Nixon, Haldeman & Ziegler on 1972 presidential campaign and Political strategy

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Yeah.

I heard about it, yeah.

About it.

Hell, it was.

With this alarm from the press of the planned YAP after carrying on the presidential campaign on my behalf, while I'm naturally proud that you hold me in such high regard, I still must ask with all the urgency I can express that you desist.

Hoping to repudiate any activity of YAP is not something I'm eager to do, but in this instance I'll have no alternative if this effort continues.

As a result, I've been in full support of the President's mavenization policy.

It is impossible to view Vietnam without taking into consideration where it fits into the gigantic chess game called the Cold War.

The stakes in that game are no less than our very existence, and only the president has access to all the facts necessary for each move.

Long way since those brief cold water days when there were so very few of us sounding the alarm.

We've elected a president, but he is opposed by a hostile congress determined to deny almost every request he makes.

The great permanent structure of government and bureaucracy resorts to outright sabotage as part of the effort to put back in power those who will renew the trip this country was on to the eight new frontier and great society here.

The move you've announced can only divide and destroy our chance to go forward.

I am pledged to support the president and have told him I'll lead the California delegation to the convention on his behalf.

I ask you to join me in this, lest we awaken, find those who oppose our dreams, and both return to power.

Ours is an uphill and long-term fight against a combination of mass media and political forces who deny everything in which we believe.

We cannot afford division, sincerely.

Their lingo and their reasoning, their marketing, their philosophy,

I'm ready to make our case, and if it seems good, I'm ready to do it.

I'm making sure he looks good for his time.

I'm just going to fight for him.

I'm going to make the best of it for him.

.

I love you, Max.

I think we should get off.

But can I?

Buckley.

You can.

That tells me that Buckley

Hmm?

I don't know.

I guess that's where it came up.

That's what led into the question.

That's right.

Maybe it was that Buckley did want to put Reagan on.

He made the point, obviously, that wasn't possible.

I think that is, isn't it?

I wonder

I was going to get a new summary, uh, with, uh, with the horror stuff.

But I'll tell you.

I'll be back.

Well, the figure is 19, but he said the news numbers are under 20.

The news numbers...

I wonder if Scott gave that to someone.

So we can't be in a position of leaking information.

It isn't smart.

It isn't smart because basically it goes for a long time.

The carrier itself is in general usefulness if it becomes a pipeline.

It's a way to do it, isn't it?

It's a way.

It's a commendation.

It's a commendation code.

Yeah, it's commendations, letters, etc., etc.

The idea, too, is to work on it.

We've got it just kind of planted.

We've set out.

We're running out about 137.

300 pieces so far.

Even better for our certificates.

They, uh, put somebody special on the chart.

That pulls the corporation.

They always use it.

Some get a presidential letter and a certificate of commendation, some just get a straight presidential letter, and some get a presidential assistant letter and a certificate.

And we've got a whole range here of people that have done all kinds of fascinating things.

I don't know how we're doing that.

Yeah.

Come on.

The Air Force Academy today, they put out a text once a month.

You can see how you can do that.

Dr. Smith did say, well, that's it, that's it.

That's what basically they have to do, which is

The nation thing is what we want to do on this Presidential Citizens Medal, which is at a higher level, but they've got some recommendations now that they're trying to get back.

But Colson, Colson wouldn't.

We've got some other people looking into it.

Some of them go away, or one or two, eight years.

What do you hear before you go out?

Two years, they go to Montenegro.

The best hope that we can do is try to see the folks that could actually

said that he would like to

He's a goddamn good professional.

Last year, there was a mention once before, I don't really remember.

He said it was something for him.

You know, he said he was running into some problems.

He had problems all the time.

I figured he was falling apart, but there was a group that sent a note on that.

We talked and he came apart.

Yeah.

I forgot what the details were, but whatever it was, the circle box fell out or something.

Yeah, I think it was.

The background was a little bit harder to copy.

Because that was a gross note that you probably know because I understand you were an investor and I wasn't involved.

And as soon as I listened to some of the other guys who were working on it, in fact, they wanted to get me in.

Bob, what you're telling me would be an excellent member of the commission.

Totally loyal, Wes.

Totally loyal.

Totally dedicated, you know.

You could pull him out of the wash and get his head out.

That's been the sixth time in the F.C.

to see that question.

