Conversation 591-002

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Well, pretty quick, working very well.

I've got a pretty idea, though, isn't he?

He has a nice compromise in the future.

You know, these talents have come with them.

Of course, it's a hell of a deal for these people to be presented.

What I think you should do is not give a six-ball butt.

I think what you could do would be to invite...

The wife and children to come and witness them, you see.

I'll be receiving, receiving connection.

And I'll say, wouldn't your dad like to come up and have a picture, you see?

And meet them.

And I'll drop the whole hot shot, in case.

I think it would be an awfully nice time.

Do they join the families now?

No.

Today they didn't?

They never had.

I see.

They never had.

The only one that did was the Irish, on a special day.

But I really believe that the family, you know, after all, this is the highlight of the man's career, to present his credentials in the United States.

Okay, we can bring a picture of it.

If you get his little lessons and then say, wouldn't your family like to come over?

You see what I mean?

Have the whole family standing in there and end up knowing that you liked it.

and have them come and they witness it and then you know and then i'll say i would you like to have a picture then come over take a picture thank you very much i wish you very much it worked fine today but i'm just thinking that it's a it's going to take one minute more one minute more we'll get through these damn things and i'll continue to do them on that basis yes but no talks no god talks to anybody something to talk about they come in this office

That's the way they're gonna come.

It's a good idea because it's possible.

Really, it doesn't.

Once you have to study up hard to do them the way you would, you won't do them super efficiently.

I can't risk it.

They may be asking me about something that I should know.

And believe me, it's a very rough thing.

But another son of a bitch isn't going to tell us anything.

And they all try to.

Not they all.

Some of them do.

But then I've got to be very careful not to have to think of something that I should say about his wife or his kids or some goddamn thing.

It's not really my time.

Or, and let's just not do it anymore.

But the family thing is nice, don't you think?

And let's not do the social one, not try to, we talked to one, Elsa having a tea, it's Elsa, that takes my time.

Because then that one wants you to come back into the tea.

She's always insisting on that.

We've got to do it right on her day, you know.

She doesn't realize, her doing it right is fine, but I haven't got the time to do it right.

The family thing is fine, she just sent a picture with me, that's what they want.

And then later on they can come to something else, but that way the white's in and down my house, and so forth.

I just like the idea, just stay with your wife.

If you want your wife, then come and then see it, too.

Then we have to bring in a separate car, so he rides with the protocol officer in his car with the flags and let his family ride behind him and watch him.

And then they come in and follow in and see that and then have them, too, but have them just standing over at the side while they come in.

and all the whole, all the family groups of us, they arrive some of the same, and they come in.

It'd be a nice touch, just a nice touch.

And I call them up for a picture, and that picture is worth that whole goddamn visit by me.

So, I think that's it.

Thank you.

Well, we do all these things extremely well.

But I've just been always working on it.

We've done our share of that now.

We're not going to do it anymore.

I checked in the afternoon.

Yes, we have the system set for 8.

The dinner guests flow from the parlors in, and as soon as they start going into the Eastern, then they bring the after-dinner guests in and mingle them in the small ones.

They go in.

They say, I'll get that right in.

We don't have time to go to the after-dinner guests.

They're not invited so early.

They wait and wait and wait.

We run a little bit of that, you know, and the goddamn toasts go too long.

We have the dinner guests that are held out there.

I would have a concert early.

Okay, it's not too bad being held, though, either.

Because it's a, they serve champagne and they have music for it downstairs.

So they're at like a reception down there.

Okay.

I always have something I need on that shit.

Yeah.

I think you're right.

We ought to get invited as ladies.

You know, it's close to the time.

But there again, I just am thinking of the use of time.

And also, I don't think I should put a man like Tito, 75 years old, through that damn thing.

What do you think?

I agree.

And that's...

It takes 20 to 30 minutes to get that many hands.

and do it nicely.

And there are people that... Well, some of them are, and then a congressman is.

You know, but most of them are administrative assistants or members of commissions or, you know, somebody that wants to go to the White House the first time.

No, it's still a bunch of marginal things.

It doesn't add that much more.

They get 50% of it by coming, and that only adds 10% to some of them, which is terrible.

Yeah.

Thank you very much.

I absolutely agree with that.

They're there.

Good.

Let's try that.

I haven't tried that.

I mean, the rose has been also bleeding.

And I just want to say, well,

Of course, the people have been, there's words around, we shake hands with everybody, but goddamn, we don't have to shake hands with people.

The words of any congresswoman, they come, they bring all their relatives from where and there, and they want to meet the president.

You know what happened last time, which I just got there, and I first of all drew a different model at the time of these gestures.

I always spoke briefly to them.

But definitely they didn't have a whole choir come through the water.

They had a choir of 15.

Now, God damn it, all that had to have some kind of plans.

15, that's, you know, a whole choir of people.

Oh, I'll go to another one.

I'm going to get you to take a look, too, just so I didn't know.

But you can see the point, Bob.

That's the kind of thing that's a waste.

Now, when I go shake hands with all the drivers, that's a different thing.

I mean, we're putting that in the magazine.

Oh, I suppose I should shake hands with these people today, don't you think?

Yes.

We should just go ahead and thank for what I'm saying.

I guess that's it.

Yes.

What are they working on?

Is there just a citizens committee for?

Well, don't get, don't regret talking about taking these on.

Public support for our, public support for the base, for the post-freeze.

Netherlands are doing the stock inflation bumper sticker business and all that.

getting word out.

It's important stuff.

And it might help.

You're right.

It might help.

Some people like to think it's like those letters you read.

I'll give up my raise if you say it's going to help the country.

There is a certain basic patriotism among a whole lot of people.

Well, if they're told it's doing some good, it'd be god-darned if they're gonna give up their raises.

The neighbor's gonna get a bigger one because of it.

That's the reason why I got out before you.

