Conversation 610-001

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He's responsible for our getting recently for us.

He also called with us.

He's he had closer Marines at the same time, but they did not meet.

He's just.

He's been in Europe, Africa, and just come back from the start.

Now, he says George Sherman is not a meteorologist, and it's not necessarily their phone, but he says he's an employee.

He likes to write the visitors that are in the area, and so forth.

Well, that's the cap on the bag.

He says his deed is secure.

Of course, I've never seen that.

So what happens, what Colson thinks is that these stories have been definitely planted by Satan.

That's what I think.

Now, what he also, what Colson suggested, and what I suggested to Colson is that I want him to get shot and see you.

There's a definite campaign going on.

For example, today's climate, whom I never see.

The New York Times had an article on the editorial page, on the op-ed, saying the whole China initiative was started by the archers on the Taiwan, that there was a Taiwan patrol

which was canceled, and Raj has got the word to the Chinese through diplomatic channels.

All the dash, we got the word to the Chinese through the Pakistan channel.

And Raj has never did a damn thing with it.

And it's so circumstantial, he says, there was a table sent by State to various emphases where they figured it would lead to China, that we were canceling the Taiwan patrol, and this was Raj's initiative, and what we did in July was simply carrying out the initiative that was started in 69.

So we never see climate haste.

So this is a definite campaign that these guys are now launching.

I mean, on China, I have a book.

I have a book.

They never knew that God damn it.

And on the Taiwan patrol, on this minor item.

Of course, then they said that actually everything was started at the Warsaw Talks in 69 and 70, and only the Cambodian invasion interfered with having the trip to Peking happen then.

State, obviously.

Now, you know that we started the Warsaw Talks when you ordered Sturffel to walk up to this ambassador, and then they let us know through Yaya three weeks before they accepted the Warsaw Talks that they were going to do it.

We'd known it before State ever heard of it.

It's not that no one pays any attention to climate, and they can't, but it's an example.

It's an example, and this Sherman thing is also, they're trying to undermine your relationship to me by giving...

I wasn't concerned about that thing of A, but when he goes on... Oh, this week about the stunning defeat?

Oh, yes.

Absolutely.

Well, I must say that this business about the China thing, now Rogers knows better than this, so he can't be doing that.

But he must go about it.

Scali told me when he was ABC, correspondent Rogers once told him the thing he's proudest of.

He said he turned you around on China.

He didn't even know where China was.

For crying sakes.

The whole tragedy was one that he had nothing to do with.

They had nothing to do with it.

They had...

I have a book, and I have two books of all the messages we sent, and so on.

Which is murder, so whenever it comes out, they're not wondering anything.

That's right.

So in the historical record, we can kill them.

That's what really matters about this, who did it.

And no one, the people who read the editorial page of the Times.

But the difficulty is, I must say, Laird, of course, tries to get his credit.

But he doesn't undercut you.

But Laird, if he knows, he's a rascal.

He's a rascal.

If you tie it, he tries to play ball.

Yes, sir.

But the trouble is that Porterville has got this attitude to be front and center.

Well, on the thing about, I will definitely follow on.

I guess I won't push it back too much.

You can talk to Colson.

I think it's well to take one of these guys into credit.

No, she's not.

No, Crosby Noyes has asked me to have lunch with the Star Editorial Board on Friday.

and I thought that might be a good thing.

All right, that would be good.

Why don't you tell, why don't you ask, well, C. Sherman's not at the end of children.

No, no, I'll C. Sherman separately if COVID starts.

Yeah, if the stars were, that's right.

You're not going to the polls, you're not going to be the star.

Because they are right here.

Yeah, and you place, and then you can really get the hoax into them.

But as far as this program is concerned, as far as they, that's a typical conduct, I think.

They kind of put that earlier, remember?

Oh, yeah.

It's pathetic.

I can't believe they would have told Scott that now.

Well, you could have asked Scott.

Oh, no, I know.

I said it was too far ago.

From the crisis he was in, he thought Scully would believe him.

Oh, yeah.

Turned me around and said, Jesus Christ Almighty.

Do you remember what we told him?

About every step along the road.

We told him about the fact that you were going to go there.

Where was it we told him?

Well, when we told him that I was going to Pakistan, he thought it like a maniac.

Oh, yes.

And then you said there's a message to pick up there.

I forgot.

Oh, yeah.

Well, tomorrow I agree we will not get in there.

I wouldn't put that.

I would know that we really have to keep that in.

