Nixon, Graham & Haldeman on 1972 Presidential Campaign and Media Bias

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You know, when you talk from the heart like that, I was talking to John Comden.

He brought me over again.

He said, you know, he's feeling much better.

He was in Pittsburgh last night.

But he said he doesn't do that enough.

And I think that's right.

You know, where you talk right from the heart.

There were a lot of people in tears when you finished this morning.

It was very moving.

That's the best I've heard you.

One of those breakfasts or any situation like that.

He does it all the time.

Nobody knows that.

He really does.

It's amazing how much he does that way.

Most probably.

I was sitting in the car.

I had tears run down his face and said, Boy, oh, our question.

The trouble is, Baba,

Well, they just don't know how to do it.

They'll all put it out.

Nobody will make a point.

Well, he gets it.

They'll go to us on the TV.

Thank you.

Well, how do you, uh...

This report that you were sick is wrong.

I'm not sick.

What happened was that during the last year, somebody told me that, you know, you were down there.

Well, I don't believe it because I think he's coming to the prayer room.

It was just about two weeks ago before that.

Well, there wasn't anything, no emergency.

Well, I appreciate your call down there, but we couldn't, I couldn't, the unit, they kept cutting off.

And, boy, was the manager embarrassed down there.

He said, the President of the United States is calling, and he said it might encourage you to put in a word to get a better line into the Virgin Islands.

No, during the last year, my cardiogram showed that there had been a slight change.

And I had a blockage in the right part of my heart, which I was not aware of.

which we have what is called the bundle of heads.

I didn't even ever heard of it before.

Bundle of heads.

That's the electric wiring in your heart, as it were.

But if you have total blockage, you have to have a pacemaker.

Many people, many people have what is called a partial blockage, and if it happens on the right, they consider it benign.

It doesn't have anything to do with your longevity or...

Anything else and probably it happened and maybe I had a little pain with it and thought I had something else and nature heals it over and it goes around it and what happens is that the right part of the heart beats four one hundredths of a second less than the other part.

It showed up on the cardiac arrest.

First time?

First time.

Are you at regular events?

Yes, sir.

It happened sometime this past year.

Do you usually go to manuals?

I always go to manuals, yes, sir.

Well, then you know you've got the test.

And then they put all these instruments on me and put a two-pound instrument on my back and made me run a mile on a treadmill.

Then four cardiologists with all these things, you know, and they put it up.

Yes, sir.

They told me to keep it up.

Well, I must say, now, first, you can't tell me about looks, particularly, but you just never look better.

Well, I feel the best I've ever felt in my life.

In fact, you should always have that.

And I had mine, and I had used some of that, of course, at various times.

But you look good there.

And I was telling Bob about your scheme that you have, which I think is a very good one.

Thank you, now.

You say you rest, but you rest.

and then maybe out of that period I'll use a half an hour to refresh myself on what I'm going to say.

But I really try to rest.

No, I'm thinking in my mind.

I relax so that when I get on the platform, I'm fresh.

And I think this is very important.

I'd rather take less speeches and be fresh for each one.

just random from one meeting to another, but at the end of the day, we've written down this theme that I always put in what I call two hours of stamp time.

It never works out that way.

We're always running a little late.

It usually gets down to an hour and a half.

And that period, you've got to eat.

You've got to change clothes.

You've got to shave.

You've got to take a shower.

And you've got to have the time.

You've got to get your notes ready.

But it's essential.

And I really think Bob's the best thing for making $3.

Now, we went, like before this last

Before I did that interview with Ramner, before this last, before my stay at the U.S.A., you know, before the speech and the friendship, you know, and the war, I didn't press much so hard.

I took off the weekend before, before being to those events.

Well, once in California, did it for, and, uh,

I don't know whether it helps, but I did figure that reading what I say is meant to make much difference.

Of course it makes difference, but I always overcompensate that way.

I write stuff and do it myself, and I'm always reasonably well prepared.

But I think more important than what you say is how you look.

That's right.

I think how you look and also how you present it, you know, if you're relaxed and feeling good, you can...

But I think, look, I meant that.

Your projection.

Yeah.

The feeling as to whether you're going to look, you know, whether I feel your sound.

You know, some people just, you've seen them.

Oh, he's not tired.

Or no, they're not tired.

Or not, maybe.

Or maybe they are.

What do you think?

What's your theory about that?

Well, I think that when you buy... No, I told him about this, and he was very interested in your scheme, and I just thought, what's your advice?

Well, I just have reached the point where I just don't overdo.

I would rather get one speech...

that really was effective and right over us and to give a whole lot of little speeches where I'm bagged out and standing barely holding on to the book.

Another thing that you're doing that's very smart.

We have a terrible time.

The last hand.

You know, he was quite a part of the church services, but I guess you didn't stand there for an hour and a half.

I think that's a tragedy.

And the other thing, you would agree with the church that we just shouldn't run our heads off and go into every stinking event.

I mean, every event is important, but what I meant is, what's your feeling on that?

i think that this year you're very careful about that i thought you're you're you're you're trying to people but i noticed that you have i get away you get ready to get into that you get out of the place i get out of the place that's right i don't know i don't stay behind i never go out to dinners i never go out to parties after without i never take anything after it and i get away i just graduate what do you have your people say you're afraid

No, and in my scheduling, I just don't take it.

I just don't take it.

I mean, we can be rucked by it, and you can't, in a way.

No, not anymore.

Not anymore as president.

As president, he can't.

As a candidate.

That's right.

You have a real problem there.

You've almost just got to be available to everybody.

But they know that while you're politicking, you're also the president of the United States with responsibility.

Sure.

And I would like to see you this fall, as of now.

I mean, this may change, but I'd like to see you this fall when you campaign.

take control of situations that would be televised and not this frantic racing back and forth across the country that you had to do last time.

I don't think you need that.

I think that you're wrecked at this time.

Being present is going to do it.

Now, I may be wrong.

Things may change.

Polls may look different.

But I think that if you pace yourself and under controlled situations, where it was televised and where if you did have big crowds, have it maybe two or three a week or something like that rather than going to every town, which you can't do.

Doing your work as president, making news, you can make some events right here.

where you don't have to race around the country.

I think that people will not take anymore the president of the United States frantically running from place to place.

I think, you know, I wrote you a letter, which I never mailed.

I've still got it.

After you came back from England last time, and I wrote you suggesting that you not get involved in the campaign last time.

Because I felt that you were at the height of your popularity, and I felt it was going to hurt you.

Well, that's after my trip to Europe.

After your trip to Europe, right.

And I feel that it's a little bit beneath the dignity of the president to frantically trace around the country like a candidate does.

Let them do the fighting.

You don't agree that the people want to see their man, whoever he is, fighting for what he believes in?

Oh, I think you can fight, but it's a different tactic.

You have different tactics.

Well, I think the fighting theory, you know, that's been your theory.

You figure, man, I ought to get out there.

Yeah, but you were the candidate.

You were not the president.

I think it's different now.

I think that you have a dignity to maintain, and you're doing the job.

That's the thing they want to see.

And I think it's got to be, and I think you have been able to get over integrity.

I think the only thing that has hurt your integrity has been this Pakistan-India situation and the so-called Anderson paper.

But that has passed over in my judgment.

That's not going to hurt.

But your overall impression is one now of integrity.

You've brought dignity to the office, and I think people are impressed by that.

I think that the black vote, I think you're not going to pick up too much more.

You may pick up some.

You could, in my judgment, if you do something that might hurt you the other way.