You know, the part is like the business of shaking hands with the reception and the church things.

All of that

Again, you can make a very good case that it was good to have done it in the beginning.

Because people were watching, you know, what kind of, what's he gonna do?

Is he gonna do a move?

Is he gonna snare people and all that?

You've established all that.

And if you don't do it now, nobody's gonna know the difference, really.

And they're not gonna make anything out of it.

And who the hell cares?

Who cares?

The people there were there.

They're not going to complain very much if they didn't get to shake hands.

In fact, it's a pain in the ass to have to stand in that line for an hour.

Which they think they have to do.

Oh, Christ, yes.

I mean, they're jammed to the whole hour.

I keep talking about it.

I know they don't do it in any of his live interviews.

Please, please.

They do.

No, no, they do.

But you wait there, see?

You don't get in the line.

You wait for a time to get in the line.

Please keep watching to let us align down and out of the way.

We just want to go.

They do a hell of a job on that.

We didn't use it.

They used it just to jam them all up and make them stand there.

I always feel so bad.

Some people won't get out of line.

See, you say, you know, please go in here and all the people say, screw you, get in line and shake his hand.

They're afraid you'll cut out or tell someone to get ahead of them in the line.

You watch them push in the line, too.

It's unbelievable.

the kind of people you have at the White House who would have the greatest of standards.

I just want to get it down where the handshaking is going to be totally symbolic.

I've got an audience.

That's the way it should be.

Now take the press side.

I heard a deal that we did for Doug Carmel.

That's my president.

And that was symbolic as hell.

Hell, a long time.

Doug Carmel wrote emails.

He was deeply moved by it.

We should have met in Sochi.

And the rest of the press were, because they saw that, you know, one of their own being treated that way, and also they were dignified people.

And without any sloppers, that sort of thing, and all that such.

And it didn't have to be done.

Didn't try to make a big deal out of it.

Did they cover that incident?

Oh, yeah.

I don't know anybody who wrote about it.

It should have been.

Of course, I wrote it before.

It was a very big story here, local story, and a...

I think it was a water story.

It did.

Oh, they did.

They ran a picture.

They had two or three different pictures that went down there.

Awful good, very in for one hell of a time was crying, and, uh, that would kind of hook any people there to do with a good smile on their face.

You know, it's, it isn't really being a sucker or anything, but, um, we, we were having a new campaign and everything else, and some of us

You just don't work your butt off to the other 50 states and shake every last goddamn hand and work a 14-hour day and be sure that you're proving something.

We go overboard that way.

And every stinky goose thing, every block of people chairing the big states and the international chairing them say, well, they ought to be doing more and more.

But I don't think they're going to say, well, I'm in this office.

Do you think so?

Actually, they don't say he ought to be doing more.

What they say is he shouldn't be doing so much.

But he should come to my state.

You shouldn't go to so many cities, but you shouldn't go to our city.

Or Billy Graham says, don't shake hands in the receiving line.

But I'm going to add 80 more people to my reception in North Carolina, which he just did.

That's fine.

But if we said have as many as you want, they'd have 1,000 people in line.

And it wouldn't mean anything.

If you have a couple hundred, it means a great deal.

The 53 things have picked up yet, have they?

Yeah.

Okay.

We're up with some more ambassadors.

The order's done.

I wonder if you'd like to get him out of the way?

Because I'm imagining that he's come back now.

He's down there after a couple of days today, and he's landing his lady tomorrow.

He's coming to land his office.

I thought Landon was coming out today.

It is a little bit of a problem.

I can do it tomorrow if he's here.

The reason is that I had to book a reception tonight.

We just added a reception to the schedule.

Oh, after 6.

Well, I'll be busy through 6.

The reception starts at 5 o'clock and 787 is those moving on.

Okay.

I just checked a lot.

He was coming to Len's office at 6.

He could get him out of the way and not have to have a special.

And Len will be turning him off today.

It just makes an edge on me.

Does he hear anything?

No.

I think he may, but...

Well, that's what I thought.

Len could chart around.

He hasn't seen any of this charting this area.

breaking up about 615 or whatever you were doing with Rod.

But maybe he's proud of you.

There's time.

I don't want to get to it.

Then you've got to find a way to teach him for him.

Well, he's got to be here tomorrow.

Well, no, no.

He's got to be coming to the last office and taking him to dinner.

He's here visiting his son to get this out.

Well, I'm sure you can come back.

I just thought this was the easiest way to handle it from getting in and out.

In a sense, you know, I think you ought to be here on your birthday.

If we could work it out.

Well, if they're doing anything for it in New York, I don't know whether you'd be able to find out.

Well, let me ask you this.

Find out who it is, if they are doing something for it, which is, and it's not even in America.

They're not.

It's just, it's just a hell of a thing, a nice thing for me to do.

I'd be glad to see it at the scene.

I, uh, I don't want to delay having it.

Well, I thought if you were going to do it, I'd call her and say that he'd be over there.

I can't find out if they're going to do anything lame or if nobody's going to call John Alexander or something.

No problem.

And there's no comment that he's coming tomorrow or next week.

That's just about the reason.

This you should see for about two minutes.

Say thanks a hell of a lot for what you're doing standing there.

These are most of the people that you know.

It isn't like the racing drivers would never have seen a five president before.

What did you tell them in the committee?

This is the committee for the new economic policy.

Citizens committee.

But I don't push him on that.

You're not pushing him.

I'm just trying to think of what's nice with him.

Well, at the age of 95, I just can't believe that it would be easy for him to make another trip to Washington.

That's right.

I mean, give him something.

Yeah, absolutely.

What about all those Eisenhower dollars?

Oh, no, that's nice.

I think, uh, what else?

It is to other people.

Those are a big deal.

Well, I mean, that isn't really serving me so much, is it?

Well, we've got your steel and your name on the file.

Well, is there, did the money live for her?

No, I wouldn't carry one.