Because they were driving at that meeting today.

They wanted to put security assistance and the other, and development assistance into two separate packages.

You said, okay, but that's just the power play on their part to keep it with the foreign relations.

Okay, and we're not going to allow that.

You'll be sure to post it next week.

We're not going to allow that sort of thing.

I've given them the word.

And I really laid the wood to them at that meeting.

Sure.

Well, that's excellent.

Now, the other thing is that...

I said tell him to make public statements.

And I'd say make public statements, get him to organize people to make public statements, but I wouldn't get him to lead the legislative fight that's got to be done by McGregor.

and all those people on the board of the harbor absolutely maddened that they're not going to take these two separate bill approaches and so forth.

That'll kill us.

God Almighty, it's too late.

It's pretty goddamn hard to understand when you have that kind of... Well, that's what you meant.

...reliant cooperation.

And they're always so selfish.

The other thing, though, is that we'll...

Is it 11 now that you mention it?

Well, I'd say it's 11.

See, I have an ambush here.

I want to get him in here and have him in here for an hour.

And then let him go out and give the press a little shot.

I'm going to be damn sure before I suggest that that he's going to take the right on early and I'm going to have him go.

We've got to have him go out here.

That's why I'll send him out.

Not stand up, stand up hard.

Absolutely.

That's a weak system.

He's a nice guy.

There's no strength in him.

I told you that when we were playing.

Oh, yeah.

I didn't have any confidence.

He's a weak guy.

He's a decent fellow, but so weak.

There's something I can see.

And also, those articles, even when they came from the States,

They don't help Bill?

No.

They are using him to size the White House.

But he doesn't understand that if he really ran the department, they'd kill him the way they killed every other secretary instead.

They're the most selfish bunch that's lived.

When they're not helping him now, they're getting him into a lot of trouble.

I'm certainly going to sign off Marshall Green from these China talks.

And I'm going to sign off Hildebrandt from the Soviet talks.

Well, in Peking, I have it set so that Cho will sign off the whole place on the delegation, but one of my people, David Yoon, and I can meet him, John.

Oh, I didn't know he was coming around, so I'm here.

He pops off now.

Now it's a different phenomenon.

He doesn't do it out of his mind.

It's not so compulsive with him.

He's like a little boy who gets his hand caught in the crooked job every once in a while.

All right.

Let's go.

Well, for all of us, it's not as expensive as Clemson, unfortunately, being a part of that.

Well, it's not a big part, but it is the executive clemency aspect of it, where you would reduce the sentence enough so that he'd get out of the plane.

The sentence is a part that would be considered later in a later date, which would probably be better to hold that over his head that it's done in order to see what commitments he'll undertake and how he'll act on the matter.

As a matter of fact, the executive clemency has the same problems as Mark.

in terms of the public.

Oh, yes.

Yes, no question about that.

And I think that's the whole sum and substance of it.

Fitzsimmons, of course, has been pushing this thing for years and years and years.

He wants to get any currency.

And he wants Hop out of there.

And I think he's having substantial troubles with his union because he isn't out of there for whatever reason or whatever conversations or commitments.

Who would recommend it?

The way the other executive clemency is handled is a recommendation from the Attorney General that flows through

from the partners board to the Attorney General, and I make the recommendations over here.

We, of course, have this fax that's sitting waiting for the Christmas season or whatever season that you want to put them in, the normal flow.

Thanksgiving, then?

Well, I said whatever season you want to put it in.

It could be Thanksgiving or otherwise.

Thanks, Tom.

The other aspects of it, as I see them, are the point that next June, Hoppeck comes up for parole again.

And if he is paroled at that time, why, there's no distinction in the public mind between the parole board and the executive aspects of it.

It's very difficult to make a distinction.

And we, at that time, would get the benefit of letting Jimmy Hoffa out, even though we had very little to do with it, that being closer to the election at that particular time.

It keeps going through my mind, although George doesn't feel that that can be the case, that the executive clemency at this time might be related, this is my opinion, could be related to the help of the team, Susan Fitzsimmons

and the other aspects that you have before you in the country and in your economic policy.

George thinks that that's what you can speak for yourself if you don't think that that's going to be particularly viable unless Fitzsimmons takes some individualistic stand that gets him out from underneath the mean domination that

I think that he's just a somewhat different position than his public statements originally.

But I think that the public impression is that he's close ranks with the AFL-CIO.

He and Woodcock are about over a 16th-grade student there.

And that they, at least right now, have a kind of a front.

