Conversation 862-004

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Thank you.

I don't know whether I'm not going to go up there.

It's kind of possible they let her or not.

I don't know.

It would be advantageous for you to leave about 6 o'clock.

I'm worried that you might consider leaving at 5 o'clock.

I'll just bring it back at 6 and then come back.

Well, yeah.

I think we'll just...

I think we better have a meeting here.

Yes, sir.

You know, the guy's been going to East.

I could take the final walk with him.

I'm not exactly sure you got this wrong.

The meeting will be transferred to here.

We'll have to hear this after the final meeting.

He's not taking too much of your sentence.

John, I think it's very important that we have that in the name of the meeting.

You know, the waitress was there and appeared.

And there's something in the Bible that's showing up.

That's a 40-minute write-up.

It's got to go at 6 o'clock.

I needed this, but I just don't want to...

Unless you feel it's important.

No, I heard last night that he was changing that.

I heard that, too.

And that's why we .

If he's doing it here at 7 o'clock, we'll have a meeting.

He'll be doing it up there.

He'll be doing it here at 12 o'clock.

We had a meeting.

Our part of it.

See, we delayed it until 2.30.

And he was cutting his tape at 12.30.

And we need to get our meeting.

We can start earlier.

Well, we can start our part earlier.

If you don't mind.

Right.

Henry's meeting here should start earlier.

It's a very good idea.

And then, my point.

Yes, sir.

Because we have three or four hours.

We've got a lot of work to do.

And I'll be ready, John.

I'll give you some time here.

I just sent a book there, but I don't want him to have it.

I want to be sure that you are following through on what is the situation.

When did they go out there?

Are they going to answer?

Sarah?

First of Saturday, Monday night.

Apparently, because of the change in the Second Version Church today, they were late getting the Second Version Church out.

They should be out today, along with the Second Invitation today evening.

So they should all be out today.

I just wanted to be sure so that there won't be any problems.

with our Republicans, and they're all being invited to talk to Rosario and Lucy, and they'll all be out in the valley, and the whole purpose of this is so that I don't care if they come or not, I just want to get their invitations out, so that they all know they're being invited to something.

So they can't bet you much about not being invited to something.

Last night, when I was at the grill, we had a few more guests, and I was sitting out there, and it was really well received.

Those guys were just delighted at the reception out there.

So many of them said that was just a wonderful thing.

I'm happy they were.

I guess they were hitting you with projects and stuff.

I'm going to see what they do on it.

That's all mine.

I'm going to see .

I understand the best thing for me to do is to see him alone.

My conversation with Baker is not going to be sure if I'm going to have a better game than that.

I'm going to have a better game than that.

on reflection, it might be well-meaning.

If you look over the tax reform, they will give a statement of the C-100.

I believe it might be probably the better numbers to certainly exacerbate the idea of the tax reform moving higher.

Now, I give a little current brief statement to help show

in terms of tax credits, property tax, and in terms of pay minimum tax.

I think that the three of those on one page, and then given the board respect, it's not too bad a thing.

So maybe we think that in terms of my making a statement to the second secretary,

Not for another two weeks or so.

I'd like to be able to say on Tuesday that I don't think they need to stay in contact with such and such a date.

But I'd rather feel like that I didn't just go in on my own.

I think it's a little bit too low in my soul.

You've got a lot of notice from the state of the nation.

I know that makes sense.

Now, my plan is to talk to you a little later, perhaps.

I might decide to consolidate a little bit after this meeting.

But see what I mean?

Baker's, uh, Baker's line is, I don't know if you can expect it, but it's just, I want you all to think about it.

He says that he would like to have his company replenished.

He and I, we've been replenished.

We've been replenished, yes.

Great stroke of earth, great confidence.

And I, of course, should be happy.

The other point that you made is that, which leads me to believe, and I just want to be sure, that I should get in line, he's on our line, our truck, and then let him be the settler.

Does that bother you at all?

It doesn't bother me if he'll do it.

He's, he, and here's the way to get him to do it, I think, would be to have him come to me.

Quine Beach has a kind of a metaphysical attachment to John Finchel.

Why am I scared of that?

I'm scared.

I put it very hard.

I put it very hard to Baker about the mission.

Because Baker was, you know, getting about the White House staff and all that, and I said,

Now,

That may be, frankly, not quite true.

I mean, you come down to us, you know, the Magruder thing.

The main thing I'm concerned about the Magruder thing is that there's a lot of young men Magruders, there's almost a lot of them, and I don't need the Magruder to say something.

But if he did, even if the K-9, he would protect God.

I think that's the way that they're called.

All right, now the other one.

The other one, no problem with you.

The other one, of course, is Colson.

Yep.

Now, the one that you do in it is Hunt.

Yep.

And the likeness of that, I think, is not so great.

And the murder.

The murder, obviously.

The murder of Colson.

The murder claims...

to do D, and then Mabruder's playing a game.

He's telling different people different things to her, and I've not talked to him.

But the impression I have is Mabruder is peddling the line that Colson is the guy who put the unmitigated pressure on him.

To take the boat?

To do this.

The boat?

Yep.

When you see Colson, you know, I've got to enjoy it.

I know.

I've asked both Bob and Colson.

