On July 22, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon and Charles W. Colson talked on the telephone at Camp David from 1:42 pm to 2:17 pm. The Camp David Study Table taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 136-005 of the White House Tapes.
Transcript (AI-Generated)This transcript was generated automatically by AI and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Do not cite this transcript as authoritative. Consult the Finding Aid above for verified information.
Hello.
Yes, sir, Mr. President.
Well, did you get back?
Yes, I'm back in Washington.
Yeah, how'd you go?
Oh, I came down by car this morning.
Oh, I see.
Well, we went by helicopter.
You could have come with us.
Well, I gather it was better not to have the press there.
Oh, I see.
It looked a little political.
I see.
That's right.
Just as well.
Just as well.
Right.
Not that long a ride, actually.
Right.
Well, how's everything today?
Well, it's good.
I'm meeting with Conley later this afternoon.
Mm-hmm.
I just came home for a little lunch, and then I'm going back in to work with him on the names.
I think we have more than enough to start, and I've just been doing some more reviewing and checking our people, and they've been doing a little better than either Conley or I realized.
So I think he's going to be ready by...
By early or midweek to announce.
And I don't know whether he gave you any indication of that this morning, but... No, he didn't.
I didn't really ask him.
Well, we talked briefly when you got back, and I think he's going to have enough by the time we get through.
We've got about 20...
good names and the moment we announce in my opinion we'll start picking up more yes sure i mean that'll give some people a place to come where they don't know right now where to go or who to talk to that's right good good so john and i what we agreed is that four o'clock this afternoon we go over the list right right he was going to start making calls he
He's pretty well briefed for me to press.
I don't think he needs a letter.
Oh, he's so good at fielding things anyway.
He's excellent.
I hope what I'm shooting for, and they picked office space today, his people did, from among the sites that we had for them, and picked a storefront, and that's been settled.
And they have now three or four staff people.
So I really think we can get it launched and off the ground this week.
It's good that he has that George Christian, isn't it?
Yes, he's excellent.
That's a good name, too.
And the press likes him.
I don't think I... Well, this fellow Jacobson is good, not as a first man, but he is.
He's probably good as a number two man.
But in any event, we'll... We hope he gets Watson, but if he doesn't, that's right.
I don't know what the hell that...
Except for when Hammer's playing such a strange game that we just can't take that up.
Conley's right on any terms like that.
That's the way Hammer plays.
I didn't want to get into it in too much detail in front of Conley, but I've been on the other side from that guy practicing law, and he's a rough customer.
He's just trying to milk hell out of us.
That's right.
My view of that is we'll get them, and if we don't get them, the hell with them.
Right.
There are others.
Well, we've got a good crew.
We've got this young fellow that I hired that Conley likes, and we have Jacobson, and we have Christian.
So we'll start putting the staff together.
No problem.
The two things that Conley and I have to do now, these are the two things we talked about this morning.
One is set the budget and be sure that we're not inconsistent with anything McGregor's doing.
Right.
And...
I think he'll do that when he gets the time, and he'll...
You know what I mean?
Don't you think so?
Oh, yes.
He said he wanted to, and he wanted to do it.
And he's awfully good at it.
Of course, the Wallace thing has to come take very high priority, too.
Even if we delay the opening a week, if he gets Wallace, that's worth it.
That, in my book, is number one priority.
Absolutely.
I had a call back from Marsh and Broody this morning, and they said, first of all, France wants to get on that committee in the worst way.
He wants to be one of the founders.
Good.
Snyder would like to work for us.
I sensed that yesterday.
Well, he's smart.
Let's get him.
Oh, I was impressed as hell with him.
I just really liked the guy.
Right, right.
Third, the meeting yesterday was very well received.
They liked it, and they now feel comfortable.
Right.
So I think we... Well, that's the thing.
If we can just sort of cut these guys away, that's got to be terrific.
Well, you study that goddamn poll data, and...
