On February 1, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon, H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman, and unknown person(s) met in the Oval Office of the White House from 12:52 pm to 1:37 pm. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 662-011 of the White House Tapes.
Transcript (AI-Generated)This transcript was generated automatically by AI and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Do not cite this transcript as authoritative. Consult the Finding Aid above for verified information.
It worked out perfectly just the way the conversation developed.
I said, no, go over city.
No, talk to him.
He called me on the phone.
So I just covered this on the phone and just said, because he's going up to the hill today.
I didn't want to turn 70 and bother him.
But the way the conversation went, I had an opening, and I just used it.
I wasn't planning to raise the floor, I think, but I did.
On the basis, I said that you wanted him to know that if he thought that he and Nellie could get away for a few days, that nothing would please you more than to have him use the floor to set up.
And then I pointed to the ideal set up.
Securing the houses, and the communications, and the food.
all kinds of facilities.
I mean, get into the, you know, there's a separate house if you want to take your family down and arrange that.
I mean, we would love to have you use his houseboat and there are other boats available if you want other kinds of boats.
Great swimming in the bay and all that.
And so he said, well, I'll tell you, he's just awfully thoughtful about that and you're awfully nice to raise.
And, you know, he's very humanly appreciative and
He said, I guarantee you that when he gets off to China, I'm going to get out of here for a few days somewhere and pay for rest.
And so what?
Nothing.
He couldn't find a better place.
Just get down there to keep his king, because you'd be completely left alone, and you can call your own shots.
He said, well, I want to get somewhere where I can get some golf in.
And I said, well, maybe he can arrange that for you down there.
There's no problem on that.
take care of that.
So there's no problem there.
And so, you know, we kind of went through everything.
Of course, he knows some others are standing there and all that.
So there's, there's a lot of things that would fit together.
I didn't think too good.
I said that John, I just let me emphasize that the president knows how hard you're working.
And he's concerned that he doesn't want you to, you know, feel that the
You can't take some of the time off.
And the problem is you never ask for any of these things.
And that's why I called the president's request to see if he wanted to go up to Camp David over the weekend.
just to get some time, because you never ask what other people do, and he says, and I never will.
I just go, I've never done that, and I never will ask.
And I said, okay, that's fine, but let's have an understanding between us that when I call and raise some of these things with you, they are never command performances, and you should never do any of this if you don't really want to.
And I said, I'm glad you didn't go to Camp David.
He said, we just felt that
We were both in our pajamas.
No one didn't feel too good either.
And it was just easier to stay home and not have to do anything.
I said, well, I'm awful glad you didn't go.
Because the president would have been most unhappy if you felt you had to go up there just because he asked you.
It would have been a pain in the ass to have to get dressed and go up and all.
He said, well, frankly, it would have been this weekend.
So the two of you ought to have that kind of relationship.
That's what the president wants.
It worked out just fine.
He was appreciative.
Yeah, there's no question.
And he said, I'll talk to you about, you know, next week or so, about maybe going down to Florida.
He said, maybe that would be a good thing.
I frankly think Florida would be better for him than, frankly, the Rawlings.
All these other people are promoting him.
And Florida also, about that long, will come over his seat line and fly him over to the other flight, take him on there if he wants to.
Sure.
George likes to do that deep sea fishing.
George's family will come down.
He loves George.
George is there.
They'll get along.
At least the ground works.
Now, if Billy raises something with him, or I can make the point that I've later learned Billy's going to be down Florida at that point.
You just never know if he wants to even have that one happen.
He'd have a lot of fans.
But what I'll say is maybe you don't want to.
Maybe we could...
You know, that...
He's curious, so he probably likes it.
He doesn't drink, so there at work, I mean, Billy there is... Yeah, Billy was making the point that maybe he'd rather not have the preacher around, but I don't think John does anything he cares about.
The preacher's catching him.
Well, that's the thing.
I think John's too legalistic.
They perfectly remember you.
I don't want to tell you anything.
I don't like to drink.
I don't like to drink.
Well, it's the talk, too.
You can't...
And that kind of bothered John a little bit.
I mean, not the drinking, but you do kind of have a different, a little less relaxed feeling.
