Conversation 147-004

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Chuck, I was wondering whether on our commercials and other programs that it is still possible for them to produce anything new or whether we're just frozen in with what they produced three or four months ago.

Oh, I think we can produce something new.

I don't believe we'd be frozen.

What I am concerned about is this, that on the commercials, the ads, the only thing we have

is the defense ad, which is good, the hard hat ad, which is good, and the twisting and turning, which is good.

On the other hand, in my amazement, I found that there's no ad which is on amnesty.

I mean, it's mentioned in the one, I know.

And there's no ad on Vietnam about turning the government over.

Now, part of that is because of the bent of the teeter outfit.

It's not a good issue.

But my point is that next week, with the opposition coming out,

with their program on Vietnam, you really, rather than answering on it, you really ought to slap them hard on that he's for a program to turn the South Vietnam over to the communists.

In other words, figuring out what is really the toughest thing and give amnesty to draft doctors and deserters and so forth.

You get what I mean?

And I figure that unless we have something like that, we're very foolish not to be ready with it because we'll be talking about...

you know, taxes and inflation and the rest, and the people are going to not be damn well interested in that when they're knocking the hell out of us on bombing and other things.

But I want you to, just as a matter of fact, just check in the morning with those people over there at the committee and say, now, we want to know what Vietnam ads do we have that we can run.

Now, of course, it's fine for Connolly to make a speech.

Laird, incidentally, should include in his speech

And press conference, a very strong defense of the effectiveness of the bombing.

I talked to him about that.

Yes, right.

He understands that it's been effective and it's right and so forth, you know, that it's for military targets only and so forth.

No, I went through that with him.

Did you understand it?

With Broody, his man, he's got down all of that.

And, yes, they do.

He's on this Sunday, Mr. President.

This Sunday, that's right.

But let's get that out before the other fellow gets out.

The effectiveness of the bombing has been effective, the essential and effective, the bombing.

The mining has been essential and effective.

But what I'm getting at is with McGovern coming out with a peace plan, which undoubtedly is going to involve a softness with regard to imposing a communist government on the people of South Vietnam, and also with his continued vulnerability on Amnesty, there should be something that hits on that one subject.

Now, Mitchell, when we were, I raised it with him because he was there when they made him, and he said, well, the Peter Group and all felt that would lose this vote among the young.

Oh, that's bullshit.

And I said to Mitchell, I said, well,

That may be, but I said, God damn it, it's a good national vote, and let the young go to hell if that's the case.

Well, the young that we lose on that issue... You lose the Jewish young, that's about all.

Yeah, I've had some healthy arguments with our own people on this issue, Mr. President.

The young that we lose on amnesty...

I am just absolutely convinced our young that we wouldn't get anyway.

If the young are going to... We may not even... We may get them for other reasons in any event, but my point is that on the amnesty thing, as you know, there's a lot of Jewish kids ran off to Canada, and McGovern, you know, slobbering over these poor, unfortunate people that made the wrong moral decision.

Now, bullshit.

We're not going to allow that, but the point is for us not to have two or three good Vietnam ads this week is a hell of a hole in our...

operation or do you agree well i agree i don't know what we can do about course connelly will hit it in the speech and laird will hit it and rogers will but the day before but they're going to come out with their own vietnam plan and we need to i think this is the time for us to have ads five minutes

It's because he was knocking their brains out.

I mean, attacking him on Vietnam.

I mean, that he's for a sellout to the communists, that he's exploited, you know, the POW thing.

But we know now that's a good issue for us.

He's played Hanar's line on the POWs, and I did that, and the Amnesty, those three.

Amnesty, Vietnam.

POWs.

Turning the country over to Vietnam.

Right.

Or leaving without our prisoners is the thing that...

But also, turning it over to the Communists is a very, very, very sensitive issue there.

Yes, it is.

Which, of course, is what he's going to... His plan will involve that.

That's why it must be hit directly.

Well, I... First of all, Mr. President, on the amnesty issue, I...

I'm kind of in a lonely position here because most... Everybody says we shouldn't be hitting amnesty.

I just keep forcing it into the debate.

And I don't want to get...

They don't want to hit it.

Because basically they feel that it's...

loses this with the young.

The hell with the young.

We're going to lose some of them and the rest.

But the point is, it ought to be hit as a moral thing.

God damn it, it's wrong.

And I have hit it over and over again.

Now, God damn it, they've got to follow my lead and quit farting around here.

The whole Price office, I know, except for Buchanan, is off on this and the wrong track here because I can't get anything out of them whenever I ask for it.

Well, I asked somebody to put to...

I asked the people putting your remarks together for Sunday night to mention... to put in there a couple of lines on amnesty and have told that...

by the writer that he can't get that approved, so it won't be in there.

Can't get it approved?

