Conversation 752-009

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The last was, it was not a heart attack, but it was a, that's what they put out.

I don't know.

I'm always impressed by Moore Allen.

Strong, bouncy, tough, hard-working, upbeat, and quick, quick.

I was also, I had not met him before, but he's a good friend.

He's a promoter.

I don't know what he is, but I don't know how he can do it with four people in it.

I guess he shifts it all over, but he's not sure he's going to do it.

Well, see, he has the whole correspondence section, and it was all the routine stuff.

He's only dealing with non-routine.

Those people are only dealing with non-routine correspondence.

Right.

Well, as it goes on, even the political correspondence, that thing is going to have to be probably expanded some.

But at least, and I understand that the Price Group writes letters too.

Oh, sure.

That's their job to write letters, and of course it uses all the department.

I see that in history.

But it's very important.

It's very important.

It's very important to think in terms, to do a thing of notice, to think in terms of now, as I told him, I want to really comb that stuff for some nuggets that we can use.

He said, it's like passing for gold, finding any work file in the mail.

But I said, look, you may get it after our convention and after theirs.

The other thing is, I think we ought to be really trying to answer the mail

political realm as much as we can so that we don't get into what, as you know, what we all know is not decisive.

Let's not have, let's not have a situation where they think they were not taking any potential people right in.

And like, on politics particularly.

And I let the other hell go to hell.

If it has to.

I've let it suffer.

It's a routine male volunteer.

And we have, let's just take a little more time on that.

But I think the political mail should get the highest priority at this time.

People are writing about speeches, about the people who mentioned the rest.

And at the end, I feel you can just forget about it.

And I feel it should also all be kept to Christ, but not replied to.

I want that to be a general tactic.

And don't worry about it either.

Don't answer it.

Don't worry about it.

Robert worked with us in 62, a little, in California.

His wife was her client secretary or something like that in 60, but it's... No, no, no.

He's been, he's worked in an advertising agency, I guess, as an art director or something like that for a while.

But he's been in...

I came in the insurance business and then the alumni business.

He worked at the UCLA alumni membership promotion and that kind of stuff.

And then became the director of that area and worked at some other alumni place.

Then went to an advertising agency, I guess, and then went on straight merchandise.

Good.

Well, he's a good property.

He's strong.

There's...

He's a quiet guy.

I don't mind if he's an inside guy, but that's why I don't get him.

He has a great speech.

Yes, I call him his mountain cat.

He's obviously top of the list guy, and I can tell.

Now, my view about the speech group, as I saw it, I think it's too big.

I guess it's a great response to hear my insistence that we try to get some better stuff done.

a little concerned about one thing, I think.

Are you, are we quite sure that adequate checks are made on where the political loyalties are?

That worries me a little because of the size of the group, you know.

And yeah, I can't tell much about them, but I,

I mean, they do not impress me too much, but I can tell that they didn't all speak.

And you can't tell if you're meeting that many people.

I don't know.

I think maybe what we should do here, and maybe it's not too late to do it, rather than telling Christ to go out and get somebody, is that maybe we get somebody.

Oh, yeah.

The last student, I'm not going to come out.

I don't know.

Rodney Campbell and Eric Bakshi.

Have you read this acceptance speech, Chad?

No, I haven't.

There's a start.

I was surprised Rodney Campbell said that.

Chris, Ray points that out.

He had Campbell and Bakshi and he's doing without any guidance just to get a feel of the guys.

You've got to get us a feel of the view from the outside.

And he said, you won't like them because they can't, they aren't mixed and honest at all.

And they haven't been given the opportunity.

Well, listen, it's hard to work in a vacuum.

And out of that, Campbell, they both have some good ideas.

Campbell was this all-Republican, which is a logical trap you follow.

I like it.

I think that was all that was needed yesterday.

It's your Republican Congress, and the Republicans and I said, what are we going to say about the Republicans?

What are you going to say about the Democratic Congress?

And I said, you're not going to refer to the Democratic Congress.

You're going to refer to the Congress, not the Democratic Congress.

And what are you going to say about the record of the Democratic administration?

And I said, don't do that.

Just say, let me mouth these things.

I said, I know this is tough.

It's much harder to say it the other way.

It's much easier to say that.

You know, I gave them a little guidance on some of that stuff.

independently came up with a concept that just fascinates the hell out of me, but maybe it doesn't work, which is using it as a basic thing, and I don't know, maybe it doesn't fit in your speech, maybe it does, but it sure fits somewhere, which is let's talk sense to the American people.

At least he was designed in 1952, I don't remember very well.

They haven't been talked sense to.

And there's a whole, you'll see it in the speeches that this is leading to the right.

And he grabbed her lines.

I went into that with Ray.

I said, no, Ray.

I also, I said, I just want to urge her.

I said, you've got to get some.

all right

I know, but his side is different.

He's just not, it's just a good line.

It's all right.

It's the same thing we've always had, but it just...

But you know what I mean by that?

Campbell, well, Batchel and Campbell both have done, Batchel's done some speaking and has been a speechwriter, not an editorial writer.

And maybe...

I don't know, just tell the story.

A number of philastronomy got a lot of replay time.

Replay what?

Time.

And a couple of them tie time into Jesse, the little black girl with the flood.

Jesse.

Yes.

I sympathize with him.

I think speech writing is the hardest thing there is.

We've been here for four years and haven't had a problem.

I mean, there's times it comes close to it.

I wonder if we are correct in thinking that I should just try to get up there and deliver it.

I just wonder.

What I'm getting at is I'm wondering if it is necessary.

I've never seen teleprompters.

That I do not do.

I've never seen teleprompters.