I would have to say that our information from inside the pay board is

that Woodcock and Fitzsimmons are biding their time, but they're not necessarily going along with me in his very strong demands on the pay board, saying, basically, either I get all of this or else I walk out.

But they're not accepting that.

But I think as of the moment, I would seize the labor group as kind of a model that's in the pay board with me.

Didn't he take a little different posture going into this earlier?

Yes, he did.

Well, he's praised the program where it means I was damned, but I don't think that's as noticed by the public as the fact of me speaking for organized labor.

Yes, technically, that's the word stamp, Mr. President, is that Fitzsimmons, of course, has been pushing for this all through the years.

and the question was whether or not that you had an interest in going along with this executive clemency and if so then you get back to number one what does happen do you insist that he get out of labor and stay out of labor whether it be unionism or consulting operations and so forth number two as to whether or not we want any commitment whether

confirm their tacit understanding with respect to political health in 72.

I think that both of them are available from what I understand.

I'm sure we're all aware that we've had lots of communications on both sides of the fence, starting with the Teamsters and going through our supporters like Barry Goldwater and Johnny Rhodes and some of the rest of them, opting to get him out.

Every time the parole board would go public, there'd be letters written to the National Committee by citizens saying, how could you let him out, et cetera.

But I don't see any concerted, organized activity to keep him in.

I think these are just people that have heard about the notorious Jimmy Hoppin.

George, what about the feeling of the other

People in labor, you were telling me about Woodcock and Abel.

Woodcock came to see me about another of my requests.

He asked to come in on top of the canals and made a pitch for this action.

I don't know how he was stimulated by his sentence to do it, but anyway, he did.

And I asked him what other pieces he wanted to talk about.

and how they would react.

His general statement was that he thought others in the labor room would favor that Meany had commented once that Hoffa's paid his debt.

I asked him to be more certain of Meany and he tells me that I'd have the ableness and that he would think it would be fine, but he hasn't made any check with Meany yet.

I think probably that other people could be positioned basically to just be quiet and sort of stand off if this is a payoff or support an economic move or something like that.

I think, Mr. President, that a lot of the people, particularly the ones in the labor that I hear from, have put it on the basis that he were not a labor leader, that he would have been paroled because of the time element

well past his one-fifth sentence.

It's been four and a half years, I suppose.

He had two sentences.

They were indeterminate.

He would have been, well, he was eligible for parole over a year ago, so that he served at least one-third of the 12th year, I guess that's what it was.

Well, there's another offense that presumably he

would come up under once he is out from the presence of the system.

No, no, no, no.

This would, Clemency would relate to both of them.

What they did was to have the second one run concurrently.

What had happened at the first time of the consideration of parole, that had not been final because it was on appeal.

So they were looking at it as possibly attacking it on the end, running consecutively.

But that is now running concurrently.

On the second parole thing, on what grounds did the parole board turn it down?

Because the case of parole was pretty strong.

Well, you never know what gets into the minds of the people, Bob.

But basically, as I understand it, why they turned it down was that the Hoppe people came in there and almost demanded parole, and yet they had not.

I'm talking about Jimmy Hoppe Jr. and his lawyer and so forth.

And yet they had not complied with the understanding that the parole board was advised that he was going to comply with.

That is, in addition to resigning as the head of the international, that he also resigned from the local and one other operation.

Well, he did that afterwards, but not at the time of the hearing.

In addition to that, some of his financial arrangements were quite contrary to what they understood were to be the case with the

The main antagonist of the teen strips was, of course, the movie.

that really got to Bobby Kennedy.

And the original, of course, was not the song.

He played the clean line.

Bobby Kennedy did it, and he did it.

So if you're well aware that Fitzsimmons now owns Woodstock.

How did you do that?

They've blown the $15 million.

Woodcock, the U.S. Federal Teamsters, while Reeder was still alive, formed something called the Alliance for Allegra Action.

Hasn't kind of brought it to the aid of the LCIO.

It has kind of fallen apart.

Hasn't anything much come of it.

But when Ruther died and Woodcock took over, he found the UAW in rather bad shape.

They had the lone GM strike that knocked the daylights out of their treasure.

And they built a apparently elaborate kind of canyon where members should come to with full confidence in that and so on.

And they were just head over heels in debt.

Plus the strike?

Yeah, and the strike.

And so the tinksters loaned some very large sum of...

It's up in the millions.

I know it's 30 or 50 million.

Something like that.

And they're...