I don't worry about that because I know you know how to handle that.

With Peter Fosco and building trade leaders and George Meany on that dais, that's one thing that...

I want you to report to Haldeman now that you couldn't get that approved.

Well... You've got to do it.

We have got to get these people in the head.

Well, right now, Mr. President, I feel...

I feel we are doing so damn well that... You don't want to break any China.

I don't want to break any China.

I mean, honestly, I've been running the system a lot, and Christ, we told people this week to go out and steal bumper stickers to get them out because of the damn system.

I mean, if necessary, I told Dan Rogers and his labor fellows, if necessary, go steal them.

And if you can't steal them, let's print them ourselves and... Bumper stickers.

Yeah.

Right.

Well, labor for Nixon.

Yeah, because they aren't getting them out.

That's right.

They weren't getting them out.

We're managing it, and we're doing so well that we don't want to rock it to it.

On the amnesty thing...

Let me say two things.

One, I agree completely that we could use a one-minute spot on Amnesty alone.

That's what I mean.

But I think I'm the only fellow that feels that way, so I'll raise it.

Raise it with all of them in the marathon.

I want it done.

I want it done, and that's it.

The press conference you had yesterday, if it did nothing else, in my view it did a hell of a lot of things, an awful lot of things.

It was terrific from many standpoints.

If it did nothing else other than to flush him out on amnesty, it was worth its weight in gold because he was on two networks.

That's what made it flush him out, huh?

It flushed him out.

He was on two networks tonight defending himself on amnesty.

I mean, you talk about putting a guy on the defensive on an issue that's absolutely cancerous to him.

Jesus.

He's on there tonight on ABC and on CBS.

and he's saying what a horrible thing it is that the president of the united states is exploiting amnesty those poor boys that went off to canada and oh my god you know he's the now by our veterans people should flack right back and keep it alive oh sure well this this one i mean he has now opened it up uh stupidly i mean that's the most basic the most elementary advice but the only thing i'm really concerned about chuck is that they're going to have this big blast for two days and i know you're working on it and so forth but

But Rogers will meet the press and Laird will face the nation in an event with the press conference.

That isn't the way.

It's got to be more than that.

It's got to be the goddamnedest barrage of these son of a... And not defending on Vietnam, but attacking him on Vietnam, attacking him on amnesty, attacking him on wanting to impose a communist government, attacking him on begging and crawling for the POWs, right?

Which he repeated today.

That's right.

Incredible.

That he would... Knowing...

What an adversary.

You see my point?

I just feel strongly, Chuck, that we just mustn't miss this now, and then wake up on Wednesday and Thursday and say, gee whiz, he's making some yardage on this.

He'll make some yardage on it, but he doesn't need to make that much if we hit him hard.

I agree.

Well, let me tell you what we have lined up.

You mentioned to me today that Rogers was going to go on Tuesday.

I was trying to move Rogers up to Monday.

Did you...

I had talked to him this morning about Monday or Tuesday, but did he indicate Tuesday to you when you... Tuesday's what he indicated.

I didn't discuss what day.

I see.

Well, maybe...

I know Kissinger would rather have it Tuesday, so maybe we should leave it at that, but...

He doesn't want him there when he's doing it.

But it doesn't matter.

Let him go Tuesday.

Tuesday, all right.

But the reason I wanted, well, in the Senate on Monday, the Democrats are planning a debate.

Our fellows are all primed not to let them start it, but for us to start it.

McGovern is selling us out.

He would sell us out to the Congress.

Heaven forbid he were elected president, he'd sell us out to the Congress.

Great, great.

And he had amnesty and every stinking issue.

But also, please, please, please, for once, get this about eight bad quotes on him.

And the direct quote, so that they just get up and read, here is what he said, quote, quote, quote, quote.

And we disagree.

Will you do that, please?

Yes, sir.

We've got those.

I mean, just put that on one page, so you know how these guys are.

They'll never find them.

Quotes on Vietnam on one page.

Yep.

We've distributed them several times.

I know.

spoon-seeding it to him.

I know.

Well, you know, but it does get through, Mr. President.

Oh, sure, sure.

A lot of them are getting it through.

They are.

I just was noticing more this week who are using that quote out of the Reichlich piece to show how naive he is and how incapable he is.

But you know his quote on begging and crawling now ought to be coming up since he's going to be on that, his quote on whatever he said on Amnesty, whatever he has said about...

dumping to and turning the country over to the communists just get the direct quote oh he just walked right into it just today he said if if i thought i could release those prisoners one day earlier it wouldn't bother me one bit to go to hanoi and beg for their release he said well now we know what the harris bull says about that 80 of the people think that that's a communist propaganda he's playing right into their hands i can't believe that either the fellow is not

using any judgment at all, or he really thinks the country is in a very different shape than the country is in.