I don't like teleprompters.

It's a change in style.

The other point is that

However, in both the case of the acceptance speech, just looking back to 1960 and 1968, both were very successful.

Both of them I read.

However, having read them, I don't think they lost much from reading, or did they?

No, they were both goddamn successful speeches, though.

And you read them.

You had this script in front of you.

You didn't read it all the way through.

You knew it so well.

You were up off the paper an awful lot of the time.

I'm just wondering.

I'm just wondering about the... You don't have a strong feeling you can read.

I may have to read it.

That's my point.

I don't think that hurts to make a coaching...

read the statement.

I hope you're a little better at reading.

I mean, I... Well, that's important.

It would be, I think it would be much better off to give a 20-minute break.

Well, we've got a speech and a rambling.

Yeah.

Except for any speech.

Right.

The problem was Jimmy coming, so there's a rambling.

I could do a text-to-reference, not a rambling one, but it just, the question I thought I'd have is whether I could get it that much into

I think it's probably better to go on the basis of reading, but with the basis of working and reading as hard as you can so that as much as you're as familiar with it as possible so that you can go through substantial chunks now and then without looking down.

Which you do.

Well, we've done some of these Vietnam things that we've worked on my whole life.

Do you think something like Tanya can be repeated?

Yeah.

I think they're right.

You know, I think they're right, too.

You can play back to it.

I can play back to it.

It has all kinds of...

But you see, I'll bet you the way a bulldog wrote it, without having seen it, is this.

As I said when I spoke on Russian toleration and so forth, that's not the way to do it.

The way to do it is to just start writing, just to say, when I visited London on that night, as I was leaving, there were 300,000 people in my shop, and I saw the diary of a child getting read as follows.

You see, Ray, Ray is a goddamn honest.

And if I've ever said it or read it before, he writes it like that, as I pointed out.

And you kill the story.

You realize it.

The first thing is, you know that you don't bother about Joe John.

If you've ever said, have you...

Have you ever heard this joke again?

You kill this joke.

You've got to go flat out on the joke and say, you know, that's a great story.

Here's a great story.

Here's one I told you before.

Or I used this story before.

Or you may have heard this before.

You immediately kill the joke.

You've never heard a comic saying that.

He always talks, even though he's got the oldest contact joke in the world.

Bob always repeats old jokes.

But have you ever heard him say, as I said...

But, and the timing thing, there's no need to, because the people who heard it before will say, oh yeah, I remember when you talked about that to the Russian people.

See, that's the other thing.

You didn't use it in a speech to the United States.

You used it in a speech to the Soviet Union, which happened to have been played in the United States.

Right?

We don't have to worry that people didn't see it.

A lot of people didn't see it.

Oh, three more questions.

That audience is clear.

It's a moving story.

It's a really good way to kind of show that you see speech right at your home.

I work a few days, but I don't tend to start work on the section.

I'm glad we got this.

I don't tend to start work until next Saturday, not this Saturday.

Do you see me?

I'm correct.

That's really good.

This is a lot.

That's right.

That's what I need.

Everybody's glad and delighted to do it.

It's just a question of time.

Sure.

I got that word earlier yesterday.

It's on the shift at 8 on Monday and Tuesday, and I'm not sure why it wasn't done.

Let me ask you what we should do on that.

Should we get, should I think, say they're in here, and we talk about it, and we format it.

I don't have a reading book tonight.

Oh, yeah.

LBJ, not serious, resting well, no evidence of new coronary, but we may have an observation for three or four days.

This is a cardiologist study.

Yeah, it's on these episodes of Wallace right now.

Yes, and yeah, there really is,

Sir, he's still breathing.

You want to see if he's finished?

Yeah, sir.

He's still here.

Yeah.

I'll do a regular call.

Yes, sir.

Can I ask you a question?

Do we have any funds that Sam doesn't know about this time, Cash?

Well, we have cash that Sam, yeah, we have some cash that Sam can't, can't do anything about.

So, I mean, he knows we have it.

Yeah, but we can have it with a non-reporting way, but we've got to do something.

Yeah, but we may have to do something like that with Tom.

Yeah, and Rosa's got some cash.

Okay, that's good.

But, uh, so...

We don't have as much as we were going to have.

We have about $300,000.

But we can get anything we want.

We got scared.

Everybody got scared because of the spending law thing and the problem of getting ourselves tied into cash that we get.

We have $300,000 left.

It's in our cash in boxes.

And it's hard finding the roses.

We can tap.

We also have cash that they have that we can tap.

We don't have to use only our cash.

There is unreported cash over there that will extend in our direction.

Oh, a little bit about Henry Kissington going to the Jewish fundraising.

He came back from fundraising, and I said, now where's he now?

He said, Henry's, it seems to me, Brayden has caught him.

When they asked about it, I said, who made that charge?

They said Tom Brayden, and I said Tom Brayden.

I said, Henry's free to go to any group he wants to and talk about whatever he wants to talk about.

I said, but let me just tell you this.

I don't think Henry Kissinger would be the best fundraiser in the world.

We've got people to do that.

I said, Henry's a very good foreign policy advisor.

He's committed to the fact that the president is pursuing the right way and so forth.

And I'm sure he's going to be talking about that.

But I said, Henry's got an awful lot to do around here.

There's a lot happening in terms of foreign policy, and I know he spent most of his day working here at the White House.

When he wants to go out to lunch, I'm sure he feels free to do that and says what he wants to about foreign policy.

I said, no matter what kind of a naked

twist, a columnist tries to put on them.

So we went through that.

Got into the dams of Dykstein a little bit, and I referred it to Rogers, and I made it clear that our policy had been followed.

