Conversation 472-009

TapeTape 472StartTuesday, March 23, 1971 at 11:30 AMEndTuesday, March 23, 1971 at 12:13 PMTape start time00:46:44Tape end time01:28:48ParticipantsNixon, Richard M. (President);  Peterson, Peter G.;  Bull, Stephen B.;  Etherington, Edwin D.;  Finch, Robert H.;  White House photographerRecording deviceOval Office

On March 23, 1971, President Richard M. Nixon, Peter G. Peterson, Stephen B. Bull, Edwin D. Etherington, Robert H. Finch, and White House photographer met in the Oval Office of the White House from 11:30 am to 12:13 pm. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 472-009 of the White House Tapes.

Conversation No. 472-9

Date: March 23, 1971
Time: 11:30 am - 12:13 pm
Location: Oval Office

The President met with Peter G. Peterson

     Textile negotiations
          -Peterson’s report
                -US strategy
          -Congress
          -A meeting in Albuquerque
          -Possible negotiations
                -Defense Department
                -Agency for International Development [AID]
                -Chief negotiator
                      -Peterson
                            -Textile industry
                      -Requirements
                            -Asian countries
                            -Loyalty to the President
                                  -President’s policy
                            -US textile industry
                            -State Department
                                  -Philip H. Trezise
                      -Peterson’s talk with Harry S. Dent
                            -Anthony J. Jurich
                                  -Okinawa experience
                      -David M. Kennedy
                            -Textile
                            -Shoe imports
                            -Jurich and Trezise
                            -Support for President’s policies
                            -Peterson’s conversation with Dent
                            -President’s view
                                  -Role
                      -Jurich
                            -Background
                            -Dent
                            -Role

               -Kennedy
                      -Jurich
               -Trezise
                      -President’s view
               -Kennedy
               -Jurich
               -Kennedy
                      -Japanese experience
               -Trezise, Kennedy, and Jurich
           -Negotiating position
               -Peterson’s view
               -Japan
               -Peterson’s view
               -Defense Department
                      -Korea
                      -Taiwan

Shoe imports
     -Spain
     -Italy
     -Peterson’s view
     -Potential political problems
     -Political impact
            -Wilbur D. Mills, John W. Byrnes
     -US producers
            -Effect
                 -Byrnes
     -Political impact
            -Options
            -Compared with textiles
            -Scope
            -Support of shoe manufacturers in Congress
                 -Kentucky
            -US industry
     -Kennedy
            -Possible trip to Italy and Spain
                 -Peterson’s conversation with Italian ambassador
     -Possible actions
            -Options
                 -Tariffs
            -Spain

     -Kennedy’s role
           -President’s position
           -Italy, Spain
     -President’s public statements
     -Kennedy’s role
           -Possible trip
           -Strategy
                 -Administration position
           -Forthcoming conversation with Peterson

A council [Council for International Economic Policy [CIEP]?]
     -Kennedy
     -William P. Rogers
     -George P. Shultz
     -Kennedy

Monetary policy
    -Current situation
    -Balance of payments
          -Peterson’s meeting with John B. Connally, Arthur F. Burns, Paul W.
                McCracken, and Shultz
          -Philosophy
          -Exchange rates
                -US dollar
                -Foreign aid and military aid
                      -Response
                -Issue of currency devaluation
                      -France, Great Britain
                -Future
                      -Need for change
                -West Germany currency study
                      -Effect of trade balances
                -Japan
                      -Currency
    -Connally, Burns, McCracken, Shultz, Peterson group
          -Balance of payments
          -Exchange rates
          -Negotiating position
                -Need for leadership
          -Exchange rates
                -Japan, Okinawa, trade

     -Situation in Chile
           -Taxes on foreign business
                 -Potential problems
                      -Maurice H. Stans

Trade with Japan
     -Okinawa, defense issue
     -Industrial policy
     -Military, politics
     -People
           -Compared with British
     -US textile policy
           -Negotiations
           -Possible leaks
           -Kennedy
           -Legal considerations
                 -Senators