I hate to say this because it sounds so damn overconfident, but if you take that Wallace factor out of there, there just isn't any way that that fellow can close that gap.
Well, you know, it's a 20-point gap, 19 to 20, but that can be closed, Chuck.
Well, it's going to be hard because we're not going to be sitting on our hands.
Well, it's where it is, Mr. President.
I mean, it's in that Catholic area, in the labor area.
I don't think he can...
I see your point.
In other words, you think it's going to be hard for some of them to go back?
That's right.
That's right.
See, if it were Humphrey, I would say, yeah, we'll turn this thing into a typical Democrat-Republican campaign by October.
And we'll probably help him by most of our fellows going out and beating the drums for the Republican Party.
But it isn't that.
It's quite different in the deflection that...
they've been there now for six or eight months and uh particularly in the catholic area they've been there in the labor area really by and large for 18 months and uh blank and file now yeah i look at that gallop data in detail and that harris data in detail i just don't think that can be closed that easily not another day and i'm not even sure this thought can get well the more we more i thought about our conversation last night
Don't see how he's going to do it.
Well, I was, Conley was pointing out that I was, what I thought really, the Washington Post this morning, it really, that goddamn editorial on him was, have you read it?
Yes, sir.
Horrible.
Yes.
That makes him look like that he was the guy that brought these slaves over and this, Jesus Christ, that was terrible.
Horrible.
It's just unbelievable.
Somebody, I told, I just went and told somebody, I went across and I really, I told them they better give a hell about that.
Then, then you read Fritchie.
Clayton Fritchie, did you see him?
Yes, sir.
unbelievable you know about the first ladies and all that stuff i mean just ignores anybody that and this is going to be there and then but boy the one that connelly just practically ripped on was that one by brayden you know this we can be proud we have a my god almighty horrible but well you know we never understand i don't want stuff like that but as you know these any columns even our greatest friends that write something but they never slobber like that this is unbelievable
Well, the floppering is what gets you in.
It comes from the Bradens and the Pritchies, not so much from Mark Childs.
Really?
One AP reporter who's been doing it with regularity.
Who is he?
I don't know.
It's always an unnamed piece.
I keep trying to find out.
The guy that's done the series, the three?
That's right.
But it's a pattern.
You can tell the writing style.
Lawson can talk.
He's trying to find out.
And, of course, we could always call Paul Miller and Dick Steele and a few of those fellows.
raise a little hell over it because yeah but but that's where it's coming from that's the the braden piece i thought was especially interesting where they said that braden who of course knows him well was just who was telling me oh yeah every night every sunday night said that he's a man of a very strong temper at which he takes pains to conceal
and has reached an agreement with one of his aides.
Obviously, that's Michael.
Never to send a letter.
That's right.
Without Michael saying it.
But that confirms the low boiling point that most of them talked about, that he does have a temper.
And that tells you something about strategy, because that, I still say, we cracked musky with that.
And the right attack on this guy at the right time, and I'm not so sure it's way too long,
just might take him apart and uh you know he has to be pretty good if you try to put yourself in his position to carry mr president you have to be pretty goddamn discouraged the week out of that convention hasn't given the only thing he has pulled off is larry o'brien you know it's a smart move but other than that my god the robust by meaning the uh the loss of all that money that i'm damn sure he was counting on the kicking the nuts
the defections of Democrats, I mean, we... Like Rizzo?
Well, yeah, it's part of them that I went through, but...
He knows our others, too, actually.
Oh, sure.
Well, it's been in the paper every day.
I mean, this is Mayer.
It was in this morning's paper, and I'm sure he's read that.
And as a matter of fact, there has not been a day this week when we have not had a Democratic defection.
Not always a nickname like Rizzo, but... Are you sure?
But pretty good names, and...
all over the place and in the South, and of course the South is coming apart on them.
I think there's no way he can get to the South, that's for sure.
I mean, his blessing position and everything, there's just no way.
