Conversation 044-132

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Congressman Wagoner, sir.

Hi, Mr. President.

I just wanted to thank you for your help today.

That was really great.

I'm always glad.

We do appreciate it.

I was going to mention that...

I'm inviting down, I thought I'd just invite down those that voted for saying the vetoes.

In fact, if you don't mind, I'm going to have a few of the senators, too, who stayed in the other one.

They so seldom do.

And for Thursday afternoon, about 5.30, so if you're free to come, I'll give you a little pop.

Yes, sir, I can come, Mr. President.

I invite all your 24 colleagues to.

You know, we got...

I know it's mighty tough, too, for you fellows.

It's not tough, Mr. President.

Well, it really is, though, Joe, because I know when the party guys put the arm on me, I always used to hate to vote the other way.

Well, some of them make it a bigger task than it really is.

Really?

Yeah.

But I think that if we will sustain this...

two or three more of these vetoes, we'll have our problem quipped.

Then we can get to work on other things.

The people in this country are not going to sit still, Mr. President, for us to sit here and play partisan...

I think they want us to get to work, Joe, on things like next Wednesday I'm having the...

I'm just thinking I had the trade thing today and the...

The trade bipartisan thing today, and it's very important legislation, and unemployment comes with it.

Next Wednesday, we're having a very big one on energy.

We're not taking a whole energy thing.

My God, Joe, that's going to be a lot of work.

And take your state.

You fellows are all wrapped up in that.

The price of gas, for example.

And Congress has got to get the hell off its ass and get to work on that stuff.

Don't you think so?

You're right, sir.

You're completely right, Mr. President.

We had people like Bob Gimo and Eddie Boland and Martha Griffiths vote with us, who are really not sympathetic with us.

Really?

Eddie Boland?

Is that right?

Well, I'll be darned.

This was his sort of anti-rural vote, really.

Ah, I see.

I get it.

really with us they'll do it on just yeah i see but sometimes well i'm glad we'll give them a chance you know i came back uh i came back from louisiana secretary connelly governor connelly was in my district last night and today oh we had him over for uh we had him over as the guest for uh

This holiday in Dixie, spring festival that we have here, and we had a party for him last night right at 1,000 people.

It was sponsored last night by the 400 men who underwrite this festival.

They call themselves Ambassadors Club.

It's a 10-day festival, and we had a real nice party for him last night, really first class.

And then today he spoke to a joint civic club luncheon

Like ruddering and all those, yeah.

Yes, sir.

That was the nature of it.

He had 1,400 people there.

So they turned out for him.

And I told him when I invited him, extended the invitation for the group that...

introduce him at the luncheon, but they had asked me to, but when this developed, I got in touch with him.

In fact, I went home this weekend.

I said, boys, I'm sorry, but when the party's over Monday night, I'm going back to Washington.

That veto's not going to lose with one vote that'd be mine.

I introduced the governor by telephone to the group, and I had a telephone report, and he made a tremendous impression.

I'm going to see him Thursdays here in Washington to talk about it.

He's on the outside advising us on energy, you know, among other things.

President, we can, in my personal opinion, deregulate new gas.

New gas.

I've got that in there.

But I do not believe we have to deregulate old.

If you do the old, first it's going to be highly inflationary right now at a time when inflation is pretty tough.

And the problem we've got now, Joe, as you know, the reason this inflation is tough is that we've got a hell of a boom on our hands.

Yes, sir, we have.

And so it's sort of good in one way and bad in another, isn't it?

You know, there's labor shortages all through the South, they tell me.

In real, you know, in the stuff, the skilled stuff, you know.

Right now today, you can't get anybody to do any work.

No, sir.

Mr. President, most people don't want to admit it, and you've been in front of a lot of demagoguery about meat freezes.

The truth is there is a shortage of a great deal of food in this country.

Meat is one of them.

This follows such things as energy, but we're headed for a fiber shortage, too.

You wait until early fall, and it'll be in focus then, too.

But the point is, isn't it, because short people have got more.

People are buying more.

Isn't that the reason?

No question.

You see, we're not getting the normal demand increase, just an increased population.

We're getting...

getting the fluid demand.

And we're getting it not only, Joe, from the United States, but from all over the world.

Yes, sir.

I mean, Europe is richer.

Japan is richer.

Even places like Singapore are richer.

We have to say that there's something good about that.

I'd rather be that way than the other way, wouldn't you?

Yes, sir.

I like your trade proposal.

I don't think I won't have any trouble with it.