I stated clearly, I stayed away from Waldheim, but I made the point that I said, look, you guys have been around for a long time, most of you a lot longer than I have been, and I said, even I can see that this is a very clearly patterned propaganda

all of you know that there are 2,000 miles in the complex of the North Vietnamese dam and dike structure.

All of you know that each year there's flooding that occurs in the North Vietnam.

All of you know that each year the North Vietnamese try to blame that flooding on the United States.

And I said there's an effort here that is, I think, quite obvious, especially this year because it is yesterday.

But our policy has been clearly stated about this.

There's nothing more to say.

What about the civilian killing?

The civilian death?

I said, Helen, I said, Helen, the reason we are taking the action of providing air power against military insulation, high insulation in the North, is because North Vietnamese sent down 15 divisions in the South to conduct war.

I said, when war occurs, unfortunately, death occurs.

And that is why we are making every effort, the President is making every effort, to end the killing by stopping the system, by assaulting

which, you know, without saying what about the killing themselves, I don't know.

Property reviewable.

Of course, we talked about the Security Assistance Act, and I made it clear that it is the president's office stated position, it's the administration's position, that we need the security assistance legislation

for national defense in order to conduct foreign policy, which we feel is the right foreign policy in this country to pursue, I say, the president.

I said there are a number of actions that could take place now to achieve a security assistance bill.

Other congressional actions.

Therefore, we intend to pursue a legislation to provide for a series of .

I think it's true .

And, of course, our president, Percy, you know, Percy is launching his campaign for the presidency.

You know, he's launching his most important supporters.

Totally, totally knocked down.

He's terrible.

Terrible.

You know, he doesn't realize that Percy in order to get his campaign for the presidency off,

He doesn't need the lips.

He needs to conserve the honor.

He doesn't play the right audience.

The Republicans are not going to lie.

The Republicans' lips are not those that control every convention.

That's why they're not trying to reform the convention.

They don't get it reformed.

When I was asking about the security assistance failure last night and whether or not the public voted for it, I said, well, I

unilateral withdrawal, I referred to it with a fun cutoff.

And I said, also, because of the fact that it cut out all aid for South Asia, Section 14, which has a question of constitutionality about it, in other words, the base agreement.

And I said, there were a number of elements within the security assistance legislation that many people just wouldn't buy.

I said, that doesn't mean that they don't support security assistance.

It's the writers and amendments attached to it that you can see why they wouldn't agree to it.

And then I said, the amendments

unilateral withdrawal and fun cutoff, we have said before, hinders our efforts to bring them into the war through a negotiated settlement and indeed could do those negotiations much harm.

So let me ask you a question about what we ought to do in terms of oppressing the convention.

There is something that I can do about it.

Yeah, the question is whether we ought to do it in office or just go with the televisor next week.

You see, I've got to get the...

After next week, I could do it.

I've got to start my preparation for the acceptance speech.

We don't want to say this, but I've got to start it about the night.

I could do the press conference on the 8th.

I did it the week before.

Or I could do it the 3rd.

I mean, I could do it all by the press conference on the 3rd and not do anything this week.

Do you think that's best?

Or I could do one in the office on domestic affairs this week.

Or one in the office on everything.

I like the combination that you followed the last time.

It's so effective.

I don't even know if you had advice like that.

But I would like to see you do it in office.

It would show quite a contrast.

McGovern's been out there batting around.

You don't have to get into anything that he says.

But there's a lot that you can set the tone and posture for it.

And then follow that up with the televising.

Why don't we just say it?

Rather than getting ourselves stuck with what we might not feel is the best we can go on, let's simply say that I'm not aware of it.

Just call them in.

And don't make any commitment at all about having a telephone.

How do you feel about Obama?

I think it's, I think it's a good idea to do it in the office, do the combination.

I personally think the office also do tend to help, I think, Ron and I discussed, you participated in some of the sightings of the, of the, if there is any way to ameliorate some of the hostility.

I don't mean the fact that any of us have ever been forced to ameliorate the hostility.

You do a little of that through letting them come in the office and screwing around with an owner of half a car.

Is that the reason?

Yes, sir.

Plus the fact that we get our... You're out there with your case being made as you, you know, would in the first time.

Do you have another number?

We get to discipline the bureaucracy.

The whole point of the discipline of the bureaucracy, the thing is, we all look, we're all positive.

I particularly heard...

Most all of us are trying to speak in the world, and it's not a good chance, and I'm totally going to turn it all that way.

We talked yesterday about the new seminaries and so forth, but one thing I've ordered, which you'll find very interesting, and it's only for you, for you and me, more help is going to give us an excellent analysis each week.

But I told him to make it, that I want, of course, to put about 60% of his effort in hiring people, if necessary.

60% of his effort on television.

Not to break down the network, but network by network.

He doesn't have to do that, because we don't give a shit about that.

We're going to make that much difference.

He doesn't have to do that to get it.

Well, what I mean is, I don't want him to spend a lot of money.

I just want him to take the business.

I'd like to know at the end of the week, how did we come out last week?

We sit here.

We sit here like we didn't account for anything.

And we didn't know we were getting shafted that bad.

We really didn't.

And I could never convince her at 60 that we were getting shafted at all over the last two weeks.

But now, if you're going to be shafted that bad, you need to know for a reason that what we do is we say, gee, didn't we get a great play on the other team we have in Chicago?

And yet, CRIP, CRIP, CRIP, they're knocking their brains out on every other issue.

So what we want to do, we've got it all hacked into us.

We've got it, so I told you to say, 70% negative, 30% on.

70% for a governor, 30% Nixon.

