Nixon White House Tapes — Conversation 512-018
Date: Friday, June 4, 1971 at 1:18 PM
Participants: Nixon, Richard M. (President); Haldeman, H. R. ("Bob")
Recording device: Oval Office
Source: https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/512-018

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 Do not cite it as authoritative.

[0:05] He's a very impressive fellow.
[0:20] He's Jewish, liberal, a lot of semen.
[0:22] He's a hard-line, very good at the crime.
[0:23] Hard-line and one-hearted man with good credentials.
[0:25] Which is unusual for a Jew.
[0:25] Yeah, good credentials.
[0:26] He's got very good communication with the young people and the blacks and that's because he's got imaginative procedures like, for example,
[0:29] In the field of drugs, he's got this program.
[0:45] He is against legalizing marijuana.
[0:47] He says, the position is exactly right.
[0:48] He says, the evidence points to that.
[0:49] But he says, he's got this pre-indictment probation.
[0:50] He says, what you do when you've got somebody who's out enjoying a ride and you pick them up, you know, a college kid, you arrest them.
[0:55] And then you bring them in before indictment.
[0:57] And you say, all right, you're on probation for a year.
[0:59] There will be no record if you don't break it.
[1:04] But if you break it, it's going to sort of look at you.
[1:08] Excellent idea.
[1:09] I'm all for that.
[1:09] Excellent idea.
[1:10] A conventional abuser of anything like that shouldn't be given, I don't think, shouldn't be in that kind of a situation.
[1:30] Any punishment at all.
[1:30] I agree.
[1:30] I think, but Frank, do you arrest them?
[1:31] Yeah.
[1:31] Do you fingerprint them?
[1:32] I set an all-criminal record, and it's a pre-indictment for what you call it.
[1:33] And I, as a lawyer, say a conventional abuser is completely, and I said, that's very good to see.
[1:35] Yes, but to legalize it is way wrong, because then it makes it fashionable.
[1:37] and acceptable, something that people should not realize is wrong.
[1:49] Well, that's what, you know, as I told you, this kid, who has been on, very heavily on marijuana for two years now, said, for God's sake, don't legalize it.
[2:00] He's the kind of a guy you don't even think he could.
[2:02] He could run your thing, couldn't he?
[2:03] No, here, your dope thing, if you don't get it, what's his name?
[2:06] Huh, yeah.
[2:07] I don't think he'd do that.
[2:25] At least his future is there.
[2:25] He's the kind of fellow that really should be heading...
[2:27] He ought to go to the...
[2:27] If you have appointments in the Supreme Court, if you go to the Jewish room, you're not supposed to get out of there.
[2:30] You're on the harder line, Captain.
[2:30] The regular line would be more tough, less intellectual.
[2:35] Good.
[2:36] What does he think about Rizzo?
[2:42] He's managing the campaign.
[2:57] Is he managing Longstrap?
[2:57] He's making it clear that they're not attacking Rizzo as a policeman, just saying.
[2:59] Which, of course, Green had done.
[2:59] Respect for him, he's worked for him, with him for five years, and then basically the issue is whether or not he broad-gaugeed that community.
[3:03] Longstrap is a Nixon man.
[3:03] He's always been a Nixon man.
[3:06] You know, he stuck his neck out.
[3:14] Well, he was, because I was for him once, and he knew there wasn't a chance.
[3:25] And a very strong guy.
[3:26] He's a very decent guy, basically, not strong.
[3:27] But who the hell is the strongest guy on the people you know?
[3:28] Not very many.
[3:30] It's the strength of something that's, I don't know, what the hell is it?
[3:32] Does it get beaten out of college?
[3:33] I think that's what it is.
[3:35] The more intellectual people get, the weaker they get.
[3:48] The less they've got.
[3:53] That's right.
[3:54] This economic thing, I talked to John.
[3:56] He's going to put the thing together and he says Schultz is not in town.
[4:13] Why doesn't that have to be done today?
[4:17] But he's going to get it done today.
[4:18] Okay.
[4:18] I thought anyone that did together was an exception.
[4:20] No, I think we ought to let the weekends go by and let them listen to the numbers and all of them.
[4:44] Why not?
[4:44] So he's, John's building on it.
[4:45] The fact that I'm 1.6.2, you know what I mean?
[4:46] But I can do some things with it, I think, without it.
[4:47] It creates jobs among people who are not in the same labor force.
[4:48] It may not make a whole lot of difference.
[4:50] Huh.
[4:52] Have you lost 23 to 67?
[4:57] Is that one year?
[5:08] No, that's end of draft.
[5:09] One year is shorter.
[5:13] I'll be the second, yeah.
[5:14] I'm being so responsible.