Of course, we had Wilbur down today, but I do think you'll like it.

It just gives us the tools we need to do the job.

And as I told the boys today, I said, look,

I know some of you figure this is giving power to the president.

He says, now, I know all this argument down there.

And I says, I don't want any more power.

He says, it just puts the monkey on my back here for this stuff.

But the point is that I can't send a negotiator like Eberle abroad to negotiate with the Japanese or the Germans or the rest.

And then the guy on the other side of the table says, look, I can do this.

And Eberle says, well, wait, I've got to check with the Congress.

I said, I can't make any deals that way.

That's the old labor management proposition.

Labor management makes a commitment.

Labor goes back and checks it out with their locals.

Right.

And you see, the point is, we want to be sure, Joe, that our negotiators, and you're in committee, you ought to just say it.

It isn't the president.

I don't want a bit of a... And they can always vote the president out of office.

But the point is, we have got to see that our negotiators, in order to get the right kind of deal for American goods...

Go up or down.

And right on the spot, they've got to be able to do it.

When we get a quid pro quo, we've got something we can live with.

That's correct.

And I like the proposal.

It's okay.

Now, you know, ten years ago I would have said no, so, but I'm somewhat more of a free trader now.

Yeah, I know.

I'm going to send you down a newsletter, Mr. President, on taxes that I just did last week that's in the mail today.

I'd love to see it.

I think you'll find it suits you all right.

Good deal.

I believe it will.

Good deal.

I sure do appreciate you calling.

Okay.

I'll try to help every time.

Tomorrow I'm going to, when you come down, I'm going to call on you for a couple of words, and Jerry, and of course you, and one of our Democratic friends on the other side.

Thursday, you meant?

Thursday, Thursday.

I'm always thinking, no, tomorrow I won't be here, but Thursday gives you a day to rest.

Yes, sir.

Okay.

Thank you, Mr. President.

You're a big day.

Make this thing another veto tomorrow, then I can give you an extra drink.

Well, I guess the older Americans is next.

Oh, God, that's tough.

No, it's not tough at all, Mr. President.

It's a bad bill.

Well, it's a bad bill, but these boys, the older Americans, are willing to settle it in conference now.

Oh, good.

The other day, now this is firsthand, the other day they came to see Al Quay and their representatives came to see me and said, will you find out, and we put it into the mail, and

We do not want a confrontation.

We're willing to settle this thing without a veto fight.

And all we want is some sort of a going program that will help us.

And we're not talking about a multi-year.

We're not talking about massive increases or anything else.

This one can be settled, Mr. President.

Right.

That's good.

I hope we can...

I've been trying, of course, to order Brian Dorn to try to settle those veterans ones because those will be terribly hard for us.

Well, you would be overridden on a veteran.

I know that.

And that's why I say I want to settle them rather than be overridden because, frankly, I don't want to veto a veteran's bill.

No, you don't.

You know, after all, after doing all this thing and... Say, what do you think of those POWs?

Aren't they fantastic?

They give me faith.

Flynn was then to see me yesterday, and I'm only seeing the top four.

I saw him, the top Navy man to Stockdale, and boy, they are fantastic men, fantastic men.

really are they've gone through when they when they talk about faith in their god yeah faith in their country they believe it too and then they said and faith in their president whoever he was at the time came that's right you know what i mean that's right whoever he was when the time came right that's great one of them i said you know uh said i know a lot of you i mean you may have noted that a lot of people in the senate voted overwhelmingly to

trade prisoners for get out.

And Flynn spoke up and he said, listen, he said, we wouldn't want to come home that way.

He said, we didn't want to come home that way.

We wanted to come home with honor.

He said the slogan in their camp was home with honor.

And then when I finished it, I said, Colonel, he's now a general, but I said, Colonel,

I said, you've suffered a great deal for your country, and I want to express my gratitude.

He said, Mr. President, I haven't suffered.

He said, I'd go through it all again.

He said, how else could John Peter Flynn be standing here in the office of the President of the United States?

How do you like that?

That's great.

It really moves you.

It sure does.

He'd been seven and a half years in that damn stinking jail.

Well, anyway, we'll see you tomorrow.

Thursday.

Thank you.

I stayed up all night.

Didn't even pull my clothes off last night.

I got in here at 746.

Oh, my gosh.

Went to shave and bathe and came to the office to work on the veto.

And after the vote, it was worth it.

All right.

Okay.

Thank you, Mr. President.

We'll see you Thursday, sir.