And I would think that Chicago's situation, which has him terribly, terribly worried, the action of that judge, that's Daly's appointee who's trying to throw Singer and O'Neill into the can, won't disqualify himself for that.
They associated themselves with the comments that these people were fascists.
Incidentally.
How did the networks play on economic news, all right?
Yes, sir.
Two of them read with it, and all three played it bullishly.
Well, the papers were excellent.
I was so surprised to see the Post playing it well, and the Times.
The Post gave it a hell of a play, and that New York Times lead headline gain in economy fastest in 1965, price rise slow.
Now, I think the economic news played...
It played about as well as we could expect it to play.
It was both on the CPI front and on the TMP.
That was a hell of a good story.
It was excellent.
It was a very, very good shot.
And I think we came out quite well on that.
And despite the Washington Post editorial this morning on Connolly, Mr. President, I think that the...
Jack Anderson column is perhaps with all of the others combined.
What the hell is that?
I don't read that.
I don't read him, but what do you have?
As a matter of fact, I hadn't seen it until I got home a few minutes ago.
My wife showed it to me.
I know he says it prefers McGovern is the headline.
That column is going to see a lot of distribution.
Is he there?
That's his headline.
No, no, no.
That's his headline.
That's based on the news report.
God knows why he...
Why he wrote it, I can't believe that he did.
It's just a headline.
It's good.
Where can you send that?
You can send that to... Oh, hell, to the veterans' organizations, to the labor.
You know that brochure is being mailed out to 12,000 council leaders this weekend.
Yeah, I do.
And we'll have no problem with getting wide distribution on that.
Of course, Anderson...
I'm sorry to say it gets a very wide distance.
Sure.
Sure.
But that's a delightful headline.
Jesus Christ.
I just think things like this... You think they'd dig him in?
Of course, some might think, well, that's going to bring peace.
No, no, no.
They can't think if the enemy's for the other guy, that goes too far, does it?
That's too far, yeah.
I mean, no matter... Well, it doesn't go too far for the... That constant 20%... Oh, 30, 25, 30 maybe.
But nevertheless...
it's uh if it if that is the case the country's headed but but then and it's this is totally true me this one time anderson's telling the truth of course oh hell uh we've we've the farthest we kept that front page piece on radio which i was amazed to see them playing as much as they can and that's that's why even though even though the braids are going to smother all over them i still think there's enough uh
media attention on his liberal position.
I think that Harris told us that we had turned up to his last night is very accurate.
I really do.
I think that Pierre Winfrey has been going around the country making speeches.
Our people aren't too happy about him because our own economists don't like him much, but he's
Why not?
They think he's too bullish.
Yeah, they will.
They think he's a tyrannic.
Well, he always is, but that's all right.
He's saying something.
He's making news.
He's making news, but he said that he's really getting fired up.
He said, I talked to all the economic writers, and he said the prevailing line now that they're trying to use to clean him up is that, well, nobody has to really worry about... You mean the Congress will save him?
that the Congress will prevent him from doing any of these rash things.
Oh, for Christ's sake.
The President's got to stop the rash Congress.
That's the way things work.
That's right.
And that's the way the liberal economic writers, there aren't many that are any good, as you well know.
Yeah, yeah.
That's the way they're trying to clean him up.
I don't even like that.
That's taking over the McGovern market and stuff.
which you read every day uh yeah for two weeks i haven't seen yeah the stories even though i mentioned international monetary and northern ireland and peace drops but they also always put in and uh fear of mcgovern yes and that kid or people that you report you know that i didn't know about that or whatever that japanese fellow's name is he wrote it
just a devastating piece on the McGovern market.
What was it, Chuck?
What did he say?
This week, his newsletter, in which he said that the whole decline in the market was due to the fear over McGovern that those economic policies are irrational, would lead to economic chaos.
He goes through a whole deep analysis of why.
And we've asked to distribute to beyond the normal list.
But that kind of thing is getting through.
