by Independent Counsel came too late to investigate effectively and to prosecute the false statements involved.6 The passage of time, claims of dimmed recollections and the running of the statute of limitations protected the underlying acts.

129 Hill Note, 11/22/86, ANS 0001883.

The foregoing facts would suggest that the President, during the first three weeks in November 1986, knowingly participated or at least acquiesced in the efforts of Casey, Poindexter and North to minimize or hide his advance approval of and participation in the 1985 Israeli arms shipments to Iran without notice to Congress.

Yet, such a conclusion runs against President Reagan's seeming blindness to reality when it came to the rationalization of some of his Iran and hostage policies. The portrayal of President Reagan in the notes of Regan and Weinberger, and Shultz's read outs to Hill, not only the November 24, 1986, meeting but beginning at least on December 7, 1985, show a consistent reiteration of the President's position. The simple fact is that President Reagan seems not to have been ashamed of what he had done. He had convinced himself that he was not trading arms for hostages, that he was selling arms to develop a new opening with Iran, and that the recovery of the hostages was incidental to a broader purpose. He disdained the restrictions of the Arms Export Control Act. He made that clear as he brushed off Weinberger's concerns about illegality on December 7, 1985. At the November 24, 1986, meeting he was ``v[ery] hot under the collar & determined he is totally right.'' 130