But that's probably what I do is wait a couple of days and then call Nellie and just say I talked to John and I just wanted her to know if they were talking.
They just see the place sometimes.
Yeah.
Now, he thought at first I was talking about this weekend.
Unfortunately, he said, I can't go down this weekend.
I'm going to Texas to get the headliner of the year award.
Great.
And so I said, well, maybe.
So I didn't say I didn't need this weekend.
I let him think I did.
And then said, maybe while we call the president, he's going to turn it.
So it's a great time.
Great time.
Good.
So we made the plans there.
He's in good shape.
to be back by 4.
And I told him, don't worry about it.
This wasn't anything urgent.
Just a chance to touch base.
So I'm just going to let it stop.
The thing I was talking to him about is the question of whether or not you do anything with the Productivity Commission tomorrow, when they meet.
And I wanted to get his view on it.
He thinks that if you come in at the latter part of the meeting,
if you felt like you wanted to make a sort of a clarion call to the country type thing, but in private to them and let others get it out, that it would be good.
Now what he says ought to be said.
He says this is a damn good chance to say it to the right people.
This is a positive side of the economy.
You could hit strongly on the point that we've got controls in effect and they're going to work.
We're not going back to inflation.
We're going to make it.
We've broken the back of inflation.
We're going to keep it that way, number one.
Number two, however, we've got to put people back to work.
And more importantly than that, the 80 million people who are employed have got to produce 10% more on an individual basis than they're producing now if we're going to compete around the world.
And that's the key to our long-range economic success.
Number three, I'm the president.
I'm taking the political route now for the budget deficit that I proposed this year.
I don't mind doing that.
Because in the process of this, we are shopping inflation, we are increasing our productivity, we are going to have jobs, and we are going to become competitive.
But you people are going to pull the key to whether that succeeds or not.
And you've got to join with me in this.
I'll take the ramp on the deficit, but you've got to handle the problem.
And the American people have to decide, as I have to decide, do they want to compete with me?
And he said, I don't think he should come for the whole meeting at all.
But he said, I also don't think he should just come in and make a talk and walk out.
I think he ought to come in at a time to the point where he could hear the last report or two or something that's being discussed and then make his remarks and then leave.
And the other possibility was that maybe you have a reception, a little kind of reception for him afterwards.
And he said, I don't think you should do that.
The social thing won't do any good at this point.
He says, the goddamn commission hasn't done anything.
They are important to us, and they can be valuable to us.
He said, they haven't done anything.
He says, hell, they don't deserve any credit.
They haven't done a goddamn thing.
He said, we've got to breathe new life into them.
That's a good group.
Now, Mimi's going to be there, as are others.
And if you're going to participate, we'll move the meeting over to the cabinet room.
If you're not, it's going to be over at Treasury.
And we'll leave it over there.
Or we could leave it at a treasury and you could go over there if you wanted to, which might be where we'd go .
Back down to the treasury.
Maybe just leave it at a treasury.
I think maybe it has more impact.
If you leave it, if you have it down there, it's just so what?
You have it at a treasury and then you come in.
It could be quite effective.
What does it mean now?
Amy, tomorrow afternoon, they're suggesting you come in around 4 o'clock, the latter part of the session.
It is pretty close, I'm sure.
But you already know.
So we can, I didn't know whether he, yeah, but I don't think you have to, I think it's not a, he doesn't see this as his job.
This isn't his baby, so it isn't something that you need to do for him.
I think he would, if you wanted to say that kind of thing, he'd like that you say it.
Other than that, I don't think he might care.
It is like some of the things where he wants you to, you know, like the World Bank is like, he wanted you there because it added something to his party.
Well, since I'm doing that business from 1979, I think the points that he makes are well taken.
Might be better safe, but I think those points
could well be made in that speech rather than some necessary crap that Steve Peterson might prepare.
Well, I'm not sure.
I don't mind, but on the other hand, everything we can do is stir people up.
I don't know about that.
I must say, I mean, you know, this business elite's a pooper with painted asses, you know.
They're not much worse, are they?
The elite, the elite.
I don't believe it over a treasure in any event.
Believe it a treasure.
