On October 3, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon, Charles W. Colson, Henry A. Kissinger, and John D. Ehrlichman met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building from 2:15 pm to 3:15 pm. The Old Executive Office Building taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 355-014 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 Do not cite this transcript as authoritative.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.
Sir?
What can I do for you, ma'am?
You can, sir.
Take this, I want to say thank you.
Thank you for your question.
You're welcome.
The government's very, very harsh, exactly what we get.
Morality.
Morality and corruption has been a century and a half since I've seen myself.
It's a whole desperation ploy.
And I talked to somebody the other day, and he says, you know, he said we managed to destroy this world.
That was something he was talking about.
The senator doesn't do much.
Not only does the senator not get a hell of a lot of negatives, less than he used to get.
The comments range from the bad things.
I asked him about all that.
He said, well, he was brilliant, brilliant, and honestly successful.
He said, you guys, this week, let her go.
He must attack him, but they can't attack him for the same thing.
They can attack him hard, you know, with his lying, his desperation, his vicious, his mudslinging.
He said, now you have to remember, if you attack him, then you do right.
The possibility of creating, with the goddamn media, the place where it goes, the center of the bank, and so forth and so on.
You know, I was thinking, it egged, let's leave me out of it, but it egged him.
and said one third of the things about the exact son of a bitch that he said about me and so forth.
The media would always say, and some people do as well, have any of the goddamn media mentioned what a vicious son of a bitch this is?
And so I have this in me.
Not to tell anybody.
Not to tell anybody.
That's where it counts.
Well, they are, they are, they are.
NBC, Jesus Christ, NBC.
Oh, right, all right, well, I was bunting up the walls on NBC, but I still heard from everybody that one of them, the, on the other hand, CBS was an agency we came out of, and I guess the only thing you can do is,
Anybody that doesn't know how to hold their ground with three nets, getting as good a break as we can on the net, you know, but, you know, whatever the hell it takes, I know it affects CBS because that's been a monster, and it's been a shame since we get it.
But at least they, maybe the thing they can do is just breeze, cold, if they pay no attention, and just not take their calls and so forth.
I don't know, I don't know, but their NBC, as you know, even though CBS has got an American skin on NBC, it's almost had the worst record.
It has the worst outfit on there and so much of that.
The type's complete left-wing Jew bastard.
Yeah, he's a horrible, horrible people.
Oh, he's a vicious man.
Oh, he's a really nasty man.
Of course, you took the part in the day, you know, effectively, I don't see that at all.
They've got to be worried about what the hell that, what NBC wants for them.
But why something like that?
They need more than anybody did.
What do they need?
Well, in fact, they've always been, because we're in Seattle, most vulnerable in any crossroads.
All right, they've got an anti-crush unit.
They have one that, we've got about a million people that's important.
I told Chancellor Pope this morning, he said, I suppose you've seen me on the last night, I said, I should have done it.
And he said, well, we screwed up.
I said, John, don't bother to call me anymore, because I don't want to be able to screw it up, because I just want to see the results on TV.
He said, you will do it.
I said, well, all right.
You've got 25 nights to do it.
And you've got to start pretty quick, or believe me, John, I'm going to make it to my point to see that we get even at the end of the election.
I said, you're going to do that?
Yes, sir.
That's it.
You can take that as a threat, coming from me, because I kind of like you as a person.
You can take it that way if you want to, but boy, that's the facts of life, you know.
It's just the one sound on the other end.
Oh, Jesus, it's incredible.
We've got to, there are other ways you can do it.
There's only one way to get there, and so forth.
The networks have got to be disciplined.
We've got to discipline some of the local stations too.
I mean, this idea that we're not going to allow competition and so forth, the ones that we want to allow, the ones we won't, we won't allow.
But then we care about whether or not they have problems.
It's a place to be absolutely disciplined.
And we've got to go.
We haven't been loose enough.
We've been Mr. Nice Guy.
They've come down.
I'll never see those sucking bastards again.
I'm going to have them there in the Oval Office.
And they're not going to be invited to the White House for affairs.
It's true.
They're done.
But there is an interesting pattern.