They should be.

I think there's a lot of people around this country, there's a lot of the arts and there are a lot of the, I can't say that, but there's a lot of people around this country.

This is a very good presentation, but a little too long.

Well, I was afraid it would have deceived you.

In fact, I did not know what I was considering.

Part of the problem was the light had gone off on the podium, and he couldn't see his watch, so he didn't realize how long.

Wouldn't let his watch on the podium, you know, to keep an eye on the time.

Well, no great law.

What you have to do, boy, you start speaking, you have no idea how long you're on.

And I said, sure, at least not this time.

And he said, he did answer me.

And he said, I can't believe it.

But that's less than somewhere in the apartment.

And then talking about going into Northern California.

That's five years I've worked for him.

because it's a little past 28 on the scale.

It's a good time to get in your old chair, and then the wedding is a time when it's really important.

You push good luck into it, and you never come in push good luck.

So I think he likes his job.

He works as a spy in the press corps in Toronto.

He saw us in the press section of The Lane and all that.

So he tells Ron what they're talking about and what the story's going to be about.

Yeah, that's pretty helpful, because they'll say to Rodney, you better get back to the straight line, because they're talking about, you know, they're interpreting what he said as being such and such, and they don't want, they forget, you know, they don't pay any attention at all, considering we're on the press corps.

The way they won't tell Don something, they'll talk to each other in front of all of them.

As they're floating out the window, they'll be coming running up and talking to each other in front of them.

All the years of running around the weekend, it's business.

Of course, he had a very good job before.

That's right.

That was a tough job.

That's a dog-to-dog business, I'm sure.

I owe people.

I mean, getting canon officers to write letters.

Or a congressman or a senator, somebody that has some.

All right.

It's good because people can exercise their frustrations that way.

You see these things that make you mad, and you want to do something about it, and this is a way to do it.

Mort can say, get some letters to this person, he does, and he'll put a note in the market, and they can do a fun job.

Even if they didn't hear it, it's good for you to do it.

That's the thing, it's one of the things that's wrong with that.

His first blast, his documented blast, wasn't pointing at all.

But now it becomes that.

Someone had also raised the question,

.

You know, they return people to India, and they were stout on some, and the Russian people were still up there.

I think we ought to put, we ought to treat them at least like we've done with the YRs a couple of times.

With the 18-year-old vote and everything.

That would be enthusiastic.

Here's what I would like to hear your questions on.

I don't want to talk about any of it, because we, Bruce and I, and Scott and others, are young people, and we haven't got them to let show that we have something out of purity.

And they aren't terribly enthusiastic about anybody else that we're going to be accepting.

We've got to pay attention to that.

The, uh, Chief Bill Robinson.

The top State Department officials are giving an assumption for the treatment of the senior Washington press secretary.

They're raising, I guess Scali suggested that you consider dropping by.

Well, there's a lot of other things.

John Eintower may be, Charles Roberts, and Paul Ward as well.

Well, that's Eintower's group.

That's the State Department guys, but they've all covered the White House, too.

It's a week from Monday.

Well, that was our problem.

Just at the last minute, if you were in town, I had nothing to do with it.

We don't tell them at all.

And we've got...

The directors of the National Association of Broadcasters are going to be in town.

to present you with a personal, whether or not a copy of the history of broadcasting the book.

The problem is to have a White House reception, a formal reception.

If you do the press conference on Wednesday, Thursday, this, and there here on Wednesday, then I think it's the only day we can do it.

All right.

This is the guy from Capital City Broadcasting in New Zealand.

People from all over the country have been stationed all around.

District directors, his work.

People outside of the store.

That's one guy.

These are a little different.

These are businessmen.

Yeah, I agree with you.

If they had to do that, I think you'd have George Hudson.

You'd have Paul Harvey.

Big time, local gods.

The big deal for them would be that we can't get into the place.

Good breathing.

On Monday, the American Society of Association Executives...

What we want you to do is post, you know, the freedom type thing.

The problem would be to have you come in and read it between Ronnie and himself, and then have you come in and read it, and then leave it, and then tell me what's the problem.

Thank you very much.

that you want this day of your reception to light up.

They're going to do the briefing.

Have them read the briefing, and then you receive them afterwards.

You see, you understand what I mean, right?

It's a little better to do that.

It's a little better.

I agree with each other.

