Conversation 725-011

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 Do not cite this transcript as authoritative.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.

He's upsetting it half-heartedly.

He knows some page numbers.

That's what I mean.

That's what he does.

And he said, what's on the internet?

Page 534 to 568 or something.

In fact, I've been trying to think maybe we ought to have a memo for the president's file.

I can give you one of those.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Mr. Ziegler has raised the point that he thinks we should go ahead with this enterprise decision.

Is that what you think?

That's what I mean, that I think we should.

I think we should.

Yeah.

Okay.

But a memo to the president's office, right?

What was the request from the Bureau today?

Yeah, there should be.

I will be sure.

There should be a seminary.

What's it?

I think it should be shut down.

And I think for your protection, and in order to the White House did last night, that if at some point it ought to exist, if you get hit by a cannon or or .

I'm gonna be single all the time again.

that when a bold move has to be made, if somebody tries and fails, that I understand that, and I'll back him up.

But if somebody doesn't try, then he doesn't go up.

See, that's totally different from the rule of the bureaucrats.

The bureaucrats, the main thing is whether they fail.

That means most people go up who don't try.

Because people who try sometimes succeed, sometimes fail.

Now, you tell Abrams of God damn it.

I wanted him and you and the rest to make it in terms of trying some new things.

Now, they fail.

I mean, I don't mean to fail big.

But a few little ups and downs are going to hurt them.

But it's sitting on our ass and not trying.

You understand?

All right.

Well, that's what I want you to get into that whole God damn army when you get over there.

Is that clear?

That's my rule.

The rule for promotion from now on is not whether I see a fitness report, one of these nice little things.

I made those out when I was lieutenant commander, and there were all these little boys underneath me.

And so what happens is that you get the impression that

His shoes were always shining.

He always smiled at the right time.

He never thought of his copybook, as they say in Britain and all the rest.

That didn't mean a thing to me.

I mean, what we want are guys that try.

But if they try and fail, my view is I'll back them up.

But if they don't try, they're out on their ass.

Okay.

That's me you've got to tell these jackasses around here.

Our people do drugs sometimes.

What I mean is, I tried to work my way out of that place, but I'll do the bureaucracy job.

That's the problem with government.

Am I wrong?

Everybody's afraid of it.

Everybody's afraid.

They're afraid of failure.

So they don't try.

He doesn't want you to.

He says you shouldn't go out.

No, I didn't ask him.

I asked him, and he said that, like I said, we need to install Mrs. Walters.

Mr. Walters is a brother of Dr. Kroger's.

I called last night.

I told Mr. Kroger to close the apartment.

I called him, and I said, this is my, this is how I'm going to offer everything.

Well, this is, that's including the residential street.

I said, I've never eaten a goddamn thing.

I was sick, and I've never burned myself in my hands with a baby doctor's.

Anyway, so we've done everything we can in that respect.

On the other side, I asked him for his professional judgment.

As he said, the process in terms of recovery and ability is great.

The reason for it is that the bullet is lodged in the spinal column.

You can probably hear it.

Being lodged in the spinal column does not mean that there isn't a chance that they may be able to get it out in time, but on the other hand, it's a very serious problem.

He says in terms of the very best, that it would be three months before he could be back.

Last night, three months.

I said, well, what do you mean, one month, three weeks?

No, he says three months before he could be back on the fire line.

He said that the, but I said, well, there's a 50-50.

There's a 50-50 that we won't have.

We'll have a lot of people.

This is better than 50-50.

So that's the problem.

He's got it.

Of course, how anybody can be president of this country at this time, we would share, I don't know.

It's difficult for us to know if John was during the war.

I think it was such a long job.

I called and checked the record.

He used to go home.

I've been away from this damn place the only time I've become.

Thank you.

Maybe we make a mistake, but those are all pretty important presidents.

You can have a hell of a time selling them.

Oh, what a cool president today.

You know, those were the days of the $40 million budgets.

That's right.

They were $40 million budgets or less.

And they're less than that, $20.

When I was a congressman, the budget was less than $100,000.

Sure, but Roosevelt's top budget was $100,000.