What did the group score last week?

60% for a governor, 40% Nixon.

Not in terms of what we say it's important, but in terms, was it a positive story or a negative story?

And this is the particular twist.

Even when they try to twist sometimes, we come out all right.

Somebody who saw the CPS special on flavor, but I know two of them, very specific, thought it was, gee, that's very good.

And of course, Colston was very mad because he said the suspensions didn't use spits on us at all.

And they were kind of screwing up everything.

But nevertheless, the very fact that it shows some flavor

But when it was all over the ordinary slot, you could only include everybody who was against McGovern on there was a big shot.

And everybody who was for the government was an ordinary slob like me.

And that's the way they played it.

They showed, they showed George Heaney, you know, saying, I won't endorse him in all that, but there's six hard-earned black and up and oppressed boys in all that.

Then they'd go out and interview six laborers who all say they would never vote for Nixon.

Then they showed, and I hear Taylor, and he says, you know, you know,

more or less saying, you know, we think that's great.

But then they go to the precinct workers in Chicago and say they're all going to work their hearts out.

Don't show the... And then they go to the South, and they show the Georgia National Committee men and committee women who were just sensationally good for us, but they were the big wheels.

And then they went out and showed Julian Bond and State Senator Johnson.

They were all for the government.

They thought it was a good thing.

It's great.

The point is, we've got to know this.

We look at it bit by bit.

We've got to have an analysis by people so they can read that crack.

They've got to give us that.

And I said, at a second level of priority, you give us a analysis of wires, the wires in the crack, and a third, very much lower level, analysis of other loose coverage, and a fourth, in the lowest level,

I don't know what we're being done in, how badly we're being done in.

After the thing at the airport, I'm convinced that he doesn't go through the process before press section, the session of preparation.

And that's why I make the errors.

And that's why I listen to the tape.

Well, that's my point.

The morning...

where he's been studying and working with his family all the time.

See, he was down there, he was there until 11 o'clock.

I called, or 10.30.

I called Dick Gold at about 10 to 11.

10 to 11.

And he was, you know, he was still not, he was there with Dick Gold, I guess, going over some stuff.

But you don't have time when you get showered after tennis and cool down after three, two, three hours of tennis.

You don't have time to adjust your mind to this.

and to be up for it.

You've got to be up for these things.

I mean, you go over here, you're doing breathing therapy.

You've got to prepare for it.

You've got to be sharp.

So for a particular age and older, there's a little bit more time each time to be breathing up.

And when there's not preparation, he doesn't really...

He is the type that he would rather...

you would look forward to the challenge of the press conference and the opportunity to figure out how you can get some of your points across.

You'd spend the morning here because you wanted to.

You wouldn't even consider going out to play tennis.

I don't.

Or, well, forget about tennis, but if you were down in San Clemente, you wouldn't consider going out for a swim that hard.

But Tom, that's why you should rather do that, even though you'd love to go out for a swim.

I wouldn't rather do it, but I'll tell you what, the point is, to me, I mean, I don't think the so-called challenge of the press conference, I mean, the excitement of the press conference,

I know you'd have to do them.

And if you'd have to do them, it's like taking the bars and everything else.

You've got to sit in your fin and remember that the most important thing you can do is to take off whatever is necessary for a press conference, a couple of days, more or less.

I don't take off that much of one in here, but for the average one, I take two days.

And I mean, I take the day of, the day of, and the time of day of things on.

You see, if you prepare that when the question comes, like Eagleton,

then you have thought out what you're going to say.

I am convinced, in listening to the tape, that he did not write that out.

And the question came to him in such a way that if he was not going to say anything about Eagleton, the question came in such a way that he was forced into a comment.

I wonder if the problem may be, too, about a little bit of a consciousness issue.

When people read, he's got a lousy staff.

He also has these celebrity types that, you know, tell him he's the greatest thing since cream cheese and so forth.

And I think this may be part of the problem.

He just, he probably needs... Let me ask the thing.

How about Graham Harlow again?

Does he do have a good effect on you before?

If so, is there anything more important than getting...

I think...

with Bryce about it.

I'd like to get his review.

Because I'm not sure that Bryce felt that he had done well, but then he broke his pen and he gets so upset with the Secret Service and all this other stupid stuff that I'm not sure he feels he could be useful.

I'm afraid there's got to be somebody

I think that's worse.

Buchanan beats the worst gentleman.

So that's my view.

That's my view.

But you had, you remember you dropped the idea of Buchanan about three or four days ago.

Yeah.

And I, no, I think Buchanan, I think Buchanan, well, Buchanan has no judgment.

I remember that he does.

The one that he's most remembered for, that I remember the most, was the one he could tell about the Christine Durbin scandal.

That, to me, was a very crude

It was shocking.

And that was because it was in a speech that I had never heard.

I cut the goddamn thing out.

Do you remember?

I cut it out of that speech.

That was when I edited it.

But you had got it.

Didn't you cut it out?

I had cut it out before.

Also, I cut something out about Joe McCartney.

We had that in.

About defending Joe McCartney.

I don't remember that.

I cut that out.

But then it got set in his mind somewhere and all of a sudden it zipped out.

I think that the vice president... That was to me.

You see, I understand how it is.

I don't feel it because of the ass and so forth.

I understand that.

But you don't get into something that you just don't talk about.

You just don't talk about taking shit in the living room.

fine line between checkmating yourself to be able to checkmating yourself to the degree that you can by overhanging and by by creating this i think the vice president rehabilitate himself and i don't want to say you think he can well i think he can if they're already seen

sound, effective, hard-hitting, and tender.

I'll be sure that nothing leaks out of our show.

