Conversation 697-002

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So that can't be canceled.

That is one that he is a friend of a friend, has to do with a senator.

As far as all you should know is he's a guy that wants to, that is supporting you and has never met you.

Simply wants to shake hands.

Some other people are wrong.

We will not be there or anything else.

It's a very strange thing.

Yeah.

It's a shame because he's working the campaign.

He isn't working.

He's a very large contributor.

And we don't want to set him up for any kind of a meeting here.

He knows that?

Yeah.

Uh... Jackson obviously wants a job.

Why the hell do you need one?

I'll give you the best job you can get.

He says he doesn't want another job, but when he's leaving, have a look.

Sure.

Yeah, and this was going to be, and this is part of the reason we did it, was going to be Joan Crawford.

But she's sick or something now, so I ain't lying.

They're just coming instead.

Let's do it with the...

I think it's just all... Oh, I suppose then she's... That just tied you to the cancer, right?

That's the only reason?

That's the only reason.

Well, there's another thing we can do.

They cannot hurry.

There's a thing that we can add that I don't think you want to, and it's the type.

The whole drug story you said, and he did, but I don't think we need to.

I think, well, I don't know.

Maybe I'm not.

It's a little shaky right now.

That's fine.

Good.

Going back to this ITT thing, I had a session with Clint East, saw McGregor last night somewhere, and said, I'm too gracious, so I've got you out of this Eastland thing tonight.

And that got me very disturbed.

He called me, and I don't know what happened, so I wanted to anyway, but I went to the coast this morning, reviewed the biddings, where we stand now, and the point of our...

We now get into the other subsurface of McGregor is deeply distressed by that.

He wants to deal with Michael.

Well, he points out that, and Colson, of course, is totally in agreement with him, that, in the first place, Claiming doesn't know anything about what's happening on this case.

He has, as he said, stayed out of it.

The lawyer is saying he is leisure, not able, and claims to be no leisure existed.

And that would have been one of the, if they had followed their, which is just one really example, if y'all like, we can call that a shot.

We're not, that's what we're talking about.

That we're talking about only the one thing on the daily with Eastman.

Okay, but Eastman is calling McGregor on a continuing basis asking about the Republican counts.

Do we have the times?

Is Vaughn going to be back?

He called yesterday afternoon to reconfirm his commitment to vote with us on closing hearings next Thursday.

And I can call a vote.

No problem.

And Clark says, I don't know how I'd turn off that kind of contact with Eastland.

He said the other thing that you're not being told the full story on is that Eastland's real plan here is to go for an acting attorney general, not to go for a confirmation.

Eastland asked McGregor yesterday or the day before for assurance on behalf of the president that the president would keep calling Eastland on as acting attorney general if they were not able to get to a floor vote.

Park makes the point that if we turn the Eastland contact over to Kleindienst, you've got a battle between these two.

Martin said to Eastland, Kleindienst's presence made the pitch about the serious philosophical differences between McGregor and Kleindienst, that you need not be concerned about that when McGregor's motives in this are perfectly clear.

Martin said to Colson,

in other people's presence that they should not bring McGregor in on this because obviously he wants to sink Plunkett because he wants the job.

So you see this factor is in there on their side.

McGregor's concern on our side is that in trying to get the confirmation, which is what he's after,

Mitchell, Kleindienst, and Martin have pretty conclusively proven in their track record that they aren't as smart as Eastland.

They have misjudged every

that the Eastlands told them so far.

Well, you had the impression that we were leaking the confirmation matter to Comp Line Eastman.

No, sir.

I told them that that was the only thing that the Comp Line Eastman was a contact with Eastman, because he drank something they tossed with him, and we needed commitment from him.

But we're working every other damn thing the way we want to.

Well, but part of the reason they want to take the Comp Line is to talk to Eastman.

They don't object to Kleynes talking to Eastland, they object to being closed off from contact with Eastland.

On the basis, well, that's what we pretty much agreed to yesterday, and that's exactly what Kleynes agreed to, and told, remember Kleynes flatly said, you've got to keep Mark McGregor away from Eastland.

That goes back, you see, there is a McGregor-Eastland problem also, because in the campaign against Humphrey,

McGregor argued we need to change it in the Senate so that we won't have all those Southerners dominating the committees.

And Eastland apparently has that in his paper ad.

But McGregor doesn't like it.

But McGregor's gotten around that with him on other things.

And thinks he has a good relationship.

The other thing is that

Klein each now said, you can't talk to Eastland after 5 o'clock.

That was a direct reference to a meeting Marty and McGregor had with Eastland at 6 o'clock the day before.

And that's when, among other things, Eastland got back to the point of, the way we've got to set this up is to keep Klein in his acting attorney general.

And Klein each seemed that he weren't going to buy that.

He now knows that he won't buy that.

He knows it, but Eastland doesn't.

was trying to talk to her and say, oh, I see a point there that, well, this is all, a lot of this is all, this, you know, some of it is the usual thing that goes on in stats.

But the thing to do is to use everybody.

Everybody you can.

I certainly think that it turns into a relationship with Eastland.

In my opinion, Eastland's a good man to talk to.

was on the Justice Court.

Let us see what he can do.

Let us see if he can get a commitment.

But when we talk to Mike, he's just fine when he talks about the commitment.

The one thing that I think is important is that we've got to declare that Greer has got to continue to talk to all the Republicans, you know, on his count, and we'll do so.

or you got another thing there's no reason why economy spot shouldn't get the fan to work on the urban problem maybe there's a way to get an urban that we don't know about do you agree i agree that maybe there is part of it part incidentally the other side of all this that comes out of the

public stuff to a certain degree is that they're they aren't going to get a clean cut vote on stopping the hearings which is the i think maybe the principal problem what they're going to get is a compromise thing of hearing x number of moral witnesses of course worse setting up a subcommittee with teddy kennedy to continue the

that has turned to continue the, is that what the Republicans are going to vote for?

They may.

That may be what all this Scott stuff is coming up with.

But that's what Teddy is voting for.

And McGregor and Colson are both convinced that claiming to you that we only lose three votes on the committee is wrong and way off.

Well, I have doubts about that too.

But also McGregor and Coulson could be off on the other side too.

Sure.

But they're, as McGregor always has done, and I think it's the right way to do it, is they count doubtfuls as negatives.

