Nixon White House Tapes — Conversation 322-059
Date: Tuesday, March 14, 1972 at 4:42 PM
Participants: Nixon, Richard M. (President); Ziegler, Ronald L.; Haldeman, H. R. ("Bob")
Recording device: Old Executive Office Building
Source: https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/322-059

This transcript was generated automatically by AI (WhisperX) and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Do not cite it as authoritative.

[0:04] Excuse me.
[0:06] Do you have a good time?
[0:08] I have a good time.
[0:10] I think it's a great thing to do.
[0:11] I get the question thrown at me in sort of a different way.
[0:14] Sally Clinton is dangerous sometimes.
[0:16] She doesn't mean to be.
[0:18] But she led into the thing by saying, she hadn't been around.
[0:23] She said, Ron, how are you going to clear up this Sherman Adams type situation with Pete Flanagan in relation to executive privilege?
[0:32] And I said, now, wait a minute, Sarah.
[0:37] I said, I'm not going to let that question pass.
[0:42] I said, we're in an election year here that I want to do.
[0:48] There are going to be partisan, you know, there are going to be partisan charges.
[0:53] And I'm not going to comment on all of those that will come against this administration order in order to give an effort to get it done.
[0:57] But I said, when you put a man's name out,
[0:59] And honestly, on the record, by the way, I had to respond to it.
[1:09] And then I said, the president of the United States has told me about it.
[1:18] He feels he has conducted himself properly since he's been in the administration.
[1:20] And I went on to make reports.
[1:21] Now, we have staff, the systems, the White House, who have contacts for it.
[1:23] I went to them.
[1:24] And I said, the type of partisan charges that are full of innuendos,
[1:27] General statements are ongoing without any concrete evidence.
[1:31] They're just not responsible.
[1:33] And they are partisan in nature.
[1:35] And I said, I said, I can expect those issues in these years.
[1:41] I said, I noticed that the senator on the floor referred to a Flanagan factor.
[1:45] I said, I think what we have in the book of years is a political factor.
[1:50] Then they tried, of course, after he had been set forth.
[1:52] Then I made the point, those people who make the charge
[1:57] had the responsibility to present concrete evidence of any personal meaning.
[2:06] They had an annexation, right?
[2:08] Well, they did.
[2:09] I don't know.
[2:09] I mean, that's where I was going as well.
[2:12] And then they said, well, did he say there was personal meaning?
[2:14] I said, that's an observation I'm making, gentlemen.
[2:17] I said, the burden of responsibility and the burden of proof is on the attacker, not the defender.
[2:23] Which is, you know, they tried presently to shift it.
[2:28] And then they tried to give him the ITT thing.
[2:35] I said, gentlemen, I'm not going to comment on the ITT thing.
[2:41] I read it to the board, the commissioner came in and I said, Mr. McLaren, very, very clearly spelled out what Mr. Flanagan's role was.
[2:47] What was his day?
[2:47] You know, I said, well, no, I can get you better, I think.
[2:50] I didn't carry it to Baylor, I think, or something.
[2:51] Of course, there was...
[2:52] Skip Isers.
[2:55] Skip Isers.
[2:56] And they wouldn't toy around with that.
[3:00] Well, it was supposed to be that.
[3:04] Skip Isers.
[3:05] Oh, and then, of course, Sheldon.
[3:08] I think he did it.
[3:11] Well, then they tried to bring you into it, of course.
[3:14] And they said, when did the president learn about the $400,000 contribution to the Republican Party?
[3:20] And I said, now, wait a minute.
[3:22] I said, now, wait a minute.
[3:24] This is the very thing I'm talking about.
[3:26] I said, and I'm not going to get into that, but just for the record, you have said $400,000 contribution to the Republican Party.
[3:40] I said, now, the record should be so clear.
[3:43] I said, everything that I have read, everything that I've seen suggest $100,000 contribution
[3:49] the city of San Diego, who is hosting the convention.
[3:58] I said, I said three days ago that the president learned of this and I'm reading this and it's very untrue.
[4:12] And then in other questions, which are supposed to be so externally, you know, they had to ask questions.
[4:31] I was confused when they commented.
[4:32] I said, I'm not going to stand here and make any questions about the item.
[4:34] It's not a problem that I have.
[4:35] So the Attorney General is testifying.
[4:36] Jay, were you able to get on the hearsay at the court and agree on that?
[4:39] No, I didn't look into that, because that's related to MITT.
[4:42] And I tried to maybe attack the Eagleton thing so that I wouldn't be driven into comments on the initiative that we had.
[4:54] But I got a little bit, you know, greater the posture of being, you know, in the defense of you than ourselves.
[5:08] You need to be, you need to get, Ron, the thing we don't need.
[5:12] Maybe you ought to get...
[5:15] and they're not going to get a cover grade or some sort of thing.
