Conversation 763-015

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Preserved from the realities of life over there in that operation.

Very good, very good, good operation.

He's kind of related to the other two guys.

I think it's just as well, if the people tried to all pretty run it would have.

He said one of our better.

Because he worked on it for a long time.

Oh, yeah, so he could go out and read, you know, a few ideas.

I thought Michael was really very strong in the field.

Of course, he was in the environment.

Everything in the environment should be tilled and farmed for work use.

Yeah, for work use.

Of course, I was working parts, but not just parts.

I was working parts.

We've spent a lot of money here doing that in the district and we set the example for cities around the country in terms of getting the neighbors out and they actually do the work.

It's no good to have your municipal people come in and do it because then the people don't have any, they don't change their attitude.

So we've been getting quite a lot of coverage and a lot of favorable comment on it here.

All the Washington's been punched on it.

He gets out and takes it to the people, handles the trouble, throws the stuff in, and so on.

And they tell us something, you know, they clean up the neighborhood and then it gradually slides back and over a period of six months and they're back down to where they were before.

And then you go in and you do it again.

They look like they just have to accept that.

Life is really about space and pain.

That's why he's not out there with them.

That's why he's never going to be part of them.

But that's a thing where he's got a great sense of personal pride and a sense of family.

And these other just like a bunch of dogs.

They just really that way.

And no sense of family structure and they sleep around and all that kind of thing.

It's just another life.

It's another society.

That's the problem for the decade as I see it.

I think we have to break up that concentration.

Get those people out of the society somehow.

Yeah, that's right.

Without having to force the intrusion, obviously.

Well, I think you've got a concentration here that feeds on itself.

It just gets worse and worse.

And I've gotten to the point where I think they ought to be all stuck in boxcars and sent out around one family to each town and distribute them around.

And they can do the domestic work and they can work their way up and the kids can go to decent schools and every town can take one or two and spread them around.

You obviously can't do it under any form of compulsion, but you can do it.

You can do it by figuring out what incentives you can crank in.

But that's a long, long story.

I've got two or three things.

You notice that the Ellsberg case went over.

That's what you want to yell.

It means it won't come up before the election.

Everybody's playing it now as a victory for Ellsberg.

And I just don't give a damn.

That's fine.

If they want to think that was a victory for Ellsberg, that's fine.

The point is that the payoff is for us.

We, we, no, it's the court.

It's the court entirely.

And I talked to the Chief Justice, and he was kind of intrigued with the political aspects of it.

He said the natural inclination of the court was not to come back for the summer anyway.

You know, they don't want to break up their vacation.

And, uh, they were concerned about the press as well, though.

So, uh, we can tolerate a little jubilation on Ellsbury's side for a while, I think.

Sure.

Just right along with them.

After the election, I'd like to crack Neil Sheehan.

Dive the hell out of him.

How about Jack Anderson?

Jack Anderson on the other case.

I don't feel that we see... We don't have a lot of time, Henry, but we have a lot of time in a minute.

I don't certainly intend to allow that, so I'm going to make sure to get away with that.

And I see no reason why we don't get at it and let the Joint Chiefs take the heat.

Well, we're keeping track of our sailor, and we should continue to build him.

We took the tap off the sailor, but we've got to watch him.

And we'll just keep him on the string.

Remember, we talked about Larry O'Brien and the IRS, and so I did some checking.

It seems that Larry O'Brien was already invited in for an audit just last week, and he failed to show up.

So they, uh, uh, Schultz wanted some guidance as to how to play this.

And I said, okay, invite him one more time this week before YC, while a national committee is meeting.

If he doesn't show up, then subpoena him.

Yes, sir.

Absolutely.

And so...

once he will know, because what he can do is, you know, he can send his lawyer.

He can send his lawyer, his accountant.

Right.

Yeah.

But I think they've got it.

I think they have it.

And it's this.

This element of policy has already been audited.

And he has testified, or he's reported it.

that the huge money that he got was split three ways.

And we got $120,000 or something.

And then O'Brien got $190,000 direct, but then Napolitano got $120,000.

And he split his with O'Brien, and O'Brien got a fourth of that.

And so they want to see if O'Brien has reported that.

Well, they can't.

They can't do that without water?

No, they can't.

What can't he do with his return?

Well, see, his return will give a gross number.

He's not required to bring it all down by sources.

Oh, I get your point.

So they're required to justify his numbers, you're saying.

Unless it was, if you recall...

Unless it was with Hedlund or something.

Yeah, Hedlund, what I meant is...

When I was in private practice for instance, I always had to report a gross number for fees.

Well, there again, it would come out of that same general heading.

And it would all be lumped together.