[5:15] Instead, I feel to lose about 31.
[5:15] That's exactly what he lost by.
[5:16] Probably closer, but we'll defeat it.
[5:18] I'm glad you're staying up.
[5:20] All right.
[5:21] He's about double stage.
[5:34] He's got a great future.
[5:34] I mean, I would never see him acting an asshole like this fighter.
[5:41] I mean, he's tougher.
[5:41] You know, he's a Jew that's come up like Henry.
[5:42] I think.
[5:43] You know, he's developed some toughness.
[5:44] I don't feel like there's anything I don't want to do.
[5:45] I wonder what it does.
[5:50] You know, of course, you know,
[5:51] He didn't seem to feel that
[6:19] I mean, he's just skimmed through it, I guess, but he said it's coming up.
[6:28] But Benham, what Benham told me in the general discussion was that this is Benham's truth.
[6:32] Benham did both polls.
[6:33] He did our image poll, and then he did their issue poll.
[6:41] The poll was paid for by the government.
[6:46] It's part of the basic research in the domestic concept.
[6:49] It means a lot, but it's a lot of money.
[7:03] It's good.
[7:03] We're playing our game, Johnny.
[7:04] We've got more mileage out of the ORC releases.
[7:06] They've got bigger news than the Gallup releases, and that's pure.
[7:08] It shows you how screwed up the DER is.
[7:10] They should have breaks out of ORC stuff that we put out.
[7:13] It's not news.
[7:14] It's a job poll.
[7:16] I mean, it is.
[7:19] It happens.
[7:22] It's an honest job.
[7:27] It could be.
[7:28] They have no reason to believe that.
[7:33] I imagine that if we were to job it, they wouldn't know it.
[7:35] That's right.
[7:35] That's why we've got to use Harris a little more, too.
[7:36] They wouldn't know it.
[7:36] If we job the ORC poll, put it out, they wouldn't know the figures.
[7:39] That's why we want to keep it quite credible by not using it too often.
[7:41] Try to use Harris.
[7:41] See, he sells his stuff.
[7:42] He sells his results.
[7:45] Chris, if Harris pays for the poll himself and sells the results, you know, the curious thing on Harris, the Harris trend lines on trial heats differ from Gallup's.
[7:58] I mean, Gallup shows the trial heats closing.
[8:00] Where we were ahead, we closed.
[8:02] And Harris shows where they were ahead.
[8:04] And they were closed.
[8:06] Now, what the hell is right?
[8:11] I think Gallifrey's are kind of true.
[8:24] I think Harris was, I think Harris was jobbing and now he's moving him back in the line because of our economic relationship.
[8:28] He was jobbing.
[8:28] And the reason I think Gallifrey is because Gallifrey are seeing basically our improvement, right?
[8:32] And I, if we don't wait a little more until Lawrence, the other, I mean, I don't know if it's right, but you know it's not.
[8:35] Oh, boy.
[8:41] It's not going to change.
[8:52] It's not going to change either.
[8:56] One thing about the economy, the economic land, it just doesn't get any worse.
[8:58] You're supposed to live for six months before it gets better and you'll be all right.
[9:02] People can get used to it, you know.
[9:03] And after all, to tell you that you need to sign one.
[9:05] It's like, you know, a 24-card.
[9:05] Well, I think it's great as far as the college kids are concerned.
[9:07] You really need it.
[9:07] The fact that the graduates this year can't get jobs is the best thing that could happen to them.
[9:10] and higher education, I disagree with, damn right.
[9:17] Well, when I used to do college recruiting back in the mid-60s, it was obnoxious, because these kids didn't come in, you know, they were doing you a favor to even come to the appointment.
[9:28] You had to go to the campus, they didn't come down to the office.
[9:31] You had to go out to the campus.
[9:34] And they were very awful on the nights that they came.
[9:37] You had to have nice, colorful brochures,
[9:40] I wasn't going to be treated like I did in the law schools.
[9:54] Why not give it one trip?
[9:57] I mean, I mean, I mean, but there was the same lot of things.
[9:58] Here I was the former vice president of the United States.
[10:00] I went to these places.
[10:00] Well, they, of course, were recent.
[10:01] They were almost independent.
[10:02] They had little shit-asses I never saw in my life.
[10:06] And, uh, the, uh, there was any offers that they did.
[10:08] Well, all these companies just stock them up and then they can parent them.
[10:29] They have benefits and a salary and guaranteed promotions.
[10:32] And that's what it is when they hear peace.
[10:33] Peace.
[10:33] Sure can if it happens.
[10:33] Even assuming that Vietnam just drags on in the end to make the final announcement, that's that.
[10:35] That's going to be done whenever I lay the books right to them.