Their alliance, George, as I understand it, listen to Fitzsimmons, has fallen apart because the automobile workers wanted to get into all these social projects, et cetera, et cetera, and Fitzsimmons wasn't in favor of that, so they've never... ...organized the workers and collectives, and, you know, the workers want to go out and register and they grow some... ...Rose was always interested in the great social issues, and the painters were interested in more.

In terms of wages, right?

Right.

They're a narrow labor union in the traditional sense.

They're really religious socialists.

That's the difference.

Well, I have to say that I've found in dealing down in the local, say, around Chicago, that the Teamsters give very honest representation to their two minorities.

And they probably do as good a job for blacks, Puerto Ricans, and so on, as honest a job as any union does.

Comparatively, you mean.

I said it was executive.

I don't see if there are any orders of magnitude in any of the certain conditions that are publicly known.

No, sir.

But not legally.

You can't oppose it.

But I don't believe that the action

individual by staying away from labor unions would carry through with a public understanding.

Well, I think I'd put it in a batch of 200 of them, just of which you... Oh, correct.

Thousands of them.

waiting back up there, but we've acted on numbers of them.

I guess we've acted on 250 of them already, and we've just run through normally at Christmas time, I guess.

What are the others?

Well, they're everything from pardons, where people are not in jail, to restore their civil rights, to chronically ill that can get out of prison and can be taken care of in other places, reduction of the

Some of these extra long sentences, they've got a 40-year sentence, and there's no basis of keeping them in jail.

They're not going to go back to the rackets because of age and all number of situations.

Basically, they're partners that restore civil rights so that they can go back and get a job or qualify for veterans' benefits and things like that.

That's the big block of them.

It would be the biggest sensation.

I'm sure of it.

Oh, it helps.

The fact that it shows that it isn't something that is not, it shows that it is not an undeniable procedure.

That's really important, whether it was just one unusual case, it would be a very, it would be impossible.

It would be the big story.

It was interesting.

I was at a luncheon today with the Time Life Fortune people.

They're meeting with Rogers, Kissinger, and all the rest of them down here.

The fellow that brought up the subject matter referred to, how do you treat this question that Jimmy Hopp is a political prisoner?

I said, out of Time Life.

I think that since he has gone past the normal period of parole, they begin to question.

That's what I'm trying to get at, the way that he would position it.

And of course he has to say that in his case that since he had not passed the normal period of parole and since it now appeared that he had met all the conditions that we normally qualify that he should not be discriminated against because of his being a laborer.

He's been a model prisoner.

He has to unpass the normal period right now.

He should not be discriminated against because of his being a laborer.

That's what he'd have to do.

That's the best way to handle it.

Now you've got to figure out who's going to take it on.

And it was a liability for anybody not to take it on like they were.

And so if they ever put this off or anybody else, they just don't like it.

So that's point one.

The other thing is that you can figure that

and those who would take it on in the public spirit.

The main one would be Teddy Kennedy, because his brother Bobby, you know, and Hopper, he saw COVID, and so I suppose he would take it on.

What a terrible thing.

Hardness.

Horrible creature.

That I think is what we had to add up.

Teddy taking it on, the idea that

whatever the political benefit we can get us, whatever political benefit we can get us, might be significant.

It could be extremely significant.

If young Kennedy turns out to be the candidate.

Yeah, well, but we have to also figure the balance on the other side.

That is the fact that leaving Paul out of the thing,

that any labor leader is not particularly a popular guy at the moment.

The other thing is leading off, looking to hop as an individual.

The inevitable charge would be made that this was done for the purpose of political support.

Now that's better for the community than I think.

and that it would be more difficult for them to give it.

Well, it is a question of endorsement.

They endorse it.

They endorse it for the last time around.

I'm just thinking that they would try to build the idea that there's a deal, and so we'll bother and so forth.

We're looking at it on the merits, looking at it on the merits.

If the goal is to want to have the U.V.

order, not the parole, if he meets the parole requirements, he should not be discriminated against because he happens to be a legal leader.

That, I believe, political standpoint poses a problem.

What do you want to say?

I would say the political aspects of it pose less of a problem now than they do later on.

As you get closer to the election.

You're assuming that they will parole him, which they might.

I think that they might very well do so.

And it looks like we did.

Looks like we did.

It's true.

We've been putting that out for three years, we can do it a little longer.

No, no, no.

But if you want him, then it's good to be in the Christmas list.

It ought to be in some list that comes up.