And they closed the town for three months in the summer in Roosevelt's days.

There wasn't anybody here.

But anyway, that's the way it looks at the present time.

That's how I view it.

Well, I think we ought to start trying to get it back in politics.

Yes, for Christ's sake.

Mike, what do you have in charge?

All the domestic policy.

There we go.

All right, now he needs to go to the abortion bill.

Yep.

He needs to go to Morrisville, and then he needs to go to the bus moratorium.

Eric is in charge.

I'll go ahead.

It's hard to get him to do those things.

One was silent, and I'm talking about this.

Mr. President, that Secret Service agent was in surgery six hours last night.

Yeah.

Broke the jawbone.

And now his voice box.

Well, they say they've repaired the internal tissue damage.

They think he had a shattered jawbone.

His wife and mother are up there now.

This is Georgia.

Detail.

I said that we should flower as we send this on the bench.

That will be asked.

Well, I told Bob this morning.

We've got to get this, I don't know, this courier on.

There's going to be absolutely no increase in my security.

Absolutely not.

There's going to be absolutely no increase in my own security.

Absolutely not.

It's got that left-wing people wanting to appear.

This country is built to appear and all that crap.

You weren't able to get off.

I'm sorry.

There was a left-winger.

No, you're joking.

They're running.

They could run.

They're running.

The wire service was rented with the UPIA account with the reporter on the scene.

Yeah.

It was so much more complete that they ran that.

Although, I noticed the post that they found black painted literature.

As well as, as well as black issues, which I didn't realize.

What's your judgment?

Is it fixed, or is it not?

It's not.

Sure as hell it's not.

It's very disjointed.

In six months, he had only one visitor to his apartment.

That's his mother.

What is the situation?

Are you satisfied that we're totally on top of the investigation?

Nobody's going to ask any goddamn questions.

You put the FBI in charge.

They're in charge.

The Secret Service is not worth investigating anything.

Why can't we get rid of Orhani?

Well, I think probably today would be a good, you know, in the context of this whole shift, there can be some changes in personnel.

I think, oh, I don't mean today, but I mean, the event today, that's the point.

But I don't want to take it like Taylor, a sweet guy, but not a very confident fellow.

I mean, he's confident enough, but he's slow.

It's like a comparison between him.

88 on our staff.

And Brandon, once quick, once low.

I hit the ball like nothing.

I just jumped over the whole goddamn bunch.

We don't realize because you've got to have more confidence than you've got.

The only way you can get it is to take it and put it in the top.

I remember I said, I'm sure you realize about my feeling.

I realize what I said.

My theory is

If a person tries and fails, I act.

We've never failed a vaccine.

No, that's not anybody.

The Supreme Court judges inclined these and all the rest, even though some of them made some mistakes, but they tried.

But if a person doesn't try, it's his ass.

George comes in with these nice names and says they've done bad in his record.

Doesn't he have anything to do with it?

I think he should have done bad in his record.

Why, is there anything good in his record?

Yes, he went to college.

He was finally a guy.

What the hell was that group?

But then he worked.

Nothing else.

That's all.

That's everything.

Well, the Secret Service, to get back to our problem, blew the one thing that they did do, which was to inspect the guy's apartment in Milwaukee.

The illegal search and seizure.

And so we cut down on all the evidence.

But it isn't essential to the conviction, unfortunately, because they have the movies now and the witnesses.

But if there's anything in that apartment that's important, it's too bad, isn't it, Nelson?

They didn't get a warrant.

They went charging in there.

You can understand why they did.

They didn't know if this was a nationwide conspiracy to take out all the Democratic candidates or what.

But they went charging in there, and it was bad police work.

And the FBI found the car.

They didn't even enter the car until I had a warrant, which is a damn smart procedure.

And it's just the difference in the outfit.

We've got to do this.

The Secret Service has blown three burgers now.

They're out of control of this.

They're taken out.

Gray's in charge, and he's doing a heads-up job.

He's, I think, a big improvement, actually, over the way Hoover was formed.

I have no question.

Everything happened for the better.

Second point.

I realize this is a totally legal thing, and I realize it's about the National Idol Association.