Adjustment program
     -Current program
          -Effect
          -Need for changes
          -Congressmen and Senators
     -Big companies, little companies
          -Consolidation
          -Antitrust laws
          -Byrnes’ concerns about shoe company in Wisconsin
          -Retooling and retraining
     -Economists’ views
     -Aerospace industry

Poverty program
     -Past experience
     -Investment policy
     -Management
     -Focus

Adjustment program
     -A council meeting
          -Attendees
                -Businessmen

          -Congress

     International initiatives
           -Agriculture
                -European imports
                       -Citrus fruit
                       -Tobacco
                -Spain, Morocco
                -Latin America, Japan, Southeast Asia
                -Meeting blocs
                -Mediterranean countries
                       -US military role
                       -Cooperation with US
           -Multinational corporations
                -Mergers
                -Labor view
                       -Jobs
                -Need for US policy

     Future administration action on trade
          -Congressional action
          -Outside advice
               -Businessmen
               -Compared with government workers

Stephen B. Bull entered at an unknown time after 11:30 am

     President’s schedule
          -Press

Bull left at an unknown time before 12:05 pm

     Edwin D. Etherington
         -Background
         -New position

     A meeting of CIEP
         -Importance
               -Henry A. Kissinger
         -Kissinger, Shultz, John D. Ehrlichman

           -Domestic Council
                -Compared with National Security Council [NSC]
                -Membership
           -Role of State Department
           -Role of Stans
           -Kennedy’s role
           -Connally’s role
                -Burns and Shultz relations
           -H. R. (“Bob”) Haldeman
           -Burns
           -Burns, Connally, McCracken, and Shultz
           -Balance of payments
                -Quadriad meetings
                      -Shultz
                      -Burns
                -Connally, Burns
           -Role of State Department
                -Projects
                -Adjustment program
           -Connally
           -Rogers

Etherington and Robert H. Finch entered at 12:05 pm

     Greetings

     Etherington’s acquaintance with Peterson

     President and Peterson’s meeting
          -International economic issues
                -Spain, Italy, Japan

     A statement

Peterson left at 12:05 pm

     A plan

     Photo arrangements

Photographers entered at an unknown time after 12:05 pm

     American Stock Exchange

     Stock market

     [Unintelligible]

     President’s dinner

     An unknown woman

     Etherington’s staff

The photographers left at an unknown time before 12:13 pm

            -Romney
            -Henry E. Ford, II
            -Romney, Max M. Fisher
            -Charles B. (“Bud”) Wilkinson

     Volunteer agencies
         -Administration proposed
         -Volunteers in Service to America [VISTA]
         -Peace Corps
         -Teachers’ Corps
         -Effect on Etherington’s Center for Voluntary Action
         -Women’s role
                -Lenore Romney, Thelma C. (Ryan) (“Pat”) Nixon’s role
         -G. W. Romney’s role
         -Blacks’ role
         -Mrs. Nixon’s role
         -President’s role
         -Needs

     Ford

     President’s dinner

Etherington and Finch left at 12:13 pm

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.

