Nixon White House Tapes — Conversation 620-014
Date: Wednesday, November 17, 1971 at 12:50 PM
Participants: Nixon, Richard M. (President); Haldeman, H. R. ("Bob"); Sanchez, Manolo
Recording device: Oval Office
Source: https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/620-014

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 Do not cite it as authoritative.

[0:27] It really is fascinating when he sees everything as it's either here or it's there, doesn't it?
[0:31] It's not all about it.
[0:33] Let's take this.
[0:34] It's great.
[1:05] I don't know what it is, but he didn't raise it with me.
[1:09] It's John Plunkett.
[1:10] It's John Plunkett and his other brother.
[1:13] I'll work out eventually what it was.
[1:15] It was a thing where we had a bunch of empty civil service jobs that Finch discovered and figured we could help them.
[1:24] It was a token gesture.
[1:25] We've got to at least fill those jobs in California.
[1:29] So John finally had nothing to do with Pete.
[1:31] Pete didn't even know about it.
[1:33] John was working the political thing with Len Fireshut and all out there, with John Mitchell's knowledge and good cards.
[1:40] Went to work to get the jobs done.
[1:44] That's all Pete knows about any of it.
[1:47] Well, you can see how everything would come to it as a, you know, a time.
[1:52] I assume it would certainly think so.
[1:55] They had to kind of go and do a civil service job before it would come to Bob.
[2:04] I don't know what...
[2:05] It may have been that Bob was under one of his old peers.
[2:10] Except, and that's quite possible, it's all done, whatever it was, it was on our expense, I'm not saying...
[2:16] And I'm sure it's a thing that he's always, he's old cases, but here he is.
[2:18] He sees Finch and Fleming, and I knew there was something like this in it.
[2:22] Otherwise, I knew there was something like this in it.
[2:25] It was a Finch, you know, Finch, wherever he had John Fleming working.
[2:30] And you said Fleming and Flemer, I thought it bothered me.
[2:33] Well, I don't know.
[2:34] I thought it was all too good.
[2:35] It's fine.
[2:36] I'm glad he did it.
[2:37] It was all right, except they should have told Reagan.
[2:39] Yeah.
[2:43] We've got a gallon coming out tomorrow that shows a five-point drop, which is kind of curious.
[2:49] Global?
[2:50] Forty-nine.
[2:51] Yep.
[2:54] They make the point that it's a...
[2:58] The high point was immediately following the nationwide televised thing on Phase 2.
[3:04] The latest survey was taken during the first days of implementation of Phase 2.
[3:08] It was October 29th, November 1st.
[3:14] and after the defeat of the United States to China policy.
[3:21] It's interesting, on the breakdown, the drop in the West is enormous.
[3:32] It had gone up to 52 in the West, and it dropped to 41.
[3:39] That's the only one where there's a really major drop.
[3:42] The 41 in the west?
[3:43] I don't believe it.
[3:46] The east was 54 and it went to 50.
[3:49] The midwest was 52 and it went to 50.
[3:52] The south was 56 and it went to 52.
[3:54] The west was 52 and went to 41.
[3:57] Now before the big rise in early October, the west had been low.
[4:04] The west had been at 45.
[4:09] But it was 45-47.
[4:09] It was 45-47, so it was more disapproved than approved in the last one.
[4:16] Now it's more disapproved again, 41-43.
[4:20] What do we have?
[4:24] 37-14.
[4:36] 49-37-14, I decided to disapprove 1-0-2, and I decided 1-0-3.
[4:39] Well, you had others.
[4:40] You had a... You had a pretty big ground fire right there, you know, about defeat and all that sort of thing.
[4:52] Sure did.
[4:54] In the press, remember, we said at the time we were having that, it would take its toll.
[5:01] But on the other hand...
[5:04] And looking at it, it's looking at it in its coldest terms.
[5:08] So you've got $49.37.
[5:09] You know what I mean?
[5:12] Yeah, it's one of those things.
[5:16] Also, I don't have the confidence, frankly, in either Gallup or Harris because I think they're, I know it isn't that volatile, basically.
[5:25] Do you?
[5:25] I don't think it is.
[5:29] In August, it was 49, and it went up to 54 in October, and then down to 49 again at the end of October.