We have to watch very carefully.
It's a very interesting pattern.
And that is...
They each want his testicles, except ABC, you know, where are you, right?
Wait a minute.
But, and CBS testicles, who are doing great, I don't know if you've heard of them, they did great, aren't they?
They, one of them, we haven't had to be proud of them, CBS, they're great people.
Now ABC is really going into the test, they've given us three nights in a row to screw it, and we complain each time, and they know what we're talking about.
They may just react the other way and say, well, okay, they don't want to report, but if they do, then we have to take their case.
The AIA has to go out and act.
I think what I'm saying is, are they letting somebody else do that?
Well, we can do it.
We can do it.
I said, well, I didn't have a chance to do it.
Of course, they're worried because they're, as you said to me yesterday, they're fighting like hell with all their agents.
Everybody in the organization knows who you are.
That's a very internal problem.
I don't know how much of a chance I'll get.
I don't know how much of a chance I'll get.
The way you see it is nasty.
The way you see it in the ratings, and the way you see it in the retreat.
I don't know if you can discern, but what that does is to put that, that chance of anything is where you let it shine, right?
because he sucks around with me and tells me that, yeah, he's pretty good, but that doesn't, he's not even great.
That, that isn't what I'm trying to do.
He's a little bastard type thing.
Worst guy.
Absolutely worst guy.
Never gonna get him.
But I think Connelly's analysis is right.
I think he wouldn't understand.
Never, never defend.
That's the thing that most of our staff would not understand.
They want to defend.
I think the strategy has got to be that I drew out, and I've got to live with it after the election, too.
I think that the strategy, my strategy, has got to be to sail right along on BAM and not pick them off.
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.
Are the attacks, we have to realize, do cause some attrition.
I don't want to go down.
He said, but he made the same point.
He says it doesn't help him.
But he said people will leave any conflict in charge.
And so he would put you down.
Somebody would put you down.
They don't want to do it.
Huh?
They don't want to do it.
They don't want to do it.
They don't want to do it.
You know those things this morning about that assault thing, like Percy was there, Keese was there, was sucking up to you, Cooper was there, you know, they weren't there, they would have been there, Janice was there.
You're running ahead of all these things.
No.
No, you're not.
There, my, the McGovern's attacks are biting some.
I sense it.
Well, I sense it.
It's interesting, my reaction was when he was on the bus, when he was going to start to rest, he had to turn this against the ground.
I'm going to talk to someone here who said, my guy is destroying himself.
I asked him, he said, absolutely, this is a dying gas piece.
I'm going to be showing out this for you.
Christian says, when you go down to the bathroom, you don't have that issue.
He said, of course, you know, Chuck, he really isn't talking about corruption in a people sense.
He's talking about corruption, moral corruption.
Yeah, like mommy in the dark is corrupt and people don't like that.
Christian thinks that he's showing utter desperation.
He shows how many say that.
Oh, that's how it started.
Oh, hell yeah.
We called every single surgeon.
Oh, did you?
There you go.
That's what they say now.
The big lie, mudslinging, below the belt conflicts, dirty campaigns, desperation tactics, trying to avoid the other issues.
You know, we've given them a whole series of things.
All right.
The drive of the surgeon.
The only condition I think we've always had is...
an agonist should continue to settle on so that they can't use it.
Yeah, okay.
What else is going to do what he did yesterday?
I mean, he did that, of course, he was very good last night.
On the two networks, when they put the two-man attractive position, we thought, oh, that's good.
That was good.
That's not my bias.
That was good, very good.
Everybody I've talked to today is so good because Agnew was poised, he was calm, he was strong.
The government was not as bright looking as the words.
But he was mouthing very harsh words, but he wasn't showing any animation.
He wasn't firing.
So it wasn't as bad as I thought.
But the government these days, I'm not saying that this is the most corrupt government, or the most corrupt country, either.
75% of the people who have issues, they must find that people don't want to be told this country is corrupt.
They don't want to be told that.
They don't want to be told that they have to use us to be corrupted by them.
The question is, why is that a matter of race, why is it a matter of issues?
You guys, the text on that, you said that it was the only issue.