I think if you had an address that you talked directly to the black people and laid it on the line—

straight out to them and their responsibilities and what you've done and what can be done and how much progress has been made it might pick up five or ten percent especially if you picked up i wrote it down i want to find that scripture that's really there because i don't remember it that's the thing mayor washington referred to when he said at the january they asked not what did you believe but were you one of the doers or one of the talkers

Well, that's...

Yes, there is.

In the seventh chapter... Where is it?

Yes, sir.

Yes, it's big print, you see.

I've got it sitting right out here on the short piece.

It's got print that big.

I don't have to have glasses.

No.

It's epic truth.

Matthew is a reference similar to that, but it's not exactly that.

He was not even character.

He wasn't quoting the Bible.

He was just...

He said the scripture says.

Right.

And he filled it out of that.

I'll get it done.

Black talks with great emotion.

Of course, he's not a preacher.

He's a lawyer.

But he talked like a preacher.

That's right.

Like Cliff Wilson.

Good job, kiddo.

Well, your advice is to, at this point, not to kill myself.

Right, absolutely.

And I would say at this point.

I mean, we don't know what's going to happen in the next six months.

Yeah.

Well, at this point, we have to do that.

But you see, Muskie, if he is the candidate, is going to try to project the image of honesty.

He's going to try to capture Abraham Lincoln and all that baloney, and then he's going to try to project it as reasoned, calm, going back to that night when they played this tape of yours, and he came on.

I wasn't here in the country.

I was over in Europe, so I didn't see either one of them.

But they built it up in the contracts that

Of course, in a political speech, I'd like to see you do something else that you don't agree with me, I know.

But I would like to see you do a few things where you look right into that camera and talk where you're reading the thing in the lens, if you have to read it.

Because I think when you look down, look up, and so forth, it just doesn't come over.

You prefer teleprompter.

I prefer the teleprompter.

You can't do it live, I know, because if the thing broke down or something happened, you're in trouble.

But Johnson did, you know, where he would look to the left and the right and all that.

But if you get one where you look right into that lens and read it.

Now, the few films that I make, you can't tell I'm reading it, I don't think.

You can put as much expression into it if you practice it a few times.

Practice it four or five times so you know every...

Practice it looking into the lens.

The other thing is that most of it, like in a political speech, the president doesn't read it anyway.

No.

No, but I'm thinking about in television, where you're doing, what, maybe it's a five-minute spot, or where you're doing...

Well, I can tell you to be sure that if we do any spotting of all the people in the land, they actually have some direction.

They cannot be read.

They cannot.

Yeah.

Now, I think that, now John was telling me an interesting thing.

He was telling me that down in Texas, yeah, I suppose he told you that they took this poll among young people where it showed that you were leading all possible candidates among the age between, I don't know what he said, 18 to 25 or something.

And of course, 50% or 60% of the American young people don't go to college and university.

So that I suppose that you can't go, but what the students are saying or doing.

You also can't go by the student polls, because they don't poll places like Texas Christian and Oklahoma.

Or Wheaton College.

Or Stanford.

They poll Stanford.

They show the government.

You've got 25%.

You've got 12%.

Everybody else got nothing.

That's where the president of the United States gets 12%.

Well, you know, I mentioned to you some time ago something in Texas that we're going to have in June.

We've got 100 and some thousand students coming.

In Dallas.

Now, you are overwhelmingly invited to come if you want to.

You don't have to decide.

You get right up on it.

Sir, all over the country, they have, I forget, 50 or 60 747s.

No, sir, that's going to be in the cotton bowl every night.

And then the last day will be in an open field.

Right.

At night.

Only at night.

And then the daytime meetings will be broken up into groups of 50.

It's the most highly organized thing I've ever seen.

And these will, about 20,000 of them will be blacks.

There'll be about 25,000 high school kids meeting next door in Arlington.

And all these kids will be coming together at night at Cotton Bowl, where they hope to seat about 120,000 using the playing field.

And as we approach it, I will give Bob all the detailed information as to exact how many reservations we have.

But it would be a controlled student situation who would be overwhelmingly pro-Nixon.

It would be like Knoxville Rock.

It'll be more so because all of these will be committed.

Many of them will have beards and all the rest, but they believe something or another.

So you might put that down as something you might want to do.

I think we should.

It's a good way to go to Texas.

We'll be happy to trip to Moscow and be in good positions with young people, I think, particularly because they're so concerned about peace and that sort of thing.

And I was telling Bob also that the establishment of Dallas, all those top super millionaires like Clint Murchison and Lamar and all that, they are really back at it, sir.

And they are pouring the money into it.

They are.

Ross Perot, all these people are in it.

That's how I met Eisenhower.

It was through Mr. Sid.

He sent me to Paris to try to, he said, Billy, he said, you're a good talker.

And he said, if I buy you away a round trip ticket to Paris, will you go talk to Eisenhower and try to talk him into running for president?

Well, I was just a kid, and I went over there.

And, of course, Lodge and all these other people were trying to work on him, too.

And I went over, and he gave me the whole day nearly.

And I ran out of something to say, you know, with General Eisenhower.

But he was so gracious.

No, he hadn't.

Well, at least he didn't indicate to me he had made it up.

He said, all right, give me all the reasons why any man ought to run for president.

And I tried to say why I thought any man ought to run for president.

Oh, my, tremendous.

That's right.

I had just held the crusade.

He was in shape.

That's how I met him, was through Sid Richardson.

Sid is the one who paved my way over there.

Now, we are going to, if you want to come to something I'm involved in at any time, one event would be next Sunday.

I'm going to speak at Annapolis.

which is a situation where you can stand there and take a picture, you know, all those cadets marching in.

You know, it's a marvelous thing.

It's all, you know, it's compulsory.

They all have to come.

Then another event will be the sunrise service on Easter Sunday.

Well, that'll be Key Biscayne.

It'll be the city of Miami puts it on.

But they do it out there at that track, you know, what is it, the water seaway there?

Yeah, that's right.

That's where they have it.

If we, let me say, Bob, if we are not in California, well, as a matter of fact, I see no reason why we couldn't be there.

I'll be the speaker this year.

They have it every year.

Well, the Council of Turkey... That's right.

And now they have developed, this is new, where they put all the churches together.

I usually go to that on Easter.

I don't go to the Episcopal, but the community church is a nice ball, and of course the Presbyterian church is a nice ball.

He was the son of this one.

He always comes to this camp.

I think the best thing to do on this would be with me directly because I wouldn't I don't like for you to get I see you're fine.

I just didn't want to do this at all.

No, but I would rather give you the... Hi, Rosemary.

Did you push the wrong button?

Oh, did you?

I wasn't any closer.

Dr. Gray.

Oh, yes.

My goodness, we should kind of do it again.

Thank you.

She's one that you ought to put on television more often.

She's so great on that today, Chef.

Yes, she is.

Well, I think that the Dallas thing is terrific.

And now, Billy, the other thing I mentioned about your plans for the winter, the summer, and the fall, is I understand you will be in a concert in Western States.

Is that so possible?

That's correct.

I'm going to be speaking at two prisons, for example, three prisons.

Next Tuesday, I'll be at the Ohio State Prison.

That'll be televised.

I'm not speaking now.

I'm speaking now.

The fall.

You said summer and fall this year.

Well, I'll hold a crusade in the summer in Cleveland, Ohio.

That'll be 10 days.

in which we have all the black churches with us there.

And then after that, I have left my schedule quite open.

I'm going to Springfield, Illinois.

I've got that.

And I've forgotten a few dates like that, but I can get any dates that I wanted to wait until I heard a little more from you all where you'd like me to be.

Can we talk about something before you go to Seoul, Korea?