I don't give a damn if a person has the right to wear a shotgun, but I don't know why any individual should have a right to have a revolver in his house.

It's a dangerous goddamn weapon.

The kid is going to kill themselves with it, so why in the name of Christ can't we go after him?

I'm a radical association to be against.

The gun makers to be against.

But God damn it, people should not have handcuffs.

Do you not agree?

Why?

I don't agree with your question, because I don't think it would solve the problem.

The argument doesn't exist.

But handcuffs are so easy.

Oh, I know.

The argument is that people who want to protect themselves have a right to words.

The criminal will always get a word to you.

It would scare people with this.

That's it.

All right.

Well, we're cranking on it, and what I think we ought to do is get a paper to you today that explains the issue and why we've had it bottled up.

We talked about that this morning.

Yeah, it was such a fascinating point.

You know, there's some possibility that the idea of the concealed weapon, or the automatic jail sentence for carrying a concealed weapon, let me say this, if we could do that...

If we could do that in the automatic fields, I'd like to move on it today, though, or tomorrow.

See what I mean?

Move fast.

That you spoke of in the 68 campaign, that everybody feels better about because no one has the right to carry it, but to keep it in your home for your protection, I bet you.

Right.

If we get something out fast, let's get a crow, get something out, and that doesn't go against this thing.

This Saturday night special stuff we've been talking about wouldn't go against this particular thing.

That's right.

Well, we'd have a federal law.

Now, this fellow transported this thing in interstate commerce.

well we have a rule outside of the transportation handguns i think is i remember getting out of that statement i mean just just get a little bit quicker well on a brand new basis though concealed weapon then i think everybody will support that first video let's get it down there but the finance and plenty of characters concealed weapons but a person's at the same time

Right.

That one wouldn't have hit the Kennedy guy because it wasn't a concealed weapon.

Sir, hang on.

He had a gun with a lighter in it.

I'm telling you, he had a gun with a jacket in it.

Honestly, he had a rifle.

Oh, okay.

But that's all right.

That was the mail that Bobby had.

So that we can say that we brought it on.

We brought a new.

I'm predicting that there will be a mandatory for the thing that what did this was mining the parking lot.

It certainly will stop their animal killer.

Everything is right.

Are they playing the wave of violence in the 60s on the wall?

Like, in other words, if I were a word or two, if you were not part of that, we would have had the greatest crime in the way of history.

You didn't.

Killing breeds killing.

That's a real word.

Killers use kill.

That's all there is to it.

This guy may never disclose his motives.

He's weird enough.

He may never know.

Probably a pathological liar.

Seeking publicity, yeah.

I don't think, there's so much hanging for a little while that it's gonna, I don't think you can do the right assessment.

I can't grow any more movement on that.

Right.

You don't know what Wallace is gonna do, which will make some difference.

I'm sure his wife and his staff are doing just what you expect them to do.

They're charging on, they, they, they.

You know, really, this is a good thing for that.

Yeah, well, I can't get some people in just because you like it that way.

It's going to be, it'll make some changes.

Well, I would think that generally speaking, I don't know what you're agreeing on, but I think that generally speaking,

There's no reason for us to let this rub off on us.

In fact, all that should happen is by being gracious, thoughtful, but not slobbering over it.

And at the same time, by taking an action on the gun thing.

Gentlemen, that's it out of the way.

If you wait three days on the gun thing, forget it.

There will be something up in the Congress today.

Maybe get it, let us know.

That's really

People squeal, but do something and do it fast.

Would you do that, Mr.

Chair?

And we're ready to go.

Let's put it out on the street.

This is the big news now.

It's a 10-year sentence for carrying a concealed weapon on a person.

10 years.

I don't think you have to describe what it is.

Well, that's, of course, the thing they've been hung up on in the Saturday Night Special thing is a way to define that.

But that's also been an excuse to not do anything.

You can do it in the firehouse.

Yeah, there are generic definitions.

We can get something together on that.

And of course, it's over.

But there's been remarkably.