I'm the first one to be able to do that.

You probably don't know about it, but they think they can.

Well, they sure as hell will know me.

I'm on to them.

And I can at least get some chocolate in the morning.

I just want to do that sometimes, maybe a little bit sooner, but I think we've got a little while to pay it back.

This week, next month, I think we're waiting for Paul to do that, but I think so too.

I guess that you want to do that only once.

Or we've got the time to do it in the eight days.

We can do it again next year sometime.

Right.

They don't expect you to do very much, but you've raised it really well.

I like the idea of getting in the business.

Well, that's different, but I like to get in the business and also grow my children.

I think my idea of a state by state is the best.

I don't know.

I think we should.

I should.

I would think you could do one after another.

They're kind of with people and there are people.

This is too early.

I don't know.

He's done the summit of Andor, he's done one of the two, he's actually done two of the other three.

He's done a lot for sure.

You know, if that one is one, who he is.

I can't tell.

I put the state list.

I think those should be well.

Anyway, they can start to get a list together.

And I will see, for example, what I can do with the fact that I have a blue shirt.

And it's definitely a good way to pull together three to four states.

Maine, Vermont, and Hampshire.

You see they all travel back and Maine, Vermont, and Hampshire, Massachusetts.

And then you put them all on the bed and you put them all on.

And then it gets really damn connected.

So there's a special twist to it.

It's here by itself.

And then you put them all on the bed.

I don't know why it's like you're coming off this as a different game than playing these guys.

I mean...

with their wives is good.

Or administration officials.

Their wives are bitching because they're out all the time.

The guy from out of state

We come in for one, three of all the working sessions.

And we will always give.

I think in that case, we ought to go rather heavy on those compacts.

I think we could always give that.

Well, that is a gift.

Yeah.

I gave my motion.

This is my party.

Put down the fact that we have a motion.

That's my party.

And you forget all the rest of it, just hold on to it.

It's all out on them, you know.

Yeah.

It's a hundred bucks.

Just as much as they like the toys and stuff.

That's all they'll give you.

And they know you're a good buddy.

That's what I'm saying.

That CD, he can't hold it.

He's got to sell it.

The bank isn't allowed to hold it.

Okay, we'll buy it and rent it to us.

I didn't think it was available to, uh, guest officers and so forth, but they, you know, if you want to send people down for a, for a rest, rest, or something like that, I'm sure.

I'll see you later.

I'll be with you.

You see that dude?

He held off on building the...

He's there now.

Go ahead and build it.

Go ahead and get it done in time.

Get it done in time now.

Go on.

And then let me know about this person, you know, understanding one another.

It seems to me to be completely indescribable.

And then, the best of all, was that the other laurel is totally inadequate as far as, as it, as it goes on and stuff.

Yeah, termites, and it's the heat.

It has no heat on air conditioning.

It works, and it's much longer.

All right.

I go ahead and put it in.

Might as well.

We see if there's a real problem.

Provided they got it.

But they can't get it done this summer.

They can't do it in the winter.

It would be, if you want to have any kind of meeting or anything, it's there now.

It's not going to be fancy, but it's going to be bigger.

When they come down the hill, you need to go away from your place around them.

So, yeah, they can't do a lot about it.

I forget whether they take it down or where I think they do, or else they convert it to another world.

If they have notice, they'll be there for the support staff to go ahead and comment.

And it doesn't cost much money in terms of the price of it, you can say, yes.

But how many people use that?

How many hours of that?

They don't compare to it.

They don't compare to the cost of it.

Whether it's the Bill Rogers office or something, the quality of those acres is the same.

They get it in years.

Too economical for the big names.

You know what I mean?

That's why there's an over-done business.

I think that's where we're correct now.

Of course.

We're in a place where we can carry the money.

We're also in a place where we can do it.

We always make a fuss about that.

They pick up things like that in Europe.

I'm telling you that we're doing well.

We do well.

We're part of this world.

We've got an in-governance community.

You can see that.

We're the Senate and the House now.

Of course, you could build a new office building.

You can cover some more space now.

Ten years, you're accomplished.

than there always was, and I could never undo what happened.

And I thought to myself, I'll be better than the raven for now.

The fourth house office building, the third sound office building, and then we are getting to the point where we're picking up, and we're taking on a never-ending process that is, you know, the evidence, and we've got enough time to think about it, and we've got enough time to call an officer.