And I just don't see an arrow in the...
period of time he has that he can get back from that stuff.
I mean, I think that stuff is going to continue to haunt him.
And we know damn well the defense issue will continue to haunt him.
I think the defense issue and that stuff.
And the defections in the Democratic ranks.
That'll haunt him some.
Oh, bound to.
And basically the other thing, and it's sort of tied to the defense issue, is that we've got to remember that people are
people will figure that the thing i mentioned last night about the courts somebody we don't have some sort of a uh committee that would uh lawyers committee or something that would say that uh or a law enforcement committee maybe police and the rest and in that area who say we praise the nixon court and that's by god let's not turn the clock back the other way can you imagine the kind of judges mcgovern would have played okay that's the point it really scares me actually
So there's the point.
Lawyers, I mean, good lawyers ought to be scared to death.
And that gets to the lifestyle thing, you see, which nobody can really talk about, but which guys like Jesse Calhoun feel in their gut.
And Meany feels it.
Oh, Meany feels it strongly.
As you pointed out last night, I talked to Schultz yesterday.
After he had seen Meany, he said, if anything, the feelings are more intense.
He said, we're going to be doing a lot of work with this fellow.
I noticed that that International Conference of Police Associations got played in both the Times and the Post, page two of the Post.
And to my pleasant surprise, they carried all of his lines about strengthening the court.
And President Nixon's record demonstrates his understanding of the need to support law enforcement.
Law enforcement officers present have supported the judiciary appointments he has made.
leadership than any other president or potential nominee now kiernan is a great guy we're going to get him in next week and he has offered and we're going to take him up on it to just spend his time going up to these to these police beneficial associations and working for us because it was a unanimous endorsement and i think a group like that can talk about the court appointments and can talk about being that's great
but anyway his getting off he can't get off that's one thing he can't well he can he can throw in something in his acceptance speech about well we got to do something about narcotics but how the hell can he do that on the one side and then say he's going to loosen up on marijuana even though he's even though he's watered it down a bit I think the public I don't know I don't know how you can well they can change they can change they forget so quickly what a man says
No, but they don't forget impressions.
They have the impression that the kids like his position on marijuana better than they like yours.
Well, they know this, that there are no marijuana smokers who support me and a hell of a lot support him.
That's right.
And they've seen enough pictures of that.
And even when he talks about, well, it should be a misdemeanor instead of a felony, people...
people think god damn it people shouldn't smoke marijuana period that isn't the question is it a misdemeanor or a felony uh as lawyers we understand that but yeah but people just don't want their kids smoking marijuana that's i think on an issue like that that's one that's very much like bussing where you have to keep it simple but his original position chuck was not to make it a misdemeanor wasn't it to legalize it wasn't it that's correct and
He has backed off now and said he just really favors reducing the penalties for it.
That's, of course, I do that.
I favor that, you know, some reduction of penalties.
I haven't said what, but I oppose, no, my position basically is I oppose the legalizing of marijuana, period.
That's the only way we've got to put it.
That's the only way to put it.
We oppose it and he's for it.
And then he'll say, well, it's just the difference in penalties.
Well, that's it.
To me, that's a moral issue, and it's kind of a fear issue.
And it's one that people just have to...
It's like busing.
People consider it in very simplistic terms, I think.
Those he can't get off of, Mr. President.
The defense issue, he shows no intention of getting off of.
And I think we'll cut him on that a lot harder than he realizes.
Yeah, on the defense, we've got to kill him on that.
Well, I think, happily, fortunately, we have a...
Secretary of Defense, who's just totally turned on on that issue.
Totally turned on.
A real gut fighter, and he can cut them to pieces.
That's right.
And he loves it.
He's got great interest in it.
And that's kind of his baby now, and he's taking it on.
He wants to stick with it right all the way through.
So he can't get away from that one.
He can't get away.
He can fudge the tax.