I don't mean to speak for David, but the other inspector, they're back here in the dark, they're having a hell of a night out in there in check, and a lot of them seem to smell the rain that's coming down in the middle of the night, but it was thought that they were big, so I was the person to report.

There was a conscious quality day, but they'd now been a week, like we've been saying, that's the reason we've been here.

We could go for 80 hours from these doors to the right side of the issue, but the predictions had gone yet.

And the way they are in these spoiled actions, despite the attention of the president, quote, great, they've been just that.

They've been moving against the main thing that they're moving.

And the main thing, which most of our guys do not understand,

This is the effect of what we did last Monday, which I do, and I planned it exactly this way.

It is just a question of the effect on the area, on the rest of Dallas.

It's the effect on the psychology of this.

The psychology of our own, of course, 60,000 Americans out there.

The psychology of the environment services around the world.

David was talking about his little cruiser.

His big cruiser.

He said that when they got the word that they were out, the whole day they had a celebration.

And none of them had a situation that they... Oh, this girl saw a English angel here.

She has a brother or something like that.

She said they celebrated a three-in-one.

He probably talked about his son in Westlaw.

Captain, what happened there?

The barracks, cheering, singing, celebrating?

Just what?

The military saw respect as not their man, but has been recognized and revitalized again, and they realize there's now a chance that we may not lose the first war against them.

in our history.

We can't win it, but we have to lose it.

And they know it.

There's that psychological effect in the northeastern beach, too.

It's got to be traumatic.

And because, basically, now they've cut off the Cambodian bombs, they're cut off by sea, they're getting the British bomb, and we're getting the hell out of them trolling them.

And they want their deployment in the name of God, the Constitution.

Now, they've got problems.

But we have to continue on the rest of it.

And here the Washington Press Corp. was politely along, just cracked us back.

And they had a mad Irish temper, did this and that the other day.

Guess they were trying to hold us back.

Rockets was, later it was, only caution.

It was a wild war.

You know?

But they don't realize, they have no understanding of psychology.

We haven't done that.

This week, we've done two.

They were sent to Suffolk.

All you had to do was to read the weekly news magazine.

Which came out shortly before the war.

You feed the Vietnam.

You treat the Vietnam.

You humiliate the Vietnam.

Those decisions are hard and life-enhancing.

But all of this time in both campaigns, political campaigns and military campaigns, it's psychology that's terribly important.

And they know who's going up and who's going down.

I agree completely.

I was just going to say, as I mentioned last night, the unfortunate timing of Wallace was that he

Probably not to have a lot of good footage of the networks last night, but I had a few, and it was great.

And I already spatched on it.

Oh, and some of it is moving, and there's footage, and they really, it's coming through that the morale is back in the spirit, and that they're on the move rather than retreating and running.

Well, it was a hell of a risk for everybody to, you know, prepare to risk everything to fight this.

I know we brought it in memorandum.

How this comes out is important, but far more important.

So now there's any residue, and far more important than China.

It's not how it came out, but is there any residue?

Personal presidential leadership.

Get a little of that, and the story's going to be awful.

Harrison, the one on Sunday, said,

The China trip had held an impact on your image of people, perception of people, your boldness in doing it.

The question is, how much of that do you hang on to?

The question is, what hangs on now?

What hangs on today for people now?

We've got a little bridge benefit out in front here, quickly, so that's what we've got.

No, they came up with a little better system, which is they got them alliterate or something, and they picked up all their sleeping bags and their crud that they've had out on the sidewalk for a year now, and they confiscated it and took it to the police station.

They have to go down and bail it out and sign on for it, and when they sign on for it, it comes back here, and if they pick it up again, they can't have it anymore.

It's complicated.

So now it's

I'll lay your money if you went down there.

You wouldn't find one out of ten.

It was a bird's right quaker.

Oh, no, they're over.

This is the culinary FBI.

Yeah.

Members of Bremer's family described Arthur Bremer as a loner who moved out of the family home approximately six months ago and has withdrawn from the whole family since that time, but no indication Bremer's ever used narcotics or alcohol to excess.

It also ties into his very interest in politics, being a douchebag member of the Young Democrats Club.

