Conversation 165-040

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Hello.

Raymond, President.

I just want to be sure that all day on Mother's Day you spent a little time with your wife.

Oh, yes, sir.

Yeah.

I hear.

I know.

Ron said he's just going down to the office, and I said, oh, my God, I thought of you and Bazaar and the rest.

And, fellas, you know, the world is still in deep run of tomorrow, no matter what happens today.

Yeah, we're all so anxious to get off and running that we're doing it.

I appreciate that.

The kind of post today was miraculous.

There wasn't one thing on the front page except food, constructive stuff.

Well, we had some good stuff.

I have an idea that I just wanted to run by you on this commission, ribbon commission.

I think we ought to throw in there consideration by this commission of presidential and congressional terms in office.

Yeah.

It will really cause suspicion.

In terms of how it's done, how about age?

Age?

Fine.

Yeah.

Just to keep this thing so that the editorialists will have it working for a week.

Yes.

And age, retirement age and other reasons.

The only difficulty with the age thing is, unfortunately, the oldest guys, except for a couple of old farts like Batman or like Stannis, are best friends, you see.

I've been making up a list of names of my own, and of course, one occurred to me that is just terrific is John Williams of Delaware, you know.

And I mean, I'll put his name on everybody.

I'll just jump up and down with joy.

And I'll get myself a lot of good names without going to the hot shot vessels and just trying to make a charade out of it.

Right.

We consider very carefully how to get the chairmanship of this thing, and we think it's best done

from within.

Let them elect a chair.

That's right.

Absolutely.

They should elect a chairman.

But I think that my legislation should indicate that without recommending on such matters as terms of office and so forth that there has been discussion of terms of office and therefore

That I should think that they should consider such things and throw out three or four different possibilities that half the House should be elected and half the presidential and half the non-presidential year.

Things of that sort.

See what I mean?

Right.

For a four-year term.

It's always been my view that the House should be elected four years.

Two years is too short.

Because they serve for one year and run for one year.

We don't get total House support if they...

So you could get the House and say, yeah, I should be elected for the presidential year and have the other four, say, if you run that.

And the age thing, maybe we won't.

Maybe we ought to, maybe diddle around with it.

They'll come up with that on their own, probably, yeah, with the Williams on it.

But, you know, I think that should come in, and I think...

The limitation of financing, where I would make it so strict that only individuals could contribute, and I'd say up to a certain amount, and no organizations of any kind, whether labor, educational, you know what I mean, like educational, business, etc., etc., etc., could contribute a total of more than so-and-so to any one campaign.

including all the campaign committees for a candidate, everything, you know what I mean, and things like that.

If you get that so goddamn strict, that's been our... That's right.

I don't think we want to get anybody tackled up in this, make this mandate so broad and so enticing and so... That's right.

That goddammit, this is going to get people right.

That's right.

Oh, we have a thing I've got to get together with immediately, which Lennon would obviously not be keen on doing, but if we can, I'll have it.

or not even the National Committee, there were a number of complaints filed on the Democrats, not as many as on us on the financial note.

Right.

And just say that during the last campaign, there were 18 complaints, you know, technical, et cetera, filed, you know, violations, so forth.

And there were a total of so forth filed against Bullpark.

What I mean is that the Republicans that are involved, they also get in to be sure that they consider the problem of violence in campaigns and the idea that

If a campaign committee is responsible, let's put up a bond, or is responsible for any violence that is committed by organizations under its control or something, you know what I mean, something like that, that'll throw that thing in.

How would that be?

I think that we get the biggest order for it here, and we can put together to just have everyone start thinking, God damn, here's a real initiative to do this.

We're going to do some things that get a lot of editorializing on terms and all these kinds of things.

Yeah, well, that's exciting and good.

Well, I thought it was done, yes.

I've been thinking about that, too, and I'll work on that speech.

You know, it's the second thing I wanted to mention to you, sir.

Yeah.

ASH, as you know, has been working on a charter for Conley.

Yes.

Now, this is extremely sensitive.

Yes, I talked to ASH yesterday.