[5:39] Their education, that was kind of interesting.
[5:41] The college educated, you went up 58 to 59.
[5:44] You were already high, ultimately educated.
[5:46] It stayed there, in other words.
[5:52] Where high school went down from 54 to 48, grade school from 47 to 41.
[5:55] More of a worthy charge.
[6:01] 30 minutes low, 38-47.
[6:02] We have to have the train on that.
[6:06] 90 minutes, 52-34.
[6:10] The only thing we have is the subject matter.
[6:13] The fact that we have our own people.
[6:18] Oh, well.
[6:19] How do we get that?
[6:21] I mean, our own political supporters.
[6:30] There'll be a lot of them between now and when it's managed, but again, I think we've got to follow just the practice we have.
[6:37] If we get a good one, we run out and crow about it.
[6:39] If we get a bad one, we ignore it.
[6:44] We've pretty well gotten to live with that.
[6:46] We've gotten some pretty good modern general reps, and not that they've used any of the other ground jobs as much.
[6:51] Oh yeah.
[6:53] And all the, well, I don't know, the hair or something, I don't know.
[6:56] I think they're out of gowns, too, because they've got a lot of stuff on, you know, the necks and rods and the poles.
[7:00] It was working into everything.
[7:02] And, uh, it's a problem with this.
[7:08] Does Harris have a son?
[7:09] He doesn't have any poles.
[7:11] Does he?
[7:20] What do you think?
[7:25] Three degrees, actually.
[7:27] But even in three, we said five points.
[7:32] We should go in there, margin of error thing.
[7:38] That's how they can explain it all the way, because they get a three plus or minus three point.
[7:43] On that basis, there's no change.
[7:45] There may not be any change.
[7:49] I don't know.
[7:56] If they did, we don't have them.
[8:01] They did do the Democrat thing.
[8:04] This is the same poll.
[8:05] I also don't believe it.
[8:07] It's not the Democrat thing.
[8:17] I wonder what's, what's involved in order that there could be some handy-dandy involved in this thing.
[8:22] Maybe, because it's kind of interesting.
[8:24] Young George wouldn't give Rumsfeld any information, and so I had Chapin working on Davies, his contact again, and Davies didn't even return his loan to Cox.
[8:35] So, there may be something there.
[8:37] What do you think about this whole, you know, they were paying?
[8:40] Well, one of the things,
[8:43] Democrat thing came up.
[8:44] That's the first week we didn't know they were taking a nap.
[8:47] And they took it too soon to get it, which is another curious thing.
[8:52] They waited, you know, for that nap from August to October.
[8:56] It didn't take any, and then they go in three weeks.
[8:58] Now, they never take a poll within three weeks.
[9:01] They always wait.
[9:03] Their normal pattern is one a month.
[9:06] They did one October 8th, and then go out to another on October 29th.
[9:09] It's curious.
[9:14] I don't think it's curious.
[9:19] They can do that, uh, that, uh, now they, uh, they, uh, certainly be, uh, pushing on.
[9:36] Yeah, there's something phony about that.
[9:38] Don't you think so?
[9:40] It sure looks like it.
[9:41] Because it's a different question than, as they point out, it's a different question than Harris.
[9:45] Because Harris is a two-way between Muskie and Kennedy.
[9:49] Where this is the whole feet.
[9:51] Gallup is a two-way.
[9:53] Muskie and Kennedy, Gallup is a two-way.
[9:55] Harris is the feet.
[9:59] that comes out ahead because Gallup explained it.
[10:04] Gallup says, and that is explainable, but Gallup says, the monkey makes me rise.
[10:09] Gallup, I don't think, pulled it before in a two-way race.
[10:15] Yeah, he did.
[10:17] I'm not sure.
[10:18] And maybe I'm wrong.
[10:21] I don't know.
[10:25] I don't know what it was.
[10:26] This comes out suddenly, doesn't it?
[10:39] They certainly shut off the contact area, didn't they?
[10:50] The bomb detector had that much effect, that sort of thing.
[11:00] That vector, that creep.
[11:01] As I called them, you saw here's the rest.
[11:03] Well, there was talk, in all that.