He probably will make some points on the tax issue.
the other two make himself less frightening on the economic issue don't you think i don't think he can make himself less frightening because he to sophisticates he could make himself less you know and i'm not sure he came to the working class that brilliant piece that crystal wrote the year that we've the two you read and sent to me is that yeah very very well then you know people just don't want to feel that they're being taxed to pay for
services that they don't want and people who aren't willing to work for it.
There is that working-class resentment that is different than the middle-class liberalism that he talks about.
There is a real schism between that that you have to exploit.
I was just looking over these names that we have for the Democrats, and I think when I get through these with Conley, he's going to be ready to announce.
I haven't put them all together in one place until this morning.
We have a former mayor of Boston, which I'd forgotten about
As a state senator in Massachusetts, we have a mayor in Rhode Island, biggest city, who's at least against McGovern, whether he'll cross the bridge completely.
Former candidate for the Senate in Connecticut.
We have a former secretary of commerce under Truman.
What's his name?
Sawyer.
Charles Sawyer in Cincinnati.
And they're all over the country.
We have in New York, we've got Kiernan, the police fellow now.
We've got Chern, Calhoun, Brennan, former party leader in the Bronx.
We've got Rizzo, we've got the head of the steel workers in Pennsylvania, Carsella.
McCarroll, the head of the auto workers in eastern Pennsylvania.
We've got the mayor of Elizabeth, New Jersey.
We've got Lausche in Ohio.
Mayor of Baltimore this morning, I don't know if you noticed that in the paper, said he wasn't going to make his...
Democratic mayor was not going to make his choice until he saw what the positions of the two parties were in the cities, because he was not at all satisfied with McGovern's position.
We've got Campbellman, we've got Jack Marsh in Virginia who wants to go on.
and kenny campbell representing humphrey kennedy kenny representing jackson that's that's the line that i think would be very good well i think right right here in the city yeah those fellows can stand out across the country for us and kenny on on a letter it'll look good farmer farmer for this chairman for hubert humper and that guy out in california in the state of washington former state chairman bradley stevenson in 56 that's a good name that's right and oh yeah there's quite a few of them really
He began to end this alderman in Chicago, President Alderman, and very much a part of the Daily Machine.
So that's kind of a tip-off.
That mayor in Nebraska that your daughter saw, he becomes too very strong.
He's Jewish.
Schwarzkopf is his name.
And when we call him, he said, you just tell the president, he said, please, that not only am I 100% for him, I'm just going to go down the line for him, but he said, I'm getting all my friends out of here.
He said, all right.
He said, my Democrats.
He said, we're the shopkeepers and we're the little folks around town.
He said, none of us.
We'll take that guy.
We want to beat him.
Mayor of Lincoln, Nebraska, that's not bad to have a sitting Democratic mayor.
And of course, all those Jewish names, holy smokes, we're overloaded with them if we want to use them.
Well, I think we have a good shot at Horace Koenig, eh?
Are you sure you get somebody from Florida?
I'd like to have, really, some of those states down there.
Florida, Georgia, maybe.
Well, we have that whole Columbus-Georgia Democratic Organization that bolted.
It was in the paper this week.
We have a shot at Bob McNair.
I don't know how good it is.
He's at least interested.
It's probably hard.
We will get some others.
It just means putting a little
pressure on him.
He's protecting his law practice.
That comes first with George.
But we'll get him.
For what the cost?
If Clark Clifford can make millions being a partisan, so can George.
That's right.
No problem.
Well, we'll get some others.
He was playing me a little bit.
Apparently we'll get him.
He's very, very persuasive.
Conley makes the sales.
It's his job.
He's got a great closing line, and I have no worry about Conley doing that.
I had Ehrlichman talk to the Boeing people about Jackson, and John called me this morning to say that Jackson has, in fact, released his people, and that was evident from Kenny yesterday, that the Boeing people are going to continue to work on Jackson, too, at some point.
I came out for his date.
They want him to, and Boeing is very important to him.
And they're scared to death of the governor.