And we'll see whether you want to go by or not.
And you might park it down this afternoon and see what... Yeah, I will.
A couple others.
Henry says you want to meet with Ken Keating.
No.
He's leaving.
He was called back at your orders, apparently, for consultation.
I have to see him, yeah.
So I'll get you that.
I want to see him.
Sure.
I guess do that Thursday.
We ought to keep tomorrow afternoon clear.
If you do this, you keep it clear.
And if you don't, unless, we ought to keep it clear.
Yeah, why not?
Yeah.
OK.
I sat next to Keith at the breakfast this morning.
Yeah.
He said, he's really gotten old.
God damn it, he's over 70.
He's 71 years old.
He's too old.
He could see that.
He didn't make a hell of a lot of sense in some of what he was talking about.
That's the way it happens.
I was about to turn this down, and then I thought maybe I would raise it with you.
Question of a brief interview, possibly with Joe Garaciola and John Underwood, but at least with John Underwood, Sports Illustrated.
on a cover story they're doing on your interest in drug abuse prevention and the athletes involved.
In other words, it's just more of the same thing we're doing.
No reception for it.
No.
Not good.
We're going to get a good story anyway from the magazine, I don't think.
Okay, we could.
I don't think it should.
No magazine would work with mine.
I don't think we need to do it anyway.
I think we'll get the story.
We can get the story out of that with all you're doing on us.
We're not here to talk to Ben.
You know, I was sure that the period would be as rough on the astronaut thing as it was, but it's all you should have been.
It was typical of the kind of thing that I just don't want to have happen again.
It's one that we should not have had.
It's one that we've been watching for.
We should have
Glenn is perfectly right in raising that.
I don't want to discourage people from raising those things.
Because we all agree, I told you, that he's seen them before.
But I went back.
See, I didn't know until I started reading.
Well, I remember we talked about it, and I thought, oh my god, maybe I haven't seen it.
Well, I thought we were getting some flight back in Apollo or something.
And that's what I thought, because it said on that thing, the president has not met with them.
He's only called them.
Well, it was just a thumb bit of information.
And there's no excuse for that kind of stuff, though.
We didn't have a damn thing to talk about.
No reason to take it to my face, and I've had all the small talk with him before.
I have a feeling that that came from Mossacker, that there was a push on his part to try and, you know, his protocol programmed their trip and everything, that this was sort of a...
a little frosting at the end, all the way back.
Once you do it, never be ungracious about it.
I've jumped on my own people here in my office, because it's our mistake not theirs.
We are limited amounts of time.
That's the kind of thing that's no good.
I'm just thinking, you know, looking ahead.
You know, Bob, you really need a stand in this damn job.
They need it, really.
And I think the thing to do is just use the Vice President.
And just say the Vice President does that sort of thing.
I mean, the Scots.
I love seeing the Scots.
I mean, I love seeing everybody.
You know, there's nobody that I don't enjoy seeing.
But you know, you really come down to it.
The President of the United States is spending his time trying to do a good job on things that are important.
And maybe four or five major speeches a year.
And that's it.
And you know, maybe a press conference every two or three months.
They don't feel good with me.
Why?
There's a ton of the things, like talking with an Andre Malraux, where you can get some benefit to you out of this.
Where you call in somebody and say, look, who knows more than you're drinking banana?
I'd like to find out what the hell it's all about.
But we are...
It couldn't be more right to argue that he's absolutely wrong on his part.
Of course, he's quite a bit from another standpoint.
He wants to show that the State Department told me what they did.
The China trip or some goddamn thing.
That's what the basis of it.
He knows Dan well.
They haven't been talking about it.
Do you think that he feels that people don't think I'm studying for this trip?
What he wants is he wants the people to see you meeting with his people about it.
I will, yeah.
I will.
I will.
He's just...
He's done the wrong work, you know.
Well, you know, I'll do everything we can.
Well, what's it happening?
We've got an NFC meeting tomorrow, aren't you?
Tomorrow morning.
Oh, we'll do it tomorrow morning.
We'll do it tomorrow morning, yeah.
Very happy.
Take your shuttle.
We, uh, as Rose told you, I don't know if she told you, we have to take off.