According to Bremer's brother, Theodore, Bremer, in a recent past, was a staunch supporter of Governor Wallace, had Governor Wallace posters and stickers on his automobile and in his apartment immediately prior to the Wisconsin Democratic primary in early April.

He stated that Dr. Bremer had also been against violence, and to their knowledge, never owned or undertaken any interchangeable guns.

He shot point blank and screwed it up the way he did.

I'm going to have a meeting this morning, but they have to be asking a secret service to you.

Would you, John?

I can't lie.

The judge is in the case of the public injury case.

In this case, what matters is not the gunman in the crowd.

What matters is women in the next 24 to 48 hours.

This is a public injury case.

I'm forgetting it.

But we don't have to say that Reverend is a cop.

We say that's whatever he is.

I realize I have my prejudice of trial.

God damn it, get it said.

Remember that Democrats have to come out and get it said.

That was, of course, we didn't get that out until 1230 last night.

Yeah, but it was buried in the paper this morning by a bunch of assertions that the guy was apolitical.

And that's a line that the Post is starting to move very hard.

And I think we've got to get this out and get it scotched.

Why are you supposed to do it?

It's me.

Well, the first CPO said that.

Okay.

That said everything.

Yeah.

Well, let's do it all over the book.

We've got this.

I think the big question that somebody's going to figure out is how is this fellow been supporting himself?

He's got...

He worked in an athletic club.

He worked as a janitor for the schools.

He's got a three-bedroom apartment.

He goes out and buys a pistol that costs $100 last week.

He had three jobs, though.

He declared his net worth of less than $200 and less than $10.

And that revolving 11 is a waste of time.

How the hell does he get a freeway from the parking lot?

And without a job.

Driving in Washington.

John, all the VR, all VR, all VR.

We got on the right side of the school right back.

We've got to understand that.

Nothing, I mean, nothing that I can go for.

We can have the most beautiful, rivetingly sharing program, and welfare reform program, and health reform program, and Expo, Transpo, 66, and 64, and I don't know how to make it.

I don't know how to make it.

Foxfire's got a great line on that.

Transpo is the most ill-conceived federal venture since the Battle of Little Big Heart.

You're going to hear some squeaking about the pressure that we put on these guys when you see findings this morning.

and they apologize to you because they didn't have their report in on time, for instance.

We've got them on very short tether.

And so, yeah, I know you've considered reporting this matter, but John was using the report as a device.

It is the report on time.

The address is getting control of another thing I don't remember.

Is it my address?

It's like everybody else who goes through the horrors of the investigation.

He's got to shine.

Very.

He's got to shine.

And he wants to prove that he's a good guy.

Wow.

And so you've got to be worried that they have to turn you down.

I have an understanding.

Loyal, sweet, not gray.

It's not going to be not shining.

Because he's going to have to go out and steal.

And also, gray is the rule of the sun.

Well, I have an understanding with Kleinbeach that we don't deal through him to gray.

We deal directly with gray.

I deal directly with gray always.

I'm going to get you.

He told me that.

Did he?

No.

That's the way it's always been the case in their time, so it's best that the Justice Department not know first.

We'll tell you what we think you need to know, but you just got to understand it.

I understand it.

So he brought that back to me, then.

Yeah, there's other questions if you don't know it.

But don't say anything nice to them.

If you're talking to either the FBI or the Secret Service, if you pat them on the back and say you folks are doing a great job, I'd tell them what a crappy job they're doing and keep it from being hired to them.

I'm going to get rid of Rowan.

I'm going to wait about two weeks now.

Well, let me, yeah, George can do that.

George can do it.

But listen, I don't have confidence in Taylor.

I love him now.

Part of our problem with Raleigh is the whole, you got nothing in there.

After Raleigh comes half a dozen other guys that are even worse than Raleigh, which is just bad.

Kelly and why not Duncan?

So you gotta dump the whole batch.

The one guy with a possibility, and I'm not convinced he's right, but he's the one that Archie will think is the guy he's gonna kill.

And he may be, why not a man that we know totally like Duncan, who's with us?

I'm not sure Duncan can run it, but he can.

Sure send a hell of a signal through that app.