I gave it to you without any information.

Yeah, so you don't have to specify the source.

Oh, no, no, no, no.

I did it when I was in the Senate because of that.

Oh, I thought you were going to report it.

Yeah, obviously I was in the Senate.

Yeah, well, I'm sorry.

Yeah, well, I was in the Senate.

I heard of it so much, and I would put the other things down.

All right, so you just wrote down gross under debt.

So, they're going to say, where's the deposit?

No, right there.

We'll see whether he reported it or not.

We don't know.

DePaul complained and said he didn't.

Why does DePaul have to say he didn't or requires that he didn't?

Because DePaul doesn't want to pay income on it.

Well DePaul didn't report it.

He didn't pay tax on it because he said he was just a conduit for a bribe.

What kind of bribe?

Is he a member of the firm?

No.

Some guys never heard of him.

We're going to check him out.

What period of time?

While O'Brien was National General.

Before the election, during the election?

Yeah, between 70 and 71.

The problem we have is a huge thing.

and a two boat one, it allows them to reopen the dock.

That was a long time ago.

Now you don't have a huge thing up in this district, because I assume that if you can watch the dock, the dock doesn't take any more money.

Not that I know of.

And none that shows up in this thing.

This all has to do with this gyre, this black mire.

I don't think about it because we scare people.

That's the other one here.

So if you can all accuse the lawyer, whether they want to make a contribution, he, to his great credit, said no.

He said $50,000, $1,000, $1,000, $1,000, $1,000, $1,000.

He wanted to get a present.

Oh yes, yeah, and he would do it now.

He did contribute $250,000 in 1968, but that was a campaign contribution, probably in cash, but I don't know how they're going to be able to handle that themselves.

Now, I think Morey and probably Kalbach must have taken $50,000.

or some of these people, I mean, how about, you know, you could get the money.

So here's the deal, I see.

Yeah.

How much do you get in housing?

Alright.

Now let's just go down the lines, as I was talking to the control office over here.

I mean, uh, would that, if they were to go and have to do this thing?

No.

Because, what would that be?

How do we say yes?

I mean, they didn't have any contribution here.

I wouldn't be troubled by that.

That has never achieved such a level of income tax evasion.

Well, my hope is that he doesn't report this to the policy side.

That could be something.

That's pretty good.

All the way?

Yes, sir.

Absolutely.

Is George willing?

George is very willing.

He's the one who's doing it so that we don't appear in it.

And he's hot.

He's tenacious.

He'll, he says, I don't like this Thompson-Roberts business and all that.

And I said, George, this is a major contribution you're going to make to this campaign.

He just hanged there.

Calvary didn't happen.

She said she had a call from Bobby Baker at 7.30.

That was at the time.

Baker said, told her, I must talk to somebody.

He said he was going to be cruel to me.

He said I had a good time with you.

But he played out of a musket.

And so I was about to do a coffee with him.

So I was trying to beat him to coffee in the back.

And he made a call to me.

He said, Rose, I was at this university around the center.

Yeah.

that involves musking.

And I found some.

I also found some that involves brine.

This was a good one, because after we got the musking turned down, he made her something that served to take her brines out.

And he says, what can I say to you?

And so we were very good judges and said, well, look, I'm going back to Florida.

We want a good job there.

We could meet down there any time.

And so I told him he could follow through at the earliest with the idea of getting the information.

on both Muskie and O'Brien.

And also, I said, on any other senator, except those who might be flex matters.

Now, we may have one here, because Bobby Baker, I'm just making this up, O'Brien, the major one that he has information on, will never have to try on.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Because Bobby was in the thick with him, and he never really can, and I'm talking about him.

On the other hand, he was a bag man, and they were really bag men.

He was about ten times a bag man.

But, of course, all of a sudden we had Big Johnson on the show.

Bobby was just, just, well, I think that's how people, I'm honest, are less and less able.

Big was able.

Yeah.

He was a great scooper.

Bobby, without question,

I mean, it's even real.

My view is, I don't know, let's see what the BB finds out.

My view is, if it's a head musket, we can carry it.

Take it over to O'Brien.

If it's O'Brien, the head musket, let's face it, let's see what that carries.

Yeah.

that if O'Brien, you just might find one of those other white knights, like Nelson, who's down now, that he lost all the eternal electors.

O'Brien, God damn it, what a defeat.

But O'Brien was 190, it's hard to think.

What in the name of Christ would he have done for Hughes for this money, for the lobbyists?

What for what?

You know, for a lot of us, you can't imagine.

Most of these lobbies don't do anything.

That is my impression.

You know, very perfunctory services.

That's a lot of money for a lobby.

Yeah.