I may have to still keep that.

I don't know.

They sent a delegation last week to see my people, which I haven't heard the results of, and they just feel like it's a disaster.

I may have to take 10 days off in September and go out there.

I hate to have to do it, but I may not.

I've canceled it.

But they're not taking no for an answer.

What I was thinking, one state that I particularly would like to concentrate on, if you could, is Pennsylvania.

We have very strong, we have some undercurrents in Pennsylvania we want to talk about that have to do with a huge, huge ship in Philadelphia.

And if that happens, we'll win the state.

In order to win the state, what we need to do is to get our usual strong majorities a little stronger in the center of Pennsylvania than the rest.

You're very strong in Pennsylvania.

That is my strongest state.

As far as my financial support.

Pennsylvania is the number one state.

But you live in Pennsylvania, don't you?

No, I just have a daughter that lives there.

I remember you had a schedule.

You remember you had your Pittsburgh meeting before.

I remember I went to your Pittsburgh meeting.

But there's Pittsburgh, Harrisburg, all those places out there.

Pennsylvania is terribly important.

Well, I'll get a whole string of the numbers in Pennsylvania.

Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois.

at New York, who depend upon the third and fourth party situation.

California's always, of course, following Texas.

And Texas, for what we already announced, I think Texas, we've got to be in Texas.

But I really think that your presence is going to have an enormous effect, you know what I mean?

Because without being political, which you cannot be,

Not totally, but nevertheless, it can have an enormous effect.

What this is really going to be in this campaign, I think, is going to line up those, I believe, frankly, in the old square,

principles, and so forth, and those that believe in other things.

Oh, that's right.

Irene is going to be that way, despite it.

It must be Sagan that he'll try to move more to the center and the rest, but he has tied irrevocably to the way out, left-wing, liberal media types, and if they get in, they're going to turn the country that way.

They don't believe in the things we believe in.

They did that kind of thing this morning as corny.

That's right.

They don't believe in that sort of thing.

They don't, they also, they don't believe in such things as the Reader's Digest.

No.

They think it's corny.

They like that pornographic stuff that appears in the light, which I hope goes down the drain.

By the way, Hedley Donovan has just invited me to have lunch with all their editors here on March the 7th, and I was quite amazed because it's the first time I've heard from Time and News, I mean Time Magazine since Henry Luce died.

Even though they're editors, you better take care of them.

Is that right?

I don't know any of them now.

It's become almost, it's a very interesting thing.

We can't talk about it publicly, but you know Paul Gies.

Yeah.

He was saying on his show, he said this was a very short one, 11 out of 12 writers were Jewish.

In the media now, life is totally dominated by the Jews.

Newsweek is totally disowned by Jews and dominated by them in their editorial pages.

The New York Times, the Washington Post, totally Jewish.

The Addison and the ownership of Seabed in the Los Angeles Times is also now totally Jewish.

The other thing though is that all three networks,

except for they have front men, like our case men, or frankly, or a front guy who may not be of that situation.

But the right is doing 95% of Jews.

Now, what does this mean?

Does it mean that all Jews are bad now?

It does mean that most Jews are left-wing.

particularly the younger ones like that.

They're way out.

They're rank.

They're piece of any price, except for if the support is of the least concern.

The only thing we don't rely on is that, and this is the real reason,

The best Jews actually are the Israeli Jews.

That's right.

Because Israel, and the reason Mrs. Mayer supports me, which she does, and Diana does too, is for a very fundamental reason.

It has nothing to do with, they know these Democratic candidates will be catering to the domestic Jewish vote.

She supports me.

Because she knows the great danger to Israel is right.

And she knows that in the crisis involving Jordan, that I faced the Russians down in Florence.

She knows I'm the only one who will do it.

She knows that they never communicated with the communists, the Russians.

See, that's the point.

She's stuck.

We talked about this.

Rabin is the same way.

Rabin, of course, is a Russian Jew.

Boy, does he know them.

Now, however, in this country, we must be under no illusion.

You're aware of that, aren't you?

You're aware of the fact that in the media, we confront almost a solid block of people.

He's the point of the thing.

They're advertising because he took the whole thing on.

And it has nothing to do with anti-Semitism.

It happens, though, that insofar as the media is concerned, the power of the media,

They've got it.

They've got it right by them.

And they're the ones putting out the pornographic stuff and putting out everything.

I don't know why they do it.

You see, the Bible makes a distinction, Mr. President, between two groups of Jews.

One is called the synagogue of Satan.

Yeah.

You know it's an archdiocese.

Yes.

So he read the Old Testament.

And one of the reasons is that I, you, the person, was a little bit of that, was that, you know, the first Stephen from the...

Those people in the latter days is called the remnant of

of God's people, which will be Jewish people, and then there's the synagogue of Satan.

And yet all of your religious deceptions in the latter days, what the Bible speaks latter days to be a thousand years, what they call the synagogue of Satan.

In other words, they are energized by supernatural power called the devil.

This is what the Bible teaches, whether you believe it or don't believe it.

This is the biblical teaching, and this is what I believe.

and i believe that you have they have a they have a strange brilliance about them oh they have uh they're smart and they and they are energized in my judgment by a supernatural power well also they do something else and you see and of course hitler didn't uh they had a stranglehold on germany on the banking of germany on everything in germany and the media they had the whole thing you see and but he went about it wrong

But this stranglehold has got to be broken, or this country is going to go down the drain.

You believe that?

Yes, sir.

Oh, boy.

I can never say it, but I believe it.

No, but if you're elected a second time, you might be able to do something.

Let me tell you something.

All women, every Democratic candidate will vote.

Always election.

I won't.

Never.

Because they know where I am.

I've got a few, Max Fischer.

But the only Jewish support you have is a different kind of people in the East.

They are.

Like Bunny Lasker.

He's a terrific guy.

Bunny Lasker, and Max Fischer, and Tanner Fischer.

I know about 15 to 20%.

That's all I'll ever get.

But the point of it is this, that the difficulty is that they not only are Jewish,

But, boy, they take care of each other.

Now, every group has a tendency to do that.

A Catholic tends to hire a Catholic, and a Quaker, perhaps, dreads it and wants to hire a Quaker.

But the Jews, we even see it here now.

And, boy, do they struggle.

They expect the tax office.

The man over back for the hire is a Jew.

In my mind, all things also being evil.

What we have to remember, and why I digress on this, is this.

The media in this country is extremely dangerous.

I mean, you've talked about the need to get a network and so forth.

Everybody's working on that.

If we get in there, believe me, we're going to take care of it.

There's a way to do it, but we can't do it now.

We can't do it before the election or before the political.

But believe me, if you don't, you're going to have

You haven't told me how filthy it is.

Terrible.

It's deteriorated in the last year.

I've looked at movies.

They're filthy.

No, I don't even know the movies.

Well, I did none of the dirty movies on TV.

Now, we, sir, when we see movies, we see usually the old ones.

But we read them in advance, and then we show them to camp in other places.

But I never saw the movies.

But what I'm getting at is that the media today, the film,

African-Americanism, and the rest, it's immediate, essentially.

And time-life into good year.

No, I know they're not.

When Henry Luce died, they dropped me just like a – he sort of promoted me for years in my work.

But since you've been president, I've had to be quiet on just about everything that would make any news due to the fact I didn't want to look like I was critical of some policy of yours or be interpreted as political and so forth.

So I have had to, you know, watch a little bit on the things that I would say that normally make news.

For example, even when Mr. Eisenhower was president, I spoke out against the way we were giving to India, and Mr. Dulles called me out to his home to explain it to me, and oh, I would talk out against this or that or the other thing.