All right, come in.
Good morning.
Well, I read your, uh... Well, it looks fine.
All right.
That's, uh...
Very, uh... Not very imaginative, of course.
All right, you can be done.
As you say, it's a slippery path, but they just give us an option other than simply waiting for the Congress.
I'm afraid, Mr. President, that if we leave it in their court, it'll be a hell of a mess.
A hell of a mess.
And they're not here to help you.
They're not here to help you.
No, they're here to give us the real vote.
And by this time, so there is, you, et cetera.
No.
No.
No.
I think in addition to the approach, which is going to require that you can see Mr. President
probably defense and aid and, you know, whatever other leaders we've got.
I think it might be well to be thinking about who should negotiate that package and at what point we should bring them in.
Let me say, first off, I'm not a candidate.
I don't think I should do it.
There are too many other things to do.
I'm not credible.
The industry doesn't know me.
They probably think of me as a, you know, free trigger, et cetera.
So let's eliminate me.
The criteria, it seems to me, is that I'll be somebody that's trusted by the Asians, or somebody they know.
It should be somebody that's clearly your man, because I think the right answer here is for you to solve this problem and nobody else.
And third, you've got this problem in the State Department, as you know, where the industry wouldn't trust them, and so forth, even though they've got a damn good man on their name, that, sure as I know, they're going to trust him.
that they would never be trusted.
Just an idea for what it's worth.
I talked with Harry Hinn about this at some point.
He says there's a man named Tony Jurek, who did the Okinawa thing.
I have yet to meet him.
I'm not quite sure as I hear the description.
He's got quite the dispatches and his code.
I wanted to talk to you about David Kennedy very briefly, because not only on this, but on shoes, it seems to me that he might be able to play an important role for us.
Now, the reading I get around about David, I assume we can speak off the record here, and I can tell you about whatever I...
I don't know whether...
I don't quite get the impression that he's the toughest negotiator in the world.
Some senior member like that does have the virtue of saying, you, the president, consider this problem important enough that you assign a very top man to this.
Now, I simply throw that at you as the prosecutor.
I don't know that it's the right answer.
I don't know how to get Harry Dent this one.
Yeah, yeah, let me say this.
I don't know how to get Harry Dent.
I don't know how to get Harry Dent.
I would like to give Dave something very substantive to do.
This is pretty substantive.
And second, he has a great stature and so forth.
He's a needy backstop by a very good staff man.
I'm sure of it.
I don't know well.
My impression is that he is somewhat limited.
I mean, his main experience has been in the National Defense Area, prior to this time.
And I don't know that he frankly would have a
I do the great, the great, the, I don't, but I would prefer, I would certainly prefer to, maybe Harry knows, you know, his courage, but I think he knows that he's,
As I understand, he couldn't be the top man.
No, but I was in with him.
I know he didn't make it up to be the top man.
I think David Kennedy, though, sounds like a intriguing possibility.
And I think it says to the world that you and your son are jurors.
So you have David Kennedy.
And a juror is a strong staff man.
I'm trying to stay up to the law.
And I'm sure that's how you think the guy is.
You can't be hosting anybody in any other agency.
Trezise is the best guy.
The best man.
If you had David and Dirk, maybe you could have a Trezise.
If you had Trezise in it, that's what I would do.
I think you need Trezise in it because you need somebody that knows more about it.
He doesn't want to be a jerk.
I know there's so many puppets.
A lot more audience.
The Japanese understand that you have a relationship or something that over the age of many times has been achieved.
and Hong Kong tribal, I think that all the countries mentioned in your study, I think you'd be fine.
All right.
But by the way, I just don't let it be a state department.
See, if you have only Interzis and Kennedy, eventually you will not trust them.
If you have Interzis and Kennedy and Jurek, Jurek does, and you don't want to trust them, because Jurek is basically a sort of a desire to fall in their heart.
to the feds guy and which probably will gain support among that kind of folks that are there.
That'd be my guess.
Now, just so you and I are together in what we're talking about here, I'm talking about a pretty tough package for these people.
It may involve aid, it may involve military, I mean, it may involve whatever it takes to get them to sign this deal.
And then you just impose it on the Japanese.
I've looked at six other options.
Frankly, most of them are both this national defense thing.
Mr. President, I'm afraid your credibility would really be strained on that.
I'm not held to argue that textbooks affect our national attention.
Now, this is the only one I've been... Now, this one sounds good to me.
Play it right down to the hill line.
These guys are probably going to give the Japanese a little kick around too, so...
I think we'll have to play it up to the Japanese.
Yeah, I'm sure a lot of things have fallen apart.