Even at this time.

I think.

Well, we'll keep running on this.

And that's very...

So, at the present time, we need a problem.

Why haven't we learned this sooner?

Oh, it's just happened.

We've been right on top of this within a day.

I just want to make sure IRS wants to know.

No, I don't think so.

Because our guy is still in there and he's feeding this to us as fast as it comes out.

So I think we're very current on this.

And the problem is, as Al said, he's still competing.

Right.

Because he is afraid of it.

He was brought in last week.

You think that he...

Probably did not report any money or so.

He didn't pay taxes.

Is he a corporation or a partnership?

I don't know.

I don't know the answer.

He probably had to wrap up.

Well, because he didn't pay any income tax on the allowance that he turned over to O'Brien because it wasn't income to him.

That's perfectly okay.

In other words, if you and I are private practice, and I collect the fees from the client, but part of it is yours, then I don't have to pay tax on it.

I don't either.

But I was thinking of doing a corporation.

I was very involved in that.

With an amount like that, it would be hard to do.

I see, you know, $500,000 or $120,000.

But anyway, anyhow, you'll be hearing more about this.

We'll keep you in touch.

Speaking of smathers, this must be the ballgame.

Yeah.

We've got this railroad bailout bill.

Mitchell has never talked about that.

He doesn't think it's very wise.

I talked to him just now upstairs.

I think he's concerned that we're not getting enough for him.

And what I mean, it's going to hurt us with the tinctures.

I would not know.

Therefore, yes, sir.

Tinctures, the truckers.

The surface carrier was all for it.

The water carrier, they all needed to get the information, the idea that they were against it.

Well, he didn't know, and he assumed that they would be against it because it was favorable to the railroads, actually.

But Smatresk has covered his flanks pretty well, and he's got these people.

As a matter of fact, the truckers will put in money, and they will give us the old man.

The t-shirts are definitely for it.

Colson's checked.

So what we've got is an interesting lineup.

And we've got an offer of money in this field health, and Smatter's coming across, which is sort of a fringe benefit, in return for withdrawing our objection to a bill that may not pass.

And Smatter's going to figure out some way to get around Smatter's.

Yeah, please.

Now, that looks like we've got things all our own way.

The negatives are that on the merits, we try to get some reforms and transportation.

If we withdraw our objection to this bill now, the reforms are probably dead forever.

Our one chance of getting a certain kind of deregulation, more competition in the industry and so on, would be for us to continue to object to it, to make sure that the bill didn't go anyplace this year, to reintroduce it next year with our reforms attached to it, and try and get it through over a period of time.

I think four years, obviously, is going to look like a pale of a smithereens.

He talks a lot.

Then I would have to say yes.

He will undoubtedly peddle his services to other people by saying, look, this thing was cracked in the White House.

I have access to the president.

I have a three-year contract with the railroads.

I pulled this thing off.

I got the administration to back off its objections and abandon its reforms.

I'm a hell of a guy.

And he'd be entitled to sit down.

Because that's in fact what he's going to be doing.

But it isn't worthy of him to sit here with us.

That's the remaining consideration.

The amount of money that the railroads is supposed to help us, half a million dollars is what the railroads have offered us.

Plus, the trucker's offering us a couple hundred thousand dollars in treatment.

And that's the...

We can hear the congressman.

He says we are getting some reforms in the bill.

We've got a very sick road over the end of the street.

We ought to take what we've gotten out and then fight vigorously for the reforms in the new congress.

We'll be strongly in favor of this thing on the merits.

He thinks we've got a modicum of reform and we ought to go for it.

So he makes the case on the merits.

At the same time, this man is undoubtedly going to be arguing that it was a perfect lobbying job and pulled it off and the Americans didn't have much to do with it.

Yeah.

Well, who are the people that are going to blow this one up?

The shakers?

Yep.

I don't think he will raise hell with us if he will raise hell with the railroads.

Stagers has frustrated Smathers in this thing from the beginning.

And Smathers has frankly said that he may not be able to get it through.

Yeah.

I'm just trying to think.

Does it look like we're doing something big business?

Yes, it does.

It'll be seen as a railroad bailout.

A railroad bailout.

Well, they'd kind of like to see the railroads get this because it'll make a better contract for them next year.

But... to the outsider...

It'll look like a $9,000 gain for the railroads in terms of guaranteed loans and so forth.

If you ask me any other railroad presidents have been in, they put on their presentations, they lobby this hard.

They say that Southern Civic and Union Civic are all right, but that the rest of the railroads are in big trouble.

And that they need help.

John?

Well, it certainly isn't a winner.

It doesn't do you any good to go out and say I've saved the railroads.