They only go, they try to go solid on grounds.

So that no one in God said, oh, I think that's probably right.

I think that's probably all right.

This gets back to the department versus White House, Mitchell versus White House, and all that kind of stuff.

And you'll have the same problem.

We talked earlier about who's going to be the cops in San Diego.

But there I know we're not going to be the cops in San Diego.

I'm going to keep that one step away from us, even though we'll be money.

I just want one step away from the White House.

Do you agree with that?

Yeah, I think so.

I mean, I just think it's a...

This one, I must confess, I have no confidence in finding these things, much less in Martin, in terms of what they can do, what they know, how to work.

And they're single-minded.

What they want is to help.

It's a little different than what you want.

Although, ultimately, the best for everybody would be for Kleindienst to be confirmed.

Yeah.

Well, at least we've made this much progress.

In our own thinking, we know that we cannot have Kleindienst back in the Attorney General or the Continental Credit Convention.

Correct.

I just wonder, I guess it's counterproductive, whether Kleindienst ought to make that very easy.

Do you mean so that we can force her to move forward?

Or try to?

Clint Eastwood would have to say the president won't do it.

Clint Eastwood said Eastland won't do it.

I clearly understood that there is not a question here of Mike continuing his acting attorney general for anything other than another month or so in time, another time.

In other words, sir, it's all the name of an unpersonal racist in Eastland.

The other thing that disturbs McGregor is that last week he came to McGregor and said, you've got to get in this thing and pull it together.

We don't have the resources over here to work with these people.

Well, I hope you didn't overstate it to Client Hiker in that argument.

We didn't.

Client Hiker only said McGregor should get out of the Eastman drill.

He didn't talk about anybody else.

That's right.

He just had a relation with Eastman.

That's right.

McGregor's point is you can't run this thing on two tracks.

You can't have...

Marty, what you're talking about is Marty.

It's Marty who we'll be working with, not Kleindienst.

As Kleindienst pointed out, Marty is my representative.

He speaks for me.

Marty doesn't track with anybody, and all our people have said that all along.

He wouldn't track with Mitchell.

Probably you can't, but there's one thing I do know that I'm right on, on Eastland.

Eastland is tricky, untrustworthy, and does things from highly personal motives.

Now,

Eastland has never done anything, how we talk about the votes and all the rest, he has never done anything with potential or fine deeds that is strictly or untrustworthy.

Yeah, on the judges and so forth, he kept his word on that.

He worked all the way through it.

I don't think in Clark's case that he does that, that he would have, that he's just going to take it from Clark Pencil, because he considers it to be an art of the liberal.

That's what I feel is the problem.

That's right.

Eastman hasn't been tricky, but they have relied on Eastman, and Eastman hasn't been able to deliver.

Well, and isn't that contrary to thinking that we're relying on Eastman at all?

I'm just trying to get Eastman's commitment that he himself will bring the thing up to a vote on Thursday and come and vote with us.

And then, well, we've got that.

Well, Clark says that we have that.

Yeah.

And vote with us.

Well, then, why do they think Eastman are quite a subcommitment?

Is that a thing that they can vote?

Because they may not get it.

See, what Clark disagrees with me is how the vote will go.

That's in my hand, because it didn't get put easily in my column.

And Republican bygone, it didn't get...

I mean, I haven't figured through it, but I think it seems to me it got in the organ.

Except for the pressures of the publication.

Not necessarily a subcommittee, but a few more witnesses are a little bit here, a little bit there.

Mikey's working on it.

Everybody else is working on it.

Scott, et al.

What's your recommendation?

Okay.

Well, certainly my view is that they should use all the players.

Sure.

I don't believe, in other words, when I could set it up between you and Kleinke, I would set it up with you and Marty.

I said, Kleinke used to talk to you.

You're not going to talk to Marty at all.

And Kleinke used to get his own counsel.

Didn't it seem to you that Conley did rather well?

Right.

All of that's

Because he did lose.

He was a big story.

You're going to help him for election, I assume.

Contributions, he must even contribute.

What are you going to do about that?

Do our people have any thoughts still about planning?

They don't want to write a letter now or anything.

They want to talk to her.

Yes, sir.

If that makes any difference, sir.

they don't want to go beyond that they want to go where go beyond an off-the-record conversation mrs elsa never heard you you know

It was an interesting party.

Afterwards, I thought to myself, we're going to have to do that every time.

Oh, yeah, but you really, you did it with so much fire and so much deception.

And they never heard it before.

Oh, she was absolutely flabbergasted.

And I said, well, I hear that every day.

I called on him, we had a little talk, and I called on him.

Yeah, but you did 95% of it on China.

I really... No.

It wasn't...

I mean, I picked it up from you.

Here's all of it.

And it was really done with great force and also how you compared them to other leaders.

Too bad we can't do any of those.

i thought that was you know one thing about joe i hadn't realized he's becoming very very old what is this raw now that's what i'm concerned about

I don't know what that's about at all.

Well, got it.

That's it.

You may recall, I said it for some time, with the major thing you have to have here, if you have this straight up and down partisan vote, there's no problem.

I mean, it's, it's ridiculous.

If you count on every Republican running off, see, they gotta call, uh, call this thing partisan.

It was interesting that, uh, that, uh,

They didn't comment on a very good point.

Yeah.

Sure did.

And in exactly the way we want.

They put the squeeze on it.

I've worked out the right kind of people.

I worked out with Connolly going down to Texas with him to talk in Houston.

We asked him.

I asked him about that.

Good.

Well, how about Dallas?

He thinks Dallas, too, and he thinks that it's better to be an actress in Dallas than tap driver.

Oh, yes.

There's no question about that.

Oh, yes.

I know.

That's correct.

Oh, yes.

I know you did it.

I'm just supporting what you're saying.

The point is that...

He says he can get the key people that Tack wants, he can put into his crew.

Exactly.

And so the way we'll do is do lunch in one town and dinner in the other.

That's great.

And so... And he'll go down with me.

What did you, you know, Joe was telling Bob Alsop was weak with Pat.

That's where I'm at.

Because he's poor.

He polls for left-wing liberal organizations like he polls for anyone.

And always told them what they want.