But your point is absolutely that we have got to keep hitting him on it.

I talked to, I briefed Mel Laird's man for an hour this morning, and he's got very good points for this weekend.

Mel's on Face the Nation Sunday.

We have a debate started in the Senate on Monday.

We have both Conley and Richardson giving very tough attacks on Vietnam.

On Monday and Tuesday, he has Agnew out of Anaheim at a rally Monday night where he'll get a good coverage.

And he's getting TV every day now.

He's getting network TV.

He won't that night, but it'll carry over to the next day.

Roger's press conference Tuesday.

Laird is all prepared to deliver him on Wednesday.

And I think, really, Mr. President, I would love to see some spot ads put in the same period.

Yeah, we could have them.

And you see, the difficulty is that the ads we've got, Chuck, the defense ad does not relate to Vietnam.

No, it doesn't.

And the hard hat ad does not relate to Vietnam.

That's right.

The only one that does is in a very tangential way is he's changed his position.

Right.

Now, you see, now that's wrong for these people over there who've worked all this time and not have an ad on Vietnam.

God damn it, when it's a good issue.

Well, I think we could put one together very soon.

They should have had one.

There's some terrible mistake, and it's because of, as I said, it's because of the benefit.

That's why they believe.

Just face it.

No, but the people that do ads basically are, even though with us, they're for us, I'm going to be clear, but basically they're liberal.

Let's face it.

Or am I wrong?

no you're right and you heard me argue with alderman over the over the newspaper ads i don't think they've been tough enough right right alderman thinks i'm heavy-handed and the the ad guys are too goddamn soft but somewhere in between yeah i know there's an ad that will uh that's right that will suck it to him i remember that abm ad that we did two years ago that had the whole heel up in arms hell of an impact that's right you got to be a little tough once in a while the answer that and even you take a fellow like lou harris today he's saying to me

Don't let up on attacking this fellow.

Keep attacking him.

Lou is a hawk in Vietnam.

I imagine he's a liberal on domestic issues.

But he believes in attacking.

Keep slugging him because you're knocking the hell out of him.

And if we don't slug him, he's not getting sympathy.

He really isn't.

No, he can't.

He's just not that kind of a person.

Did you see the picture on the front page of the Star tonight?

Did you happen to see that?

No, I didn't.

What was that?

About him?

Yes, sir.

It says, weary campaigner, and it's a picture of him holding his hand up to his face and his eyes closed.

He looks like he's damned here about to cave in.

Well, they just probably caught one picture, but nevertheless, they may be trying to create sympathy with that, too.

Oh, God, no.

This picture is like the Shrivel one last night.

You look at it and say, God, you wouldn't want that man in the way.

I mean, it's scary.

He looks 90 years old.

His hand is all wrinkled up, and he looks like hell.

But there's no question that the basic point is to keep the goddamn heat on him because he is, number one, he's making mistakes.

Number two, the more pressure that is on him, the more mistakes he will make, like on this amnesty thing today.

It's a terrible mistake.

Seems to me it's a mistake.

Thank God.

There's no question it's a mistake.

It shouldn't raise our issues.

Well, that's right, and defensively raise them.

In other words, he didn't...

He was defending his position on amnesty on two networks tonight for a couple of minutes.

That's why the networks used him, because they agree with his position.

Oh, that's right.

And I think they thought they were helping him.

He was...

Smart enough to realize that that was devastating stuff and didn't use it.

Yeah.

But, no, I think that's right.

I think that's right.

Well, it may be that the ad people are way ahead of me, but if they don't have one on Vietnam, they have really dropped the goddamn bow.

They're not ahead of that.

Your point is absolutely correct.

You see, basically, with Vietnam going to be his subject next week, we should have an ad on Vietnam.

I mean, on those three points.

Amnesty, POW, and...

turn the country over to the communists.

Right.

He said.

Right?

Well, I totally agree.

And they can crawl.

Okay?

Yes, sir.

I'll go to work on it the first thing in the morning.

That's what is really killing them, Chuck, because you see that McGovern people are actually talking to

the establishmentarian types, you know, the rich suburbs and the middle-class suburbs and the rest, and they aren't talking to their constituency.

That's right.

And we're getting their constituency.

That's exactly right, and that's why he goes on television and rants and raves about what a horrible thing it is that we're talking about amnesty.

Yeah, because...

Right, because that appeals to those rich suburbs whose most, many of those kids are tractors.

Exactly.

And what he's missing completely is the traditional constituency of the Democratic Party.

Meanwhile, we've just stolen away from them.

That's right.

For a lot of reasons, but that has to be one of them, at least.

Okay.

Well, if we could just get one commercial in Vietnam, I think it would be great.

I'll go to work on that first.

Okay.

Great.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.