He probably just comes.

What about anything else we're taking?

No, let's do this.

Let's see what we can do.

Steve's got some good gift stuff.

Give him one of the expensive ones.

See, there's something very good in giving one something around $20, $25 a gift.

Okay.

Would you do that?

Okay.

And Rose, why don't you come up to this and get a nice thing?

I don't want Len to get into the courtroom with me.

He's written me a long memorandum, you know, about my name.

Certainly.

Well, it isn't that.

It's along those lines, and you know what I mean.

The liberal left wing get treated in order and so forth, as well as the outstanding church.

And I'm just not going to do it.

I could hold it for the next few months.

No, no, no.

You see what my role is.

And I think if it's church socially, I just want the church to discuss.

You and Pat pulled out for a woman in North Lansing.

Yeah, I've got a Negro woman that everybody thinks of me as.

Have you?

Yeah.

Jewel La... Yeah, the one from Alabama?

Yeah.

She's a beautiful Negro.

Yeah.

And she's an attorney in Chicago.

She's a judge, isn't she?

She's a judge.

She ran for judge.

She knows pretty well who she is.

Joe says she's real great.

She'll die in the Republican, which is, you can't say that very many.

She is a Republican.

Oh, yeah.

She ran for the appellate's court, or some court that you're talking about.

She's head of our, she was on some committee or head of something.

All right.

She was on one of our side meetings.

Yeah.

If Marshall goes, I've got to put her in his job.

That's a good one.

Oh, really?

Really, my view is this.

What I do with women, which may come in some manner or another, by God, I'm going to get one that at least is, I can't get a conservative view, but I'm going to get one that is bad, not bad, where I can get a syndicated, so you get a law degree, so you get your due and your black belt and ranks, but the blind vote is the same thing.

And the toast and the bad liver people.

Gross.

Now, I don't want to push that.

You're not pushing it at all.

If you could let me bring him up at, say, 615, tell Pat that he's just coming up to say hello, have a little give there that we can get him.

And I will mention it right on then, and I'll step out and say hello in any ten minutes they should leave.

You know what I mean?

So, don't you think that's a good idea?

Then you see, you could be there on...

Good.

That's good.

We have a solution tonight.

We should.

I mean, it's not something that's so obvious to go over for so much longer.

It's not a private position.

But at 95, I just don't think he probably is up to taking very many trips down.

And if you're having to come down, especially, you have to spend more than 10 minutes.

Well, I'll be coming up to get a picture.

Yes.

Great.

Have all of you give the viewers a lot.

We're going to have to find out what gift we got.

Yes, I will.

Both of those things cut down.

Do you know what you realize?

And next year, as I told you, I'm not going to have any state visits.

That's just not happening because of the China-Russian thing.

We told them, unless it's Europe, unless we have to do something for the Europeans.

Guess what?

I'm still forcing America to do it for the Europeans.

It's about some of the deal.

You know, let me hear you now.

I hope it does.

Is that it?

Could we do that?

Well, yeah.

The president had a great talk with the regime there, and it was just a committee.

Oh, I think.

No.

I think he was back asking for another meeting, so I don't know who you are.

Oh.

No.

I never know what it is you're up to on that.

But, uh, maybe because, uh,

We'll try to work out this perception that way, shall we?

I just found that they...

The border section.

Well, really, anybody can do it.

But, you know, somebody that I know 30 years ago, 100 years ago in my house would have come up and said, you know, we invite very, you know, second-level people to that, which is wonderful.

But they shouldn't be taking my time when I've got a first-level person to be talking to, right?

We're awfully good at this, though.

You stop and think.

Christ and the Eisenhardt, they had that same plaque all the time.

Jesus Christ, we had had everybody.

We'd had White House staff, we'd had some of this.

You know, the only one that I'd heard of was that guy.

And we covered the staff, and we have every damn person there is.

We've got good coverage.

The conference, we moved it around in the conference field instead of just saying,

I don't have a...

I've got a call in here tomorrow, and I've got to get Henry tomorrow, and I said, oh, yeah.

I mean if you can't, if you finally get out of that camp, who would be good?

I'll prep myself.

This time of year, you know, the weather's good.

That's, uh, all right.

You can be honest with me.

That's the person who put her on.

How are you?

How are you doing, please?

Oh, I'm fine.

Oh, did you see that?

Did you see that wearing an arm since you got here?

Well, yeah.

Well...

It's good to see you.

We have a lovely day today.

I'm going to tell you a secret about your ambassadors.

I told them they're not coming this way all the time.

I'm going to sit over here.

You can sit here.

That's what we call a practice.

This is an honor.

And every time anybody has to get plugged up there, I point out...

One of the guys that sat in that chair, I mean, he's been happy to be home since then, so really.

Poor guy.

I don't know which one of those little countries it was, but there was one out there.

Well, I want to tell you that I've been very grateful for your talking to Chuck Mercer from time to time and giving him some of your...

analysis of this political stuff.

I didn't follow the polls as well as I probably should.

But on the other hand, one of the things that I'm particularly interested in in your polling techniques is that you attempt to

to get something other than some of the obvious answers.

In other words, you try to dig beneath why, and so forth and so on.

And I always felt, myself, that a pole is not a pole saying, well, what you before, and so forth and so on.

It's susceptible to enormous variations

unless you analyze why, what's motivating and so forth, the depth of support and so forth.

And I thought, too, another interesting thing, I was rather curious, you had mentioned to Chuck the fact that you thought that, you know, phase two, it should not be, I'd say, the same level of intensity as phase one, right?

There were some people who felt there was a continuation.

as you probably know that we i was no i mean as i wrote that speech i used to continue yes

I had talked to you yesterday, obviously, but I thought that Fitz had played such a role.

Was there anybody else there that helped out?

People were, you know, Fitz, for anybody, was that Gable was all right?

Was Gable was fine?