He does a phone call, he's the guy that does all the phone calls with Evans and Novak, where they both say to, well, they go around in these stories, and they finish, and Dave Grover works with them some, too, where they talk to 17 people in the state, and then they say that, you know, the results are such and such.

Yes.

McGregor thinks that Laird is probably behind the Senate's cancellation, then.

I think so, too.

Sanders told me last night.

Yeah, but McGregor thinks Laird probably put him up for that.

Well, he may have.

No one will.

He said, I don't know anything about it.

I said, well, he said, look, he said, you know, I just greatly appreciated this long talk we've had tonight and the chance to hear reviews and all so forth.

And he said, I don't think there's any real need unless you want me to come down today.

That's what he said.

The one thing that I'm curious.

I see one that Larry's gotten him to get out of it because he doesn't want to be put on the spot in front of the presidential powers.

question and the only thing I want to get that that that oh

Because Senator doesn't want to be put on the spot.

On the other hand, I can't have Senators come because they want to come, right?

But if you're self-departing, if you've got to make them come, then he's setting up a red party.

We better watch what's happening here because Senators point that he isn't prepared to talk to you unless you're here somewhere.

That's a lot of bullshit because he's prepared to give a long speech on the Senate floor.

No, he can't make them come.

He didn't talk about that feature at all.

I think what is going on, I wasn't even focusing on the war powers.

I think that Laird is pulling a deal with Senate to cut troops in Europe.

And I don't think we need that prior to the summit.

So what I would...

I wanted to ask you a question.

What I was going to say is if you go down and say, look, Senator, you're not going to, we're not going to see, no, you're not going to have the meeting.

There's one thing the President could mention in that group last night.

And that is that before we go to the summit, there must be nothing which undercuts the president's bargaining power in the social sector.

Nothing.

And, for example, there can be nothing on war crimes.

And after the debate all we want, there must be nothing on troops.

And that's what I want to be trying to do with this.

I'll stop listening.

and others, but he must know that this is terribly important to this Justice Summit.

And then getting a little doubly good, you know, there's some things that Senator and Secretary Laird and others don't even know about, and Secretary of State doesn't know about, that the President is working on directly with Brezhnev.

Let me call him first and...

Well, you understand that you think it'll... Oh, okay.

Oh, yes.

Good.

Fine.

That would be good.

I'd like for him to drop down and see you.

He'll be calling.

I appreciate your giving him a few minutes.

That would be great.

So that he doesn't think you're... No, that would be more than enough for life.

Senator Sanders, please.

I was hoping you wouldn't notice.

He thought he was speaking out and not getting to it.

I thought he was going for an hour.

Let's say we get a very moving little closer, right?

Sometimes I'll just slowly go, there it goes, right?

Yeah, I read it.

It was very, it wasn't really, but it was the way it was done.

Yeah.

It's a very, and also, also the fact that we needed two rooms.

We received a room when we served George Washington.

My father was my father's minister.

He said, save your family.

We saved this country.

We can't save it.

It's a father's country, but certainly everyone who knows the history of your country knows that he is the savior of your country.

I know that it's your helicopter pilot versus the airfield pilot like the Oregon versus Indiana.

We are putting out these tows.

They're about to thoroughly ignore it.

I know.

I mean, it's a different question.

Well, because they're good.

Yeah.

Well, they're not that good.

But that's what it is.

No, Mr. President, I think that the level of the tows...

They're all about a damn tow, but you're not...

It's...

They are...

almost without exception, very subtle, and the standard of them is so high that if somebody put them together and looked at them, but the press is not looking for ways to make it look as good as... Let me ask you a couple things, Henry.

When will you get to Texas?

I want you to get this before the time thing cools off.

I hope you can go within the next week or so.

You're conserving my wealth.

Did Billy Graham come?

Oh, yes.

He called me.

Did he call you?

No.

He just called me.

It's not self-serving, but I just called you.

He said, he said, you will not be able to tell the impact of that.

It's so enormous.

He said, Howard Lentzel, I don't know who he is, Christianity Today.

He said it was turned around completely.

He was turned around completely.

He called him afterwards and said he's got an entirely new perspective.

And as a result of this, he said it wasn't just good, it was overwhelming.

The greatest mistake he made about this damn train, well, it wasn't crazy.

A big mistake was he took the cannon along.

Because he took the cannon along, he wasn't going to be sold.

And he pisses on it since he comes back, you know.

He has no, no, no, but...

in his own mind, among our staff people, instead of out of something.

Now, who the hell is out of something?

Well, that's an excalibur.

Like I always say, excalibur.

And in the right way.

You know what made him a Christian?

Pardon me, what made him a Jew?

But what made him a Christian or a Jew or whatever he is, was when he saw that, and that fight with Rogers.

You know, you remember that?

Yeah.

He couldn't believe it, could he?

No, no, no.

When did he run?

When did he reach that?

The next morning.

I just went to him on Sunday morning and started pissing on the communique.

While we were in China, while the thing was still.

And then Scali answered the phone to me.

And put it on.

Scali is smart enough to reach us.

And that's exactly what he had thought, what he had thought and said during that exam.

Not one of them.

But not one of them.

In spite of the... Did you realize all that crap about what you call it?

There's not no deal fixed by the most right wing people.

Good morning, John.

How are you?

Good to talk to you.

Well, listen, that was fun to have you there, and I just wish we could have heard you talk more at all.

Henry and I sort of, and Ms. Nix and John and I sort of took it over with that.

But we listened to you on the other floor.

I just, sorry, sorry, Mrs. Nix wasn't there.

She's one of my favorites.

I have one thing I'd like to say.

Joe Ossoff there and others, I didn't want to say in their hearing that it's quite confidential.

It has to do with the running of the summit.

And I would like that Henry, if it's all right with you, he'll give you a call sometime.

If you could get him just a few minutes and he'll tell you that it's a...

what what happens in the senate after the summit is the that's okay but before the summit there is a great necessity for a reason that he will tell you for us to play a very strong game and i think you ought to know that and then you're you're welcome to have the information

And then you can use it your own way.

You know, it's like, you know, there's some things that we just can't tell everybody.

And so he'll come down and he'll call you, John.

Will you be here all day or are you going to go now?

All right.

Oh, no.

He'll call you tomorrow.

He'll call you this morning around 11 o'clock.

Okay.

Fine.

Right.

Well, he'll just tell you that we will appreciate your help on that line.