Well, it would make news.

But with you as president, I feel like, you know, I can't do that.

Now, this year, I would like to do...

What I'm going to do is to say things about you personally, you know, as we've talked before, integrity, religion, so forth, that type of thing.

These will be local news coverages.

I won't get national news.

They won't, but it'll just be local.

Like if I go to Pittsburgh, there'll be a press conference or Philadelphia or cities like that.

It'll be local news, but it won't be.

And I have a fairly good rapport.

Politics is a business.

The game will carry a state, not a nation.

Right.

And if you go to Pittsburgh, if you get the extra 10,000 votes, it means that you would win Pennsylvania by 10 rather than lose it by 10.

Well, and secondly, I would like to say that if it takes, if we come right down to the wire, and it looks like, you know, that I could help in a public way, even if I had to come out and say I'm voting for Richard Nixon because I'm ready to put that on the line, even though it would hurt my ministry for years.

But I'm 53.

I don't know how long I have anyway, so I don't care.

But I feel that this country is going to be gone if these people get it.

If you get elected, you might be able to project it into another term, you see, through somebody else.

There's so much you can do in a second term that you can't do in a second term.

Because now you have to think policy.

You don't care about anything except what you do with the country.

We tried to do that in the first term.

But we don't have the vision to try to get in.

Sure.

There's an awful lot that needs to be done in the world and so forth.

Let me just say a word.

The remarks I made this morning, they're not taken for a problem.

But there was much more to them than any sophisticated person was listening.

There normally is in that occasion.

The point being that

But we are in a situation at the present time where, and it will be the last time, when the United States, through its power, can create conditions which can lead to peace for a, perhaps, 25 years.

Nobody can look beyond that.

That would be a great achievement.

What is important is that the United States use that power and use it effectively.

Now, I said something which many people, of course, like to hear.

Most people like to think that if we just get to know each other better, we have no differences.

But the people that haven't paid a spike are people that are married.

They know each other too well.

The problem that we have, of course, with the Russians and the Chinese, as I said, and I'm sure you didn't find, it's not that we do not know each other, but the fact that we do know each other.

They believe in one thing, we believe in another.

They believe in one kind of world, we believe in another.

But if you start talks with that in mind, then there is a chance to find.

those areas where you live and let live, which is about the way the world is going to end peace.

The millennium will come someday, we hope, when everybody may want peace for the right reasons.

But at the present time, we may want peace for reasons of necessity.

They're not necessarily wrong.

We may want the thought that there's a limit.

The only thing I would give to the other side is what I say about the fact that

that any man, no matter how tough and savage and barbaric he is, probably does think of young people, the kids.

I mean, the right leader must think of the Russian kids, and the Chinese leader must think of the Chinese kids, and would hope that they not be incinerated.

And they know, as we know, that any medical word will mean mass incineration.

So we didn't think of that.

Now, the point that I make, however, is that there has never been a time when the United States needed, in this office, somebody who knew the communists, who knows our strength, take it or not.

But who is more keen to be aware than I am that from a political standpoint, we had a fight at the bottom of the drain three years ago.

Blaine Johnson and Kennedy.

Kennedy got the same.

Johnson kept the same.

Eisenhower might not have been an actual hero as Eisenhower was during the career.

And it wouldn't have been too bad, sure, that our Vietnamese would have probably slaughtered or castrated two million South Vietnamese Catholics, but nobody would care.

These little brown people so far away, we don't know them very well.

But yet again, we couldn't do that.

Not because of Vietnam, but because of Japan, because of Germany, because of these.

Once the United States ceases to be a great power, acting responsibly to restrain aggression, which exactly what we did in India and Pakistan.

Our problem was no more with India.

I can count.

I know there are a lot more Indians than there are Pakistanis.

And I prefer to say India for the Pakistan government.

But we could not allow India, with the support of Russia, to gobble up its neighbor.

So we said, stop.

And it was right.

But be that as it may, the problem we've now got is that you have in this office, and I think of them all, Teddy Kennedy, Hubert Humphrey, Orr Muskie, who would be one of the three.

Each of them will be in debt, unfortunately, to this group of people that are defeated, that are being submitted to Christ.

That, frankly, probably wouldn't be caught dead if he didn't like that for the day.

Not after they were elected.

They would move him forward.

Now, the thing that we have to bear in mind is that this country now faces a real crisis.

Now, it's not just in this country.

I mentioned Lund.

Do you know him?

The new Director General of NATO.

No, sir.

I met him this morning for the first time.

Yes, I met him this morning.

But Lund said, thank God he was mentioned in my speech.

And I just thank God.

And he said, there is a difference between surrender and surrender.

He said, somebody had to say that.

He said, all over Europe today, they look to you as the only strong man.

He said, Willy Brandt is, you know, sucking around with the Russians.

And the British, of course, are trying to get into the common market.

So they will not be.

They can't.

He's a good man.

But he can't be very strong.

Alec Hume and the rest.

But they have strength.

But France or Europe, the Italians don't have a government.

Probably never will have.

And nobody else matters.

They're too small.

And so here we sit, for better or for worse, the United States is the only nation in the free world that can act and act hard to restrain the Russians or the Chinese who do know what they want.

And who will wait for it and are out to get it.

So what do you need?

That's why we have a stronger defense budget.

That's why, as a matter of fact, that's why I think he needs trips.

Because regardless of what happens in the election, the Russians and the Chinese need to see one American.

And perhaps they need to see the first American, somebody who knows them.

that they know is not a sucker.

I'm sure you wouldn't get sound to that.

So you see, the stakes are very high.

That's the stakes in the international market.

It's peace in the world, it's freedom in the world, the rest.

Here, the domestic front is something else, too.

It's, I mean, you need to talk to the economy and the rest, those things.

They'll whip it around one way or another.

It's terrible to have to call problems to the Lord.

But here, the domestic front, the real question is whether this country's going to believe in anything.

Now, we all have different degrees of religion, and we have different ways of expressing it.

Maybe it's the center of the center.

But the thing that Bob will have to bear on, the thing that concerns me about him, and I will defer to your judgment that maybe it's bad for other places to change security.

I hope it is.

But among the professors, and the associate professors, in the colleges, in the universities, in the junior colleges, and the high schools, I think 90% of them are atheists or worse.

They have no confidence in themselves.

They have no faith in this country.

And... Well, they're undermining the country.

And their confidence.

Now, therefore,

You see, we simply cannot allow that sort of thing to prevail.

Now, thank God, at the moment, there's still a majority of Americans.

This isn't a very big one.

Maybe 55% of the American people still will support those decent, strong urges.

Let me say, that 55%, however, would have to be very strongly modified in some areas.

In the Northeast, it's not 50%.

in New York, very problematic weather it is.

Pennsylvania, on the edge.

In the Midwest,

Ohio and so forth.

The South, that's the strongest.

The South is probably because it's religious, it's the most patriotic, decent part of this country today.

It really is.

Without the South, the country would be in a terrible shape.

California being banned and undermined because of Hollywood and because of the lousy colleges and universities.

California's overeducated.

And everyone, that's where we stand today

And what we have to do about it, of course, is to fight it skillfully.

You've got to get in it first.

But believe me, once in, then we've got to really then start to reward the decent people.

And frankly, throw out the mean-to-take-hands thing in the press.

He was right.

He understood it.

It was worse.

Have you read the Eckhart book?

No.

Now, that was supposed to have been sent to me.

I'll probably have it down in my home.

I probably read a review of it.

I read excerpts from it.

One thing that I know... We're in a terrible fight.