Maybe I'll give him a call tomorrow.

I mean, we need those fellows to cooperate, and that's been for a while.

They may go up in the air, you know, they may, they may, they, well, they're interested, but if they let us ride for four or five months,

Because they're standing, the American people, expresses that I think that's why they did this.

That's why they came along.

We have ample evidence on two things.

One, that they don't have the support of their own membership on this position to defy you on it.

I don't think they're opposed.

Number two, that they

Would you like a tea or a coffee or a Coke?

I'd like a tea to achieve this.

The reputation is not that good in terms of leadership.

I've got something coming out on that.

It's very interesting.

Their view on their own numbers is more manipulators than they are dedicated, more manipulators.

selfish interests than they are, and they don't look at it as their selfish, their rank and file selfish, because they think the leaders somehow are pushing their own interests here, than they are public spirits.

So the last area I should think that leaders in labor can stand up successfully would be to affect the financial policy.

uh what seems to be with their ownership makes it good for the country i think i have great trouble in saying but we oppose it uh they may have been involved on a particular wage demand or a particular you know strike or or collective bargaining situation but uh i doubt that you know i think the crunch on this will come and the way i see it is

When the particular union that's frozen in right now, which has the inordinate demand, capital, maybe it's construction, maybe it's job, whoever, comes in and they say, well, let's give it to them.

At that point, I don't think the rest of labor is going to support that union.

I think I calculated that.

And I'm right, because they'd say, that's just going to ruin the whole thing for everybody.

There's a great, deep desire for the American people to

deal, and lastly, to do something together for the common good.

In other words, even though there's no war, in the sense that there was a World War II in Korea, do you think at the present time, people kind of want to be, quote, patriotic, quote, on the city?

Yes, I think it's gotten so bad that they have, or they have, they place them

that they feel that something's done.

They've all, there isn't a person or family that hasn't suffered in this period, at least they haven't suffered one way or another.

Therefore, they .

They are correct in this sense.

I was looking at the figures.

It's quite interesting to note that while we have had, since the

of the 1930s, well beginning of 1932, the Depression.

While in that period of time we have had unemployment, recessions, and the rest, this is the first time, except for the many bulge, which was quite a bulge for one year at 17%, just before Korea, during Korea, this is the first time that you really had inflation problems in this country.

Now, as I said, we didn't worry about inflation in the 50s.

inflation in the 50s, 1%, 1.5%, 2%.

In the 60s, until 67, it was around 1.5 to 61, 62, 63.

Of course, that came on.

Then in 68, because of the war, in 69, it continued.

In 70, it began to stay at a high level.

In 71, it begins to come down some.

And even though the inflation in the United States is less than that of any industrial, but any of the major industrial countries, like Japan is just higher, the British is higher, the Japanese is higher, and the Italians, of course, are higher.

Our people, our people, I don't know, they react to it.

But yeah, I think it's the same period it fell down.

Plus, all of this is relevant, you know, I remember well, I guess back in 1958, when I started to think that there's a dip in the economy, and a lot of things, Delto, people of Indianapolis, going around by foot, and I remember well, I guess I've taken you also out there.

Yeah, I can show you a story.

And, uh, come to see me now.

It's true, I guess.

It was old.

Joe's?

Joe's.

Oh, I know who that is.

I've heard stories about him.

Joe.

Who's Joe?

Joe, I don't know.

He just cut.

I mean, just overworked.

Yeah.

You know, I mean, it's so intense.

So Joe is.

Absolutely.

Go ahead.

I know that there's been an amazing event, which, you know, it's changed just one little bit, but these fellas were worried about losing their television sets.

They had to put them on.

And the idea of losing your television set or your automobile was as bad as I recall from the Depression, you know, of losing everything.

And today, if you can't say anything on a colored TV set or a washing machine, in other words,

It takes not a great deal of setback for people to feel that the bottom's dropped out.

It's all a relative thing, you know.

That's the thing, too.

It's like everybody today is borrowing up to the hilt.

So everybody borrows.

You've got household finance.

You've got, of course, installment credit and all the rest.

We've always had it.

But never everybody would borrow.

You buy everything on time.

You buy your car on time.

You buy your house on time and everything.

And that's going to be a little blip upwards and you can't get the payments.

That's why people are more interested in such things as interest rates.

That's right.

It's just that they're very sensitive.

One thing that I find hard, and I'm not sure that we have found a way to ask about it, but people do not, as far as we can tell,

get very large quote, devaluation dollars.

They, you know, I would have bet that they would have worried more about it.

But I don't think the evaluation is something that people understand.

They don't think it's a loss of national pride.

They just think it's something concerning the United States.

It's just a bunch of little bankers who are involved in something that doesn't affect us.

You were voiced this week with a show that the public attitudes on you.

I was not paid.

It was the first time I heard you tell us, one tomorrow.

One tomorrow.

In some ways, it's even better.

But it really does show that the attitudes have shifted.

Well, what's happening, I'll be back in, I guess this is July, I think it's 34 or 39, people did not think that you were working and doing much good.

This is now reverse of 53 to 28, and we think that you're doing great.

This is a tremendous ride.

What about your theory that Chuck told me about, that you do have a theory that it takes six months and one day between an upturn in the economy or a recovery from a recession, or whatever you want to call it.

This, of course, is rather kind of good.

Before people reflected in their attitudes.

Now, the line is perhaps a little longer this time.

There's always the same thing.

You can't come up in January and say,

Yes, very.

But actually, we see that tax was starting to come up.

It started to come up in the fall of last year in the auto strike.

Yes.

And then it kind of came up in the first quarter of the 50 years when it really started to come up.

I'll go as far out as present, but I just bet you that by the middle of November, it's going to be as Christmas to be the biggest thing that's free.

And initially, you're missing it.

You can just feel it.

You can feel it in a way that's necessary for the way that some people respond.

That's tomorrow's poll.