[5:27] I told the post-colonels to get on the floor and say that it was the smear they would conquer us rather than the law they would conquer us.
[5:34] You see what I'm saying?
[5:36] I'm not cursing.
[5:36] No, I don't know that you should, but you've got to attack the attackers.
[5:38] You've got to go smear, scream, and mess with them.
[5:44] But then there was a bunch of shit asses who was pressing the button.
[5:56] They must have been dying.
[5:56] They must have been dying.
[5:57] It's that they simply were Washington journalists.
[6:02] They stand in there and they ask questions.
[6:06] And they are so poorly prepared.
[6:07] You know, you have a guy like Kurt Gosselin sitting over there who didn't have a damn thing to say to the lady.
[6:11] He was not even aware of the extensive wire service that ran around the center.
[6:22] And then you have guys in there who simply, you know, don't, they seem to be unaware of the good and the bad surrounding them.
[6:28] That's what leads to good and some bad.
[6:31] They're bad people.
[6:34] It's really a phenomenon that has to be done.
[6:41] Well, you need more gun owners on our side.
[6:51] Good to you.
[6:52] Well, I... Now, you're not just saying it, but I do heard you're going to do a republic on 30.
[6:57] But I have heard that you have to make that happen.
[6:58] I don't want you to do it.
[7:00] All right.
[7:12] .
[7:15] .
[7:17] .
[7:19] .
[7:19] .
[7:40] .
[7:41] The thing that I've had a shaking here is that I decided to summarize it.
[8:01] It's such a long message.
[8:02] It's such a long message.
[8:03] It's sort of complicated.
[8:05] And the intricacies that I thought were important to summarize it for you.
[8:08] Do you want that?
[8:09] I have that now.
[8:09] I have it thoroughly.
[8:09] Go on.
[8:10] Did he ever ask about anything in the truck?
[8:23] They didn't.
[8:24] They didn't know about it.
[8:24] They didn't know about it.
[8:25] They didn't know about it.
[8:25] They didn't know about it.
[8:27] They didn't know about it.
[8:28] They didn't know about it.
[8:30] They didn't know about it.
[8:31] They didn't know about it.
[8:31] They didn't know about it.
[8:32] They didn't know about it.
[8:32] They didn't know about it.
[8:33] They didn't know about it.
[8:34] They didn't know about it.
[8:35] We may have gotten all these sheep better than the same antlered machine.
[8:54] We don't need it.
[8:54] It's the same.
[8:55] It's the same.
[8:59] It's the same.
[8:59] It's the same.
[9:00] It's the same.
[9:02] .
[9:04] .
[9:06] .
[9:07] .
[9:08] .
[9:10] .
[9:13] .
[9:32] I talked to a cast.
[9:36] What had happened was that they said the memo wasn't handed to the FBI.
[9:41] I said, well, how did the FBI do it?
[9:43] They said we finally got it.
[9:45] And I told them to start checking the typewriter.
[9:46] And they now think that it wasn't done on their typewriter.
[9:49] They think.
[9:50] They're not sure.
[9:52] That should have been done one week ago.
[9:57] They got that one from the Xerox.
[10:01] They couldn't move anything off the Xerox.
[10:05] Now they've got the original.
[10:15] The TIE fighter.
[10:15] The TIE fighter is an inclusive definition.
[10:17] OK.
[10:58] All right.
[11:31] This is a presidential participation.
[11:49] We're going to ask for John .
[12:13] Yeah, that's right.
[12:30] Then they stopped having him.
[12:32] John's a good one.
[12:38] Actually, he did too.
[12:42] He did a little bit of that.
[12:54] He did a little bit of that.
[12:55] He did a little bit of that.
[12:56] He did a little bit of that.
[13:01] He did a little bit of that.
[13:03] He did a little bit of that.
[13:08] The little red arms don't count.
[13:14] They didn't count.
[13:17] They shook as they did.
[13:20] They did it just for information.
[13:23] They're in the tally on top of that now.
[13:32] Okay.
[13:33] Okay, well, John.
[13:33] Sure.
[13:34] Hey, go back.
[13:34] Most of us would expect, well, if you like that kind of stuff, look for it.
[13:37] He wanted to kind of josh him and all that sort of stuff.
[13:47] Well, they never joshed him.
[13:48] I'm sure they did.
[13:48] They never joshed Kennedy.
[13:51] They were very easy on Kennedy.
[13:55] But they kicked the hell out of Kerwin.
[14:02] The hell out of him.
[14:04] I admire him for the animation and all that.
[14:05] I'm a Democratic speaker, excuse me.
[14:09] It's probably going to be hard to keep on.
[14:21] It's probably going to be good.
[14:23] And I doubt it will.
[14:25] Oh, my gosh.
[14:39] Oh, my gosh.
[14:42] Oh, my gosh.
[14:48] Oh, my gosh.
[14:51] It's our protection.
[14:54] Everything that they sell to the people, the people sell it to them.