She's testifying today, I guess, at her tomorrow at Irvin's committee.

And her testimony is...

is better than her book because he gets it all in the compact.

That's great.

I didn't know that.

Is that?

I didn't know that.

That's a big point.

Go ahead.

I was going to say with the... Do you understand I'm not overstating yourself here?

Oh, I know.

I know that.

The really scary thing is that the media control used to be certain places that writers on television have always been to.

It was Japanese writers and all those people.

They were always in.

But now, what's become the old-time press corps, the old-time White House press corps,

It was the Maryland Smiths and the Dick Wilsons and the Kirkpatricks and all that kind of people.

But you look at what covers the president today, and it's really kind of scary.

From Time magazine, it's Jerry Shanker.

From CBS

But I think the way you have to play it this year is just what you said.

You've got to almost play along with them a little bit.

I mean, it's a matter of strategy, and I put it to the president.

No, sometimes you can feel just as strong, but you've got to work very subtly this year, and you've almost got to... Now, this picture, for example, that came out...

Yesterday, when you went over and this Negro lady was kissing you in Sammy Davis Jr., that was a fabulous picture.

Bob Brown's deal, that was a terrific thing for you to do.

That just made everybody feel good.

That type of thing is something that, whether we like it or not, everybody thinks of you as conservative.

And then when you lean a little bit in that direction toward the sociological thing is the big thing.

Sorry.

What's that?

You have to, or the whole thing will be closed to you.

You know, I mean, I don't care how conservative, I'm sure I'm more conservative than you are, at least you told me that one time, and I think that's true, but I have to lean...

A little bit.

You know, I go and I keep friends with Mr. Rosenthal at the New York Times and people of that sort, you know.

And all the, I mean, not all the Jews, but a lot of the Jews are great friends of mine.

They swarm around me and they're friendly to me.

because they know that I'm friendly to Israel, but they don't know how I really feel about what they're doing to this country, and I have no power and no way to handle them.

But I would stand up if, you know, under proper circumstances.

Well, you do have a way to handle them, but the only way to handle them is to have an effective workforce.

You've got to reward the people and start promoting people.

You know what we have to do really?

We've got to build a good establishment.

new scholars and so forth.

I was thinking, for example, of our speechwriting team last night.

I didn't think about it.

It's not good enough.

We've just got to get some better ones.

And I've been aware.

I'm aware they are.

But maybe they aren't.

Maybe you just can't find any good conservative writers.

I don't know.

They are hard to find, because even though we have to try to find a conservative columnist to take on the challenge.

That's right.

Bill White was sick while they, Bill White was debuffing over him.

By the way, there's quite a big, there's quite a big protest among religious people, you might check this out, religious magazines, that no religious person has been invited in the press thing, and the one that they chose, that the religious news service and all of them sort of agreed on, was a fellow by the name of Gene Koshoski, who is really conservative, and I was amazed that they chose him.

They thought maybe he might have a chance.

And I don't know whether you've got another place or not, but... You see, out of the religious papers that were submitted a month ago, the religious papers in this country...

By the way, there's another thing, you know, I brought up to you about the fact that a lot of these papers are going out of business and so forth.

We were supporting legislation for a congressional subsidy.

My own magazine, if that went through, was going to rise 700% my postal rates.

Pornography, rise 29%.

Somehow they had a discrepancy, and I got our lawyers.

They're drawing it up right now to submit to the proper people.

But I told you that we could absorb it.

My organization can absorb that.

It would be hard on us, but we can absorb it because our income is very large.

But the religious people are really howling over it.

And a lot of motor clubs.

You know, in fact, the Christian century is just about out of business.

It's about out of business.

And our Christianity today... No more.

Well, it's the most left wing of all the religious press in the country.

It's published in Chicago by a foundation, and the man that's been the angel back of it is the fellow who supported you, is J. Irwin Miller.

And he gives them the money.

Well, at least it came out in the paper that he supported you.

I think he endorsed you.

Yeah, probably is.

He endorsed Nixon when there was nobody left, but he's never supported it.

By the way, what is your situation in regards to Mark Hatfield?

Are you going to back him in Oregon?

I assume so.

We haven't got anybody in the primary.

No.

I'm talking about in the election.

It was nominated.

All the way.

It was nominated.

All the way.

Because I'll tell you why.

I have a little difference.

I cannot, if there's a primary, and I can't encourage it, I don't know who's going to have it.

If there's a primary, I've got to stay out of it.

Sure.

But in the election, I endorse all Republicans, period.

You see, I helped talk to them about it.

I'm frankly not a Republican running against Johnson, for example.

I won't do it.

I want him to.

Democrats are going to have our support.

We're going to build a new coalition of Democrats.

The good side of Democrats has got to join Republicans.

Aren't you agree?

I'm thinking that after you get elected, which I think there's no doubt that you're going to be elected, but I think after you get elected that you could realign the whole political thing in this country in a historical mood of major proportions.

Well, I'll get Harry Berger to be one of the candidates.

But I would like one request.

I know there's one thing about reading a news summary with regard to a poll by Terrell and Time magazine about the West Coast.

Yeah.

I don't know if you need that guy.

Is he from Cambridge?

Yeah, he's the Cambridge Research Institute.

We quite distorted with the West.

That, I don't think it would be, I don't see how you could, it's what I've got with our own.

You can't, it's way up.

And I'm going to talk to him because God, okay.

Tully Plusser, yeah, who used to hold in 68.

He was, Tully Plusser was doing, he was doing those focus groups introduced to the government.

I need somebody, Mr. President, this year that can really give me some behind-the-scenes briefings, both politically, what is happening, and also on foreign things that I have to defend, on television, things like that.

What I want you to do is to work with me.

After we return to China and after we return to Russia, and if we get a settlement with the North and the East, we don't have to get it now.

Four or five months from now, we might have to.

I want you to see that Billion gets the way that it is.

Just invite me in to a briefing of, you know, we have a little heat group, see?

And he sits down.

Kissinger is very complex, but you understand it.

Well, can I talk back and talk to Bob and get all the political?

On the political side, I really think that Bob is the best one to handle it because Mitchell will be too involved with party organizations.

What do you think?

Or do you want Rachel to do it?

You see, Bob, here's what I feel.

It's probably better for me.

What we want to do is to tie yourself in to me in a personal way and a non-political way.

This is going to be so broadly involved.

I think we can send her down as well.

And I'd rather have somebody that's not going to

let it out or even write it up that I ever was involved politically.

I have to maintain a public image as far as possible of being political without being political, if you know what I mean.

And as we come down to the wire,

You just say straight out, Billy, I think I need your help here.

68, I said in Dallas with Jim Chambers that I had already voted for you because I have an absentee ballot, and that went out everywhere.

And then when Ball said that you were not morally capable of becoming president, I answered him.

That's the kind of thing that's in our perspective.

Let me say that on that point, we will play it at the right time.

But in other words, that's the big bullet.

But don't ever hesitate to call me and say, Billy, I would like this.

And then I'll have to decide whether it's something I think I can do.

But I think you can call and say, Billy, I think if you answered this, I knew.

Let Bob be the contact here with you on this.

And you've got to follow up that sometimes there may be, like, for example, but I think you ought to get him in for the two foreign policy briefings.

There are only two that are going to matter, the one after China, the one after Russia.

There's going to be enormous conditions both times.

And you're going to be enormously effective with the people after that.

So get him in on that.

See, the stuff you sent me when you thought I was going to –

Taiwan, the background, that helped me tremendously.

I had things all to say to them because they said that they had told my friend out there who is their very close friend of 40 years, they said the only American we'd believe is Billy Gray.