After six weeks of the next administration's new economic policies, there are a dozen signs of the confidence of the American consumers on the rise.

The figures are 53 to 23.

And in March, there were 37 to 34.

So that's the other way around.

The other way around.

Negative over positive.

This is now.

It's a very, very, it's money, money is there, sitting in these savings accounts.

All people need is this turnaround in confidence.

And I think the key, that's what I felt some healing about in the base student, that the key to it is that they feel what the,

So obviously, kind of turn them on in phase one.

It's not the drop.

They got one message that... Did that get across to them?

No, I think it did in a sort of delayed way.

I think what you put to them that night, I thought very effectively, was this can only be done with you.

And it's true.

These are, these are the CDs that have, we have a very interesting thing.

I mean, let me, let me regress myself.

I can't for a moment here later.

Oh, I guess the, yeah, I'm sure I'm sure I'm fine.

Do you have one for your, for your gallery here?

I'm a plus.

He said, why, I was going to ask him, and he said, very good.

You never listen.

Listen, he said, to you.

I was going to say that the campaign yesterday, we had, of course, you can imagine, a number of people, all of them, they know something about politics.

They're very good at it.

Oh, I would say you have to read both of them.

Ronnie understood it well in their states, but from an action standpoint, Conner's got the field negative.

He was born in that.

Yeah, he's kind of done it.

Just see what I was there to hear.

See what I'm talking about.

He's a great guy, Conner.

Anyway, the point where it is raised, they said, and I can see it being the surface.

Well, now, why do we have to take this for a pain in the rest?

I mean, after all,

Let's just throw it down there, because they aren't going to be with us anyway, and so forth.

And then I said, now look, let me talk to you about it just a little bit further.

I said, first, nobody is more aware than I am that George Gideon and Woodcock and that group are going to be against us.

I said, Gideon is a dedicated partisan.

And that's the way it's going to be.

But that isn't the problem.

The problem is that in order for a phase two to work, it is essential to have a cooperation of leading leaders.

Or, either that, or we have to go to a total compulsory control program.

Job owning alone will not work.

So if you say, well, we don't have the cooperation of labor, then we'll show it.

All right, then.

All right, what was the next step?

Well, then, Mom said, we'll send a public board.

And the public board will, rather than the pay board, will tell labor how much he can have.

And we should turn back some of these deferred wage increases.

And we should break the auto.

In other words, the auto debt was too high.

Turn it back.

We'll seal the deferred.

I said, all right, Mom.

So they shot it.

What do you do?

Well, I don't know, that's, uh, just to look at the country really, like, if we had even any economy still, we're not going to be able to do that.

So, what are we doing?

What we have to do is to take, not a perfect situation is going to be that.

Labor is going to, uh, they're going to steer us through some things.

But, on the other hand, as George Falls pointed out, take Canadian experiences.

And the Canadian experience is typical of every country that has tried guidelines or a job on it.

It has never worked unless labor is participating.

Canada couldn't get labor to participate.

It broke down in a year.

Now, we have labor participating.

This doesn't mean it's going to work perfectly.

But lack of a totally compulsory program, labor now has the responsibility to trust upon that.

And so instead of having the next time out of 15% in Greece, we make it 8% in Britain.

And that's a hell of a difference.

And I think that's what can also, I think that the alternative, according to a controlled economy, to the Islam.

No, I don't think it has taken as far as where people aren't buying.

Well, you'd have to be at five markets after World War II, and during all of that, you'd have to be at another one.

I think what you've come up with is the only viable solution.

I noticed that many said it's supposed to be in this portion.

It has to be.

The funding was, in a nonsense, good because it raised...

It puzzled some people, I think, that night.

But by the time economy got through the next day, one fact that they came through, and that is there still will be some form of wage price controls here.

And I suspect that's all that was communicated.

They don't know what the price for it is.

Probably couldn't care less about what it weighs.

They don't know what that does.

Something's there and it will continue and by God it's probably going to work.

And I think what you did so effectively was to say it'll only work with you.

If you don't do it, then all the things... One of the things that's interesting, too, is the critical idea we may be

We're starting to get some good numbers now, too.

Wow.

We can't go better this month on the CPI.

We get the wholesale price index, which I pulled again last night.

It was very, very good.

That will retract itself in two or three months on the CPI.

The CPI this month would be good, and I think it would be good in that month.

Don't you think so?

I don't know.

to be able to figure it out.

They need to just be honest with our souls, you know, what you can do with the pictures.

And they are, that's unbelievable.

You know, Mr. President, when I started talking about the countenance of the BLS and the census, because he will give you half of our budget.

How about talking it out and running it?

I mean, that's how it is.

No, seriously.

How can you do that?

Well, you know, let's just say this.

This is a question that you look at.

We have a bunch of,

running these things.

And I don't want anybody here to lie to me.

As I said, I told Chuck and I told Alderman and all my people, I don't want anybody to lie to me about the poll.

If it's bad news, I want to correct it.

If it's good news, I want to correct it.

But I don't want my statisticians out of here.

to fake the numbers, I don't think.

And also, it's very important for me to know, however, that they are, that they are competent enough that I can soundly rely on them.

I know that this isn't anything, you know, you have to find this, and it's totally a pull.

Well, I know it's a pull, and the unemployment, they'll, they'll, he got that number for over a few years, but it's understandable.

What is the workforce now?

I don't know what the hell the workforce is, and they protect it.

I can never tell you how many people were really temporary or just in for a great time.

And they say they've got hours cut off, and yet they have to run until the end.

I think you just want to think about what we're talking here, which would be how wise a person would be to be on your client.

But let me suggest, like I said, see you at the meeting.

You would want the ambassador to proceed before those poor bachelors come down.

That's the worst job.

Thank you, thank you.

Well, I agree with you.

I kind of hate when they say they're going to abolish all ambassadors.

Right.