They'll go right through that, according to John, to Dr. T. Wilson.
They'll do a hell of a job for us out there.
They ought to us, Dr. Lichtenstein, SST.
Oh, Jesus, I'll say they do.
I'll say they do.
Well, that's good.
That's good.
We can...
Then, of course, you've got your, you put two or three sports figures on there.
Yeah, those are damn good names there.
Yeah, we have no problem filling it out.
I ran into an interesting thing today.
Don't mention this or use it yet, because we may not get it, but a life photographer, a young fellow, just came back from Iceland.
He's been covering the chess matches.
And he says, I'd like to thank you for your experience.
He says, Bobby Fisher sends his best to you.
He's one of your great supporters.
Oh, really?
Yeah.
You know, he's a great character, but I've never met him.
But, you know, he's a 29-year-old genius.
I mean, probably the best chess player in the world.
When he comes back, if he comes in, I'll see him.
That would be good.
Let's have Bobby Fisher.
Oh, I think it would be.
Chess reaches a crowd that most people never reach.
That's right.
And plus the fact he's young and temperamental and sort of a...
And from a poor Jewish family in Brooklyn.
That's right.
See?
And the kids kind of like the rebellious... That's right.
He tells them to get those television cameras out of there.
They like him.
Yes, they do.
Yeah.
Well, that's damn interesting.
But we don't know anything about that, because I have to confirm it myself, but we'll get him.
That's well worth exploring.
Yeah.
Those kind of people... You could put, incidentally, among those you can check on Charleston Heston, I have his letter, and...
But he should, before his name is on a letterhead, he should be called.
Oh, yes.
But he's a good one.
But he'll go.
There's no question.
Did you read that letter?
It's a beautiful letter, isn't it?
It is, yes.
He says he was an independent who's always voted Democrat, so we can call him a Democrat for now.
Oh, sure.
And this committee will take independence.
In fact, John and I were talking about some subheading on the letterhead which says Democrats and Independents, all Americans.
We're working on it a little bit.
as more catchy as a short title, because every time somebody joins it, it sticks it to McGovern, is the beauty of it.
Every time you get that name in print, it's a plus, and John will make good use of it.
Well, this is a real Democratic committee, as I say.
The Eisenhower one was not.
uh well it was good it was good but it was basically southern oriented here southern you know there's a jimmy burns and the texas crowd and kenned in louisiana and john minor wisdom and so forth but uh but ours is basically nationwide that's bill white pointed out this morning that the democratic defection is not it's a nationwide thing
as openers mr president with uh with only one we've only had one fellow who's been working the mayors and uh county officials and governors we have right now uh uh you know let's see five six seven mayors if you want to include altista small cities uh and schwarzkopf uh lincoln nebraska but
Louis Welsh will take a call from Connolly.
That's all.
I know we're going to pick up a lot of southern mayors.
That's easy, but we have a nationwide sampling of that.
We've got a couple of good former mayors' names.
We've got some candidates.
We've got a candidate from the Senate in 1970, which is pretty good.
We have a lot of former secretaries of this side or the other Democratic administration.
So it is national.
And of course,
The big Jewish names are big defections in what has always been considered at least a little, well, what has been.
Sure.
No question about that.
So it's not bad considering we've had it for 10 days.
Of course, the laborer, the King's name.
The interesting thing is that if you could get Wallace out, then according to both Gallup and Harris, it's a 19 to 20 point spread.
And that is a hell of a spread.
I agree, but Conley makes an interesting point today.
He says that we've got to be ready particularly about three weeks before the end of the campaign if the other, as he says, the gap inevitably narrows.
And he says when it narrows, he says, you mustn't let it get great momentum.
It's then that you can really have a danger because then it feeds on itself.
The momentum feeds on itself.
So he says then that's when you have to strike.
You've got to strike and try to nip that momentum that they're getting in the bud.
Well, that's the brilliance of the Haldeman thesis of no campaign.
In other words, you don't define the campaign.