That's how we've kept this so closely held on.

For the effect that I didn't have this sort of talk with him, that would be not my appeal reaction.

Exactly.

They asked me, did you come here?

Now let me tell you, Mr. Preston, I had a guy in my office yesterday.

So did you do it?

Who called me?

Oh, Bob Pierpont came into my office.

And he said, I understand that the president reprimanded.

No, Senator Scott said it.

That's where it was.

Senator Scott said on film that I didn't see it.

But the airport came in and asked him about that.

Senator Scott said the president had reprimanded the vice president's tongue-in-cheek rhetoric and all that.

Maybe at that level it's okay, because Scott says some other things aren't true.

But, but you see my problem there, and they'll say that too.

I'm not gonna comment on that anyway.

They ask me, I'm gonna, if I'm gonna hold hard in line, I have no comment on political matters.

I'm not gonna do it now, I'm not gonna do it then.

And my view about the, thinking about this African convention,

I don't believe that I can be in the position after the convention of not talking about political matters, but I had a way, and I thought we would do it.

I think after the convention, when we got those jackasses out there in California, that's what I'm going to do.

I'm going to get far more on the grass.

at some point in the discussion, I mean, I'm not here for a question, but I want you to know that I will limit, I will not answer any questions whether it matters.

I will limit them all to you.

I will not consider this where we are in the campaign, but as far as any use of the tall lies press conference where we are on, I will not take any questions.

I'm not going to say that it varies in the campaign.

If you've got questions,

I don't want to do political questions, which I'll always try to do as part of it.

It has to be tough to pull off about perhaps it being the other thing you can do is just twist everything.

Let them ask whatever question they want.

And just move it immediately in your answer.

Don't answer the political question.

Just move it to the statement of what you advocate, what you've done.

I mean, we just had a manager come in, and I wanted to select on something that doesn't have truth on it.

Actually, it's more of a post-shot.

Tell us what you thought about the counterattack on the Eagleton and others, or upon the Eagleton.

The Eagleton, as we can say, he thought it was a big deal that they had to copy and block through the Eagleton and knock out all the positions designed to fit into your political time table.

All right.

as he predicted we would get out, but that I had delivered his delay in getting out.

He didn't quite say that, but that was his joke.

That was his joke.

He said something worse, that there was no question he was going to get out.

But the answer, we should give this on two levels.

One is, it shows a complete lack of understanding of foreign policy.

It assumes that we can program Moscow, Dignity, and all that.

over a period of a year and a half to fit into our election schedule.

It's an insult to them, and it's a total misunderstanding of how foreign policy is conducted, and we can demonstrate.

We won't even dignify it with an answer, but these meetings were the result of many years' work of many complex factors, and so they're shocking in experience and ignorance.

Secondly,

uh...

So I think we should – I don't think it should come out of his office, and I doubt that you are not, I would say, but I think we ought to get some out of it.

Well, I'll tell you, though, if you get so – I had the same reaction, and I immediately pulled out your statement that you made, and rather than call people into the office just when, you know, we're talking about things, to have them reread that, particularly our White House press release.

See, he had some present answers that were very completely honest on the matter.

I think one of the best methods is to keep stressing their incompetence.

See, McGovern did the same thing yesterday.

In other words, more incorrectly, but a total mistake, obviously.

Well, he told them a statement of why we're bombing the North.

And it referred to the fact that you had been banking and bombing Hanoi for three and a half years.

But his misstatement of the bombing policy.

He also said, if the president settles it in the next month or two, that proves he could have settled it in the next month or two.

Which is another example of a total abject ignorance.

Now, the point that Henry makes is, how do we get that into...

counter-attack machinery.

His feeling isn't that sort of thing.

Should we just get by tail before he gets... We should just keep up a drum fire.

Not so much on the moral issue, it's on the incompetence.

What's your opinion about that?

We should get out of this building if we can afford it.

I'm not so sure it should be out of this building.

I don't know.

I guess not.

I wouldn't get out of that.

I wouldn't keep politics in the White House.

I don't want an answer here.

I will want you to answer any of those questions and that sort of thing.

But who could do it better?

When Barrett put it, it would be better to have it done by the Senate.

Do we have any foreign policy that knows anything?

Scott.

Well, I'll tell you, if you get it written right, if you do it, they're going to be the guy to say it.

David would get good play.

That's right.

He'd get a good play and it would startle everybody.

You're asking how it should be done.

The way to proceed with it is to put what you're thinking about down.

It's just a shame, though, that we don't have, you know, you say he would get played, but, you know, a dynamic, you know, aggressive senator up there who could be programmed, like you're talking about.

The other thing is to consider Bell for some of this.

He's a big name.

He sure is, and you'll get attention.

Now, they're already screaming that you distorted the

traditional role of Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense by using him for political attacks.

Great.

And that shows that you're much more afraid of him than you said because you've called him out before the campaign team had begun.

Hey, I didn't mean it.

I just said that I'm in the photo office and I'm...

Okay, there you go.

McGovern ordered up for his working session stuff out there in South Dakota, ordered up this tennis teacher from Washington

Allie Ritzenberger, whatever his name is, or him out to South Dakota.

He flies his tennis teacher out to South Dakota to give him a tennis lesson.

Has the guy, who's a dumb shit who pissed on his ass from a tennis ball, has him sit in the strategy sessions and then discovers there is no tennis court in

wherever it is.

He's in Custer, South Dakota, wherever it is.

He's at one behind the church somewhere.

So they finally went out in the morning and played at the one behind the church.

The TV cameras all came out to get pictures of him, so he quit.