I really believe it's a serious issue for us.

Because I think, as often as not, they go, they, certainly the professional staff, tends to go Navy.

Yeah.

And represent other countries.

All in the spirit of saying, look how well I get on with these people.

And then you come back, this massive, I don't know how you can get the truth out of it.

You don't get the truth until you go after it and find your own.

Right.

Here's what I'd like to hear.

I'd like some help on what you could get.

I don't actually get to go back to that.

Let me say, I don't want to fix it.

I don't want it in common.

But there must be a high, there must be some highly intelligent people that we can feed into BLS and into Congress.

We need to get both places coming in.

Now, you've got a pretty good man in Congress, and you're getting some others.

And this is not a reflection on the honesty of the people I think of.

I think that in some cases that I don't really know.

What do you think, Joe?

I don't think they're professionally competent.

I don't think they're out to the top of the heap.

But in your business, your business, there must be, couldn't you say, we need a competent man?

Right.

Or two.

Or a woman.

Please.

And remember, I said woman.

I say man.

Sir, I'm glad to hear that.

Well, sir, what about a woman?

Excuse me.

The guy who has to replace the same record that he signed out.

Well, the technical, really, in that whole area, I don't want to get me started on that, but Lou was talking about this before.

They, number one, they get a particular technique of doing business, and it will never change.

There is absolutely...

There's so much subjective judgment that goes into the patrolling technique.

It has a pretty fair judgment.

It counts in the school, you know, it has judgment.

I can tell you, I just saw something in there.

I said, if anybody, this was a census thing, I said, if anybody did that for the unconfirmed, you'd have this really bad.

Yeah, just like you were telling me, you may have somebody say what I was thinking.

You might have somebody in your organization, or you may have somebody that's, you might have a bit of a competitor.

Yeah, that's true.

You know, that's what I'm saying.

You know, I mean, this is somebody who, there are some things, there are some common people who've got it.

People wonder why presidents deal with so few.

And the reason is not only that you can't trust many people, but also that most of them, frankly, aren't smart enough.

They just aren't smart enough.

I mean, how in the world, I heard this from Chuck, how in the world can you have a four-month running efforts to measure the impact of something that began on August 15th?

That's what we did with the receipt.

You can't do that.

Well, I know that was a fake.

It was not accurate.

Can you refute that?

We knew prices had been frozen.

And people were here.

Did you know that 93% is the indication of adherence?

You can't have 93% with clients and price go up 4%.

It cannot be.

There's no way.

And who could want to have gone up all that much?

That was not, of course, the goal.

But it was just an absolutely different line.

It was a mad figure.

You know, Dr. Keller, Georgetown, has been running his own unemployment study.

And he's always above the U.S. figures on the overall, because he factors in unemployed people who can't work.

And so he always has a big look at our figures since he was eight.

The significant thing about tele-speakers is that for the past five months he has shown a steady two-tenths, one percent, per month.

So it's just, some of you, and some of you are totally heated.

It's similar to how bus people think.

And then what they do, they come back to you and say, I'm sure they've done this, but how can we change the trend lines here?

You should go to another measure.

You throw out all this.

And that's the ultimate, in my judgment, of bureaucratic dictation.

Because they say we've had this for 10 years and you can throw it out no matter how bad it is.

Then you have no basis.

So getting away with those things and getting on the field of my heart, it's terrifying.

In fact, the latest on it, he even wrote this to me.

He said, Brian, you live and die by these damn numbers.

That's right.

Every night you fight about them and say, oh, well, that's bad and it's good and so forth.

But now, that's only half the story.

Half the other half of the story is what you've done.

You've moved consecutively now, and we haven't got to read on some of them in Moscow, and certainly it would be- I did that actually yesterday because I heard you were coming in today.

They wanted me to do it today, I'll check.

I just did your question.

The economic policy, to a degree, which has got a literate policy, and these are the people who respond most of all to it as fast as the other people are winging their pocketbooks in a sense to improve the funding and say how it's working.

These are people who can see the thrust of what they might be doing.

And then there's the summing thing.

Let me say, let me interrupt you for one moment about the summer thing.

The China one is more exciting because it's like going to the moon.

In terms of long-term, it is, of course, it is possible that more important.

In terms of the immediate, short-term, the Soviet thing, of course, is infinitely more important.

For example, the Soviet thing involves

And actually, you know, where we cool them to the brim, which we could play a joke on, but I'm sure you realize we're not saying this because there are too many deals.

The very fact that we're having this has a restraining effect on many situations.

That is terribly important because the Russians, in our view, are not about to cause us trouble.

or want to go down with the United States at any place in the world.

So, in other words, the Russian summit will be Montana.

And that, of course, overall is the enormous problem of ours, where we'll have agreement.

So the Russian summit is going to be something that is not good, I would think.

You know, I think a lot of people see it.

I was over there recently, and I know you've just been to Russia.

I must say, we can never say this to them, but the China thing is just working miracles.

It really is incredible because they didn't have any priority or said that to any Americans.

As a matter of fact, I used to die when I was president, so just to show you what it's like.

They just disarmed them and pulled their teeth when they started up and said, look, here's the area of present U.S.-US-US relations.

I said, that's, that's, that's, it's this big.

Now the President, at least in American terms, took a very radical step by establishing U.S.-China relations way down here

in a radically local way.

In fact, he's the only man who could have done it probably in the White House without getting impeached for going this far.

I said, what does this mean?

He said, what this means is the potential in terms of now the latitude for US-Soviet relations

the gap in between here, you've now increased the possibilities in terms of what the American people will allow for us to do from this small area here to all of this area here, you see.

And this really stopped.

I mean, I must have used it four times and said, now you've got this great thing in the rest of the area, which you didn't have before, and you people ought to welcome it.

Or I welcome it rather than be worried about it, you see.

And, uh, they really did.

I never saw the Russians.