I think the worst that I have to say is absolutely correct on that.
You may want to start campaigning in September.
You may want to wait.
You may want to never have a formal campaign.
You just may want to keep doing things.
The thing I'd like to have in our hip pocket are a couple of bombshells that we can drop if we need to.
I would think there might be things that we could do if...
I was reading a very, very interesting interview with Cadell and Himmelman, who are two of the government staff people, and they outlined their strategy in, I think, in a very candid way, a piece that Saul Friedman wrote, and who is, of course, fairly friendly to us.
But what basically they said is that they're going to sort of lie low.
They want to keep the
Well, they expect to keep a rather wide gap through the month of August.
Then they hope to close, and in September the gap somewhat ends, as they say here, the same way he ran his primary campaigns.
Come up from behind on President Nixon while he's not looking in mid-October, and be able, therefore, to beat him four weeks later.
The McGovern forces will have to surprise Nixon, force him to come out of the White House, force him to drop the statesman-like character of an incumbent president, and then fight like a politician.
And I'll make quite a few quotes in here.
They feel that if they can get up to within five or six points in the middle of October, there will be a sure sign that they can close it because they know that we'll blow it.
But on that point, I just don't think they're going to get that far in the middle of October.
That's the whole key.
But they might get 10.
They might get to 10.
That's quite likely.
10 they can't close.
Yeah.
But I think 10 is awfully hard to close.
But I think there's a way to keep this fella down and not let him build momentum.
In other words, the thing we have to do, and I asked Alec to do this for me, and he didn't because he said it's foolish that he can't do this.
The thing we've got to do is keep enough pressure on this fella right from this day forward that he never really has the opportunity to...
consolidate its forces and begin to develop a consistent theme.
And I think the key to this, Mr. President, is the use of surrogates effectively, kindly being, in my book, number one in this regard.
And we'll use the cabinet fellows, too, who are articulate on this.
Sure, sure.
We'll do what we did with Muskie back in January, and that is... Well, Laird will get under his head.
Well, Laird will.
And where we just keep pressuring this guy, and when he thinks he's making...
particular strides in an area, just keep dropping it on him to keep him from building momentum.
Because if you keep a gap like we have now and
You've got to figure that the gap, I think, would close at 15, certainly, in the month of August, due to the congressional thing.
The congressional thing is not a good thing for us, Chuck.
It's just no way we can beat the Godhead.
You know what I mean?
They're constantly being beat over the head, and that's going to be tough.
It's going to be negative for us.
Yes, that is.
Then we will hope to come with our convention, make it positive enough that we stop
our erosion at that point.
In September, we've got to have our other guys out raising hell.
Well, anyway.
The same article, Mr. President, says that he's going to pin his campaign on IT&T, which I just don't think sells.
Oh, Christ.
Bigness.
Bigness, yeah.
20,000 American deaths in Vietnam.
They backed down on civil rights.
That does not hurt us.
Great.
I hope you say that.
I just don't think it does.
The backlash is bigger today than it's ever been.
and to the 10 million dollars in campaign funds he has secretly collected well i haven't seen a damn thing about the 10 million campaign funds in a month and we may hear about that again but oh sure but but none of those as i look at that none of those have really got issues this economy uh continues to turn on the way that i do think that something might be done without uh being uh personal some something ought to be done with regard to
getting him to, I mean, disclose funds or who are his big contributors or something of that sort, some sort of article like that.
He's likely to react to that.
Well, that we try, that we are trying to do.
We've sent some stuff out to Corson.
He's pretty good at that.
That's why we bring that stuff.
That piece yesterday was a mass destruction.
But we'll get some of that out.
It won't come from us, but Evans and Novak have some of it.
And he's going to have to go for some big money.
He's got to now from the left.
And that may start to surface and neutralize that issue a little bit.
Right.
Well, get out to your next event, okay?
Yes, sir.
We'll stay right with it.
Thank you, Mr. President.