Duncan was my man from the beginning.

I like him.

He's totally strong.

I don't know whether he has, frankly, the intellectual ability to run.

I don't know whether intellectual ability amounts to anything.

I was going to say, I want the third lady to be with us.

He's got a lot of the same attributes that Greg has.

Nothing to do with that.

He taught school, for Christ's sakes, you know.

He talks slow, and he seems to act slow, but God damn it, he always seems to talk right.

Your problem with Duncan is that he is absolutely square with the book.

No, he isn't.

The hell he is.

Listen, I've got to hit him with that book.

It's going to pay more time.

You've got a question?

There's some really good ones in the presidential detail, but they're too far down.

He's got some independent money.

He does the work because he likes it.

He's got polish.

He's tough as hell.

Great in the Nats.

He's a super guy that advances on foreign events.

He can deal with foreign events.

We've got some awful good people.

I'm a member, but the kids are good.

what I just said.

I'm not going to have Chris come down to Agnew's testimonial on Friday.

But we've got to change the list here to see what the situation is.

But I would say just as a precaution for 10 days, I wouldn't have milk running around.

I love it because I can walk around the town every day.

Because by God, we can't just back down the hatch because the goddamn New York Times says we can't do anything.

I hope.

What I'm saying is that after the 1st of June, I want the Philadelphia, that's great.

I, for the 1st of June, I want them out.

Out, you know.

And I don't want them to be scared.

I don't want them to be scared, but I, you see, the spirit of this country is also, that's it.

And I just,

We can do some symbolic things in the next day or so before we go.

Well, I'm going to just say that I made a vow.

I'm going to tell you.

Yep.

Very good.

I see a few of the tourists out there, and I'll walk them up and shake their hands and so forth and get stabbed.

And I can do that.

Thank you.

Well, we'll think of that.

I agree with you, but I've got to be on the books.

I mean, the books are great.

That'll be a secret service.

Our police are not going to happen.

Do you understand?

The Secret Service has probably been already on the mark.

I want to increase the details for the Australian total.

There's to be no changes of any of their operations.

No entries of paramedics or other lives.

Could I ask you to have, say, their name on the lab?

I mean, I think I can see that.

Well, I don't think that's a good idea.

People are worried about you at a time like this.

And if you go across that green, it seems to me that that's a very...

But you sure don't want people to think you're foolhardy.

I think you could do something symbolic with regard to the Secret Service agent to emphasize the point that Wallace had protection, that he was afforded protection by the federal government.

Well, putting it up to Teddy, he did that pretty clearly.

That helped.

That was good.

That helped.

But I think the fact that we— Well, it's all right.

When I go out today, I've got to say a word about Wallace before I go through this damn announcement.

I can say that I've been in touch with the hospital and its conditions and the group.

But what I was going to say, what I was going to say, what I think could be said is that, incidentally, I don't know where I might be on this one.

The, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the,

Any general statement you make like that they deserve protection on is fine.

I don't think you should be in a position, I got to think about it last night, watching you at 11 o'clock on the news, where they had you on saying that Governor Wallace's condition is good.

Well, you were on at 6 saying it was good.

He could have died in the meantime, or he could have gone into a coma, and here you are saying he's just fine.

I don't think you should give medical bulletins because the news media moves you fast and you don't get on soon enough.

If you don't get on this morning, Friday 11th, Friday 11th, she said it.

It's period.

I'm sorry.

But if you go to the office of this commission,

You could say that you had been following medical reports not only on the government,

And you are aware of that.

And we will receive the very best medical attention.

That's the benefit.

Yeah, that's a good thing.

Then if you follow up...

Don't don't because we don't

Well, I don't know, but I don't think you can afford to acquit him at this point.

Can you do this?

Can you express appreciation for, and this is just typical of fine law enforcement officers all over this country.

Yeah.

the risk that our law enforcement, and I'm most grateful for what they've done.

His mother and wife have been brought up here from the south, and it calls to mind, and so on, somebody else.

That's interesting what he said about us.

Thanks, Steve.

He's got his son on the other side.

Here they are.

I don't need anything.

Thank you, sir.