Right.

And I just want to be absolutely sure that when...

He is not, but he's not working on anything in the foreign field, essentially.

No, no.

So Harry doesn't need to be worried about that.

No, I'm not worried about that.

I'm really worried about the whole sphere of what he does do and how he does it.

Right.

I think what we ought to do is to get firmly for you on Monday night what we would intend to ask him to consult on

and to have his charter clearly dominated for him Tuesday morning, coming in Monday night.

All right.

And to be sure that it, you know, to say that we'd like for him to consult on these items, the energy problem, the bank problem, the bank is a problem, but without any operational.

No operational whatever.

That's right.

That is it.

What I would like, for example, for him to sit in as a member of the energy panel, whatever it is, I'd like for him to sit in as a member of the...

I mean, I want him sitting there.

If we want to use his talent fast, then we can make the best things out of him sitting there as an advisor.

Right.

But not as a guy who has the responsibility to go out and do it.

Right.

I'd like for him to sit in there as a member of the... And he might do ancillary political work in support of the actions that are underway.

Yes, yes.

Yes, I could say that he's got his way.

That's right.

Okay, you're right.

This is very, very crucial that we have this very clearly delineated.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, you know, after all, looking on the positive side and so forth, since I told you last night when you were having a dinner, I mean, how are you going to get all that excited about the absence of the summit in the end when it's held?

There's got to be a good old

I don't care what's going on down there in the goddamn Senate.

That's going to be a bigger story than the Senate story.

It's going to be a good one.

Yeah, it's going to be a good one.

Well, that's right.

But it's a good story, too, you know.

I mean, what the hell?

It's what they elected the president for, isn't it?

That's right.

Well, this is what we were going to do today.

And then when they get down to the back as to whether or not the lawyers talked to Gray or something like that, they said, oh, for Christ's sakes, what the hell is all that all about?

Well, I'm going over Henry's briefing yesterday and that...

God damn it, it was self-serving again.

It was picked up by Sherman truly incorrectly in the store.

What do you mean?

What is self-serving in their respect?

Well, it's very minor in the NSC.

Bullshit.

Nobody was fired because of it.

Well, he was wrong about that, of course.

That's why we're not helping him go.

But of course it was.

We squeezed him out until we got so frustrated he quit.

Sure.

And that was an intentional policy.

But his idea that Henry doesn't really love it.

No.

He read every one of those things until I finally, I think, had got a hold of him.

Then I offered somebody.

I said, for Christ's sake, he's spending too much time on them.

He's worrying too much about them.

That's right.

Well, I've gotten bizarred with Ruckelhaus so he doesn't get rattled by that Sherman story.

And I sent over the text of his preaching to him, which is not bad.

Sherman's distorted it.

Unbelievably.

So that he doesn't get rattled about this thing.

Why would it rattle him?

Well, because the inference was that

that Henry has asked for a report.

He didn't know what came out of these taps, and that's not true.

He never said that, but that's the way Sherman wrote it.

What Henry said was there would be a report made by the director of the FBI, you see.

And Sherman just twisted it around and said it couldn't be read, demanded a report.

You know, so it's a whole complete surprise to him.

Oh, God, I don't want Druggles House to get, you don't know who this guy is.

Well, we forget, you know, with all of our affection for him and respect for him that, by God, he pulls us all the time, doesn't he, Al?

We rehearsed him five times yesterday to be sure he hit this thing in a confident, positive, not self-serving way.

And it unfortunately came out that way.

The attack report, God almighty, the son of a bitch.

Oh, God, isn't that awful that he would do that?

Ridiculous.

All right, he didn't do it.

Maybe we'll just bust that Indian-Pakistan one on him.

No, the text of his briefing was all right.

It just was on the border of leaving it open to a reporter who wanted to make trouble.

Yeah, I know, I know, but Henry knows what the hell a reporter's going to do with the text.

You know it, Bob.

Yeah, that's right.

He's not that dumb.

No, no, he's not.

He's been around that track too often.

But he came in here this morning to see about it.

Jesus, God, this German story told me wrong.