Well, I guess I assume that would you, you know, would you prefer not to today?

Or...

fine why don't we just make it why don't we just make the two of us each other and set it up when you want at a later time and not have any captain officer because i have some things that we don't want to get around i'll be glad to do that whenever you're ready oh yeah

I think he's all right.

He said, I'd like to talk to you alone, just the two of us.

He says, possibly with Henry there.

It's the other way around.

This fellow says, look, he says, I just want to be home.

He says, I just want to be home.

And you see, he's got to know.

Now, Laird is so tricky that Laird, you see there again, Clark had got the right information because he trusts Laird.

You see, Laird's wrong on this one.

Larry's wrong.

I think, I think he's wrong.

I don't think Laird, I don't think Spanish trust Laird.

That's my, I don't think Clark trusts Laird either.

I think Spanish is President-oriented.

That's right.

Not Captain.

No, the way I would handle it, Henry, is that I would go down and I would say, look, Senator Fershaw, salt.

Fighting like a tiger against the unilateralist armies.

Second,

The President is greatly impressed by your view that the Defense Department, and his way, he did very hard work last night, that the Defense Department is extremely wasteful in many areas.

He said he's got a lot of contracts.

That's what I think is going to happen.

He's going to start some investigation on some of the overruns and all that sort of thing.

He said, and his view, of course, is that we ought to put the money in hardware type of thing, which will impress the Russians and impress the Chinese, rather than a hell of a lot of personnel that costs us money.

This is Spence talking.

So you can tell him that we're impressed with that.

The third thing is that our views with the Russians are that we're in this position that

That we must not give an inch with regard to Europe.

We can't give an inch that we can't indicate that we're going to cut our defense expenditures in any way prior to the summit.

Because I'm going to drive as hard a bargain as I can after the summit.

Then, we may be able to take a look at some things, and we'll keep in a close touch with the whole thing.

That's not what you would say, exactly.

And you wouldn't say, now you wouldn't say, no, Senator, nothing.

What is not relevant, even for the Secretary of State or the Secretary of Defense, is the President's impression of an impersonal communication with my letter.

And you can't say that this is not the President's narrative.

It's, it's, it's known expressions.

You know what I mean?

You're not going to see him a little later on, you know.

It's true.

That is true.

And your conversation with Cabrinha, deliberately, on his part, he has one most common mistake.

Oh, I know.

All right.

Then, and it'll give you the stroke, so that when you can call him, Senator, he gets the word of heart and say, look here, we just can't handle this.

Correct.

I think that's exactly right.

He has the same decency and orientation.

And when he knows what you want, he fights for it.

I liked it.

They were a little suspicious about the gynecology, but they shared the standing ovation at the end.

Oh yeah, we had to shut them off because they all wanted to get up and say they were now for us.

Well, that's their thing, you know, they come to the cross.

They wanted to be a witness or testimony, whatever they called it, one after the other.

Billy Graham just said it's now 1130, I think already.

But it was...

Very good.

Now you've done the writing.

That's very good.

But I'll go to Dallas and use my code, John, to find you.

I'll leave that in Chicago with you.

That's the other place I'm going.

That's Chicago.

No, but he gives me the list.

Now, who lives in Dallas?

The West Coast, I thought I'd say... Yeah, but that's soon enough.

That's after Russia.

But here, this time, I wanted to get it different.

I wanted to get it more into the media area, the media there, and do some television on the West Coast.

Regional television in Los Angeles has more impact than one television national show.

George Button has gone into a new format now where he has a half hour of his newscasts into a different kind of thing that might be working for him.

George Button.

Oh, he's got a huge audience.

Huge audience.

Well, it comes to another thing.

I think, uh, I want Henry to do a San Francisco project.

Yeah.

He's never done a San Francisco project.

What I would get there is get the P.U.

called.

Uh, well, I'll pick a man.

Uh, you know, he's got, uh, well, what we're going to use is a big tool, potentially, to have a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a,

Well, you know, Cooley is outside, and I've had the two, and I've had the two, and it's got the shape.

Cooley and Packard could be the, could be the joint posts.

Cooley and Packard, Cooley and Packard, Cooley and Packard, Cooley and Packard, Cooley and Packard, Cooley and Packard,

But this is in Syracuse.

It's a very elite, small club.

It's an old house.

Near the Markovkin.

Well, you can sit with 30 people, and that gives the collar of the New San Francisco, you know.

They're 10 grand decent, but liberal.

They'll buy it, I should say.

Should I take a special trip out there, or should I do it when we're out there anyway?

Well, to tell you the truth, I think a special trip would be very useful.

If you went to Texas and could go on, when you're halfway across anyway, and then could go on to do San Francisco, I think it would be good.

We need to touch on San Francisco.

We really do.

And July is a long time.

Maybe you ought to do it on a swim basis, anyway.

You do Texas, then out to San Francisco, then to Chicago, and then way back.

You could do it all in four days.

The Western Pacific.

Well, they're not going to pick it up then.

Okay.

I've got the trip to Japan that screws everything up.

What do you mean, when you're going from Ottawa to Japan?

I don't want those San Francisco bitches up there to say they're downgrading them.

Well, can I say, if that's the case, a very good thing to do would be to stop in San Francisco and overnight there on the way back, you know, from Japan.

How would that be, Bob?

I'll look at the, I'll look at the schedule.

But I'd like to get San Francisco.

Los Angeles should be hit afterwards.

I'd like to get an Orange County crowd.

Los Angeles, that's... Really, he's done Los Angeles.

About the Orange County crowd.

Well, he's done key ones, and they were at the Los Angeles thing.

Wow.

Okay.

Thank you.

Mr. Chandler said, once said, that anytime I want to, she wants to get together.

The Pasadena in Glendale Group, I don't know who that is.

Strong.

And she said, that's very important for you.

If I could meet with him, brother.

She made it self-serving, I think.

All right.

We want her.

I think I got through it pretty well.

That's very funny.

You know, I'm going to say, Bob, an interesting thing.

I don't know whether it's worth doing, Henry, but go against my principles, but did Henry tell you about my...

on how I almost puked after the meeting with that arms control committee that you set up.

Well, look, I have never seen Pete be so soft, so completely out of touch.

Well, I asked him when he thought he could just shake his head after this.