Yes.
That may hurt you, but he said, when there are other issues, like the economy, the war, and, you know, conflicts between men and men, people, you know, hard-hitting people, hard-hitting influence, but when he said there are other big, big issues this year, he started going through it, he said, certain areas of the busing.
People care that hell a lot more when it comes to the kids when they get bused into black schools than they do when the administration is corrupt, even if they're working, and even if the jurors were creditors.
He said they care much more about that.
And, uh, because he goes to the, uh, to the Johnson Brothers, too, he's never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever,
But the county is still alive.
Oh, sure.
That is cool.
Oh, that's about the water.
You know, the water people.
I think that would be a lot of stuff.
But now, the way they're serving, but apparently still kind of have hearings.
But I said, oh, they're done.
It's not 2015.
They did?
I wonder how it got put down.
I guess it was our voice was some funniest piece that we considered good ass.
Yeah.
I just don't think, unless it's Larry O'Brien being quiet.
Very, very quiet.
Was it Michael O'Brien?
Yeah, it's probably that.
Yeah, it's probably that.
He knows you're talking about.
I don't even know if it's perfectly legal to do the first time break, but, well, he knows, he knows, he knows, because, man, you know, they've got, they've got, you know, they can go on and, you know, that's all it is.
I'm sure they're, you know, that's all it is.
Oh yeah.
No, that's good.
We haven't gotten rid of it, but I had it in Boston.
I don't know if you have it in Boston.
You got Boston?
I had it in Boston.
I don't know if you have it in Boston.
I don't know if you have it in Boston.
I don't know if you still believe.
1.
Slicing her in the best way, to a level that would equate to sending her on a street, by delivering a security record.
2.
The busting is necessary for a school-age group.
3.
Realizing marijuana.
4.
Ending her in a head-on abortion without guaranteeing her to a civil prison.
5.
Taking a bath with everyone in the country, regardless of the degree or ability of work.
6.
Imposing age in a broken school.
And now we just have these quotes, supporting each one of the six points.
You can't get them to say no to help you with these things.
They're very effective at it.
So without the Democrats and the Republicans, how do you feel about it?
No, it's a Massachusetts committee for regulation.
Greg Gallagher, Greg Boehner, the hell with them.
I had a number of people call me this morning and say, Jesus, you can see the address on the bus.
They know this one.
Friends from the bus.
I agree with that.
I think an ad in there, that's hitting it.
In a way, somebody will eventually pick one up.
It's hard to answer that because you can say, well, no, I don't still believe in this or that.
It's hard to answer.
Or you could say I never did, but for the thousand dollars in the first year, I don't know what we had to support.
You can't.
The only thing you can say is I changed my mind and I'm going with it.
Which is fine.
It depends on itself.
That's a very weak, that's a hell of a weak answer.
But I go back to that issue right now.
I agree completely with what this guy, what is coming out of this?
I've got a whole range, but I'm sorry to keep talking about this desperation politics and the big lies, and that's avoiding real issues, and this swinging wildly.
But the hard part about it, and somebody has to take it very hard, is that this is, there's no question, this is about it.
I wish, frankly, that we could talk about it.
I wish that we could be relevant at the right time.
In a way, his illness has been a blessing because he would have gotten better.
He would have let her shoot first.
We haven't needed him with the help that we had not needed.
I think things are going very well.
This is the first day since the first of September and we haven't had as good of a plane impact on it.
It's just because we don't have any good places to go and we can't cancel that.
Every day we've had some of these, well, circuits are kind of going on nationally.
Tomorrow, I suppose, we've got a great speech on the 7th of February.
Dr. Cook, what do you got to say?
Well, we're going right ahead, except for some quotes.
Hey, you know what she said about not being good.
I won't be around.
I can't thank her.
I know she's so good because I'm running for president.
I hope they do.
But I want to support the citizens of my home state.
And really, you ought to support me because if I get to be president, what would I do for something good?
Just look at what happened in Massachusetts, Missouri, and Kentucky.
And, of course, it's a hell of a slur by Kennedy, Kierle, and Jackson.
And it's a, it's a blatant, electrifying vote.