And I think what should also be done is if you decide you want to move in that direction, then we better get some pretty clear understandings from this guy as to, number one, he's not going back into the labor market.

He's going to stay out of it.

And I think Fitzsimmons will get those because I think they're in his interest.

Well, I'd also like to get another shot at Fitzsimmons and give us some help with the pay bar.

That would be helpful.

You know, I kind of agree that maybe it would be useful.

No, I think it would be useful.

Fitzsimmons has done that good in all of his private work, too.

I know he's done some things privately that have been very helpful.

If Fitzsimmons were to vote against the rest of the later people in favor of some restrictions, say on deferred increases, and probably the teamsters and the construction workers would be the ones that would be hit most by that, I think it would be a question of whether Fitzsimmons could carry his membership.

Yeah.

He would have one hell of a time.

Yeah.

According to Fitzsimmons, there's a very strong impression around among the Teamsters and the locals and so forth that your appearance at their convention down there and the hop of resignation and so forth were all tied in together.

This was all part of the package that Fitzsimmons had brought off.

And the questions are now, why is Jimmy still in jail?

particularly after the parole board hearing that was structured at that time came up.

That was in July, wasn't it, the convention?

Well, they just thought they had a spot at the parole board.

Well, apparently.

Of course, one thing for sure is that Hoffman, despite the fact that he's been out of it for a number of years now, has genuine grassroots support in the Team Street Union.

He is very popular.

I think a lot of that carries over into the construction worker groups.

It isn't just that there's support on the executive board or something like that.

His support comes up through the ranking file.

Laugh out.

Don't go there.

This is something that I can appreciate.

Also, you've got to either write it down.

Well, particularly, we decided to do it like there aren't many panty laces around here.

Oh, God, it's just terrible, you know.

Whereas if it were a black panther, they'd all be chomping up and down to joy.

Well, it was a murder, son of a bitch.

Look at the first one you did, that black girl was in so much trouble.

She's stolen everybody's line.

Dr. Matthews?

Yeah.

Well, she's terrible for us.

Well, I know.

It's just a stupid portfolio that we're trying to do well by these people.

So we let her go.

Everybody cheered.

Isn't that the way?

Len Barber wrote me a book.

The greatest thing I ever did.

That's when the black hole...

They all steal.

I mean, not they all, but they do.

They tend to do much.

People do.

He probably didn't know he was stealing.

He just liberated them.

He just liberated them all.

But also, he was .

He was a very nice man.

Very nice.

He had wonderful ideas.

I hope he's here tomorrow.

He's got you.

Well, he is.

He is, but...

He's been stealing.

It's a lie.

It's a big problem.

But he still says what to do.

Oh, yes.

And we have cut him off from...

He's in the government financing that he's got.

He's got all these projects and all those works.

I don't know what to do with that.

He manages to get a fair amount of it.

We've got to stop him.

But that is, there is a double-stack, it's true, of the policy, kind of a great symbol.

You have to realize, John, as it does, it cuts into the Kennedy mystique.

This was, this was the major accomplishment of Bobby Kennedy's attorney general, was to put Mohawk in jail.

Correct.

So, so Teddy Kennedy will have to come roaring out like a Chinese artist.

Take the hell out of this world and put Mohawk out of jail.

Correct.

On the other hand, there's an awful lot of people around this town

feel that this was a bobby kennedy vendetta because of the mcclellan committee bobby kennedy i don't think he'd be overjoyed about it but i think he might be induced to keep still okay

Talk to whoever about that.

The idea really, we really got the best, the only grounds of what you recommended, George, which we discussed.

You cannot, you cannot roll back.

You cannot say, Roger, I can pay you something for granted.

But you can't take the 90-day period out and say, well, this time launch goes on.

But...

Well, there are five.

I was talking to John about this.

There are people like the railroad workers whose contracts expired early in the year, but who have this kind of legal arrangement they operate under where they work at the low rates on the understanding of the contractual actors.

And there were some of those contracts signed during the freeze, and the decision of the possibility council was to

let them have their retroactive pay back to the contract expiration date to come up to the freeze period, and then drop back down to where it was for the freeze period so they wouldn't have negotiated themselves a raise during the freeze with the rather clear feeling that no doubt that pay would be retroactive during the freeze period.

That's one situation.

The other, he should be handled differently.

The group that had a contract expire during the freeze and negotiated an increase, or the group that had a contract which called for an increase as a scheduled contractual thing during the freeze, represent different matters.