I think, too, is that once you move in this direction, the hell behind the Japanese may come around.
I'm going to say to you, we're serious.
One time, they may die, but we always have hope springs eternal as a friend.
Now, on the work earth, do you have any other ideas that should have been finished being involved in this at some point in view of the...
As part of the work group to plan the negotiations, you shouldn't say, I'm making this press about Korea.
You've got those divisions there.
You've got Taiwan.
Don't we need a little of that input into this?
It's always good to get a chance to always watch this.
And now, you just use your judgment on things like that.
On shoes, if I can briefly take this out, it's going to be a very sticky one.
You do know, I guess, that footwear is an important part of Spain's export stuff.
It's about 25% of its total.
The Italian ambassador is also an interesting thing.
It's a very important part there.
If we hadn't passed, we wouldn't do anything here to hurt them.
So on one side we've got our allies and we've got the fact that the case is not a very good one.
It's a split deal and the injury is marginal and so forth.
But an awful lot of states are injured.
On the political side, I've been up on the hill with Schmelz and Burns and so forth.
The guys getting hurt are the little guys, not the big guys.
The big guys aren't doing a second thing about this, but they're doing pretty well in the province and they're importing a lot of shoes anyway.
So it's the little guy spread throughout the countryside.
Johnny Burns tells me about his little place in Sturgeon Bay and so forth.
Now to me, the judgment here is going to depend on to what extent do we think taking action on this one of some sort diffuses the Christmas tree bundle possibility.
To what extent do we take action on this one?
lessen the probability of your getting that kind of a package.
And what are those odds?
And I'm trying to .
Shoes is the hottest one, right?
It's hot because it's not like Texas, somewhat regional.
It goes into every state, and it's all these little guys, and little guys, of course, while they are small, many times they're nerve-acking in politics.
Kentucky's got a huge factory here.
They're all over the country, and those people, you know, so it's a little business.
It's a million dollars, two, three million dollars, and some of those guys are supporting the Congress.
and he knows it.
The thing about it is they don't want to, they don't support anybody.
They all play both sides.
These guys know.
So we're talking about a very important statement of American small business.
If we could use that to an extent, if we could create it to be home free, I agree that people can't get free from the home, from the Christmas tree.
Now, once again, David Kennedy comes into play.
The scenario that's going to appear to me on this one, and I talked to a tenant investor yesterday, is if David could make a little trip or somebody like David as your special investor, Italy and Spain, looking for you.
We try to, instead of deciding in advance what the action is going to be, kind of sit down with them and we talk about various ways of solving the problem.
One possibility, Mr. President, that's kind of intriguing is that we put a tariff, something of that sort, after the growth exceeds a certain factor.
See, one of the things that the Spaniards are just kind of in a state of panic over is that you put a quota on them back in 69, roll it back in just to just kill them.
So, again, you might want to be thinking, and I'm not quite ready to make this recommendation, that David might be able to play a role here for you.
with the heads of states or with the ambassadors to show your very special concern for Italy and Spain and, you know, a few of the other countries.
And while we might decide to find injury and we might decide to take action, it might be that using him in some way would be helpful rather than just an accident, you know, someday.
Particularly since there's some record, some that you have said on
vacations passed in cars on the way to the airport and so forth, that you wouldn't do anything to hurt them.
And it might be that if you were to just enact some action without careful consultation, excellent idea, excellent idea, let him see if he could take a trip over to a hotel or something like that, just in the state of insulting them on them and saying, oh, this is the kind of action you're going to make in order to avoid something worse.
which would be a quote that we got really, we had a thing to do with a player who was pregnant with a big bear, and say, look,
The quota bearer is breathing down our neck, it's gonna come and we're trying to stop it.
We're on their side, fellas, and the years over trying to do, we're gonna have this terrible issue, whatever it is, I don't know about these things yet.
But you, in other words, scare the hell out of them in the Congress and say this is what we're trying to do and hold their hands on them and then go on.
Point out that we are their friends and the Congress is their enemy.
They could be fine.
However, again,
You must talk to him.
Is he back yet?
He'll be back.
When he gets back, talk to him about the need, the way he needs to stand on that.
He doesn't need much stuff.
He's probably got a good man to go with him.
Incidentally, his name did not appear on the list of council members.
But I was told that you wanted him on there.