And, you know, Kennedy and Kierle and Johnson have done things for very few years.
But you see it from the side of a little man.
I have a bad reaction to some of them.
I'm good at committing national crimes.
They have people I'd like to be proactive with.
They've got a perfect place to do it for us.
Well, we're going to carry some of those bullshit with them.
That's for sure.
But right now we're trying a little bit to see if we can keep our idea in mind.
We've got to keep it in mind.
Not much.
Not much I know about.
I talked to an officer here this morning.
He gave me a question about sedation.
He said the documentary.
The grandson, Matt, which I know very well, is a very good man.
He said it had a bad effect on the company because it was a hell of a lot of footage.
I know he's 24, he dropped me a dime, and he said, here it is.
He told me that he didn't want to owe me a dime.
and he said there's this footage of his aircraft that kind of personalized to this kid, the devil's man.
And it's an interesting episode.
But even getting that to go, it's very sweet.
But I didn't get that to even go.
I thought it was great.
Well, that's where I came from.
Now the other thing that might have hit us in the back was probably the Social Security block that was going to do it.
It was going to do it.
The water was going to, you know, block this block.
It was really going to, you know, go about that as fast as it could.
I think that's just what you need.
We can talk about moral corruption, but people see courage.
That's courageous to be doing that.
Right now, the missing ingredient in our government campaign is
It's courage.
He doesn't show any courage.
He doesn't show any courage.
He says, he says whatever he thinks a living one will say.
And I think time goes by and you know what you need to do.
Especially when you want to go after the girl with the wrong sign.
You know what I'm saying?
You know what I'm saying?
You know what I'm saying?
You know what I'm saying?
You know what I'm saying?
You know what I'm saying?
Welfare.
I don't want the welfare bill.
Because I already had some of the welfare bills.
Is that right?
I don't want the welfare bill now.
If we get that bill, if we were to get that bill, just take that welfare issue away.
That's got to be an issue.
That's got to be an issue.
Another thing, too, is that the power of the welfare, of course, is that's Title I of H.R.
1.
and all the rest of the social security, 3, 2, 3 and 4, are so far beyond the budget that I've vetoed on the basis of that suit.
So I have no problem.
It's going to be vetoed, I don't care what the hell happens to their two-bedroom here.
But it's obvious what they're trying to do is to get a bill down that's not, that cannot be signed.
Come on in, Henry.
Oh, if they hang the other titles on it, it will make it easier for them to reach out to you.
Oh, we're going to take each other once, just the way we proposed.
Yeah, that's what they want to do.
They'll never do it.
I just want to take one thing with you on the scene.
Our friends from New York came out of the area.
And we had told them to go and send back the...
And, uh, that's all I am, Chuck.
I mean, they're back to their, their poverty games.
Like, I don't know, some terrible poverty.
I mean, those are all going to be, you know, true.
But if you do that, you want to go to theology school.
That's what it is.
So I'm going to go there because it's like a good need.
He's cut out a poem in Scat, which is the highest tribute you can take home.
Is that it?
If you've got an opponent's kid, it's going to be easy to frighten off the quarterback.
The way we have to handle it together is, in other words, we have an attack that's not bad.
And never to defend.
Never, never, never.
That's what we do in the best.
All white products better go on and cut his nuts off.
And if you're attacking...
Oh, pushy business, sowing hatred.
That's what we ought to do, my gentlemen.
Never have said anything.
Yeah, all right.
I really think it is reported.
Yes, it's reported.
Well, we have to do the best we can.
Go ahead, on the top man's building.
Well, none of it.
What do you think?
I don't want to be sure.
That doesn't deserve it.
On the other hand...
It may not have been enough because I didn't have anything to do with it.
I want to do this sooner.
In order to help us with what happened this morning.
I don't get in the hell out there so easily before the election.
If you tell me that, I'll try.
See what I can do.
The senator watched me get around, he liked me to get around, and then he pushed me to do that.
I certainly tried.
Of course, if they come back, they say it's a game.
Well, in fact, you know, if you're doing it by yourself, you know, you're going to be judged.