And here we've frozen the prices, and we've frozen the wages, and there are all sorts of inequities and so on.

But I think if you go back into that freeze period,

and unravel all the wage things that were done, you come pretty close to unravelling the trees.

Now, that doesn't say anything about what would have happened after, in the period after the 90 days, to defer increases and whether or not, whether or not some, you know, like, they're all okay as long as they fall below some human percentage or something of that kind.

Meat wants them all okay.

I think there's a fair amount of sentiment that would say if you let deferred increases of 12% and 15% come into effect, it's very hard to say that anybody who negotiates a new contract or something less than that is too high.

And that's the dilemma of the board today.

We also have this very difficult problem of prices.

pick up his income or take care of these retroactive payments when his prices have been... Well, that's the retroactive issue, but that's one thing.

From the end of the freeze on, with the deferred increases in the price floor, maybe we'll have to take cards.

I mean, he says he wants it all.

I mean, he says he wants it all, yeah.

And if he doesn't get it, he'll walk out.

Yeah, Woodcock and Fitzsimmons have it.

have, uh, been known.

Apparently the media's not speaking with them on that.

Although Woodcock, particularly, has been very strong on deferred increases.

The owner-workers having one coming up shortly after the free pens.

But their deferred increase is 3% plus cost of living changes.

And that's not a bad formulation.

It's not likely to be a real problem.

Of course, the other side of this, I'd be interested in everybody's reaction, is the Milton Friedman-type argument that one of the sort of the moralities of our society and way of doing business is the rule of law and the sanctity of private contracts, in a sense, and to come along

violating those on a wholesale basis undermines a fundamental precept to keep society going.

So does bankruptcy statutes, George.

Well, there are all kinds of things that you can say.

You can say a lot of them.

And there's an argument there.

Not now.

Maybe this week is...

to decide, and they expect that sometime, beginning tomorrow through Friday, there will be some sort of vote or determination on the paper about this issue.

And when there is, he will walk out.

And if he gets his way, he won't.

Or maybe if he gets close, but not all of his way, he won't, particularly if he gets opposition from some of the other labor people.

He's being worked over rather efficiently by the union dogs.

They're saying, well, he's just one of Connelly's running dogs.

And the administration put out a letter to Connelly.

Well, I can tell you what I think we ought to do.

This is an all-man thing.

I think we ought to get you to hold it.

I think we should do something along the line of asking the public members of the price commission and the pay board to come forward with their view of what reasonable standards are for wage and price behavior and then basically to take a relatively small, invisible segment of the economy and engage in some arm twisting

and so on, and let the rest go.

I guess that's because I would base that on the notion that without strong general support, say six months from now, an effort by just sheer administrative strength

we would control wages and prices, meaning that that will begin to fall apart and there will be a great rise in resentment against them as a general and if this is going to have support, come on, go with it.

This is new to you and I'm sort of musing about this to myself and I don't put this forward to really consider judgment.

And I'm thinking about it more and more now because of this possibility that they've always had that.

To the extent that it's necessary to have labor support to really make it work well, they obviously have a kind of veto, and I think the experience in other countries is.

Most recently in Canada, the labor people didn't have anything to do with it, and it was just a great big failure.

We might seek other things.

We better get that contingency plan ready.

Our song contingency plan ready to be bashed.

So that has been occurring to me the best period of time right away.

Because you can't let the... What can anybody else suggest?

You go in.

Extend the freeze.

Well, you could extend the freeze.

You could, in effect, run the thing in the same way as that plan, but without labor or business involvement in the paperwork.

You just have a public group taking cases and setting standards and so on.

I'm remembering that here you're talking about not a gobbling operation, but something that has the force of the law behind it.

And when you say, here's the standard, you can only go this far unless you get an exception.

Presumably you break the law if you break that standard.

And that leads you off into the inspection and enforcement business in a big way.

It also leads you into a hell of a battle up on the hill.

But your extension and all the rest of it.

Which might not be too bad.

Too late to have an extension.

What's up on the hill?

Right.

They leave the ship, they're going to be up there opposing it.

Full regalia.

Labor people.

It'll make a lot of people bite a lot of bullets, if nothing else.

Who are we opposing?

In the writing about the freeze and post-freeze material, there's now beginning to be a strain of thought, best illustrated by Jim Tobin's piece on Sunday.

Tobin has become Mr. Yale, who was one of the original Kennedy advisors.

And now he's beginning to say, well,

You need something like this, but this went much too far, and it covers the whole economy, and it really does have enforcement to it, and so on and so on and so on.