Well, I decided that I would go out there and try to placate them a little bit and explain to them, not politically, but that you could trust Mr. Nixon and so forth, and that he had a whole world to look at.

He couldn't look at just one part of the world and so forth.

But when I found this thing at Mayo's, it was felt that I better take a few days off.

So I didn't go.

But I don't know whether to go now or not.

We'll wait and see after you get back from China.

I'll wait until we get back.

You tell me what you want.

It might be very useful.

If you want me to go, I'll go, but...

It might be very useful afterwards.

We'll have to see.

Because I've known the Chiang Kai-shek for 20-some years, and they always entertained me as they did you when you went through there.

Oh, they're great.

They're great friends of Dr. Bell's.

Perfect.

Okay, move on.

think that's the best way to do it if there's if we get into some kind of a thing where it would be good to get together with john or somebody else no reason not to do it at all now i hope that uh i hope you'll keep john conley because i think he's going to put texas uh it's already in your corner i'm sure but it'll just be icing on the pudding well we'll do our best uh

He's a terrific asset.

He's by far the strongest man in the cabin.

I talk to him about things other than treasury, politics, foreign policy, and the rest.

He's enormously overworked.

He's a man who, despite the fact he's only 53 years old, the rest of the time, with all of his

It goes like a house on fire, and he gets tired and sick.

And I didn't know that.

I didn't realize it about him.

He was living in Chalk County, and he would never retire to date in his life.

I see what happens.

He knows this.

He knows this, but he should be.

Well, frankly, Bob, he should have a better schedule.

I think they're putting him into too much trouble.

They are.

And that's why he's a big gun.

If you're ever talking to John, well, I don't think it's really good.

Well, John is a man that always takes the last hand.

I think it might do some good.

I think it might be very helpful with him.

I'm saying it to him in a way that nobody else is.

The president is concerned about the fact, you know,

I think he looks great all the time, but I don't want him to work out of work.

See, he's so totally sold on what you just said.

He told me, I don't quote people to each other very much, but I'm sure he wouldn't mind this because he'd say it to you.

He said that if this other crowd gets in, he said you can kiss America goodbye.

He did that today?

No, this was the day before yesterday.

He called me after I talked to you on the phone, you remember.

Was he out of bed yet?

I tried to get him to go to the end of the day, but he left me over the weekend.

Are you sure?

He was here.

I'm doing my best.

Let me ask you one question.

What do you want me to do?

and building Ruth Knowles' building.

Oh, yes, they're close friends.

And if they will, that would be great.

And just go down there, John, just go down there.

Use my place, or they've got the big house in the other house, and have a wonderful time together.

You go, if you like, keep us in.

He's never been here.

And I've been trying to get John to go, and I just, you know what I mean?

You want me to call him up and invite him?

Or should you tell him to go?

I'm going to go to Florida.

I'm going to be in Florida the last two weeks of this month.

Yes, sir.

One week of it is with Bill.

or we could go even better than that it'd be a lot better if he went uh i don't have his communication speed that'd be the problem with all the work

No, it's down at John Rawlings' place.

John has really got a place on the north coast of Jamaica.

He has got the most fabulous home fully staffed with two swimming pools, golf course, the whole works.

that you ever saw, and he also owns that new holiday inn, Rollins.

He owns the new holiday inn right on the beach, which is not a holiday inn.

It's a 20th century plaza hotel.

The possibility for us in the future, Rollins, places included, various types of protection that the person could use in their...

Is that a meeting?

I saw it in the building.

I've seen the pictures of it since.

I haven't stayed there.

I'm going to go down there pretty soon, and I'll look it over because his doctor is my doctor.

He's a half Negro, but he is, if I want an operation, anybody to look at me, he's the greatest.

He's from London.

Where is he?

In Jamaica.

He went there as a missionary.

He married a white girl, but he is a great physician, one of the greatest.

One of the greatest?

No, sir.

Brilliant.

He went to Japan and studied heart under this famous heart specialist out there.

He's one of the greatest surgeons.

I don't know.

I don't want John.

John's very smart.

I don't want him to think we're trying to work on him or that we don't think he's doing well.

He's doing great.

But he is extremely valuable.

He is under pressure.

from his friends and the rest go back.

He's done it.

He figures it out.

And he's done an enormous job.

He's got the international monetary thing worked out.

And he's got the economic policy and all the rest.

But he's so enormously important to us to be in another way.

Because he's the only strong man in the captaincy.

Mitchell Lee turned anybody else

But he's also important politically right now, in my view, with the conservatives, to a word about the first time.

It is with his feelings.

His viewpoints are like yours, and they're like mine, that the country is at stake, and that we've got to even almost be ready to put our lives on the line for it.

He feels that.

He's never mentioned to me that he was going to leave, ever.

I just read it in the paper.

I mean, this is stuff that gets out because...

You know, they're trying to make trouble.

But John Conway, he doesn't mention it to anybody, but the stories we read are inspired stories, you know, by people who want to believe.

And then they start building it up.

We don't want to believe.

He doesn't want to believe.

In my view, John didn't want to come.

He's probably wiped together the burden of it.

But if he realizes there's a higher calling, this costs a lot of money to do, and that's nice.

But John's got to realize it.

I told him that when he came.

And I didn't think he had an issue.

And second, he also got to realize that in terms of my ability to handle this office in this crucial year of 1972, he commanded efforts.

Because I need somebody in this administration that I can talk to as an equal.

You realize I have no license to staff, but I can.

They're all younger than I am.

I mean, they even tested me.

I mean, they just frankly, they're all worked for me.

They're not equal.

None of them.

as a matter of fact, in the cabinet.

I mean, I have good relations, of course, personal relations with Rogers and Laird and all those other people, but none of them are in, frankly, on my wavelength.

Connolly is a man that believes as I believe.

Well, you see, in Texas, the situation is that, as you know probably better than I do, that the Democratic situation

where John had his protege, Ben Barnes, pushing.

Ben is in a fight now for his life, and it's all his fault.

Other things entered in that has disappointed John.

He doesn't have quite the call to Texas that he might have had a few months ago even.

And John Connolly, I mean from a political point of view, if he had any political ambitions for the future, which I don't think he's got,

But he is totally committed to the fact that if you get defeated, America's gone.

Let me say this.

He's committed to that.

The other side of the coin is that a gentleman who has no ambition, I'm sure.

Well, I say no ambition.

I don't think he has.

But he is the only man in the country, and I don't say this out of any ego of myself,

in either party that I think at the present time is qualified to be president.

I don't, and I, we're talking the greatest of communists.

I have, I like having him for many qualities, but he doesn't have the breadth to do this office at this point.

No member of the cabinet can do it.

No member of Congress has got him on either side.

The communists are the men.

The communists got the sweet, he's got the toughness, he's got the, all these qualities.

The question is how do we get into that position?

I think in the next four years we can do it.

four years you're gonna have a new coalition he knows that he has no hopes ever of getting anywhere in the democratic party well no i mean i mean there'd be no possibility and he is even in the last i was at the democratic convention in 68 because i was to lead the prayer the night that i'm going to have johnson

Conley came up to me and he said, Billy, he said, this is no longer my party.

And George Smathers was with him, the two of us.

And George helped us.

Well, good.

Why?

I wish he hadn't dropped the rosemary.

But I guess that's... Those are things we can't do.

No.

No, we can't.

But, of course, we knew them both.

Yeah, I loved them both.

For sure.

But now, I know you've got plenty to do besides talk to me.

Do you want me to call John and ask him, or?

What do you think about it?