[10:37] I'm sure of it.
[10:39] And you don't get it right there, but in some China things.
[10:51] We know that.
[10:52] And we can use it anytime we want.
[10:55] So you've got that in the bank.
[10:59] And that's going to be quite a thing.
[11:00] I mean, that's going to be a hell of a thing when the president agrees to go to China.
[11:04] It's going to be quite a thing.
[11:04] You send Bruce over ahead, that's going to be a big thing.
[11:07] When you go, it's going to be...
[11:08] It's incredible.
[11:17] You don't have the stir that that'll create when you're on it.
[11:24] See, it's pretty bigger than Russia.
[11:25] Much bigger.
[11:26] Many times bigger, because it's a forbidden land, right?
[11:28] History.
[11:28] And the element of danger.
[11:31] I mean, the mystery involved in, you know, what might happen to it.
[11:32] Well, that's something I don't recognize.
[11:33] You're safer there than any place in the world you could go.
[11:35] Hell of a lot of states that are walking across Pennsylvania Avenue are going to Mexico.
[11:51] We can't go any place in Latin America.
[11:53] Well, going to Mexico is a damn dangerous driving through.
[11:55] Hell of a lot more dangerous driving through Puerto Vallarta.
[11:57] I know.
[12:00] You can walk a little bit through the streets of P.T.
[12:01] more safely than Parma, Ostrava, or Leningrad or any place.
[12:03] You're a prime minister.
[12:03] Because they just have to tell you, no, there's a damn little bit more.
[12:06] When I say the drugs are there, just come on.
[12:28] They are ruthless.
[12:28] And take on the Soviet men.
[12:29] If we don't have something, if you get a Soviet son, boy, all right, we can just get a break and come and get you.
[12:31] Has the American president ever gone to Moscow?
[12:33] No, never.
[12:33] The American president never went to Moscow.
[12:34] I don't know whether you want to ask Johnson.
[12:35] I asked him.
[12:35] I was invited, I was the highest ranking American prisoner in the world.
[12:52] The only, of course, there was a Yalta conference, but that's really kind of different.
[12:58] That really is in the country, you know, that's a, it wasn't a visit.
[13:02] He was to visit a big tree at Yalta on the Black Sea.
[13:03] And it really had no, and this is going to Moscow.
[13:04] See, it's a big difference.
[13:07] you'll have a person on that building, a thousand to walk through.
[13:25] And the bank is quite something.
[13:27] It really is.
[13:29] Everything's like a kid with a good toy.
[13:29] Well, I don't blame him.
[13:30] To tell you the truth, that letter was worth his whole job here.
[13:31] To tell you the truth, he knows, too, that this is something that
[13:33] For what?
[13:53] Oh my God.
[13:54] I mean, that warmly welcomed historical significance of that piece of paper.
[14:15] And, you know, it wasn't interesting enough, too, the fact that it says it will welcome Dr. Kissinger.
[14:17] So, let's have this, uh, let's, again, oppose our problem with Roger.
[14:19] I am thinking in terms of, well, Bob, we can't just let him come up with a perfect ending in terms of having him recall with Agnes.
[14:24] July 1st.
[14:52] Yeah.
[14:52] He's going to end up for the weekend there, isn't he?
[14:53] I think he was.
[15:16] Whatever it is, it could be.
[15:21] No, I guess not.
[15:21] He left the trip before we got to Pakistan.
[15:25] Something out of Japan, I suppose.
[15:44] Alright.
[15:45] That was a bruise.
[15:45] Oh, you hear that?
[15:47] Oh, there's a goddamn street.
[15:47] This stuff, the hell?
[15:48] It's hardly anything.
[15:48] These two moves, there's no way you can do much more significant kind of stuff.
[15:53] Alright.
[15:53] Bruising, I guess.
[15:55] Yep.
[16:29] I totally know I'm going to trash myself in costume, but cosmetically I believe in doing the war this month.
[16:48] And for God's sake, this is our key to keep it bouncing.
[16:49] It's a tough problem.
[16:50] Let's assure you, you don't have to worry about getting in too much trouble there.
[16:52] I don't know, I think next week with some of those Senate votes, that talk with the part where they get the Vietnam votes by turning the union into the
[16:58] And there's a big move of businessmen's move for peace, and those kind of people are coming in to lobby.
[17:11] Who's leading that?
[17:12] John Gardner.
[17:12] Businessmen's, that's Willens from Los Angeles.
[17:20] Oh, he's been in this group for years.
[17:21] Yeah, he's been in this group for years.
[17:22] Businesses are getting his move for peace.
[17:27] Lawyers.
[17:28] They're going into town to try and...
[17:30] They're going into town to try and...