I think Herman Gordon, who's a member of the pay court, probably thinks that, and that this will be an emerging line of attack.

I mean by that, and Kervin Gordon's in any way not acting in good faith on the pay board, but I think that as time goes along, if the program, if we try to do something that has become more unpopular, that then this is a way that the people who have been advocating more presidential intervention and wage and price matters

would, uh, turn around and fight for this particular program.

I think that's exactly what they'll do.

Well, they'll do it both ways.

I mean, there's...

I know it's a lot of ways, quite a lot of them.

His attitude's always the same.

That's true.

He's a very smart guy.

Always.

That's all right.

And that's why...

But he's born into it, and Bill has, too, as a kid.

And so the way that he's gonna do it, he's gonna fight his way.

and say, well, we shouldn't have done this after asking for it.

Well, anyway, we'll, uh, do you have, uh, do you have five minutes to go before we call it?

Sure.

It, uh...

I'm going to keep it to myself.

I'm sorry.

I'll be back in a minute.

It has to do with the timing, Mr. President.

New Hampshire, of course, is the first one coming up.

The petitions can be filed anywhere from the 23rd of December on.

They keep pushing these things up.

And one of the things we want to do in New Hampshire, of course, is get a control delegation, pledge delegation there.

And they...

The other concept is that rather than going through all the Mickey Mouse stuff and not affirming or denying or having your name on the ballots, that you really have to do it in an open, stated position.

You have to go about the 5th or 6th of January in order to get yourself out of the posture that you had to respond to the Secretary of State

about your name being on the ballot.

And also, in order to make sure that we don't have some bunch of these coops up there come in with a different slate of delegates and screw up the delegates that we want.

And you remember how New Hampshire works in this delegate area.

So that you have your chosen delegates in the halls and it's all set with a Nixon slate and gets on the ballot and gets all these other people.

filing petitions with other delegates, et cetera, et cetera.

The point really of choice being as to whether or not you want to make a clean affirmation of this, that you are going to be a candidate.

That is a preferable time.

It probably could be pushed back another 10 days or something like that.

But then if there's

If we do, then we run into the delegate question, and who's going to file the slates, and who's going to file the petitions, and so forth.

The old game up there is to try and get into the ballpark.

After that, you get into Wisconsin, which has to be filed by the 31st of January, and Ohio and Florida within the next couple of weeks, and they all come right on and sequence there.

So you really think you're going to have to get the candidates to get lost, say, around the 10th?

So the 20th of January would be the last day to deny that you are a candidate.

Well, thank you, sir.

Does it have to be announced, or do we just have to make the announcement?

You can go ahead, sir.

Just go ahead with the formalities of them and follow it on through.

You'll have to, by the 20th of January, you'd have to respond to the Secretary of State after the petitions are filed and say, I am or am not a candidate.

Unless there are other flankers involved, it seems to me that you just bite the bullet.

Yeah, I in terms of biting the bullet, it's how.

That's the point.

Well, you would be responding to the petitions.

That's right.

No, no, no.

Just so long as you don't Mickey Mouse it.

This, I think, will be more, you'll be criticized more from, I think, just the Ziegler just announced it in response to some of the questions.

What do you think about this thing on the, what do you think about this thing on the, this paywall thing right here?

I think it's going to bust, don't you?

I think it has a great potential for it, and I'd be quite disillusioned with the people

Yes, and I think, Mr. President, that there is a potential, if this is played right and you're strong enough, that you may get Meany to back off this.

He doesn't have the support of labor, as George was saying.

I talked to Fitzsimmons about this on some length on Saturday.

On the other side of the coin, if you ever knuckle under to Meany,

This will just tear this whole posture that you've developed.

Well, the point is the one that you've made, and that is you damn well better get a good alternative setup, and this has to be thought all the way through as to what's going on down the line.

So we'll then have a public board, and get out the labor people, and then we'll use... Well, of course...

If you have a public board, then you have to select certain settlements.

Go ahead.

Yes, but I would think it all the way through past that to the ultimate battles that are going to come in the Congress and also what you're going to be willing to do vis-a-vis labor, because you may be in court every other day and slapping these birds in jail and everything else,

Somebody ought to sit down and game this all the way on through to the end of the road.

But George is certainly talking about to think of all that.

He's got a few heads out there.

Whatever it is, too.

Thank God we've got two men like Shannon there.

It's easy to go in like Coral, Arthur Burns.