[11:04] This was taken from what they write back to the first.
[11:06] That was the UFO.
[11:14] As of earlier that week, 24%.
[11:21] That's when they showed other prisoners, children, strangers.
[11:40] 87 high to a 23 low.
[11:41] We don't swing that.
[11:42] That was the other point they made in this.
[11:45] Yeah, pretty much swing here.
[11:49] They make the point that this 49 is right on the part of the 50 which has been your average.
[11:55] Your average in the current year is 50.
[11:58] Your average since taking office is 57.
[12:00] Your high since taking office was 68.
[12:04] Your low was 48.
[12:09] 35.
[12:09] Truman, 87 to 23.
[12:12] I thought it was 49, right?
[12:21] He was from 79 to 49.
[12:25] Kennedy, 57.
[12:26] 83 to 57.
[12:26] Johnson, 80 to 35.
[12:32] Johnson averaged 54.
[12:33] Kennedy averaged 70.
[12:34] Eisenhower averaged 66.
[12:36] Truman averaged 46.
[12:42] There's a new average, 57.
[12:53] Take the 14 and decide at this point.
[12:55] You may have to reallocate to the other side.
[12:56] You have to give some change on the 8.
[13:07] Because it's 49, 47, so the 8 and 6.
[13:09] So it's really 57, 43.
[13:13] I don't believe that kind of a shift took place in three weeks.
[13:20] I can't believe it because we were doing a hell of a lot of things in that three weeks.
[13:33] What was it?
[13:33] They said right after the flood that this was taking place.
[13:41] during the first days of the implementation of phase two.
[13:47] Which isn't true.
[13:47] That's an interesting point.
[13:53] Phase two implementation didn't start until November 13th.
[13:57] And after the defeat of the UN and the United States two-channel policy,
[14:10] Section 54 was conducted immediately following the nationwide TV address on Phase 2.
[14:17] That's correct.
[14:19] She did it on October 7th and they pulled on the 8th.
[14:23] To 11.
[14:25] Right.
[14:35] Your domestic...
[14:37] Advisors would like you this afternoon to motorcade to Judiciary Square.
[14:43] Be met by Mayor Washington.
[14:46] Congressman Fauntleroy, Roy, Old Scott, Hogan, and Goody.
[14:51] Climb down the stairs into the construction chamber and observe the progress of the Washington subway system and come out and issue a statement saying that it's got to be built.
[15:01] No, not now or ever.
[15:05] There's going to be a vote tomorrow, apparently, without a statement.
[15:09] And if it doesn't pass, it's the end of the settlement, which would be a million dollars wasted.
[15:31] I would recommend that I not raise this, and they asked would I please raise it anyway, and I told them I would do so, but I would keep the recommenders anonymous for the sake of their own long-range...
[15:47] Well, the argument is that this has great national implications for rapid transit.
[15:52] Oh, and, well, here's the worst of it.
[15:55] And because we need it for the bicentennial, because 40 million people will be visiting the Capitol in 1976, and they won't have any way to get around the line.
[16:15] When you see those western, those regional periods, that's where the weather is.
[16:24] The east is rough.
[16:25] East 50, midwest 50, south 90.
[16:26] What was it before we came?
[16:29] You take the three.
[16:32] The mid-June is the last regional that we have.
[16:35] And the mid-June, the last, before the October one.
[16:39] And that was, your overall mid-June was 48.
[16:42] And then you went up to 54 and then back to 49.
[16:47] That's the overall group.
[16:48] Now you take it by region.
[16:51] The East went from 46 to 54 to 50.
[16:52] In other words, you only lost half your game.
[16:58] You gained big points when we lost 400.
[17:03] The Midwest went from 47 to 52 to 50.
[17:09] In other words, you held most of the game there.
[17:12] That's a big question.
[17:15] The Sado went from 51 to 56 to 52.
[17:19] In other words, you lost all the game in the Sado, but the Sado was the strongest one-point in the region.
[17:28] The West went from 45 to 52 to 41.
[17:35] So you know, they lost the game, they lost four more points than the West, and I don't understand that.
[17:41] Communist China.
[17:41] The U.N.
[17:43] I think the West cares that much, but the U.N.