But here, Larry O'Brien is worthy to come out and sit in the planning sessions with his tennis teachers about who and how to do it.

But the press says they report that, but they don't jump on it.

Also, for a candidate to make a public statement that he's furious at his staff, that he can't handle himself without going to the premises and

He's done it twice in one week.

He got it on that letter and then on the front of the station.

And it makes a horrible impression anyway if you show no loyalty.

Well, Henry, we...

We ask you in your shop so that you don't have to do this.

You get a job and do it every day.

I want the new summary written in every vulnerable point that you find.

Let me say, you're too manly to see for it.

Take one of your young tigers and write it down.

And they don't have to blur it.

But you see, our people aren't sophisticated.

I mean, how would you go about programming over a period of a year?

I mean, that would be... Weaver, probably about the same picture.

When the hell was that taken?

I don't know.

I can't recall that.

I can't recall him or the child.

It must have been one of those open door hours.

I think it was.

I mean,

If you could bring him by and meet the president or something.

I think I would recall him.

I obviously haven't.

I don't remember having met him.

Oh, you did.

Which shows you how you remember him.

Do you recall meeting a seven-year-old boy with two girls?

You wrote about us.

Because you would be more likely to recall that than me.

Could have been.

But how his kid would get him, I just don't know, unless he came for some sort of a, like, come to the 300th anniversary of St. Louis or something.

That could have been, too.

I'm going to be trying to see what the hell he did.

Sir?

I'm just curious.

Sir?

Anyway, the real problem with God, of course, is that he's going to keep egging them.

Good.

We've been thinking about the Harlow scheme again.

Hey, Harlow, if she's broken his pigment, is that right, God?

Well, he did a couple years ago.

He made do with it.

He can get back to it.

I don't think he'll want to do this.

Nobody would want to.

It's a very tough role to be in because you're a man on the Eisenhower tour.

It's like a rattlesnake in a picnic.

We've got this procedure that you follow day by day.

You know what I mean?

It's also a thing that they largely rely on them.

don't let any of that stuff sink in and also but use it to attack you which is they're going to attack destroy you that's the thing to make him up here on that pitch suite which he is i mean let's let's face it when you talk about what his agriculture could be president questions which man would you feel more confident in this chair

Let's not pose the question, let's just try to reject the answer.

No, there isn't any question.

Well, that's my answer, but I thought that would be the public answer.

Agnew has his deficiencies, but he has a certain basic patriotism, a certain basic decency, and he...

I'd rather stand on the issue of whether they'd rather have you or the governor just so we can get them more elected and get all of them around.

And I think the big people who take them on, Henry, you could just get every day.

And I mean, we the little ones go by.

But things like this, I'm just killing it.

If we said that the other people think that we're just beating ourselves with a thousand coffins, then we shouldn't start hitting them for this.

Really, this is a campaign.

20,000 people holding coffins.

They're deliberately prolonging the war.

If we said...

That's right.

Well, look.

Look what we could have said about Johnson and Kennedy in 1968 and didn't say.

8,000 of the casualties were in the first six months before we even got hold of the day.

12,000 in the first year.

I mean, we don't want to get into that debate, but...

But if we wanted to play this, we brought back and preserved American honors.

The only foreign policy McGovern has on Vietnam is that of 50 and

I know that I didn't have anybody in the group that agreed with me on it.

One possible exception, one of the younger guys.

He said, you cannot give away the moral realm of Vietnam.

I said, I don't want to see anything prepared anymore.

Which said, well, maybe.

I pointed out that it was the state line that we first came in.

Well, maybe we shouldn't have gotten in here.

But now that we are in the war, we've got to do the best we can to end it in honor

I said, the moment you say that, then American men are nodding for a mistake made by their president at some time.

If it was a mistake, you should get the hell out the first day you can.

You cannot justify it.

I said, as a matter of fact, we can criticize the conduct of the war, but we must not back away from the fundamental proposition that it would have been morally wrong to allow the communists to impose a communist government on 17 million people.

That's all it is to it.

The moment you give away that moral ground, you're dead.

I couldn't let go anymore.

Okay.

Getting back to the press thing, Ron, you feel that we should do the in-office thing this week.

Would you like to also make sure that we do some action?

I think so, because I...

You can turn it off and you can turn it on.

You can say whatever you want on any subject.

I know I can turn it off and turn it on, but it's just a question of preparation time.

And I'm just worried about Vietnam.

If you have any Vietnam questions, you just have to say those two sensitivities.

question in preparation time.

If I have to take it on all the time.

And he's worried about Vietnam.

Is there any Vietnam questions?

You just have to say that's too sensitive to discuss.

I can say that, but that doesn't mean I don't have to be prepared on Sadat.

And on Vietnam, Henry's only worried about questions on the negotiation.

But you can still let me be prepared about questions on bombing.

Military.

When's the next withdrawal?

And then

I would say it would be better off to have a scandal, because then I'd leave your future option open.

Do you definitely think we should have a toleration before the convention?

I don't think you should lock to it, but my view would be you should, but not too close to the convention.

Well, I can't.

It's got to be two weeks before the convention.

It should be the third.

It should be that week rather than even wait until the eighth.

I think so.

That's the ideal time.

You're in between here.

Off of theirs and before ours.

Plus the fact it gets the momentum going.

If you have one this week, you've got the momentum continuing and so forth.

Then you pick up next week and then you go in into the acceptance speech for that fourth home.

I still think, Ron, there's something to be said to not to take political questions in the East Room.

Ever.

In other words, if I return to the televised press conference after the convention, I think that that conference, I think it should be on national issues as president.

Say I'm not part of the political questions.