That you did want David on the account.
Let me tell you the problem.
All right.
I think Bill Rogers objects to a valid argument.
I can't believe that the objection is one that's valid in terms of a...
I mean, well, it may be valid, but for me it's the same point.
But he would be a valuable member of the council.
I can put it this way.
George, of course, almost wrote his big sentence there.
Well, I have to press conference.
I should tell you this.
George said he would be a member of the council.
So he has something.
George also?
Yes.
He was asked about this.
I think George is understanding what I'm saying.
It's just deliverance.
It's just having come.
After all, he should be there.
He's a challenge.
And that's all there is to it.
All right.
Thank you.
You've got to be able to do the big shows.
Right.
Monetary problems very quickly.
I know you know about the financial crisis and so forth.
I'd like to just express a five-week opinion, and I hope I have the right to change.
One of the problems with the monetary situation, as the President seems to think, is that it's thought of as such a technical matter that us ordinary non-monetary fellows should kind of, it's like computers in business, we should kind of leave it alone.
And I'm more and more of the opinion that a hell of a lot of our problems have at their base some monetary principles that we've got to re-examine.
Now what I've done, however,
I've had two long meetings with John Connolly and Arthur Burns and McCracken and Schultz, and they've agreed we really ought to take a look at what our strategy is there on balanced payments.
Now, you know, there's a lot of theory of free trade and comparative advantage, you know, and all that sort of stuff.
But that assumed that you could change, that the exchange rates would change.
Now, it seems to me that we're being wasted on our own guitar here, if I may say so, where the dollar has become the standard.
We're doing a lot of things for these other countries in terms of aid and military, et cetera.
We're getting our tail even out publicly as the guys that are irresponsible and don't know how to manage their business and all this sort of thing.
And yet whenever these other countries want to devalue, they can devalue.
They can branch devalues, you know, and break the devalues.
And yet we sit here in the position of being the world's bankers.
Now, one thought that's occurring to me is there's a thrust of a policy that you might want to think about.
is I think until we can get the rest of the world to revalue more frequently so that it does get more flexible, we're going to continuously find ourselves in the kind of situation we're in now.
And I've had a study made in a German situation.
Remember, they revalued just a couple years ago.
I get two inputs on that.
The first one is it didn't have nearly the negative effects that all the so-called experts thought it was going to have.
But interesting, I'm tracking the trade balance before and after, you know, with the United States.
And while it's not just this factor, our export security has improved tremendously since they revalued, because it made it right.
Now I'm convinced we've got a very similar problem in Japan, in which the Japanese currency is much overvalued, and they, of course, don't want to revaluate, but presents them with some problems.
Now, what I'm proposing on monetary is that Conley and Burns and McCracken and George Shultz and I form a little group of listening to some of the new ideas about balance of payments.
You probably know there's some people that think that our current strategy is not right.
It's not agreeing and disagreeing.
But there's a lot of opinions that say, and this is very bright guys, saying, you know, look at our currency.
But that if we come up with the idea, for example, that our strategy should be more flexibility than these exchange rates,
Perhaps we might want to think of putting this in the context of negotiations with some of these other countries.
And the thing that's missing, Mr. President, in this foreign economic area is our leaders aren't strong enough.
You see, as long as we keep talking to people about economics, economics, we very often don't have a strong enough leader to do much about.
But if we were having a discussion with Japan, for example, on Okinawa, on defense, on something,
And I could show you that their revaluing could make a great difference on our trade.
I think our chances of getting them to do something are a whole lot higher than they are now.
We've got a problem now with Shelly, you know, with our friend down there.
Have you heard what they're trying to do to us now?
I thought I could, but it's a retroactive tax thing that goes back, I don't know, 20, 30 years.
It eats up one hell of a lot of the value that they had just with my retroactive one.
And then a 30-year 3% loan to pay the companies for their back.
Now picture the inflation in that country and you tell me what a 3% interest loan is worth.
And yet, Memorial was open yesterday, and we say, what levers have we got to apply?
And it's really, frankly, we don't have one.
I've seen them.
I've watched them do.
So I would hope that part of our strategy is to decide what things are really important to us, and then we'll get paid.
And then also, that's a good point with Japan.
What the hell we got with Japan?
Well, they opened up a lot of things.
Now, that thing now is pretty well down the track, though.
They've already sold that one once.