I want John to make a report, you know, and talk to the president's house and see if they would, if she.

Because, you see, he liked her.

He liked her.

And he might feel more relaxed without me.

I mean, you know, I'm a clergyman, and sometimes, you know, they think John and I spend a lot of time together.

It's two weeks.

It'll be beautiful.

They can bring, you know, if you want to do the date toss.

If that doesn't work, why don't you come down and try and say, you know, why don't you come down?

We've spent time together, but a lot of times, you know, a man, if he's totally relaxed, might not want to be relaxing with a clergyman.

He's got to be a little bit intimidated with certain things.

He can have a whole compound there, which is really something.

You see, there's five hoses in a row.

Well, you know, all the communications, all the communications.

He's got his telephones, the White House phones are there.

He's got the office he can use, which is my horse, the Secret Service.

The Secret Service is there.

They protect him totally.

Or if I went, I'd drive over to the hotel and see him once in a while.

And they'll drive him, they'll drive him any place.

And they cook for him.

He cooks everything.

So send out the cook.

It's an unusual setup.

Well, thank you, sir.

Good to see you.

How's your money coming in?

Tremendous.

We averaged during the last three months a million dollars a week, which is tremendous.

Who's watching?

Grady.

You could give me a couple of money clips.

I don't carry it around with me.

This is a very, this is a nice.

I've got a couple of them.

You can work off the whole thing, and then there's the, there's companies for free.

Okay, now these are very, these are very, probably expensive.

These are, this is a beautiful banner.

See, it's a, it's a money flag.

Here's the, uh, president's seal, and I haven't seen it.

It's just been made, and it's a business for a company.

It's even got a few other ones.

All right.

We don't care if it's worth it to you.

All right.

Come by classification, man.

I'll put that to you.

Okay.

Goodbye.

Good to see you.

Thank you.

Take care.

Thank you.

And you let me know, you know, the main thing, don't worry.

Oh, I'm not worried.

It never crosses my mind.

That's the reason.

Your religious fault.

No, the head cardiologist up there said it was 99% B to 9.

Just to get it.

Good.

I'll keep it.

I'm out.

Your first will be more good than mine.

Thank you.

You know the scariest thing?

That, uh...

I'm sorry, but that was a lot of hell on the wrong one.

I've never seen it.

I thought I just was looking at the rack.

Oh, well, don't worry.

I just figured it.

You know, it's one of those things, it's really how closely you've got to watch your staff.

They'll get it.

They'll push stuff off like, well, come see these people.

I know, there must have been an hour.

I mean, a whole crisis.

I've been to Poland.

That's the same planet as real life.

God damn it, I've been to more places than these guys ever heard of.

Does he know that?

Oh, sure.

It's just he pushed this.

I had to tie a cloth down on me.

There was a note I got on it that said, you know, the only reason we were to do it was to run away because you hadn't seen enough of that body.

Well, now we have it for dinner instead of a can baby.

I didn't hear the cancer was there.

I wouldn't.

I wouldn't be caught up on this.

I wouldn't.

That's right.

I wouldn't.

I mean, I was back in all that time when I heard the names, I thought.

Yeah, and you were not.

That's right.

That'll be fine.

No, it'll be okay.

Tixon, he's got to work into that political thing.

And when I talk to him, he won't talk one word about it.

Maybe this will help.

Maybe now he's, you know, you said, yeah.

Yeah.

Maybe I'm him.

Yeah.

I don't know.

Just before, when he told me to do this, then.

I'm going to be a little busy, too.

It's not important.

This isn't Henry's time?

No, no.

It's nothing like this.

It's routine.

All right.

We get a lot of requests down in Nebraska for...

and film of the Nebraska football team.

I know the picture for the day is Evans and Reagan, but I think it would be worthwhile to take a picture of the... Well, see, they don't get to film.

And the Nebraska TV station had requested film to be shipped by the various...

There's no way to do that now.

So we...

What are we even getting down on?

That's my question.

What are we doing, except that you're doing something for Nebraska?

No, that's the only reason I'm raising it.

Do we want to do anything for Nebraska?

You don't, and why haven't you?

Well, it came back to, you know, the thing they think is a, is a thing where you said if they won again, you'd see them again.

So they did it at some point.

Sure.

So you're saying that after I was called, they didn't have the fire ready this morning.

But, uh, I didn't know about that.

Oh, and I should have told them.

Sorry, I, I've already told them.

I thought we were working on it now.

I mean, I'm trying to get something ready by the time they get here.

Well, okay, but it's not good.

Well, I don't know.

You see, Ron, I'm not sure that it serves our purposes.

At other bars of the day, they've got Boy Scouts and everything else.

Oh, well, we're not doing the Boy Scouts.

That's exactly my point.

We've got the Boy Scouts, we've got the astronauts and the rest, and so what do we give them as a picture, really?

We're actually the number one football team.

We've got to play football pretty heavily.

We're trying to define, maybe, I don't know, judge what I mean.

What's in it for us?

That's my point.

You're curious?

Well, look, I'm objectionable.

That wasn't my problem.

No, I agree.

It's not my problem.

I mean, can't we have, if they've got to let Polly take pictures and he can stand, or don't mark her back and fix her shoes, is that the problem?

Is that right?

Well, they are just cases, but if that could release it, it would work.

We don't gain anything because they're going to be used.

We don't want to give it to the drafts of papers.

They run it as a bluff to give to the university and not then release it.

Then it runs out of their stuff and word does it some good.

Well, let me ask this.

But you're talking about this good sports page picture.

Yeah.

It's a good match.

All right, fine.

I don't care.

It doesn't mean that much.

It'd be one way or another.

But get this guys out of here so they don't bother me.

I don't want any reporters in here, is that clear?

And we'll just do it.

Just so, just pictures.

But no, but no, no comments or anything of that sort.

Let the Nebraska people play that.

That's, that's all right.

That's fine.

Pictures are fine.

They can come in and shoot and go on a trip.

Photo, that's not a photo opportunity.

So you see, it's about 18 of them coming in.

And if you just show them the room, okay?

And that's the way it's done.

So tell me, is there anything else you haven't done?

You know, I've got all the pictures.

Henry's kept all of this.

I know Henry's.

Always.

He told me.

I'm sorry.

I did yesterday, too.

He was barred.

Now, he was over here.

Over there.

Incidentally, he took the box and pulled it off.

Good.

In Buckley, he said.

Well, Buckley said he had a letter he saved.

We have a letter from Buckley.

He doesn't have a file.

I think he's got a file.

And Mr. President, that was fantastic this morning.

I'll bet you $1,001.

Exactly what they said last year.

Exactly.

Not a goddamn thing will our guys do to get it out.

We don't know how, though.

Let's just don't know how.

And frankly, I mean, it isn't their fault.

It's the reason it isn't.

I think that's the point.

I think they will get it out.

I mean, they'll do.

They can't get it out.

I don't think they'll succeed.

I won't take it back, because there won't be any results.

I guess you're right.

Do they ever give this sort of thing out when they do this?

Or do these color things at all anymore?

I mean, you know, I was proud.

I didn't know it was gray.

That's the same point.

It would be great if I was taught that way.

I come to it all the time.

I never use a goddamn note.

I mean, the only time I did it was when I read the brief of the 4-H, some silly son of a bitch.

And I don't think it's that important.

But my point is that

Doc, what's the problem?

Why doesn't he get it out from the box?

One of the problems is that when you're on it, I'm going to be late for the exact process, because they were not supposed to have been on the schedule at the state.

So it can't be that's the way that it was.

Are they here?

I was going to say they're here, and Dr. Kissinger has requested five minutes with you, sir.