I'll say if you want to put your question in terms of the issue with

They say, what do you think of McGovern's view on something you said?

I'm not going to discuss that.

That's what I was trying to say before.

That'll work.

Because on Vietnam, the issue's a really clear-cut thing.

You can write it, so you can just change it.

I'm not going to state my own views.

I will state my own.

Or if it gets to a personal thing, it's been reported that McGovern's

on such-and-such as using federal money to send out his campaign letters, and he said, yes, he did.

I'm just kidding.

No comment.

But these are press conferences.

They would ask questions like that.

Questions about that.

Sure.

What's that in the way?

If they would ask that question, hypothetically, that the government's sending out campaign letters with federal funds,

You could say no comment, but the value would be there in terms of the negative.

I'll go to the other one.

The governor has said that your campaign manager, Clark McGregor, has been taking money for such and such.

He's bugging our headquarters or something.

What do you say about that?

The Grand Jury and the Watergate keepers just indicted all these people.

What you do, you have someone who's already commented on it and referred to the fact that I'm not going to, in this forum, assess that.

That matters to me.

That matters.

It doesn't matter to the campaign chairman.

I have directed all the federal agencies

We need to cooperate with the investigative authorities because this kind of activity will not be tolerated, period.

That's all I can say.

I mean, I'm not going to criminalize any sort of Caucasian gentleman.

I have directed all federal agencies, the FBI, and the U.S. Attorney's Office to cooperate totally in this investigation to get at the bottom of it.

Well, Mr. President, on a moral basis, do you feel it's right for a campaign to be engaged in this kind of activity?

Certainly not.

That's why we're cooperating totally with the Defiant Automobiles.

I think there's a path you can follow behind you too.

I think that would work.

Well, maybe.

Did they mention a wire gate today?

Did they ask you about that last report?

I just want to move on to your story.

What did you say about it?

That's the beauty of it all.

There's no follow-up.

Well, we all say that we're not guns, and the only thing I suggest, if they may ask me, but you've got to be honest, you can't press too hard.

Just use the line I just indicated.

The president has indicated that this kind of action is...

You say you have educated you, you, you, you, and I back to you, and again, this action, this action has no place in our political process, and the President has directed it to be total cooperation, complete cooperation by all federal agencies at the bottom of this, and to save it for those who are dealing with such actions.

So we've just been in a position where they're overzealous people who do things in campaigns.

I don't think they'll ask you this.

I think it's safe to let them come up to you and say, you just don't probably have someone in the grand jury who might be a nice piece of money.

We won't get something that is going to be my next week.

In fact, it may not be this year.

I'm not going to delay it that long.

They were investigated very thoroughly.

What's the matter?

How is this?

What was the, I don't know what her name was.

How does that, what does a leak on that come from?

I suppose I have no idea.

I didn't see the Times story.

I haven't seen the Times story.

The Times has a story.

I don't know what it says.

About 15 telephone calls were made to the office of the council and the committee to re-elect.

And they brought the market to Miami on.

So obviously they have that problem.

From an investigative source.

The Bureau.

It could be the Bureau.

And it could be the U.S. Attorney's Office.

Yeah.

It could be the one.

Phone records, they had it in both places.

They have it in both places, I guess.

Here we go.

The way you really handle that is all the rules involved and that kind of thing.

Understanding that the right is a right and there are no certain chances of suppressing the investigation.

But that is a violation of the defendant's rights.

Sure.

Total violation.

That's a leap from a grand jury.

It was the worst goddamn thing you could believe in his case.

We were going through that.

We never got a thing out of the grand jury the way that I did.

Hunt has come up with a rather interesting thing.

What's that?

He has told the grand jury.

Has he been informed?

No, he's been called.

He's in town.

I guess, no, he didn't go.

But he informed them.

a false statement, I guess, U.S. attorney, that said to the grand jury, and then he was challenged.

First of all, he said the grand jury must be disbanded because it's convened illegally in the sense that the publicity that's come out of it has jeopardized the defendant's rights, and he as a potential defendant, as a potential...

He's turning that role, the Supreme Court, he as a potential defendant.

I wasn't going to use some other term.

What is this called?

No, no.

So it had to do with that he could be subject to indictment by the grand jury as a conspirator or something under the evidence that they'd already had.

And because of that potential, that he would not, that his rights would not be properly protected if he were to be called for in this jury because of

You can take a bad case.

That's right.

And then he made some second point also.

And he said the U.S. attorneys and all just sat flat for a couple hours.

They think the government's nuts.

And then they got to thinking, oh, what are they going to do about this?

And they began to realize it wasn't so funny after all.

So they've now demanded that he appear and he won't go and take them.

Oh, that's it.

He says if he goes before the grand jury and takes the Fifth Amendment,

then under the long tradition, it will be assumed that he is inculpated and that that would jeopardize his rights and all that sort of thing, too, because of the publicity.

And if he doesn't, so he isn't going to appear.

So they've now come to a thing where he has filed with his attorney a sworn statement that if he were called before the grand jury, he would take the Fifth Amendment.

And that...

somehow gets him off some hook or something.

They're playing some very intricate legal game that is kind of intriguing, I guess, to the guys who understand it.

And Hunt, as Dean said, Hunt's the only guy in the whole thing who's got the brains to, you know, what he's doing.

And Hunt's lawyer is...

Now, his name was the deputy in the criminal division at Justice, so he's a very smart guy.

But, you see, what hundreds of do-it-o's and the scanty-shoes and all of these goddamn permissive crap that the previous Supreme Court was going to do.

For his purpose.

That's right.

And that's what they ought to do.

All the murders and rapes get off easier than the murder.