And, you know, Floyd is a senile.

Norstedt is a... Norstedt is the most repulsive guy.

No, nothing.

And, of course, Bill Scranton, and so on and so forth.

This very guy, Mark M.I.D., the Reverend, or something, said, well, when you go over there, as we were, just as I raised you, and I talked to him about the problems and all the other things and so forth, they came down and did nothing on the soft side of everything.

Oh, yeah.

Okay, I see.

And then they came.

He said, well, couldn't you put your name to it?

You're there.

You could read it.

I said, well, you know, we're checking into it.

Verification is kind of the problem.

Well, the ruina is a menace.

And he's on that commission.

Yeah.

Well, that whole thing, it's supposed to watch the arms control agency.

Instead, it's to the left of the arms control agency.

Right.

Here's what I had in mind.

I wonder sometimes if I can go to...

I'm thinking of the New York dispatch, recognizing the problems, recognizing when they get down to it, they'll disagree on the economy and a lot of other things, but deep down they will have to fear assuming that it's Teddy Kennedy.

Or us.

They're going to have to give to the country.

I wonder if I should perhaps go into the Council on Foreign Relations.

I think you should.

And get just about what I need these people.

I could be free, you know what I mean, and not pay too much.

I think you should.

Because the Bachelors are, as you know, I know they're against us when I say they, for the most part.

But the point is that I really have not, I'm not being, that is totally off the record means.

Yes.

They have enforced it pretty well.

I've agreed to, they have a big meeting in June.

Yeah, that's their 100th anniversary, but that's public.

It's a public speech, I didn't have a hold on it, I don't want to make that a council of foreign relations.

What I'm speaking of is something entirely, I'm speaking of a way that it gets across to the power group, not because they like it, but they kind of understand that I have a position.

Mr. President, they'll arrange a dinner for you literally any time, and they'll get the 200 or 100 or whatever number you give them.

Key council members say it.

The only thing wrong with the 5 o'clock thing, Mr. President, is...

When the president meets with the council, it should be a somewhat more solemn occasion than the one they have where businessmen on the way home stop in.

I mean, they owe you a special occasion.

I won't consider it if they're going to say, well, we've got so many pressures from the news magazines.

Oh, no, that does.

No, no, no.

The television that we've got to have is not going to do that.

No, no, they don't ever.

I think what you just do...

You cannot impress them by reading a prepared speech.

They've heard all of that.

The thing that would make a tremendous impression, I know the council well, I worked there for a year, and I know all these people.

If you went in there and spoke with that force and conviction and simplicity you did yesterday, so that they, because they all got the image of you of the 50s.

I mean, whenever I tell one of this group what you're like, it's an absolutely astonishing, you can't hear enough of it.

It sounds incredible to them.

As a matter of fact, I'd like to do this with a group of congressmen and senators, but I can't.

I mean, I can't tell them, you know, the...

But if you did this... Did I give off an impression of the kind of things that I talked about so that I don't even remember from the first time?

Well, first of all, what was very impressive, in addition to the substance,

was the simplicity and conviction with which you presented it.

And that it was just pouring out, first, the analogies of the key people.

And all world leaders are in that.

Yes, the analogies of the key people in relation to other world leaders.

It was very acute, some of each other.

Second, the...

analysis of the world situation which we find ourselves, and why the United States has to act as it does, what we are trying to do, what the real meaning of the China initiative is, what the real purpose of the summit is.

Joanne, who's a sophisticated guy, came to me when we, after we were downstairs, she said, God, Russian summit, I never thought of it as a serious enterprise.

And, you know, even outside, now he begins to see it.

And that's certainly the vision of America, what we need as a country in order to be able to do all these things.

When you said, these people didn't talk to me because they liked me, they didn't talk to me because I impressed them, et cetera.

They talk to me because of what we represent, and if we don't represent a dynamic economy and a purposeful country, and some theme like this, and if you present it with the vision that you did it yesterday, and sometimes you present it in an exceptionally modest way, but if you present it with that vision, first of all, it will turn around so many opinions about you as a person,

And these people at the council do have, they probably don't affect any vote, both of them do, they don't affect any vote.

But they help with the mood, and I'm sure that they'd arrange a dinner any time you wanted.

And now the attack that he's, that the establishment is starting is,

We are playing a pure balance of power game.

George Ball and all that.

George Ball, now they're having a series of lectures at the council.

The balance of power is one of the crappiest I can see.

What do they think?

What in the name of God did they think their NATO was?

What balance of power?

Well, I hit it with that group yesterday.

I said, I know you gentlemen.

before they were a balanced power.

But we had hegemony and we threw it away.

Now we have to survive in a world where we are no longer all powerful and the only possible policy is to balance the various power factors.

What, what, what is the argument?

The balls and the rest of them get everybody everything?

The argument is... What do they find?

Alliances?

Yeah, they think this means giving up alliances, which shows the total misunderstanding.

The balance of power is in no sense inconsistent with alliances.

In fact, the way you get power in a balance of power situation, it's through alliances.

The British played balance of power and had plenty of alliances.

They say it makes our allies uncertain.

They want to go back to the situation of the 50s where we could run everything, where we could organize the world.

But that period is past.

But for that reason, it's important.

It would be useful to that group if you come up there and you show up any possible other leaders.

I mean, that was so impressive yesterday evening.

I mean, obviously,

You couldn't have rehearsed this.

This came welling out.

Everyone had the sense you could have talked another two hours if you had wanted to.

And I didn't talk to Hopart Lewis in detail, but he too, he was on our side.

But I think they were all not just impressed, but moved.

I consider it very serious.

It's a good groove.

If you do it in the right setting and with force.

I'm not sure I've asked him any questions simply because... You have to do it in the right... Yeah.

Something to be said about it.

Oh, no, you can handle the questions easily enough.

But why not?

I just wondered whether it's compatible with the authors for the president, you know.

No, I do it other times.

You do it other times.

You may get some smart-ass answers.

Yeah, there is a whole lot of them.

What time do you see the rain today?

1 o'clock.

1.15.

Well, try to cut me if you can.

Oh, yeah, I would love to.

Do your best.

When will you see the Chinese?

Did Bob have a chance to tell you?

I had just started on this trip when the Chinese notified.

I have an arrangement with Watson.

that whenever he gets notified, he tells me, and then I tell him to put it in the chat.