[17:52] The old folks, the 50 and over, went from 58 down to 49.
[17:54] Now you know damn well that that's the place where we believe all of them.
[18:02] The 30 to 50 age group went from 55 to 51.
[18:08] And the under 30 stayed about the same, 46.
[18:16] Where?
[18:16] 55 to 50, oh no, 58 to 49.
[18:18] So they looked pretty good.
[18:22] No.
[18:27] The college educated state went up, 58 to 59.
[18:35] It was going way down to college educated disapproval went from 35 to 31.
[18:38] Oh, there was no reason for that.
[18:43] If you were not a part of the U.N. thing, they were the ones who would care.
[18:48] And born in Haiti.
[18:50] You know, they were the ones, if there was any support for it, it would seem to me they didn't care about it.
[18:56] They didn't think so.
[18:59] The disapproval, well, West approval went to
[19:04] That's a strength.
[19:04] There's something screwed up with these figures.
[19:07] The West District Rule only went up four points.
[19:10] The undecided went up seven points in the West.
[19:13] But what if the West District Rule is what now?
[19:16] Forty-three.
[19:18] Forty-three.
[19:19] Forty-three.
[19:19] Yeah, the undecided.
[19:20] That's correct.
[19:21] Decided on the way up.
[19:23] The undecided in the West was low.
[19:25] It was only nine.
[19:25] Where it was about thirteen.
[19:27] That's up to sixteen.
[19:29] That's up to sixteen.
[19:38] Assuming that this, if you have this kind of a drop on this sort of a deal, that can, that can wash out, you know, a mere pop or a drop, as a result of an event, in one calorie or anything else, it washes out.
[20:00] Because I got a voice out of a very high level.
[20:02] I don't think we did something.
[20:04] I don't think the U.N. thing bothered us.
[20:07] I still believe in the U.N. before anything.
[20:11] It's not as a complicated country.
[20:12] No, but it had a big media, immediate media effect.
[20:14] And it could have made a difference.
[20:16] And the fact that we were counted, and the terrible loss for the United States, for the United States as a presence.
[20:21] Yeah, that's correct.
[20:22] But I'll bet you a say that it would change.
[20:34] Yeah, let's just say we still do very well in the polls.
[20:37] His trial in the evening will be extremely good.
[20:40] That's more important than the others.
[20:46] His last trial in the evening was Gallup.
[20:47] He was extremely good, wasn't he?
[20:50] Yeah, they both were.
[20:52] Well, I know that Harris was, but I meant the Gallup one.
[20:54] That's the one, unless you recall, was him.
[20:56] I can't get that to put it, but I don't know.
[21:02] Oh, whatever.
[21:10] But you, the parrots are in the gallop trend and the muskie men are not.
[21:15] You just sense that it's just coals, but there just isn't anything about the muskie men.
[21:20] It's not getting across to too many people.
[21:27] It's alright to keep them up there.
[21:33] It's just the way all of it is.
[21:35] You can't, on a party thing, you really can't put the thing to a two-way horse race.
[21:42] You can't look at how you'd vote between Muskie and Kennedy because that isn't the choice.
[21:47] The choice is Muskie versus the field.
[21:51] Unless you get a convention down to a certain ballot, but then there's all kinds of other factors.
[21:55] It never works that way.
[21:55] There's several people in there.
[22:01] What that two-way thing does tell you is that there's a whole lot more anti-Kennedy than there is Kennedy.
[22:07] That's true.
[22:11] If that doesn't necessarily mean Kennedy can't get the nomination, I suppose.
[22:13] It's going to be a whole fine thing.
[22:23] Look at that.
[22:23] Look at what they've got to go through before they get to where they get whatever it is.
[22:30] There's some problems.
[22:34] Well, that didn't work.
[22:40] We'll keep the, uh, we'll know nothing more about the labor event until then.
[22:43] Do you guys think our plan will be to go down tonight?
[22:48] We decided to go at about 9 o'clock.
[22:53] Mm-hmm.
[22:53] Well, you hear, uh, show us, check with me on 7, something like that.
[23:00] Show us, check with me, get the people, everything, and give me a report.
[23:04] Yes, we will.
[23:06] Good.
[23:14] Thank you.