Somebody to help Pat.
If she hasn't told you, she said she wanted to see me about something.
I'm not trying to, I'm not trying to.
Pat wants me to read up on Gus' hair and go do the clothes and all that sort of thing with her.
I've been trying for years to get her to do this and get away from this fetish that she doesn't need any help.
She wants to do it.
She raised it herself.
That's great.
I was wondering about that.
I don't know who you can knock off, but just we can add.
I don't know who you can add.
There's no problem.
It's not a press person.
There's no problem on an attendant for either of you or anything of that sort.
As I understand it, we can find them.
If we had to knock somebody's letter out, this is an existential system.
Just Monson's mind.
It could be then housed, basically what Monson is to you, right in the proximity of the immediate God.
I noticed he called my brother today.
That's another one of his damn stories about resigning.
You know, he's the one that says that he will resign before he can run.
He says he'll be back in Texas before he asks.
Now that we've opened this thing with Graham,
I don't know if they got her or not, but Julia's got a master's in the school of music she did that has never happened before, you know, a daughter of a president for a senior management.
Well, she's in the White House, you know, for her.
And so the Catholic school, she'll be back in a couple weeks.
It would work out to have them come in and give the degree here, you know, it might be a nice idea.
It occurred to me, too, that I ought to get Nance Field in for a purpose.
Separately from the OAS.
Okay.
I'm going to wait until right before you go.
I'd like to have Henry.
I don't want to expand it and not be honest.
They don't have a carriage in common.
And not, uh, nobody else.
Good, there's some wine.
See, it might be loaded right here, too.
I don't know.
In terms of what you're trying to accomplish, do you want to compliment a man to be able to be Atlantic?
No.
I haven't mentioned it.
We just gotta play this goal game, that's all.
We just gotta do what's best and not worry about sensitivity too damn much.
Right?
Yes.
I did Thursday morning.
Eight o'clock?
All the colors have been good.
That's good.
But how about bringing Barb?
Could you take Barb out?
Sure.
He's hatched.
And I've been trying to figure
whether we might pull him out of IRS.
But we have so few people in there that we can...
He's our spy.
Yeah.
They kind of keep him boxed away, and I'm not sure where he's going to be affected much longer anyway.
Maybe he's slow to get him.
I'm not sure.
He's slow to get him out.
He won't let me get him there.
All right.
Hold it.
On this governor's thing this afternoon, Mitchell was going to come in with Reagan for a couple minutes before the meeting with Evans and Reagan, because Reagan wants to cover the point of keeping the conservatives in line, and Mitchell wanted to get this done privately with you rather than Reagan getting into this question with Governor Jenner or anyone back where there were other people around.
I said, before the meeting with Reagan and Evans today, Mitchell is going to come in with Reagan to cover a point Reagan wants to cover with you on a political point on conservatives, keeping the conservatives in mind, which Mitchell wanted him to do privately with you rather than with other people around him.
On those mails that I was sent, you might take a look at them.
I'm not going to be able to get through much of it anymore.
And I guess that maybe you could tell Alex to, from now on, ask John to sort of go to the staff.
I don't care about it, so I don't know.
I don't know, sir.
Okay, I'm the FYI stuff and all that kind of thing.
You know, sort of on the basis of like, well, what do they think I'm going to be seeing?
Let's see.
I don't think they're planning for the 14th.
They can't go to that.
I don't think they've ever gone to Capitol Hill to leave before.
They have to survive it.
They're talking about Scotty Reston fighting him over for two and a half hours with the full bride of John Gardner.
I think it's a pretty pathological answer.
I think this is going to fall apart.
I really thought Scotty Reston was really that person.
I don't think so.
I don't think so.
I don't think so.
Because I was going to be excited.
And I said, can you imagine the incredible arrogance of that guy to think that he could call you over and ask you to fill him in?
And what's going on?
And the thought that what he thinks makes any difference to anybody.
And also, his idea, well, the president just wants a victory.
And I said, what's wrong with that?
I mean, assuming that was the case.
But Henry is, you know, I'm trying to, he got a lot of people in the staff there, by the way, I guess.