Now, basically, the murders and rapes have gotten off because of publicity.

Publicity, too much publicity.

I mean, I don't know.

I'm not ready to say what the law is in this case.

They all use it every damn thing they want.

Fight, twist, and turn.

That's what the law's for.

And I never agreed with it.

But now that the card is spoken, that's the law of the land.

And if it's good for a murderer, it's good for a wiretaker.

That's true.

Particularly political wiretakers.

I have a feeling this is a GOP bugging Democratic headquarters.

I'm not sure that that is...

The question is

My sense is that it's not something that people are going to get all worked up about.

The thing about the political thing, too, I would like to see if we can continue to have press conferences

On television, maybe two.

I don't think we could do more than that and get away with it.

But I think if we could have two, one in September and then one in October, that would be good.

I don't think you could have, I think if you had more than that, it would appear that we were having press conferences for the purpose of the campaign.

I mean, I think television.

On the other hand, national, national, Eastern, I decided not to do the California one.

I just think that

I guess they could be eastward, but it would be so much better.

I think you're right so much better.

I agree.

Well, you don't go to California State without campus.

Yeah.

But I think Colton makes that point that, you know, the residential, it's like the helicopter landing.

But then, the other thing we could do is to also consider California, when I do go out to meet with the press, which I would sure do when I'm out there, is to let it be done

I don't believe myself that I...

I mean, there is the risk that the one question, the one lousy question you get is the one that they will use and they'll take out of context.

But I don't know.

I may claim to think that they're going to watch that and doubt that carefully.

And also, I tend to give answers that are quite carefully constructed that it's very hard to...

to take something up.

And the one thing that it does not allow when you're on film, it doesn't allow the brusque answer that I can sometimes give to a shittiness, which I can do with this room.

See, when you don't have a film, you can say, well, no, I'm going to comment, right?

But if you put that on film, that's very good.

So what's your view on that?

Is it worth it to have it on film?

I'm not sure it is.

You see, it's a little easier for me

I can have a calling more.

I can be a little more detached and so forth.

I don't have to deal with every sentence and every move.

It's got to be amazing.

What about a little opportunity?

I think as to whether or not to do

Yeah.

In other words, I think what you could do is to say, you can come in, you can have a photo op, and then let them go out that door and leave.

What you might do

He can fill that time by saying, how are you?

I can just talk sort of casually about things and do it in some way.

I said that we have these conferences in the office.

There are some who have indicated that they would like a picture of it.

We constantly have invited photographers in to take a picture.

As soon as they've finished, we'll go ahead with the conference.

Like that, too.

There's a cherry patch.

I'll say, 10 seconds.

That's not on sound.

Hello.

In terms of California, I would say if you were going to

For example, in more informal terms, the way you intended to proceed with these conferences, you know, given the reactions to the convention and the upcoming campaign and so forth.

I don't mind the fact that you would be better off on this particular occasion without the sound on film, but with a photo opportunity.

I would like, frankly, to bother myself if I had a photo opportunity on me.

It's a very different thing.

When you're out there,

I don't think you can ever sort of, you know, look away and do the things which they like about it in here.

They'd like to see you look and see your mind working.

But you can't let your mind be showing up there in that East room.

Don't you agree with me?

It changes.

There's no question about it.

It changes.

The chemistry changes.

It does in every television studio in the country.

Yeah.

When the red light goes on, the chemistry changes.

Yes, sir.

California, I think we could do it.

Now, in terms of the campaign, suppose that we have the regional thing.

Well, of course, you'd go up, we've got the thought of going up to the, you know, catching the people, right?

Fence, a little of that, and so forth.

But how about a regional press conference at times at 4 o'clock?

Would you, you'd have to fill in that, wouldn't you?

Of course you would, absolutely.

You'd have to fill in, absolutely.

And there, I wouldn't worry too.

That's going to be, and that will be political anyway.

I don't think you can rule out a political question.

But you've seen the presidency there.

You're being filled out.

And you're filmed out and you go without talking about the issues, but you're forcing your point of view across the television screen that way.

Now, insofar as also this rule is concerned, which I can use, I may use between the convention and the election.

I will never, even in this room, take any political questions after the election.

I'll say I'm not going to use the White House for a political forum.

I said I'd be glad to answer that when I'm in the country campaigning.

I think that's a very sound position.

Don't you?

I think it can work on that basis for you.

On the basis of...

But that's the problem.

If you hear that, then you're clearly saying that when you're here, you're president, and when you're out, you're not.

No, you're not.

The only other way you can do it is just not answer questions delivered to you.

That's scary.

And finesse them and say, well, I'm not going to comment on that.

I wouldn't answer about the country either.

You're out.

I wouldn't answer about the country either.

I don't care.

It's going to be really that big of a division.

Well, then maybe we should even consider having a press conference in California where I take political questions, although I think I have to.

I think I've got myself into that position, unfortunately.

But I have to.

Because I couldn't delay having them forever.

Well, I think that's all right in California.

That's right after the convention.

Now, you have become a candidate, and they'll ask you, well, of course, you don't answer.

Well, yes, you do.

I'll say, when are you going to start your campaign, gentlemen?

I tend to start my campaign any time that it's been begun.

The campaign is on the issues, and the issues have been explaining the issues ever since I've been in this office, and I'll continue to watch for every means that I can.

Okay.

And, uh, how many disease do you have?

I, look, I just assumed that put it in the category.

I mean, I'm doing this for therapy.

I don't see how many people kept out that they could walk and have you kind of achieve it to the point that you can't have it.

I was going to eat this, but I thought I'd have to talk about what they're doing.

I was working on why.