Now, Watson, unfortunately, was on vacation.

So they notified us in Paris.

That April 16th is today, and that son of a bitch there that was on vacation called Mansfield and Scott directly.

Didn't even know if I stayed.

And... Can we get a postcard?

Now it's going to be tougher.

I'll try, but it's going to be tougher.

You know, if this guy had notified me first, we could have sat on it.

God damn it.

What in the hell is the matter with Watson being so stupid not to tell us opposite is his subsidiary that he's supposed to do this?

What in the hell is the matter with the fool?

It's a silly fool.

He knew that he was supposed to inform us in advance of these things.

But Watson was a marrakech.

That's nice, but why didn't he tell his support?

Because it's too dangerous if he tells his support and everything.

Yeah, because they have put out an order from, say, that they are not permitted to use back channels.

They must do it all through the secondary.

And we are circumventing it with our own ambassadors.

I see.

It looks like they are attacking now.

They have not.

That was the gunner?

Yeah.

I dried up the DMZ and some of the pictures again.

I made them check whether the, of course, the weather is too bad for us at all.

We must have the world's worst air force.

What's the situation there?

Is this an attack on broad front?

It looks that way.

They have attacked eight fire support bases, which is usually the way these things are.

And they're attacking within range of the Sands and North Florida.

It says they're doing fairly well.

You know, the first six hours of an attack, you have to look into how they are doing.

That's what they say.

They say they're reacting well.

I think if this is a real attack, we should hit the sands and what we are not protecting.

And we told them we were going to do it.

Well, I don't see why we don't do it right now.

It's wedding.

Well, let's wait until the end of the day to see whether it's a real attack or just a play.

And also knock off the...

I wouldn't have Porter go second back in comparison.

No.

If there's an attack, we can't do that.

That's right.

Remember you told them that.

No.

And then I won't go to the April 25th meeting either.

That's right.

We can delay it another time.

Play it very tough.

We can delay it.

So we're stuck with Scott going on April 16th then?

I'm afraid so.

I'm going to see whether...

I'll talk to the Chinese ambassador in New York today to see whether...

Wonderful.

...who I'll send a message to.

I'm afraid that... that we are in... Vietnam, about two weeks before...

But I will really lay it into them about Vietnam.

Yep.

groups are getting together.

You want to say?

Yeah.

They're getting together with Shearhook.

Maybe they've got a Shearhook out of them.

That doesn't bother me as much.

I mean, what he does with Shearhook, I mean, your buddy knows he's with Shearhook.

But if they play around with him, and we announce he comes back with some gun and has peace things,

Well, now, let me ask, what the hell is the situation here?

Well, I, Mr. President, I think it is infinitely better for us that the attack is coming down.

My nightmare was that they do it in September and October.

That's right.

If, we'll either win or lose.

And I don't think we'll lose, because if I watch them in Laos, for example,

There's no reason why they haven't been able to take Long Chiang yet, except the fact that they're a lot weaker than they used to be.

And they'll use up their supplies this way, and we know when this is over, there's going to be anything the rest of the year.

I think if this attack continues 24 hours, then we should hit them by Sunday or Monday.

I think a 48-hour attack.

48-hour attack, right.

And don't scatter it around in ways that are going to affect this thing.

If I'm just north of the DMV, is that where it is?

Yes.

Like the B3 strike there, is that what you said?

Yes, sir.

And that would get rid of the, we could take out the sands there, plus the supplies, and then they can go in with gunships against us again.

Is that right?

Yes.

Well, that's it.

Oh, Stennis, and I think I think.

I'm also going to lay it into the reading paper.

Fred has wrote you a letter this week which is very, very conciliatory.

He says he's got it.

The salt will be settled.

Are you to tell the brain that you go, first of all, do your best to cut the deal and pull it?

But the second thing, and you can point out that he can be not concerned about what I say and pull it.

He can be very sure that there's no problem on that, that we'll be totally discreet, but that I think we're going to be in a terrible position if we turn it down.

The second point is, I think you should tell the brain that.

We're rather surprised by this attack.

I tell them it's an attack.

And you could say, look, you don't know it.

The president said he wants to make the best possible arrangement.

Right.

We're all out.

We're on the same track.

But an attack in North Vietnam may make it impossible.

It may spoil it.

Well, I play very hard.

In fact, at the end of his letter, he had a rather mild expression of hope that we wouldn't bomb the Mosque.

And I can just say, well, we can't.

That's right.

We've shown great, great strength, great restraint since this.

Now, he says, we're going to have to do it.

And it's only because they're attacking.

And you've just got to keep having to knock off this attacker.

We're going to bomb it.

But I tell him, look, Mr.

Ambassador, I cannot vouch for what he won't do.

I mean, don't think that it's going to be limited to what we have done before.

Throw that in again.

These facts continue.

I think you, I believe I owe it to you to say that don't assume that it will not be, that it will be limited to the time of the bombing.

The effort is not to be deceived.

We've tried to get them to attack in February, in March, and now in December, they've been in Spain.

No, October, November, the weather was bad.

I don't know when they came in time.

Maybe in July or the 30th.

But I don't know.

Thank you, Henry.

You know, it's incredible that that Scotch man, that scum man, still went forward that way.

showed you little shit asses in the State Department building.

Those little, gut-damned bastards, you know, calling them direct, not even important.

It's like an attorney in the States, you know what I mean?

Yeah.

Trying to leave big shots about their little channel.

And of course, Bill is like, says, who did you came here to?

I'm telling these people that all the messages must come through the State Department channel.

Now, Bill knows they leave.

You know, he knows it damn well.

Well, we don't, don't we?

Don't we know?

Sure.

I saw a little flag above.

The bull right there.

Man, he sure got trapped on that.

Don't quite bug him about it, but...

The vitals turned off, and that's all right.

We turned it on.

O'Bride whines around about it.

Why didn't we allow a reporter or anything like that to hear it?

To hell with it.

We're not going to do it.

They were there.

They got to hear everything they want.

They're not going to bring any goddamn reporters in.

They've got to bring us to remember everything that's been invented.

Make their notes.

i don't think

that decision.

Coming back to IDT, that reason, your answer, I don't, let me say this, my life has been, I have been spending, and I, you know what I mean, because Colson is so terribly involved in it, and so is Clark, and actually I'm, and I'm, I'm, I'm just...