Yeah, it sure is.

Let's do the best we can on it.

No, it'll be swept right away.

Tomorrow we're going to have to see.

Yeah.

Incidentally, on the other subject that I was talking about, I feel very, so very strongly about that, you know, Walrus and his so-called memcons over there.

I just want to be very sure that you and Lazard and so forth and Schlesinger and Colby

not misunderstand that thing from anybody's standpoint not mine not all of us other arguments because god damn it we were trying to find out and there was a hell of a lot of talk to the effect that the cia was in the son of a bitch remember i mean we were told the white house we know the white house wasn't in it we were told that by eventually they were in it and we thought well what in the name of christ was it

We heard about Mexican money or something like that.

And I said, look, that'll get warmer.

But as I said, if they were going to do anything, concoct some crazy scheme, which Dean in particular could work on, do you think for Christ's sake they would have had Dick Helms in the office, as I told you?

The point is, it's all ridiculous now.

To put it together, God damn it, what to say, Victor?

Well, the president called him in and said, let's see if we can get some scheme done.

why we can pin this whole damn thing on the CIA.

Well, goddammit, and I hope that Bizarre doesn't feel that way.

Bizarre doesn't even question at all about it.

And you have to keep in mind, sir, when a guy sits down, that may have had some dangers in it for him, he's going to slam his medcon in the most self-serving way he can.

Sure.

But if, you know, when you get into what I call testimony, the man can't, even for his own good,

He didn't plan anything that way.

Well, he won't.

He won't.

He knows.

He can and he won't because he knows damn well what happened.

He knows that I never gave Walters any orders ever to do anything, you know, about a damn on this thing.

And I never gave Gray any except to get on as well, go to the top.

And as I said, in any conversation, anything about asking Walters, if you've seen Walters, Christ, I thought they were all working together to find the answer.

Those were the two agencies that had to do the job.

That's right.

Well, I'm not all confident we're in good shape on this.

Yeah.

It's a doubt.

It's one of those papers that occurred to me.

What should be the rule on privilege papers generally should be no disclosure.

No disclosure.

The rule on memcons generally should be.

Well, on the rule on those, I think that the general rule on memcon is a distortion.

It's hearsay.

That's right.

And it gives hearsay credibility that you can't use it.

And I would simply say that these are M-Cons that are the property of the White House and the property of the President of Maine for the benefit of the President of Water.

Now, if it's presidential business, that's right.

Well, then it's not.

So you've got people coming down the pike like a poop who's going, oh, well, he's working on the campaign.

I'm getting out on a M-Con and said to her,

Let's take this, for example.

There isn't any damn reason why Walters couldn't say that, well, there was an actual security item discussed in the first meeting, but there were none discussed in the other two meetings.

So in the other four meetings, he had 15, and here they are.

I don't know.

I talked to the guard about this.

He said, we can't give them cons and don't want to give them cons.

It's natural.

The way to do this is that you have the witnesses.

He's available to go across the place.

He can explain everything.

And that's far better.

And quite frankly, it's far more accurate.

It is accurate because the MemCon, as you well know, is something that is written at the time with self-serving things.

And anybody that writes a diary, Al, always writes the diary, you know, to serve the self.

Exactly right.

And that's, you know, a diary is no evidence.

It's no evidence in it.

Neither is the MECON in the real estate.

No, but outside the government, the MECONs that they made, you say that they can get a hold of, well, or could they?

I don't, I know that, you know.

Maybe they ought to stand firm on those.

I mean, even, I mean, you know, again, we've got these here, so we've got possession.

But, uh, and, uh.

You guys have general ruling.

That's right.

Yeah.

Well, we, we sort of broke that on the case of, uh,

uh, uh, Cushman.

And that Schlesinger did furnish Cushman's MemCon, uh, to lead the committee and the grand jury.

Uh, now they weren't, they didn't do any harm at all.

Yeah, but why'd he do that?

Well, I don't know.

Now he throws orders now that he's not gonna pull anything like that again.

Uh, in other words, Cushman had bought a MemCon.