They're, uh, aren't they?

They're all being, won't be in no fight, but it's over.

Uh, I know that they're all in the room.

Understand?

All right, sir.

This is a million three.

But I think they, well, let me just say this on that.

They also went to Israel earlier this year, and I'll say they've been touching me since Goldmire's people.

I think it strikes me that they...

won't yield on us east of the Suez.

I don't know if they can get them to go, but I don't think so.

I think what they would buy, I think, is the US-Russian agreement on no fighting if the terms of the political settlement are allowed to be worked out between them without sticking over their shoulder, obviously, but over the same period of time.

And I think, my sense, I did not talk to Russians about the Middle East, but my sense of their deep desire to defuse any tensions with the West, they were very plump about saying they were in deep trouble with China.

They just held out no hope for any kind of accord between themselves and the Chinese, very plump about it.

And they're not about to have a double trouble on that, from the West and from the East at the same time.

And I think they'll do, I don't think they'll do damn near anything as long as they can save face on to come to some kind of solution.

But I think that's right.

And I think I wouldn't be surprised to see them do that.

I mean, I say, okay, look, they make games.

at least they're not going to make the ultimate game of training.

Right, obviously.

Right.

I think the degree to which we're talking, telling, and saying, look, we'll match you if necessary, the degree to which I don't understand it, I very much just feel like they would like to work with us in Southeast Asia.

This is one of the greatest strides they've taken.

They do not want our presence out of Southeast Asia.

I'm very clear about that.

Even though you might say, we'd like you back in Pakistan.

We'd like you back in Pakistan.

We'll back India together.

We might keep China out.

This was the head of the department.

This was the man who was down there negotiating with the Maoist communists.

I had a very, very interesting thought.

I thought this was...

very revealing because they said, well, we know how far you can go with China.

We're not too worried about that.

We know what you can give.

And they said, the only places they'd like us out are Thailand and Korea, but they said, we know you're not going to leave there.

They like Malaysia.

They're worried about Burma.

They like us somehow being around for that.

They're worried about Indonesia.

The Chinese and Japanese control it.

They're worried about the Japanese and Chinese.

They're worried about the Japanese.

They're worried about the Chinese.

I don't know if they're putting me on or not in this, but they say they're worried about it.

They said the Japanese-Chinese deal would mean having a bomb in the world.

And they see economic reasons why they might get together, which China can short in 20 years, in five years.

Japan is a big market place for raw materials.

But they also said in Southeast Asia, they're colliding because

Mao, I told this chap, I talked to him, he said, within 10, 15 years, we must control all of Southeast Asia.

And the Japanese, he said, they can't go west without banging on the United States.

They can't come east without banging on them.

The only place they can go is Japanese and Southeast Asia.

Therefore, they don't have a coincidence of interest.

The Japanese do a billion dollars in Taiwan as well.

But they're going to go to trade mission, I guess,

And now they know they're real and saying that trade missions to Tokyo already want to take up the slack that they think the Japanese will have from the U.S. $2 billion in trade established right away in Russia.

This would indicate they are trying to break Japan's $2 billion trade with Japan, for which they'll pay dearly.

I mean, you know, copper developed in eastern Siberia, where the fact that it will be all Japanese technology for Russian raw materials for their country, that's a whole great deal for the Japanese.

The Japanese are going to take it really clean, exactly, in terms of the Japanese technology.

Well, let me, can I?

Sure, sure, sure.

Mr. President, I think the most, it's a funny thing.

Well, let me ask you this.

Do you feel that these things, you know, I was rather interested in, people said, well, China is such a big deal, and that changes the attitudes of people, people on policy, not on Soviet.

I have this feeling.

that as you look at polls and so forth, it'll change it much.

It may change the mix, but isn't there a situation that occurs, I'm going to read it for a moment, that after we have a look at this country today, if you look at the media, and I won't say this in a complaining way, just by way of observation,

And, you know, we're sort of in a psychology of knocking estimates and everything going to hell, and nobody can be president, and the United States does everything wrong, and Jesus loves to have a change, and we need leadership, and we're a star, and all that sort of thing.

You see my point, though?

And I wonder if, as a matter of fact, if the...

if the presidential standing did not make sure the president had another individual, then maybe it'd turn out fairly well.

But I wonder if presidential standing in the country is ever going to prove it.

President, I've got a thing with the age.

I don't know if it'll make you feel better or not, but I try not to tell it to you because it shows for me.

What the essence of the problem of God is not an individual one, but it's also one that's done here, something we did in 1966.

Why we haven't done it since, I don't know, but it was the degree of respect that people have for about 20 different types of leaders in various fields, including executive ranks, government, the Supreme Court, doctors, educators, bankers, institutions, leaders of these various institutions.

And the results are really, well, they're both shocking and they're, and the only solace you can take is that there's been a lesser drop in confidence in negative brainstorming than there has across the board in this country.

At the top of the list are doctors who were 72% great deal respected in 1964, educators who dropped from 61 to 37 in the last years, bankers in financial years 67 to 36,

Religious leaders, 41 to 27.

Businessmen, big drop, 55 to 27.

Military leaders, 62 to 27.

Scientists, 56 to 32, drop.

These are huge.

Executive branch chairman, 56 to 71.

Got them in five years.

That's the story.

See?

Then they hold us down.

Hold us down.

Executive branch chairman, 41 to 22.

Supreme Court, 51 to 22.

Then you get Congress, 42 to 19, way down.

Then you get the press, 29 to 18, at every rate, high and still lower.

And down at the very bottom, you get labor union leaders, 22% respect.

You need 66 to 14 now.

Very interesting.

But what this shows is that we've had, since 66, a general loss of feeling about the

Is it possible for anybody to be president?

Is that really the problem?

No, I think it is.

Because we should consider the big plays.

Not that we did it for that reason, but we just have to be here because of the combination of circumstances.