He's got that ability and he's got drive.

Great ambition.

But you should have.

You've served it.

God damn it, you can't go sitting around here as a counselor to the president.

You've got to get the hell out of here.

I want to get out now.

I think he's...

I was trying to grasp onto about this the other day, but the doctor said, you know, it's not for long.

I'm trying to go through all of these things together, but I need something rather than, you know, I'm afraid I don't know what happens.

It constantly doesn't work.

Harlow was very wise when he said, you know, don't put me in it because it won't work.

You've either got to have a job here or you don't have one.

I think you're right.

And Boyan basically found the same thing.

Rosenman's theory that you ought to have someone around you who can just think is fine, that doesn't work.

You either are in the mainstream or you're not.

If you're in it, you've got to be doing something.

You just never catch up with what's going on.

That's the problem with how Mitch and Ron Scholar are kind of picking around the edges.

There's no real way to get it in there.

They're both building their own staffs for no purpose.

I don't think they've heard of it.

I don't know.

That's their story.

That's what I want to know.

Hello.

Hi, sir.

I, uh, wondered if, uh, our friend, uh, Freedman, did he give you any report after his lunch dinner with that little doctor?

I don't know.

Oh, I see.

Right.

Well, it was good to see him.

I think my reaction was the same as yours, that he might just give Arthur exactly the wrong push at this moment, and I think he might have too much of an effect.

What do you think?

you

You're being, you're being, you're being in this for, I don't know, I'm inclined, I'm inclined not to get arsed with everything.

I'm not, I'm not quite as disturbed about the industry situation.

We got six months up, and then we take back next time.

So we had that luxury go on.

Something slow didn't come along.

All right, let me, uh, let me, uh, first, first point.

What is, uh, what do you think could we ought to do across here?

There you go.

There you go, right?

That's fine.

There you go.

Let me ask you this, with regard to your, with regard to the situation in general,

The reason, I must say, is still that he pictures a lot of steam in the barn.

I hope he's right.

He also is not taking into account what the Congress may do.

It would be very, very foolish lest we do a little bit more.

That's the other problem here.

You see, our real thing is if we were God and a dictator without having to go to the Congress, then maybe we ought to just keep it at a certain level and let it go up next year.

But we're not active in the election.

This paper isn't basically too much in the higher bracket.

Yeah.

There.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, there's no question about the directions.

I mean, there's no question.

I mean, the main problem I see is they treat it quite similarly.

Increases affect jobs, whether they affect just the, and that's, I know, it's a gray area, but whether they affect jobs.

Yeah, well, we follow.

Well, as a matter of fact, it'll be fair game because when we were running in 1968, we tied the inflation, the inflation of the deficit.

Well, we blame them, so we've got to expect them to blame us.

On the other hand, the deficit's going to be created by how the law is going to be created by Congress.

But we've got to make that case.

Sure.

What about this, uh, you mean, uh, are you ready for this meeting, uh, again, or is this earlier than what you want to do exactly?

Yes, yes.

We're planning.

Yeah, yeah.

Bob said that he had this...

No.

Yeah, I don't think we want it, but now do you think maybe we should because it might provide a challenge?

Yeah, yeah.

What's the hell's the purpose of it then?

All right, fine, then it gets done.

We either have to, we're not gonna go, what did you say it cost, how much?

The answer is hell no.

No, no, no, no.

No, sir.

Under no circumstances.

We've got to stop on something.

And if he wants to come in with a smaller bomb, we just can't do it.

I just say that I'm going to have to meet with some education bill, a lot of others, and I just don't see doing this.

I don't think it's going to be common.

It's only going to be consistent with the pattern that we're going to have to do with some congressional orders.

And for us to get on that, we're going to have to do more for the census.

Take it over.

All these people get along in departments.

He mentioned both of you.

I'll do one about the property, and one about the doctor.

Well, they should have a property after work.

They should have the other, and they should know they're going to have them.

That way, you take care of ours.

You get a quarter, and you get a month the other, and you're good to go.

I see what you're saying.

Month the other, month the two.

What about the meeting on the budget once this morning?

Well, he is.

For a precise guy, he's the hardest to eat.

It took me 25 minutes to try and finally get him worked down to what it is they do want to have.

They just want it.

I know what they want now.