But there are times that they come into me and they frankly just, they're frankly furious.
I don't say it.
They come and say, we got a good editor on the Times.
I say, what the hell difference does it make?
None.
Don't pay any attention to this, good or bad.
It means nothing, believe me.
It means nothing.
They only do that because the trend across the country and what the trend across Russia can do is good.
We know that.
But don't you agree that we are looking at it and it's no use to get excited about it?
I don't think per se it should do us any good.
And that, I mean, those are three totally discredited guys, Russ and Fulbright.
And John Gartner.
Gartner, my God, his whole thing is crumbled.
They're grasping at the straws to try and pull themselves up.
Oh, yeah, the common cause thing.
Good.
Running out of money, running out of people, running out of interest.
His own staff has turned on him.
Thank you.
Thank you, Steve Gartner, for what he really is.
I wonder, who's going to do that self-promotion?
Some of the people, you know, that have been involved over there, just a ton of our people have been embroiled in some of the press stuff.
Plus the fact that their advertising has all stopped.
There's no new stuff coming out of it.
Well, the asshole is off kicks and restraints and all that.
His latest deal is that everybody should get out their campaign financing and print it and the rest is bullshit.
He knows better than I do.
He's just trying to embarrass us.
They're not making much money out of any of this stuff they're doing.
I have an idea.
Honest human interest.
Nonsense.
Oh, I guess he'd be too much of a pain in the ass to have around.
But, uh, I wonder if you don't need a certain... a bracy...
almost aggressive type of one in my career.
But I don't think he's gonna be critical of you.
I don't.
Part of the problem with him...
He drinks a lot.
Well, yeah, but it's also sort of the sapphire problem in a way.
It's pretty hard, when he gets into things, to keep himself up.
Don't worry about it.
Well, we've been coming through the years, the other thing is, it's just terribly difficult.
to get out.
I think we just have to realize it.
We're getting a lot more than we ever have.
We keep getting more.
What's that?
We're getting more than we have.
Sure.
We do get flips here and there.
I mean, you just have to do 10 times as much to get one little thing as anybody else would have to do to get a big one.
Yes.
And that goes with it.
No, but you do, just in the normal course of life, you do it.
And we just gotta get what we can out of each one of you.
I was just thinking last night, I know this isn't true, but Kennedy Johnson, he might have dispersed, but eyes and heart, they just didn't see anybody.
You know what I mean?
He just wouldn't do it.
He was busy being president.
And I mean, the impression is that we're not available, not doing much in the rest of Christ.
When this goddamn press tour got invented with Eisenhower, it was something.
There really was, you know, at a band.
Like, when he was down in Augusta or something like that.
Like, we had a band workshop, you know.
Ziegler gets a briefing every goddamn day.
Wherever we go, you know, we always have something else.
We're always doing this.
Of course, he tried.
We don't give him too much.
He tried it out every Friday for that press conference, isn't it?
Yes?
That's true, that's true.
The company had one every week for a while.
But the point that I made is a different one.
I mean in terms of the sea of people that are registered.
Yeah.
Not the press conference.
The press conference.
It is.
It really is.
You're as far as getting credit for what you're doing in the sense of volume.
and quality from a subsidy point, I think you're in very good shape.
Where we have never been in as good shape as we ought to be is credit on the human part of the vision, the personal skill and all of those things.
We get some.
They talk about it a little.
But the myth just isn't there as to, although we talk about it,
And they report the fact that it's talked about, but they don't buy it.
I think that's the reason they don't buy it.
In their hearts, they don't buy it.
Because they won't let them sell it.
They'll, well, it's weird.
And that's the difference.
You didn't have to sell it because they bought it.
You get a chance to bring it down here.
Or have it on the desk.
In our hearts, they don't buy it because...
You know, we can have a little story, I mean, like everything from Indian boys and deaf people to the... Well, the Indian boys, they did, Bobby.
I mean, they brought that up.
But what I meant is, you go through the whole thing, and they'll give you one or two a year.
The reason is that they know they have to.
There's too many of them.
That's right.
They've got to maintain some credibility.
But they don't, Bobby.
They just don't want them to bring...
frame themselves to write anything or say anything that is favorable to us, unless they have to as a new thing.