This is the time it has to be done.

The United States had to make this move to China.

And I was the one that had to do it.

We had to make the Russian move.

And I was the one that had to do it.

And the economic thing was built in those things.

And of course, we have a war on the way and a few other little things.

for a reasonable time, but I wonder if it makes any difference.

I wonder if as far as the country is concerned, what is your view of this?

Well, I think, Mr. President, we can make the bank good as far as we are responsible.

I mean, go ahead.

I've always believed that nothing is to be, that survival is man's basic instinct and that the American people have survived as much as anybody.

So that's peace.

Yeah, that's peace, basically.

That's right.

Which has got to be the most important issue, in my judgment.

Now, why didn't you get a more immediate response from China?

You see, we find, this is coming out, I guess, a week from Monday, in Uganda, in July, 48 to 64 percent gave positive marks on the peace in the world.

Now, the only reason this happened, I'm absolutely convinced it did, like John Tyne did, was with the China thing.

Why would it happen immediately?

Well, I think the reason was there's a lead-acre weight on this China problem.

that dragged it down and didn't let it surface.

Now, on the economy, I think you really should have no illusions about that.

I don't think that's an issue that will ever work for you in 1972.

I think what you'll do is at best neutralize the issue, but when you neutralize it, you let a whole lot of other things come to the surface, like quarks rising up, the main one of which is

Which is the highest point.

And the other thing is that it's very much to our, and to the interests of whoever is here, is to emphasize the strong issue, the peace issue.

Right.

And just have a defensive action on the other issue.

That's right.

So they're thinking about the peace issue, maybe not about the other issue.

It's not very interesting statistical analysis that...

shows that the two balance each other off.

And the positive and negative is generally a combination of the two.

And the result is that in the positive negative, it's the highest since March of 70s, and March of 70s is the overall curve, which comes out next week.

You're absolutely right about that.

But most of it is wrong.

But we can have a bulletin.

I know it's fine.

I'm too late.

I started getting the news.

Go ahead.

I'll give you one result.

Mr. President, this is a study that you called me about.

These are just the details.

Now, the rest of the news, I'll be working all weekend writing it up, but one thing which I want to show you is on the, who's supplying the buses?

This one is just back.

Buses.

And the question is, who are they planning to be most responsible for addressing the chief racial balance?

The choice they have is the President, Congress, state local school officials, U.S. Supreme Court, or all or none.

Top of the list, Supreme Court, 36%.

State and local school officials, 28%.

People say they should have stopped it, and they're doing it.

They say they're the ones, of course, that are firing at the state.

Right.

Congress, 9%, the President, 12%.

I'm sorry, what was that?

Seven, I'm sorry.

Seven, and all four, with it to 12 is Deep South, that's what's in my mind.

Deep South is 12, but that's still 16 in Congress, only 11.

Those four levels, you take the least related responsibility.

Well, you know, the thing that let me say, I don't like it.

I mean, I don't like it that well, but I really like it.

18% sit in prison.

So you're really, to a degree, the thing I was trying to say about what we all have to understand, you know what I'm saying, John?

The whole black-white issue.

Let me tell you my feeling about that.

What I think about the Muskie statement on a black vice president, as I said, he just may have said it in a totally candid and so forth and so on.

But I again say that if you analyze it carefully, it is quite true that if it's unpopular to put a black on as vice president, say that it's unpopular, it means that it helps you.

No.

Right?

No.

Absolutely.

If that's the gentleman, I don't think he did it to the ground.

I don't have a question for him.

Here's the reason it can't be said.

It can't be said, even if you thought it was true, it can't be said about that term.

And the reason it can't be said is that beneath the surface is a hell of a lot of racism and religious antagonism in this country, and that's also, there's anacatholicism and antisemitism, and there's a hell of a lot of anti-blood, and all that.

The moment the public figure says

I'll become that this, all he does is reach for it all.

So therefore, you must, that doesn't mean that you say, well, there is none.

Then you just say, yes, there is prejudice, but I believe a qualified man can win.

Now, in my case, I didn't say it for a reason.

I didn't.

Brooke, on a ticket, Brooke, on a ticket, on balance, would not hurt me.

And he would help at a lot of stages.

He would hurt some.

What's his name?

Ralph Lutz.

Ralph Lutz was the only guy to beat Javits.

Well, you know, some probably in Chicago said that when I was in 68 and I was in Chicago, I said something that you couldn't have done.

You couldn't put a Jew on the ticket without earning and so forth and all for everything.

This one was set at all.

I remember it very well.

The specific question had to do with chance.

And I said, well, first of all,

Jeff said, well, I'm doing it.

I mean, he doesn't... Jeff did not believe himself.

He said, I'm a senator and so forth.

And he said, this is not going to happen.

And the other question was related to, which is a theory of mine.

I do not believe in taking balance.

I think the vice president has got to be...

He doesn't have to be 100% in...

philosophical tandem with the president.

But he came out, you kind of have a gulf between the two.

And it's, Kennedy and Johnson were about as far as you can go.

And that was tough.

That was tough.

In our end, having anybody in the vice presidential line.

I've often said the only job of a vice president is to support the president, nothing else.

and not to be on the issue himself.

There's one question you asked me that he and I discussed, and I think it's very important, really important to keep in mind.

Well, I thank you for coming down, and let's have another talk in the mail, as soon as you've got your analysis of those other things.

Yes, I think we've done some very simple stuff.

But would you like a pair of us, please?

Oh, thank you.

You go ahead.

Thank you.

You are a golfer?

Well, I'm left handed, you see.

I'm left handed, but I'll get this here.

There's your paperweight order.

You have to do much to add paper.

It's always, you know, get rid of the paper, not the weight.

He's got everything you can get.

All right.

Well, we'll see you next time.

Yes, sir.

If you'd like to come over to that for a second.

All right.

so so

So I just wanted to let you know what's going on here.