But another way I put it to them was, we already put, that was sent in from the government of Michigan.
But I can give them the service and not take a mission.
If you say that the government is the most leftist candidate in this country, which happens to be true
Every newspaper would say, here they say this is the most corrupt administration in the history of this country.
And no one read the news.
Not that one.
I read.
I read.
It's shocking.
It's very shocking.
And we ought to stop hitting these guys.
It's a terrible thing.
Well,
to try to survive.
But he is an outlaw.
He's not a good man.
He's a scum.
Absolutely, if he had any sense of patience, he'd have to conclude from the post that the chances are four out of five that you're going to get elected.
To put it mildly, they probably got tired of him.
How can you serve the country with other non-confidants in the band who are going to run this country for the next four years?
To this extent.
Also, he knows the integration theory.
Now, that's the thing I think.
Well, if he were to come up with a piece right now, it is an alteration.
Why does he do it?
Only so that he can say,
Uh, he made a...
He was trying to sabotage.
I think it has to be said that he was trying to sabotage the peace negotiations.
And incidentally, we've got to think, we've got to think very strongly that in the event that these fascists don't play, then we come back and say, well, uh, we're sorry, we were this close to sabotaging.
And now we're being postponed all negotiations until after the election.
Well, it's a good idea.
You might just have to...
He comes out with a peace plan.
I don't know where we go from here.
I think we all know that it's a three-day exercise, and that's it.
This peace plan comes out before we leave this world.
Rather, if it doesn't come out before, it'd be insane to come out of the ground.
No, I've had it my whole life.
I've got that.
But what do you know?
I don't know.
No, I think the original plan was to come out with it on October 10th.
This works, I think.
But I think now that we've been out...
Frankly, I don't think it makes a hell of a lot of sense.
Well, they always wanted to accept it, and it's hard to have government, but we've moved to some extent in the past to draft you, get out, and now you're there.
But I think Mr. President will be here.
When we publish our plan, it's an extension, it's quite different, but it's close enough to his that he can say that some of the fish come into our negotiations.
Thank you very much.
What we can do is we can kill him.
We can say we had already negotiated.
We'd already gotten their acceptance to operate on the principle of unanimity.
We will not offer as much as they have already conceded, which puts him into a very weak position.
But our line of attack is to oppose the communist government.
The difference between his approach and what we have already negotiated is that what I mean is, let us, I believe, assert that we will not, let us assert at the moment that we will not want a government without a government.
That's my comment.
That we're going to have to take this on without a government.
But I think our first reaction ought to be that in case of black, A, importance of communist government, B,
And if he doesn't come out with it soon, it will overlap our trade.
Yeah, I'm not sure if we can decide whether we're going to go or not.
Yeah, that's what I mean.
I don't know if he's going to move on fast enough out of this.
The day is Tuesday, isn't it?
Yeah.
I mean, he had to come out the night of Thursday.
Yeah.
Got it.
If you're going to check, you're going to announce to him, I mean, yes, I got it.
Let's say if he announces it, uh...
Uh...
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Christ, I already offered one.
That's me.
He said, get out.
He won't bet it.
He can't bet it as much.
And after I was closing, he got to come at him and he was still able to throw a few stuff all day.
And so, so, so.
It won't be much, but it won't be much.
Remember, the guy said, well, lock up all the beasts.
So, you know, I let him off of that.
You know, I let him off of the chase.
You know, it's really disgraceful.
It's a lot of pressure on him.
Oh!
Oh!
of all the things that L.A.P.
had conducted, nothing like what these bastards are doing now.
There's a question.
Loyalty, whatever.
Question, question.
Question, oh, well.
Oh, there, oh, there, oh, there.
That's been a real, we've got a deletion of what time.
That way, this is going to be a court trial.
Oh, I think the price, I don't know.
You can call me when you get back.
I cannot meet this in 830 because...
I don't mean tonight.
I'll call you first thing in the morning.
What is this particularly interesting?
I'll call you from New York at about 9 or 930.
Probably tonight.
I'll call you from New York.
All right.
I'll call you anyway from New York and tell you what it was.
It may not be on video now, but I think it is.