I don't think we could.
I don't know how much more they had to do this.
I don't know if they could do this.
Well, maybe.
I don't know what's happening there.
There.
The Chinese are agreeing.
They're agreeing.
I can't suggest they are.
You know, they're going down the whole way ahead in their industrial development.
that on the other hand, just like we are, the more they get, the more they want, they're equal, and their standard is high enough, and it probably isn't, considering what they have produced in the third nation of the world.
And so, I'll be living in Japan in five years.
I'll never be in the military again, maybe not as big, but will be a very strong political
Games.
Playing games with anybody, anybody they could against us.
Games are, are truly developed in nothing but sentiment.
They want nothing, they do nothing but sentiment.
Well, sentiment.
That nature, cold, ruthless, unequal.
We talk about the British being cold, and they are.
That nature more so.
Quid pro quo is the only thing they understand.
They go through all this ritual and violence.
I better have the letter unless you've got something to think I want to do it.
They say, go to boy.
Well, I'll tell you, I'm pleased for that reason with your textbook initiative.
I just think it would be just cute as hell for us to come up with something where we could put the screws right to a thing.
Just an announcement.
Oh, boy.
Let's get going with that.
I wouldn't talk a lot about that.
I suppose you have such a stint around here.
Wait a minute.
If I mean let's play a game, it can be the hell out over there.
I'm all for it.
I didn't know there was such a thing possible.
But if there is, go on and stretch the law if necessary.
The law, when they talk about the lawyers say this and that, we don't break it ever.
But you know, the law is what we finally interpret.
We've checked the legislative history, and I'm very encouraged.
The word significance is important, and several senators have alluded to the word significance in some circumstances.
This was originally, you see, Mr. President, the cotton natural field.
But we're almost sure now we can count the man-made.
So on both issues, I think we're in good shape.
I don't know how much time you have.
I've got three more items.
On my work program, there's one thing I want to add and two things I want to emphasize, too.
I think we're going to be on the defensive with regard to the shoes, electronics, you name it, until we come up with an adjustment program that really works.
I don't know whether other people have told you this or not, but I'll talk to you.
What we now have is called burial assistance, it's called funeral assistance, and so forth, you know, our current adjustment assistance program.
But everything, it comes to life, and there's so little money involved, you know, that's available, that it really doesn't solve the problem.
Now, I feel that until we can come up with a program that's got high credibility so that when a new case came up in the future, we had really answered the problems of how to help them adjust, you know, to some other business or modernize or something.
We're never going to have the right political answer to this because the senator, the congressman, is always going to say to us, don't you tell me about your long-range policies.
I'm worried about my, you know, my constituency.
This includes antitrust, in my opinion, because, as you and I discussed before, a lot of big companies could diversify, but they don't think they can.
It includes putting these small companies together.
Frankly, Mr. President, the two cases I looked at, most of our problems were these little guys.
But, you know, under our antitrust laws, it's hard to put together.
Other countries do it on a homeless notice.
It includes management systems.
It includes what to do with the communities.
Johnny Burns looks me in the eye and says, well, now you can do about Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin.
I've got 302 workers up there.
What the hell do you expect them to do?
Go into computer business or what?
Well, we're going to have to figure out a way of helping that community find another industry, you know, or something.
And I'm urging that we come up with a first-class program and price it out.
And maybe, Mr. President, it costs us a billion dollars.
But if we don't have one that works, if it doesn't work, then we're going to be sitting here for many years reacting to one case after the other.
So longer than that.
The rest of our situation could be that we can't follow what this country's going to have.
Correct.
In every case.
And the theoreticians around here, the economists, think this adjustment process is a lot easier than it is.
They say to me, well, Pete, why don't they just do a little R&D and move another business along with it?
If it were all that easy.
What's happened to the aerospace people?
Remember, they're going to medical, pollution, ocean.
It's a tough job.
This is a lot of right people and all their own stash.
What the hell do they do with themselves?
Now, they have a strategy.
I want to check with you before we present this.
The council meeting is upon us.
If there was a mistake made on the poverty program, I think it would whine for humility on how little is really known about the operational reality to get the job done.
If you recall, they just plunged right into it.
The sports adjustment process has been with us for a hundred years.