Nobody gives a damn about the railroads.

Except the outside.

Um, on the other side, the governor ought to be saying, um, the poor people can't get anything to eat, but the railroads haven't had $30,000.

They could be the last people to go back to the election.

I just don't see any reason to buy the problem of getting something for big business at this point.

Just think of it.

That's it.

As far as the money's concerned, it's up to them.

They've got to do with the support of it.

There's no chance, no way that the progression of the career, most matters of the world, will be progression.

And a lot of it will be some way to close it up.

I see no reason to walk into this thing.

I think there's a lot of, also a lot of, a lot of comment about the situation.

It's just totally my concern about a big business handout at this point.

See, it wouldn't mean any, it wouldn't mean any doubt about doing it after the election, I think.

Because the way I look at it, it's jobs.

Yep.

We're not going to put more on demand.

I don't think.

I don't know if there's any alternative to it.

I don't.

I told him, see, that's a good one.

I said, where is this shit?

I said, I don't know.

I said, not $50,000, not $500,000.

I said, you know, money is what we need.

We need the votes for it.

We need the money.

We're just not prepared.

We got that question.

That's right.

That's because we were operating here.

Right.

And George, George is going to understand.

George is timing it wrong.

He might make it later in line.

And then you can also point out that he's very valuable to his clients because he really doesn't interact with much.

That's the way it is.

But it's just not in our understanding of being an issue.

I pass the word to Senator Baker that

You would not see him on the water quality bill because he's up for re-election and because you would not want to put him in the position of being known to company you with a case and then losing it.

But there would be a deadline set up for him.

Well, when does it come up?

Probably comes up just before the convention, just probably in the next week, at least nine.

Well, you won't have it then.

You won't have it to act until after the convention.

I see.

Well, we'll keep doing it.

Yeah, we can.

But Baker has been pressing very hard because they're going to conference this week.

Yeah.

And so, I mean, he's had it turned on.

What basically is your judgment at the present time?

It's a veto.

You would reckon?

Yes, sir.

You agree with it?

Yep.

That's where I am right now.

These guys will scream and holler.

A lot of people around the country will scream and holler.

But your whole at the same time say that we are for clean water, but we're against higher taxes.

This bill would mean higher taxes.

We have a bill that will provide the job without taxes.

Right.

That's that clean water, no higher taxes.

That's the line.

And I think this gives credibility.

to your statement that you're going to hold this line.

Now, George told me something Saturday that is hopeful, and that is that because the economy is booming in the way that it is, revenues are going to be much higher than Treasury is predicting.

So we're going to have a much cleaner deficit situation, and we'll be getting revised revenue estimates, and it'll help as we get into the fall.

They've been revising that word all the time.

Yeah, but he says it's really dramatic now.

It has to be.

That's right.

Well, they predicted some increase, but he says it's beyond.

It's really beyond that.

Now, I've got an option paper here for you on this blue collar worker, federal blue collar workers.

These are the guards and the truck drivers and the people like that who are under the so-called wage board.

Probably with the Federal Employees Union, of course, is strongly for this alliance.

That's Greiner and the other guy.

What is the problem with that?

Well, the problem is it's just a hell of a lot of money.

It's well over the budget.

It's 175 million added annual cost.

Fiscal 73 budget impact would be 21 million over fiscal 74 budget impact, 135 million over.

It would put them at 112% of comparability so that they would be on a hidden industry by 12%.

You beat this same kind of bill last year, which would have only put 8% ahead of industry.

So they're cutting a very bad hog here.

And the difference in the response of these two unions, of course, Colson and the other people who seem to know, is that Greiner would give you a personal endorsement and public and active support if you supported this bill.

On the other hand, if you did not, if you vetoed, then he would be passive support with no public occurrence.

Colson took a picture of your signing and he says by signing you can secure the endorsement of Greiner and cement the endorsement of Ken Lyons.

That's 950,000 union employees.

Greiner put members of his union to work for the common areas and key states.

Lyons will do the same.

A veto could be used by the Democrats to argue we don't care about the little guys as part of the big business complex.

I'm looking at where they are.

We don't give a damn about the district of Columbia, Texas, or the resident association of them.

But Maryland, California, and both of these countries are one hell of a couple of them.

To the extent that we have a chance, and there is an obvious chance, in places like Hawaii and Alaska, it affects the parks.

It could make a difference in states like that.

I mean, why do they think that they might do the same?

Yeah, the factor here, which more or less underlines what you just said, is that probably it could not be sustained, although it clearly could not in the Senate, but it might be sustained in the House.

We're still trying to find out if it was in the Senate.

There's a chance that they're going to have these people out on the tables and kicking their ass.