What does he want us like?

We'll have to wait, and I'll pay them about $20,000.

I'll pay them about $25,000.

Okay.

There's also his...

What he wants is to make it clear that you're

dealing with these people, not Henry.

Because one of the things that Henry is, has anything to do with... What's the crime?

What's the crime?

Do I have a stand for it?

That's exactly right.

What's the crime?

Do I have a stand for it?

Do I...

They have to go out and find out, and they have to get it down, and I can read it, and I'll meet with the assholes.

I don't want to be directly with the one who did it.

He's wrong on this one.

He's just...

He said, fine.

Telling me why you didn't get the papers.

And you looked it over, get your questions worked out in your own mind, and then there might be some issues.

But there was no point in having just a bull session.

That's right.

I'm not going to have a bull session.

And he said, fine.

Kind of backed off and said, well, that wasn't really the point.

It wasn't the meeting.

And I spoke it up.

And I'm not going to go to court.

I don't think it's worth doing that for you.

That's a snouser.

God damn it, that's just a fake friend of a brother.

There's nothing in his argument that you should tell your adult public to be consulting with a lot of people about China.

Well, follow me.

What in the nation of Christ are you talking about?

You should appear to the public to be spending a lot of time getting ready for your China trip.

China trip?

Yeah, it's getting out.

Yes.

And aren't you, by the way, not reading books?

And what's the ability to do that?

Yeah, I'm reading a hell of a lot of people, but I don't mind being...

I'll bet you right now that I'll, I have forgotten more about that hill or chapel or whatever, no, because he isn't reading this crap like I am.

I'm sure that's the only one.

Well, the other point Andrew makes is perfectly valid, which is these big farms we were bleeding about, they're not being consulted, and yet they have not turned in one thing, or they've not done one iota of work.

At least there's no evidence that they must have, huh?

Well, Bill says there is, but unless it's smoked out, they can put it in.

Okay, back to this, though, it's, uh,

We have one hell of a time when we get enough to do anything that's...

I mean, there is a few summaries that sort of work with that.

You'll never see anything in regard to a good speech or anything of that sort.

They can't get it across.

You see a lot.

No, you don't.

What I was trying to say about this kind of thing is that there will be a little blip of this on television news.

But the thing where people see you in the great masses

is when you read your Vietnam speech from your desk or something like that.

That's where you can argue that the press conference is useful because it is a way where they see you not reading.

You know, they're seeing a different kind of thing.

But look at what they've seen in recent months.

They've seen a lot.

They've seen a lot, but most of it's been reading, which is what gives rise to the thing Billy said.

Rather, it was an hour around reading.

That's right.

So, you know, that wasn't a big uptick, because they're out of the Vietnam speech now.

The Christmas shows were without reading.

The day in the life of the president was about three years.

Yeah, I agree.

What did you say to those who reached about 10 million people?

Well, to be honest, the 360 people might quite hit it, but in terms of that, except for the Vietnam speech in the State of the Union, not in Montreal.

Of course, the State of the Union didn't reach many people, a lot of people didn't.

But except for those two, not in Montreal, they were probably.

He said, no, that's true.

The State of the Union, a lot of people, a lot more people than any one of those other things did.

Because I'm a Jew.

I'm not a Jew.

Just realize that it's a problem, and I am sure it is.

I think we, I should hope to do that.

We've got to really push the price on the speed track again.

Because they had nothing in their thoughts last night.

Not a goddamn thing.

I can do this.

But as Conley says, the press conference is not what he wants.

He just wants speeches from people.

He's taking another term.

He says the press conference is basically a confrontation.

You've got to look at the realities of what you're going to get.

has a closed operation as compared to yours.

Then they invite the television broadcasters and kind of beat those people and drive them to the school bus.

He reaches more than anybody in his business does, but it's a different enterprise.

One thing he might do, he tried this before and it hasn't worked,

Don't use Sapphire, because he only gets it to his parents.

But you might show more notes that I did, evolving this.

This was totally done after reading and so forth.

Cook did the material.

It was not good.

I mean, it's not his fault, Marlene.

It was pretty good.

You read his stuff.

You could see there was no, any resemblance, whatever, to what I said.

To that, that would have been a dead loser this morning.

Don't you think so?

Or would it?

It wouldn't have been a dead loser, but it wouldn't have been a winner.

What he did was.

So what he did would have been fine.

He would have come off fine.

He could have just said, that's great, that's great.

Well, I don't think he would have scored if I didn't make the score.

Well, I don't know what to say.

There's no despair.

I shut him out.

Thank you, sir.

Okay.

Who's our man to do that?

Is that Moore?

He's the best one.

Oh, he did a hell of a job of getting the phone call story over.

Yeah.

It took him a few days because he moved out of it.

So he got to run his television and watch it.

Oh, he really did?

Yeah.

I've got a very good story on the other kinds of bone problems.

That's good.

There's so many.

All right.

Well, Billy is a .

He finally got in there to talk to you.

Now, he must not have talked to Mr. Henshaw.

Henshaw wouldn't understand her anyway.

He can't talk to you, but the point is that you've got to follow up with him.

He needs care.

Every week, find something to call him about.

Every week.

Conley is the same kind of person.

He needs care.

Talk to him.

And that's why you or the rest of them, I mean, we all head around and do our own jobs here.

You're sort of used to it.

You don't want our staff to think that we all have just the way of life to work.

You've got to bring it on us.

You've got to eat it up.

You've got to find that work.

Their work.

There are a lot that aren't work.

I mean, Romney and Bolby and the rest, screw them.

They don't want to eat there.

They don't want to act the house.

Right.

I mean, he never counts off of anything, but it's funny, that's the first time.

You know, I've tried to follow up on other conversations he's had with him when he's admitted that he's thinking a lot of the political part of it.

Well, he's got to be careful, sir, because also he's thinking of his own constituents.

He's thinking of his own credibility.

He knows that when he goes out, people are going to boo or hiss or dread him.

If he's going to be too political, he's right.

I've got to raise him up.

And, you know...

I was just getting into the writing.

So he didn't want to bring a message.

He didn't call.

That filled in on a certain sense.

I think he can't help it without it.

Yeah.

Because he'll go back and say what he's got to say.

Well, it makes no point of how important the company is to you.

I mean, that's something that's hard for us to never know if there was any discussion.

Yeah, I know that.

But he's got to stay.

the political ties between Canada and the United States, et cetera, et cetera, grouped together.

I started putting that on the basis.

Because I don't want that to be hanged off.

You know, I don't want that.

They are, it may be that the, you know, I'm listening to this and trying to be totally objective about it, but the, the new summary, trust to the hard right attitude of those graduating to be

What do you think?

I don't think it does.

In the first place, they all read the Times and the Post.

The Times and the Post is basically the New Summary anyway.

That's right.

And I think where you get the alarmist and the depression possibilities come more from the Times and the Post than they do from the .

You know, we've got this point with the Jews .

Well, it is a shocking point.

It is.

Well, also, the Jews.

The Jews are irreligious, atheistic, immoral bunch of bastards.

That goddamn girl, the other night, was Jewish.

Totally cynical.

She said, no religion.

She said, give away.

Well, after that, I said to me, before I said anything, she's Jewish, of course.

She was Jewish.

Uh, we have to do the other end, uh.

Yes, ma'am.

Now, where is this?

Have they got this?

It's effective right here.

We won't have anybody.

Nobody will come.

OK.

Nixon, Graham & Haldeman on 1972 Presidential Campaign and Media Bias

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Nixon Library Finding Aid

Also recorded on February 1, 1972

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