Can I take a look at humility in my opinion, or did we come up with a program?
We do it on a test basis, you know, on two or three businesses so that we know what we're talking about rather than, you know, a huge fanfare.
And then find out that, you know, the theory just didn't work out.
And I'm tentatively thinking that we better find a way of trying this before we get too comfy about it.
Because this is one of the world's toughest problems.
It involves management.
A lot of the management are at fault here.
They don't have the vision, some of them, to know when to shift and when to change.
And part of our strategy when we come up with a program is whether we should just, you know, do a poverty program thing or whether we should take two or three industries and say in the next year or two we're going to try it.
And that's something that can wait until we have the program.
But I want to allow you to know that this is one of the world's economic problems.
If you're saying the business is going to change, you're going to lie and change what business you're in, and it's one of the world's problems.
Let me ask you, would you, you just plan to open this up to the council meeting?
I've set up this on the agenda, and the work, very frankly, has got to include some business people.
The next one is the international initiatives.
My feeling here is this will include, very briefly I'll mention it to you, it's got to include agriculture.
You know, because that's something I heard.
You should know, Mr. President, what these guys say to me.
I've been dealing the hell out of the European guys coming over here.
Are you aware of what they've done to us on citrus and tobacco?
You know, those preferences in Spain and Morocco and all those kind of things.
We've got that problem to deal with on the ground.
So what do you want us to do?
Each of us have our own blocks.
And then, you know, if you want to do this down there, maybe we ought to do it in Latin America somewhere else and maybe Japan doesn't stop these stations.
And then you say we've got three competing blocks rather than the allies agreeing on it.
which countries should be the less developed countries.
Now, their answer to me, I found most immediately, they said, well, the Mediterranean was terribly important, and we decided to help.
And I said, you know, that's a hell of a note.
Who's lead is it down there who wants Mediterranean?
You know what I mean?
Who's taking the real pressure on the Mediterranean?
The least you could have done was consult with us and let us decide jointly on what kind of preference that we're going to give both countries.
But that's a big issue in agriculture and other...
Non-tariff barriers, you know, there's a load of those we ought to look at.
And the multinational corporation is emerging as a very key issue.
I don't know if you follow this or not, but labor is now focused on the multinational corporation as a development.
And the idea is they're exporting jobs.
And they're the number one villain.
You see, they needed some rhetoric that got them off of free trade back to what they wanted.
And they needed a villain.
And the villain is a multinational company.
And we're going to have to figure out, I think, what our policy should be about multinational corporations.
So that's another one of the initiatives that I contributed to planning.
So that's the international arena.
Frankly, in a way, and I'm kind of glad we're installing them, you know, because we're going to need six months to get our ducts on the road anyway.
So are you, and you're going to have a car dealer that you can't have, and in this case, you should get the outside people to help you.
Well, that's a very, I mean, you're outside business, man.
You're out there.
Don't do it unless they, you know, it's a terrible thing for you.
It's kind of, you know, it's kind of expensive.
You know, it's, you know, it's useless, man.
or, you know, anybody, any bright person you can find, feel free to do that and go, you know, run the whole, and actually there's a big people in government, but I think that some of the things you're talking about here are beyond the can of the average government.
Certainly so, to tie it down with all the problems that they, uh, have in this country.
Thank you very much.
Just be a second, please.
Let me say two things.
You know, Edwin, the former head of the American Stock Exchange at Trinity College, I'm going to be the head of the volunteers at the office.
I agree with that.
Anyway.
I think your first meeting is very important.
Do some thinking about it.
I talked to Kessinger about how if he puts them on, not that it's the best way to do it or not that it will be in your format, but it's important to have a, you need to have here, of course, the office and often the agenda of the leadership.
And it's just uninteresting to me personally to go out and
You work out, you can talk to them, they can give you pretty good ideas for how a meeting is running.
You've sat in on it, you know.
But you've got to develop your own part of it.
The advisory council runs very differently from the NSC, for example.
You have a high sense of security of state here.
You also have a problem on the river.
Those are one's hands.
Others are not that sensitive about their role, and I want you to play up to that.
I mean, I don't think I've ever heard of the business community.
They've already got a lot to say, a lot of worthwhile things to say.