Well, his earlier discussions here with, uh, whoever it was that, uh, asked for certain equipment, you know, uh,

Oh, this was on the hunt, then.

Yeah, it was.

Now, they're no more than a guide for inquisition by the prosecution.

That's all.

You know, they know how to direct their questions.

Sure.

But I don't think there's evidence that they stand up in the context of what the man said.

You know, you really want to know how you can justify giving them cushions and not giving them...

How do you do that, Alvin?

Well, because our report discussed was not just a little bit of equipment for somebody, but national security matters.

Discussed national security matters, yeah.

There's a discussion of national security matters, and I will discuss other matters, but not those.

You see, I asked Hazard, could we kill off certain ones, and he said, no, we just can't do that because of the

that we can hold in others.

I think the idea of that cover-up is, if I remember last week, you were disturbed about the fact that maybe we've gone too far in our rules of engagement.

I'm not so sure.

I'm not so sure about our, that we're going to get hate, even if we spilled all of our guts out, you know,

I mean, testicle by testicle, we still get heat for cover-up.

That's right.

I'm almost inclined to think that it isn't going to get as much credit to say, well, we're very forthcoming.

God damn it, I just feel it.

The main thing is to keep it as forthcoming as you can, but don't just throw the baby out of the bathwater.

Well, and especially in the preliminary period, that's the worst place to do it.

Even at the cost of irritating them, it's far better for us to keep our powder dry across every spectrum until we see what the package looks like and what we're going to be faced with.

That's the whole thing, is to keep our assets, even at the risk of irritating the grand jury, which is what we're doing.

But that issue's passed.

They've sort of been confronted with a wall, and now they're working ahead, and it's not being written about.

That's right.

God damn it, we're just old friends.

That's right.

And as a matter of fact, I think you can see in today's Sunday papers, there's sort of a slacking off in the whole thing.

Yeah, that'll be true.

We'll get another story.

That's good, though.

That's good.

That slacking off, even for one day, gives us a respite, doesn't it, Al?

It does.

Gives the country a respite from it.

It shows that the country's still going forward.

Oh, God, the country is.

It is fed up with all the things that it wants to get on with.

Well, that Dean package is the intriguing one, isn't it?

It's about them.

You know, I've had a report, and I'll take it from that.

I've had a report that some of our people in Europe and our embassies are rocking around with their chins on their chest and carping.

And I called Rush, and I told him to get a man over there tomorrow.

And to get these goddamn ambassadors off their ass.

And if there's any American in any of our missions that's doing any breastfeeding, he's going to be out.

I didn't put it that way, but... Oh, I see.

Well, I want them to be listed just as we are here in the bureaucracy after last week.

Sure.

And we don't want to put it in a message.

No, of course.

So I'm sorry to go over there and talk to them in the camp and...

to get this goddamn thing up, because this will hurt us over there.

The Europeans don't give a damn about this thing, you know.

They don't even want to hear about it.

So they think it's crazy, and we can't have our people walking around with a goddamn downbeat dog and

Added to that, we've got too many important things going on.

That's a good one to do.

Yeah.

But hey, Lee, as far as the deeming is concerned, you said we don't know what the other judge is going to do, huh?

No, we don't.

He waked us up.

Does the doctor think they've seen them?

I don't think somebody.

This guy, Sirica, is going to stay holier than thou.

And he got burped that first time around.

He's going to get it.

I just don't believe he'll do anything.

Yeah, but I mean, I think the prosecution is, they got the key, they got off and looked at him.

You know, there was a story about a week ago that, uh, got the effect that there wasn't much in him, but, uh, of course, that may have been a, uh, come on.

Would it run me crazy to think that that's what it is, that it's true, that there isn't much in him?

I don't know.

Whatever the hell it is, it's, I mean, well, whatever the hell it is, it's, uh, it's no more than he's gonna say when he gets out.

That's right, and of course, uh,

Well, I think, uh, let me just go and keep our powder dry, and we'll get them.

And, of course, we'll go.

And maybe as early as Wednesday.

Okay.

All right.