That's really what we get out of it.
We really get out of that, don't we?
Time and time again.
So the answer is we have to force them to have to, which we've done.
Yes, we have done some things in a way.
But you know, I don't see anybody that I'm removed from all these people.
I see astronauts and football teams and Boy Scouts and, you know, Christ.
The exhalation one is a year past itself.
We don't have a vision of that anymore.
So we hammered and handed it away to them.
And they built a hell of a commitment just by saying it.
By saying, nobody can get to the president.
Well, it just wasn't true.
Part of it was just getting to him, the talk time, and so forth.
But I think what I'm really thinking about
People bother in the human side of this office than they are on the other side.
We don't realize that enough.
I mean, our whole domestic staff is oriented toward program, program, program.
Bullshit.
I mean, I've got to call Rivikoff.
So I call Rivikoff.
And Buchanan's delighted in the rest of it.
Nobody gives a shit whether I call Rivikoff.
Believe me, that doesn't matter.
They care how a lot, you know, whether you're
doing something nice for somebody.
It's really quite true.
But you don't think for one minute that that sort of thing... You look back at the Kennedy stuff.
What did he play up?
Little gestures.
The nice things.
Right?
Believe me.
Yeah, some.
The flair, the...
But every time he gives you anything nice, well, I mean, he had it a little better than he asked when he did that room.
Boy, it got a hell of a point.
And that builds up the idea, I mean, the idea of, well, you know, the cold man, gory man personages in this thing.
I don't give a shit what they think about it, but I do think that the facts deserve reporting.
That's the point.
And I don't know, maybe...
There's a whole lot more realizing urges to do less of it, because he realizes he's got to do better and stuff.
It doesn't matter if you have a hundred text notes or not, you aren't going to be able to do it.
You've got to keep working it every way you can.
All right, well, I'll take the, I think I'll go over to the other side.
Now, let's do this.
Take a look here.
Yeah, I was going to say that the, uh, Connolly and Ford, if he gets there yet.
If he doesn't, there's no problem.
This governor's thing tonight, is it to call on two or three of the governors to say something?
Is that a good idea or not?
I think it is.
They like to sing.
Do I have to give a goddamn speech?
Is that good?
I don't think you have to give a speech if you've got to say something.
Yeah.
They don't expect much, though.
Well, I mean, it's how much.
Great guys are part of a team, and you know, that kind of crap.
Yeah.
They don't expect anything if you're doing this as a social event.
This is a social event at the end of the evening.
It should be just a nice pleasant evening, really.
The whole dilated dairy, which you'll find extremely interesting, is the crust.
At the moment, it's giving us a few little bits and pieces because they have to build up credibility to the time they're going to be shot.
Yep.
Sounds like a series.
I tried that yesterday.
I did, and he said, as we were kind of watching, he says, well, they're up to, he says, he's seen it, he's watching for years.
He said, and he has that, but that is Jewish.
Is it?
Oh, yeah, it is.
And so Gaia, you know, Gaia knows these people by the back of his hand.
Yeah, he's a repulsing Jew.
And so Gaia, Gaia says, he says, you just cannot estimate the hatred Christ has.
You've got to show it to him.
You've got to show it to him, because he must be under illusions.
He's ignorant of it, doesn't he?
Yeah.
But Ziegler also recognizes that he's got to throw out the urgency here.
And I just want to tell you, Klein will buy it to a limited degree.
He buys it to a greater degree than he ever used to, but he's, you know, well.
And we're not using Klein with those people very much.
Klein's shuffling around with the publishers, commentators, editorial writers.
What I have is, in the back of my mind, and I apologize for that,
I haven't read her testimony, but Buchanan says it's just superb, which we can be suspected of it.
And we're moving up the whole program of getting that out.
Buchanan's point is we can get that testimony, which is a small package, to many thousands more people than we give the book to.
And more people read it, but they won't read the book.
The book is hard reading, in a sense.
It's fascinating once you get into it.
It is the kind of thing that a lot of people are just going to pick up and eat up.
The testimony is a little more sensationalized.
Well, anyway, I just give it a hell of a play.