But I've got to get someone away from the damn thing.

And I can't be in the day-to-day deal about who talks to whom and all that sort of thing.

But I've got to do it.

Would you agree or not?

Yeah.

And I think they ought to get away from it, too, sometimes.

I guess they can't.

I think they can.

Can I suggest one thing that I think would be very good?

In the case of Colson, he hasn't been working his bottom line.

I can tell that he's, you know, works till midnight, high after night, and he's up in the morning.

Why don't you tell him that this is now Thursday, and that this is my room, because he ought to take off Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

He wants you to go to camp too.

He was the other side of the camp.

What do you think?

Is that a good idea?

Take a stand.

Take time off.

You won't go up there, you'll go south, and that's what he ought to do.

Would you urge him, and maybe urge him this afternoon to go together if you've got him going?

He needs time off.

He'll come back with a different perspective too.

Now you've got to keep the, enter that sign, warfare between the White House and the department.

I know that usually the department isn't worth a damn.

I also know that the White House is always right too.

Where there is a tendency when you get over here,

Everybody, you have to believe that we have all the balls in play.

You know, Henry isn't always right, despite his state.

He hits about 75% of the time.

But goddammit, you can't just assume that the other 25% is right, too.

He isn't.

Right?

Sure.

And that's about the record we have on the domestic side.

I don't care who he is.

Yeah.

What if you're earlier than anybody?

I mean, nobody's right more than about 75% of the time.

So all the brains aren't here.

Right?

Now, on this thing, you play the role.

You say, and you tell the client, he says, I suppose you called, I guess.

If he doesn't call, you call him.

And you say, now, look, we've got, now, just so we, I agree a little about what he said to McGregor.

I said, now, McGregor has got the responsibility to get those votes, and he's going to get them.

And he said, we want you, and the president wants you to work together on this thing.

Now, as far as the old man is concerned, the President wants you to deal with it directly and not Mario.

Put it that way.

Put it to him straight.

But I don't want this spread around too much.

I prefer that he do it directly.

He, this thing is so sensitive at this point.

See, Mario didn't know about that damn lawyer either, Bob.

And didn't believe that you would bring your coat in, sir.

and didn't get the thing turned off even if Mitchell told them to be arguing with Mitchell and didn't do it.

You do.

What else do you think you could tell him?

Well, I think I also raised the question of him, of these modifying factors having into this turning off the hearing and he's got to raise that question.

I'd like to start before he talks to Eastland saying he ought to raise that question with Eastland.

We've got a, we've got all these other rulers, how are we going to turn those on?

I mean, Clinton's just finally said to you the hearings will be ended.

The point is, I'm going to remind you of that.

He's got to commit to you that the hearings are going to be ended.

That means a clean end to the hearings.

It doesn't mean shifting to a subcommittee of Teddy Kennedy, or a deal to take ten more witnesses over the next three weeks, or something like that.

It means, what he said was they'll close them off on Thursday.

Well, let's see if they really are going to do that.

Are they really going to close them and then move to the floor?

Or have they got to drag on?

I mean, if he wants to handle Eastland, then he ought to take the same objective that the other guys that are handling Eastland are taking, which is try to end them.

Okay.

Clark's view is, let me handle it.

I'll have the areas turned off.

Clark says it's not quite Eastland's game.

He won't get it turned off.

You want me to bring him in?

It would be helpful.

I don't think so.

I think I should, unless you think so.

Well, I just, I didn't talk about that.

The argument for it would be his, he's got to know he's working, you know, as your man.

That's, he's shocked, which surprised me.

And I think it's probably, we could see, my niece is kind of a chef the way he deals, you know, he's an arrogant guy.

You're an arrogant guy.

He probably hit Clark.

Go ahead.

I talked to the president.

I bet this all worked out.

I'm guilty to say I don't know about anything.

It worked out.

Clark was obviously shook by that, because when he called last night, I told him to cut it out this morning.

He didn't cut it out.

But where is Olsen?

Did he meet him, too?

I think I know what they want.

Do you think that I would talk in front of Clark?

Why do we have a meeting with the plaintiffs for the purpose of getting sued for our money?

Huh?

No, it makes the point that the plaintiffs have to get out, which I won't even tell Clark.

See, I can't tell Clark and Colson what our plan is on that.

I'm not going to.

You know, I can't tell them that I told the Attorney General that was $8 for his help.

Don't ever assume that...

Coulson's office has leaked a bit.

You know, it has from time to time.

And just as any question, something leaks out of here.

And we've got to be more careful on that point.

That's why I saw Kleine's alone.

Kleine's is not leaking.

Yeah.

That's why we saw Kleine's.

Well, you couldn't tell us about that, President.

I had to prepare him for what happened at a later time.

Correct.

Sure.

I don't think you've ever seen a scene like that.

You want to?

I will.

You've got to keep the scene bringing it up.

You want to do that?

I'll see what the best thing is.

You want to clear away some of the anger, right?

Clear away the anger.

Let's wait a minute.

I'll be glad to meet with you.

You see, one of the, one of the, why did you, because you're talking to Clive, you said it had to do with what, right?

I said I was just trying to think.

What do you have in mind?

I'd say Clive, that's what I'm thinking.

Say, of course, did you know I talked to Clint East last night, he had his evaluation, I'd like to get your run down now, but he stuffed this in my mind, I don't want, no, no, no, I'm trying, I don't want to get into that, I don't want to get into the votes, and who's this and that, he's giving me that, and I'm not going to say a damn thing, I'm just going to refuse the whole thing, you know, we know what it is, some things they can, some things they don't, some things are going to be one vote, some things are going to be none, but you know, that's the point, the point is, how do we get every goddamn vote we can?

he's told me already what he would want to tell you is his concern about how where the committee's gonna end up

I'm not used to it.

You said perfect.

I don't want to.

Bob, there's one in your meeting this morning.

I just want you to know where this stands.

I told him, he said, I don't have to be responsible for the dealings, dealing with Eastman on this because of the relationship he's got with Eastman.

That's right.

That in no way interferes or gets into the other things, and that doesn't.

Well, the thing is, dude, and see, we've told Clint, I've got to back up on that with Clint.

We've told Clint to keep his work away from Eastman.