And Cliff is, you know, I notice everybody wants to be on the dinner council.
And as you noted at the beginning, whether you suggested they come in when they have a problem.
I can tell you that we hope that you have a very good talk with...
He's very important in this whole deal.
The other thing is that
in terms of this whole balance of payments thing.
Now, there's this enormous sensitivity of our department.
I see you run it all.
Our different Georgia competitors, you know, and at times opponents.
We're not doing it for all the Georgians.
But anyway, there it is.
Now, consequently, you and me, if you can, I'd like for you to be a very good political maneuver here.
Talk to all of them.
You can go over and I hope you will go to see Arthur and listen to him talk for an hour about these stories.
You've done two hours with Arthur this week, comedy, your character, and your shows.
And I thought we, you've done more than a little.
Yeah.
But if you were dead, as a matter of fact, you might at some point, when we have balance of payments, we discuss that only in the quadrant at the present time.
There are false suggestions about what these are doing in this area.
It's very hard and very sensitive about that as to whether it ought to be done in this area.
I think it should be.
Commonly get his, enlist him on that side.
Let's start, you know.
One other small announcement I wanted to say, yeah, I don't think you have a chance to read it.
State persists in this view that they want to approve all work projects and they want to run them through the operations committee.
Frankly, some of the kinds of things I'm trying to do here, Mr. President, I hate to just turn over adjustment systems to some operations committee.
I'd like to be able to take some outstanding experts and do it.
Do I have your general support that this gets handed out to, you know, you see what I'm describing and what is right and what is wrong?
Because we've got a real problem with the economy.
I talked to him yesterday for an hour.
He said, look, you're going to have a real problem with me.
He said, you're going to have a real problem with me.
He said, you're going to have a real problem with me.
But just keep, but also keep very close to, keep very close to him on it too if you have any problems.
How are you?
Pete Peterson.
Oh, Pete, how are you?
Pete and I have just been deciding the economic fate of Spain, Italy, Japan.
Who else have we got down here?
In front of the grass, like 45.
I'll tell you.
That was usually what I mean.
Oh, how are you?
Oh, I'm safe and focused.
And running.
You understand?
I mean, it's too fast.
I don't know what's better.
You want to get a locker?
Get a locker, yes.
I thought it was good at the time.
Oh, is that what they want?
Let's try this box.
Bob, look, that would be better.
I want you to sit down.
You sit here.
You face me.
Bob, you sit here.
I'll sort of be the attorney and the lawyer.
I'll be the lawyer and the attorney.
I think now it will start to come true.
I think it's missing out on 1910.
We believe, yeah, we started something like that.
... ... ... ... ... ... ...
Well, I remember the time I came up with the question on my assistant, and I was .
.
.
We'll have a story time today.
We'll be back.
He's a great, great accountant.
Yes, he is.
You ought to pick your own people.
We thought that, you know, we had a little problem with George, and this is the way to solve that.
He's going to go in a lot of the dead ways.
Oh, yes, sir.
I'm getting a lot of the ways.
The other thing is that...
How about your relations with Ford?
Let me say, have you talked a little about some of these?
Yes, sir.
And you've got a little bit on the board.
What might really happen here soon?
and with the very best of intentions, but Jerry Romney got into it, and Max Fischer was in it, and a long-time friendship partner was ruined as a result, and Henry Ford came in and grabbed the rich some money, and Fierce was wrong here, and all that sort of thing, and Bud Loewitz was in it, but he didn't have the organizational ability, and as a result, the damn thing just went moving along with no progress.
Now, uh...
We're sending down, coincidentally, a new message on the government side for putting all the volunteer agencies in one agency.
I mean, this is a Peace Corps, a Chiefs Corps, now that's on the government side.
So, at this time, we're attempting to get it organized.
play very high, if you will, and I think the women, Mrs. Romney, Mrs. Nixon, all the rest of us, they all work in these programs, and they're enormously important to them.
I will, and actually play the charge, and to, we had a good session with Ian Blackford, they sort of spelled out the differences, he knows what the Blackford's, he doesn't know the Black's government, you're not, right?
You really have to use her and you have to use me with me and her.
And basically you have to use whoever is the first family.
Whenever you need something, you get a goose.
So we'll fight the game whenever you want.
Like everybody, she's got to be shown that if something worthwhile isn't just a Mickey Mouse thing, it's going to fall on its face.
So whatever you can find, she must have a tea or something every day for somebody.
And it's great stuff.
But what has really been lacking is organization and follow through.
I'll have a recommendation tonight that I think those things are lacking, and we'll wait until we really have a worthwhile answer.
I think it's rather nice