They all know we'll do this.

I don't care what they think.

and not face the consequences of what the hell happens if you don't play.

I wouldn't say it in front of George, but Pat Gray has been a great moderating force on these characters, you know.

Pat Gray's been involved in all of this.

Yes, I remember that.

And he is making sure that these fellows don't get too exuberant with the labor leaders and this, that, and the nice thing.

In other words, he's looking out solely to your interest and kept a pretty good hand on that.

But it does have the potential.

You can't huckle under just meaning.

There's a possibility with some strong action and the conversations you may get meaning to go along.

I wouldn't rule that out.

But the important thing is to game plan and say you know where you're going to go and how you're going to go, and not just get caught with a big bus like Mr.

Meaning and be ready to react when and if it comes.

Because as of this moment, with all the people favoring this program of yours, it can't be very many of them are going to favor Mr. Meany if he busts it all.

No.

The problem is, not just being canceled, but being able to do something effective.

That's right.

Which is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is,

I do, but I've been so damn close to it that I'm not sure my judge might want to make a little check around this.

I think you should.

I guess I feel it out.

The last time I talked to you, I suggested that I've been so close to it.

I am glad to know you're talking about it.

And, you know, I just don't like it.

He did it because Hoppe was outside of the labor structure.

So Hoppe wasn't picked up on the labor structure.

And at that time, of course, they were in all sorts of trouble.

I had a couple of warnings to go over.

That's it.

I'll, uh, maybe we can get, get together tomorrow.

I don't know if we should be able to steer it.

It's all right, sir.

Yeah.

Got any rockers?

I don't know.

Yeah, yeah, come in.

I'm out, gentlemen.

All right, gentlemen.

How are you?

Sorry to keep you waiting.

Yes, sir.

Yeah.

Sorry to keep you waiting.

No.

Had to decide who to put in charge.

It wasn't you.

I just got some good words from the Justice this afternoon, and that is that the ABA has cleared Mr. Finstich.

One of the few good moves they've made.

Yeah.

And the plan as it's laid out now, Mr. President, is that Mr. physics agrees to stay on the GSA administrator, but we're going to be recommending to you that we submit the nomination so that it can go forth and be confirmed.

not sworn in until such time as, you know, how long that be.

I'll take it again that I did something here.

It's something obvious to you.

What you wish, obviously, I am tremendously grateful for the opportunity to have been here.

I'm tremendously grateful for the honor of running the bench, which is my dream, what I'm hoping for.

And I realize that

I guess it's also complimentary, what we can say to GSA, if we could, the only thing, I have to make sure to mention the one thing that his property didn't get cleared through, that property refused it.

Yeah, I can see that.

I've heard of our people, and I'll stick it in the hell with them.

We'll confirm it now.

We'll keep the city judge in.

He'll stay until next July.

And then he'll retire in July, and then sometime...

The city judge will retire in July.

Which is quite a way in which I could stay on and still GSA.

But I would be confirmed and...

there would be and it would be a closed book and i would just be saying things to the president yes

Well, we've gotten this in the middle letter saying that he will retire any time between January 1 and June 30.

So you'd get it confirmed.

And now, yes, they tend to do that now.

And now you can just delay or sit it down.

You think, well, this is a very interesting question.

They would raise questions if they knew we were going to do this now, but they're not to go.

There's no reason.

No, no, no.

That's fine.

We'll just say the judge prefers to stay a little while.

Yeah.

Yes.

For personal convenience.

July gets off.

You wouldn't take over from us.

That's good.

Definitely.

Let's get it done.

We're hoping Senator Scott might take a special interest in this one.

Senator Scott might take a special interest in this one.

I don't think we agree with you.

I keep that straight.

I think the less people who saw that... Don't just stop saying we're done because of that.

There's nothing wrong with it.

Except that you'll just determine they're all right after you're done.

I think it's confirmed that the judge wants to sit a little longer and so on, but I don't think that's important.

It's a change to the second sentence, so we'll just go on with it.

I'm sure we'll have to in the election if you keep doing all the good things.

All right.

I appreciate it, sir.

I don't know why you want to change the subject.

Thank you.

I've got to get you a present.

I love your honey best.

You want to tell him we got him a paperweight?

He's got a paperweight.

I've never given him a paperweight.

Sir, the injection will do.

We don't have your birthday.

Take another prayer call, won't you?

Well, thank you very much.

Thank you very much.

You've done a great job.

We want to hear some other things, but that's what you want.

Thanks.