I think I've got to say to Clint, you see what I mean?

McGregor is to decline to take Eastman's calls.

No, no, no, no.

McGregor is to inform Eastman, not only to take his call, but to inform Eastman on the counts that he's getting up there on the Republican side.

You see what I mean?

Clint's purpose is to make a deal with Eastman, but he's going to do it, that's all.

Why does every person think that he has to handle everything by his confident self?

Because why don't people like help?

They do if the help will work with them.

But the problem he's got here is the help.

The people, they don't get together and work it out together.

And then, well, one guy's going off doing one thing, another guy just as yesterday.

Our guys are having a bonafide with Marty than they do with Eastman.

How did you work out the gridiron?

Ron's talked to Poe.

Work it out.

It's all done.

Now you're supposed to be in Florida, right?

What about Rodgers?

Who's going to do the response to the toast?

Herbert is what we suggested.

That's what he's doing.

I don't know if he's tough to put in.

Would it be a good gesture for you to, without having him, without taking him with us, as well as, apparently, those with us are not, because they're not staying with me, to have Rogers go to Florida?

I think he was going to make his own plans for being gone.

Good.

All right.

Just be sure he's informed.

I will be away until then.

And he should be away until he's all right.

That's the way that's left.

That's good.

So we know that he understands.

Let me say this.

I think in regard to Clark, I think what I would do, you should talk to the client and tell the client, now let's understand that we've got everybody working on this thing and we're going to have to have the prayers even on it.

You know, Ryan heard of these Republicans because tell him about, for example, what is developing that he doesn't know about and that we didn't know about last night.

Tell him, for example, some of the Republicans are going off half-assed on this drill of having a subcommittee to pinch the hitters.

You understand?

And also that Eastland is talking about enacting the attorney general during the election.

And he says, you know, Eastland knows very well we can't wheel that political.

I think we've got to keep sticking that knife right in the car.

Yeah, I think the attorney general for the election.

Do you have any doubts on that, sir, or right or wrong?

Or, I don't know, maybe I'm wrong, but, you know, Mitch was the same way, but I think both Mitch and my client base were thinking in terms of the attorney general rather than in terms of the election.

Yeah.

Not meeting you, but naturally they're there, and they think your Justice Department is very important.

Correct?

Also, you know, it's a hell of a problem to get anybody else to confirm.

You'll have a damn can of worms.

Question, you also wrote this.

Client needs to be right.

Or shall we say, sure, client needs to be closer right than client.

Client needs cannot be confirmed.

Instead, Chuck, you're making a judgment statement, not an actual statement.

You don't know whether you need to be confirmed.

You just don't think you can be.

He thinks he can be.

He thinks a filibuster will die.

You think a filibuster will last forever.

You may be wrong.

Also, we've got a 1st agenda bill, too.

If we clear out the 1st agenda, we'll be able to pull that bill.

You forgot.

And pulling the flood line could be done at any time.

It should only be done against, even Chuck feels this, against a provocation.

You don't have the provocation now.

You would have if the filibuster wasn't there.

It might make you force it close your boat and lose it.

We're going to get back in two or three minutes.

You get Colson.

He's going to go out of town.

We're going to talk to Goldstein.

Do you think so?

There was lots of things, but they'll screw people.

I think what he needs is a chef, and he's extremely valuable to us.

He's worked like hell in this food thing.

He's been doing work in many fields where the ball's been dropped by others.

And God damn it, we've just got to get him well.

It's like Henry.

It's the same thing.

Chuck is just going to be getting him well.

He'll work.

Next week's going to be hard for him.

And you'll talk, and I suggest you talk to Clark again, and then come in.

Well, you talk to the client and work it out with him, and then you come in to Clark and tell him, say, look, this is the understanding we have.

We want to be sure that this is what you want.

How about doing it that way?

Okay.

How does that sound to you?

And I'll say exactly that.

I'll say we want everybody, and we know where the votes have to be done.

It's the responsibility of the treasurer.

But there are, incidentally, I think you ought to handle with him why I had to see Clint Easton alone.

How can you do that?

Well, I think that really already happened.

Yeah.

That I should be...

I said, this was not a thing to deal with.

This was a matter of the president arriving in an understanding of Plunkett on how, whether he was on the various alternatives that might come.

And he doesn't feel anybody else should know.

And obviously, it was a, this wasn't a local kind of thing.

I said, yeah, but you've got to ease on the relationship.

I said, that's right.

Plunkett's great.

I had to sit down because Plunkett told him that.

I think he and Chuck, in a sense, kind of beat on each other, too, in that they both liked each other's mislead, as he and Mitchell, they talked, like Mitchell and Martin.

Yeah.

As they did on the Chief Justice, or on the Supreme Court.

Right.

They could always be a time traveler, right?

Can't assume they're wrong just because their track record has some blood issues in it.

It has some successes to it.

What does it matter the type they have?

We have better than you right here.

Look, I have an idea.

I'd like for you to get Clark in and say, look, I just want to tell you that there's absolutely no, we have total confidence, the president has total confidence

that could be believed.

In fact, nobody can know what he's talking about.

And you shouldn't know it.

It's best that you not know.

Just put it to him that way.

And as far as the other thing is concerned, we've got to play every stop on this orbit.

And you're going to be in charge of this boat here and so forth.

But can I say one thing?

I would like to keep Colson through a little bit further away than that.

I think, Bob, that they intend to get into, frankly, get a little bit too involved, you know what I mean?

And get the White House involved.

And at least, you know, or if you don't agree with me, I don't think it leaks from there.

I think what does happen is Colson pushes hard on people who don't like it, and then they said to me, you know, that Colson is doing this on behalf of God, the Senate, excuse me.

So Charles pointed out, he doesn't do it, nobody does, nobody else will get it, if I get this stuff done.

I think Clark is better than Colson at this point.

That's what I mean.

And he's supposed to be getting the votes.

Isn't that really the difference?

You tell Clark that, and then bring in Walter Johnson, working with him, who is also, you know, supposed to be with him, so you've got no problem there.

Yeah.

And then you bring, you come in with Clark, and you say, now, bless him, you see him.

It's not a good idea.

You ought to talk to him about these things, not this one.

You should make the old man be up.

Well, I hope I get it before he calls.

Hey, fine, get right at it.

Helpful to take care of it.