I will read you a statement that you made for me yesterday.
Yeah.
You have a good time Chinese friends We have another person
I don't know what that'll do.
I don't know.
I just don't know where it leads.
He's called back three or four times.
I've had the message.
And he got it.
And he said, well, I know this bill isn't going anywhere.
He said, I've been a long-spent filibuster today.
But he said, well, you've got to be for the Stevenson Amendment in order that the president is not accused of joining the welfare climate.
And, well, you know, that's political judgment.
What is your view?
I think you'd be wrong to move off the position you're on.
We've seen everybody move clear off Irvington.
Now they move over toward you to Stevenson.
If you stay where you are, the worst, our biggest danger is that they might panel sign.
The biggest danger is they might come to us.
Sure.
Then, of course, we have to be to it because, well, I was three and four.
We still have Long.
Long is going to come to us.
Yeah.
Yes, very good.
As of right now.
Ken is out here, he's in touch with the State Senate by a minute if you want to.
I don't want to.
There's nothing on the merits.
Well, Elliot has put it this way.
He says, I have never called the President on an H-E-W.
I am not calling him.
I consider this the most important conversation I will ever have with the President.
He said, I don't want the President to be around.
And my only interest in this is to protect Ken.
And he said, in my opinion, the only way I have of protecting him is for him to understand, for me, from the implications of this.
He says, I know you guys have all met with it.
But he said, I think I have a different understanding of it.
Well, there it is.
Now, is anybody in this cold?
Anybody else want to talk?
Well, as you can tell, the guys that are following this are solid.
They're just solid.
Well, that's the news.
I've got to leave.
I've got to leave.
Great.
Yeah, I know you have.
I know.
That's no problem, though.
Why don't you just get over it on the phone?
All right, I'm going to go.
You can do it on the phone.
No, no.
Just get over it.
but with you and Ken.
I think Ken should sit in for the numbers and the technical...
I don't want a long description.
I understand.
It's basically a political judgment.
I understand.
I'm going to tell him.
I don't know if I have time to go into Wilford.
I'm going to go into the... to see the dangers... the dangers of...
The only reason I suggested a program... Two reasons.
One, I don't mind...
He's programming Kelly.
And so this is good for the standpoint of anointing him as a guy who I should deal with.
Well, that's perfect.
That's why I wanted to do it.
Yeah.
Okay.
All right.
I'll be right over.
He hasn't been here within 10 minutes.
Well, he won't be here by, shall we say, 3.30.
3.30.
3.30.
All right.
What do you want me to tell him?
That it's your, that you have an understanding of the elements.
That it isn't necessary for us to take a long time on this because we're only bringing it down to one.
Number two, that your feeling has been all the time that to keep a clear political position in this election, that you had to take a position and stay on it.
And that's been your strategy, and so far it's been confirmed as correct.
Sure, the New York Times says you're killing welfare reform, but nobody else in the country says that.
With that, Rivkoff and the Liberals have moved toward you, which is proof of the validity of your strategy.
And you think, as a political judge, that the soundest position is to stay where you have always been, let a long filibuster down, the opposition,
And then a lot of them try and tack the first three titles on the dead ceiling or any damn thing.
Then a lot of them, Wilbur Mills will protect you, we think, against the dead ceiling coming here with those first three titles on.
And we think so.
We tried to find out for sure this morning.
And he walked up just a little bit.
But he sees the pistol hazard.
So we think we're all right with that flight.
Maybe you don't think that's it.
You might.
But I doubt seriously that we'll ever get out of conference with those three pedals on.
If we can handle that.
Fine.
Just to tell all of you, this is a political proposition.
His argument would be that the Stevenson thing is very close to all of us.
Sure.
Sure.
What do I say?
Well, but it's a shift.
You shift to the liberal side on welfare.
You go to Stevenson.
Maybe it's only one degree.
Maybe it's only half a degree.
But the way your enemies will play it, it's a shit.
I got it.
Okay.
Getting over it, that's a wrap.
That's a wrap.
Mike has a question.
And a question about what we're talking about.
He doesn't understand it.
I'll tell him in person.
Okay.
Okay.