They'll bury it.
They'll bury the testimony in support.
But you put your finger on the problem.
God damn son of a bitch in Christ is... is...
He's so violent against us that we, we somehow...
I mean, you know what really shows and demonstrates that we're almost a third way.
Henry Kissinger, the busiest man on this man's staff, the guy that I had a talk with yesterday afternoon, you know, he was on, I'm trying to reach him.
He travels his ass over Scotty Reston's house and spends two and a half hours with Scotty Reston.
Now, Scotty Reston isn't worth his time.
I mean, he should have treated him with cold contempt.
Cold contempt.
He's done that now.
He's done that.
And Henry loves it.
And it's his ego that we hope.
And he'll think maybe we can change him.
And he's just like a little kid.
He's almost a thing.
Isn't it wonderful?
Scotty Preston is very worried.
He wants to learn what the facts are.
He may be worried.
He probably is.
There's something there, isn't there?
He probably is worried.
Well, the public opinion must worry about some, isn't it?
And when they see things like that, you've got to be careful about getting pleased about that.
It doesn't please me, but it has to bother them when that new Republican cover editorial is as strong as it is.
I mean, they've got a problem.
Well, the whole establishment does.
Because they're getting caught with their hand in the cookie jar.
We'd have put them in a hell of a position.
in one hell of a position.
It's just, you figure, if you were sitting around, if you were Scotty Rustin and James, what's his name?
John Gardner.
John Gardner.
Right, yeah.
Fulbright.
You're sitting around trying to figure, what do we do now?
I'm sure that wasn't a big idea.
I don't know if I'd ever think of kissing you as a, as you have with us.
I'm sorry.
I will, I will.
I appreciate your concern, but maybe, you know, you're a smart fellow, give some thought to it yourself.
At least you're on a bad wicket.
At least nobody on the staff has suggested that I see scum.
No, sir.
They haven't.
They've gotten to me.
Nobody has.
Good.
Yeah.
That'll be the next thing, I suppose.
Hardly any other kind of program.
Never.
Never.
Because he was in the China.
Never.
Do you want to get Gardner arrested and
I don't think he should degrade himself by talking to those people.
He can't change the world.
If they're sweating, let them sweat, all the better.
Don't ever go back to him.
No, he talked to me after he talked to you.
I hadn't seen him earlier, so I didn't know, but he came in and came in like a little while ago.
He tried to see me earlier and said, oh, he's happy.
And I thought he was going to disabuse me, because I thought you would, but anyway.
I didn't disabuse him.
I said, it's very interesting.
Obviously, then people are in trouble.
So Henry's like, but it's an incredible arrogance that they would take it upon themselves to order you up to waste your time explaining to them what you're doing.
You see, if you had any fair-minded press, they would take, I mean, I mean the TV and the rest, they would take that over.
Even something as insignificant as that speech this morning wasn't incidental to the crowd.
It was a hell of an important crowd, you know, half the Congress and the Foundation for Racing.
But they give that a quite a play.
They will not, because they are so...
Remember they did it last year.
They did.
I know they did it last year.
You didn't even find about that.
One that will carry a couple minutes out of the magazine.
The kind of flavor, Judy, that's here at this time.
I wish you could see it.
I'm referring to something that's far more elastic.
That isn't pit network because it's a hole, and they won't carry a hole.
No, but the thing about children, the concern about the children, that they would pick up that part of it.
That has a very universal appeal.
It's good what it is.
That is for America still something of a real thing that they ought to carry, though, is, which I think, how it was done.
I mean, I told, no, I mean, the fact that it was,
basically the style, all that sort of thing, and the general quality.
It's the fact that, you know, I tell you that Henry, for example, was unable to get across
Wiped it on, although I thought it was, it's called Land of War, January 25th.
The enormous work I put into this son of a bitch.
That was mine.
I did give it the first draft, and all the rest, and we came along.
They don't care.
They figure that, you know, it's kind of like, they kind of assume it's not the same as those, you know, well, or what next, so you write your own speech, so that's good, you should.
Yeah.
I mean, you're right.
No, but I mean, you've got to say, you know, in the archives, I agree with you.
I don't think...