The problem is, it's going to work again.

I would have heard him.

I walked through the group and talked to him.

I mean, if you don't have a press conference, you can do it then.

If you do, then it's good.

It's not a big story to me.

They don't want to do it next week.

They won't be ready.

Oh, no.

He's leaving.

I told you I would like to eat because I'm hungry.

So when do I go up to the rocket?

Right now.

.

Well, you know, keeping them down, I mean, I don't want to restate this, but I, uh, I mean, Jack has to listen to us, but we don't need him.

You know, we don't need him.

They may be, uh, they probably don't.

They don't.

They, uh, totally don't have any hands.

They may have been with somebody else.

Let me say no state visits next year.

I don't want to have a state visit for example.

That's one of the reasons that there's black on that, on that can.

I want you to get those hand readers.

I don't want them to go around in the car.

It will get stuck.

I don't want to go to Canada, period.

I struggle out of the letter 10%.

And he's saying that I was looking forward to seeing Trudeau.

He takes us in the ass and over there in Florida, in Europe.

There's nothing in it at all for us to do in Canada.

What the hell does it do with me to go to Canada?

Nothing.

All it is is a bunch of goddamn beasts that are up there.

You know, there's the problem.

I'm not going to Canada.

Most of it.

Canada's out.

And don't tell me about Mexico or Geneva.

And that's what Jesus Christ said.

We've done that Mexican thing a bit up here, and I'm not going to go down there.

There's no more Mexicans.

There's nothing in Mexico or not in Canada.

Geneva is out, period.

I'm not going to go to Canada.

I would share

With Moscow, that's in the fall, and thinking of the European summit type thing afterwards.

Seem to me you'd look at it a lot better to bring them here.

I thought we were going to escape it in Washington and make the goddamn thing out of it in this country.

You're in command of it.

You went to Moscow, then you come back, then you sell it, make it forward.

Right.

We've got Camp David right now.

That's why you've got to get Camp David right.

If you use Camp David's border, hell, just be here at the White House.

Oh, yeah.

Right.

Moscow or in September, you can do that.

I said in October or something like that.

A couple of weeks after you get back or something like that.

Right, right, right.

All right.

If you miss Moscow, you might want to go and get this doctor.

He won't get Berlin anyway, so you wouldn't want to go.

I think we'd get it all.

We were there and couldn't play in the United States of America.

That kind of thing.

The Europeans, I mean, the state of the hell out of it.

And they could make a station on the state of the hell out of it.

I longed to communicate with them.

And the state of the area, that's what the state of the area was like.

But you come out, I think, on that better if you live here than I do.

Otherwise, I keep going for you.

I don't think I would go rushing for you.

Well, that keeps it open if you wanted to go to Europe next to late spring or something like that, or early spring.

And at some point, there, you can go to that here.

You know, like that.

That was sort of kind of celestic.

Sure.

The more you do, the more it takes away from you.

I think they were important in the beginning.

And you're talking about the same president.

Repetition of the picture stuff of those trails.

And it becomes repetitious because it's the airport arrival that's the same street.

We gave it to another city in Russia.

Woof!

I'm going to have him back.

I don't think we should do anything after the Democratic election.

The moment you do it, they're going to say that the Democratic candidate has to be there.

Yeah.

And then in the summer, or next week, whether you're going to be there or not, you're going to be there.

I don't think you could ever return someone after that.

It wouldn't happen because you...

I just, I noticed just as well, I've been thinking all of a sudden, I've been... Like with Emmerich, yeah.

Yeah, sure.

Yeah.

I must say, though, that on this, I just can't see how we can do it on an Android phone.

We can make a pretext out of that.

Oh, yeah.

But I don't see why they wouldn't hand it over to him.

He should be able to give him a good advice for getting that.

Maybe he'd be okay and the President would be on his side of the way.

I just know what they do to you and what they do to me.

People won't pay attention anyway, so we've got to be on the ground.

We still got to be present.

Oh, yeah.

You know, he loves that, doesn't he?

Well, I don't want to spoil it, but he called out...

Nixon, Haldeman & Ziegler on 1972 presidential campaign and Political strategy

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Also recorded on June 9, 1971

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Nixon, Haldeman & Ziegler on 1972 presidential campaign and Political strategy

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Nixon Library Finding Aid

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Also recorded on June 9, 1971

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