Well, I don't know, I can't, you see, one thing that we will talk about tomorrow, I have really got to know whether or not, I just, mainly because I've got to know, and I'll deny that I've ever heard, I've got to know what they're on, I've got to know what they're close to.

Yep.

If they vote that they did, then I'm going to clarify.

That's right.

Because this is how we're going to make, that's why we're taking privilege.

I'll be taking privilege.

I got very hardly any place in this idea written around me.

Here's his plan, which would be very good if we didn't vote.

And it's not bad, because he's on our side.

I have a question about that.

He isn't going to go on the business of what the Democrats did to us on lunch.

He says, I'm going to play it this way.

He says, what he'd like to do is to live in the water game.

which is the, I said, and I gave you a good lecture about how this case was the only successful investigation in American activities, and we ruled out a year's training, we ruled out a year's solicitation, and so forth.

And I said, you ought to really insist on that.

And I will keep hitting on that all the time, because he wanted me to make, give you a statement to the effect that we cooperate with the committee.

I said, well, I'm going to have a press conference on these days, and I'll still say it.

I've always said that.

You know, I mean, I'm not going to go down and make a written statement.

You can get back on to the place and ask me, and I'll say that as a member of the Justice Department.

Now, he then says, however, that the way he feels, he feels the way that we're banning him, I mean, he's correcting the strategy here, would be to call a lot of hip-sweep witnesses, put them in a little bit of a relationship, ask them over periods of weeks to build it up, and then build up the, build up,

The question is whether or not it goes on.

And so that's what he believes, that they didn't try to call the big men right away, prick the bar, let the men on the residency board in.

Now that is the strategy provided when you call them.

He said, well now, he had to look for some second privilege coming on in himself.

He said, well, what he, what he's talking about, he said, he gets down to earth and limits it to, has a total limitation to the sun.

We've got all other questions and so forth.

He said this could have one hell of a dramatic impact.

I said, yeah, it's going to have these people .

Now the real question, John, you've got to, you've got to press yourself to it.

I think you're better to press yourself to it than either Bob or Folsom.

Who really are we afraid of to come out there and say that you're afraid of Bob or Folsom?

I don't think you have a problem.

I don't have a problem.

But the point is, I don't want to get Bob and Colson right in the position of being on the public bank.

And the way we're going to do it, of course, we're going to interrupt her as well.

All right, you've got three, well, including Sam, you've got four big fish.

Yeah, well, isn't it?

That's a curious thing.

The money end of this is a troublesome end.

Mitchell and Stans are involved in that.

And Mitchell, Stans, and Kumbach.

And Kumbach, right.

Right.

And those chips are going to have to pretty much fall where they may, as I see it.

What are they going to say?

Well, there's a hell of a lot of money, and it floated around, and there weren't receipts, and there was funny bookkeeping, and there was a lot of hanky-panky.

Money went to Mexico and back, and there were just a hell of a lot of odds and ends and stuff over there.

Now, Stan says he's clean, and I suspect he is.

I mean, he can tell a damn good story.

So Mitchell always finds out being the fault guy.

I don't know what he'll say.

I just don't know what he'll say.

He's been pumping his pipe and looking at the ceiling and saying, you guys have got a problem.

And we're beginning to get to him a little bit.

Dean's been hammering away on him to impress him that he's got a problem here.

Oh, what is he, spending money?

I don't know what he can say except to say, well, I just frankly didn't keep as close enough control over these guys with this money.

That's his best defense.

I didn't control him.

That's his best defense.

I was in the Justice Department and so on and so forth.

Well, I doubt it.

I doubt it.

I think he knew.

I think LaRue was sort of his agent and kept him posted.

Oh, yeah.

LaRue's a mysterious, shadowy figure that hasn't been called.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

Now, Bob

had what we call constructive knowledge through a fellow named Gordon Strong.

Gordon Strong's job here was Bob's liaison to the campaign.

Gordon Strong kept the most meticulous attention to detail.

But very little of it was actually a part of the Bob.

What Strong was was sort of a data factor.

So that if Bob needed to know something, he'd pick up the phone and say, Gordon, what about this or that?

And he knew.

My point is, did Bob know that information was coming from town services?

No, but I suspect Strong did.

And it was a situation where Bob... Well, Strong probably never comes into it.

Probably never does.

Because Strong's job was not to direct anybody to do anything.

It was just keep informing.

Right.

Now, on Colson, you have two diametrically opposite stories.

You have his, and you have Dean's conclusions, born of a lot of odds and ends and circumstantial evidence that he's putting together.

Dean tells me privately that he thinks that Colson was, in fact, in meetings

And that Colson probably was the efficient cause of Magruder doing this attack work.

Now that's John's, that's his conclusion based on circumstantial evidence.

I don't think that Colson, I believe that Colson is totally capable of it.

If I went down with Colson, it would be that and I'd kill him.

Well, let me tell you, the hunt trip to Dita Beard was a bonehead play.

And that was a Colson operation from beginning to end.

So I have to assume that Chuck was kind of intrigued.

I think he was.

I think he was, because that's a Thompson-Robert thing.

Now, I'm not going to tell you with any degree of assurance that Chuck's involved.

But what's important to know about this is that there are circumstances which a diligent council can put together in the same way that John is.

Well, from that, I think, or should they say, all right, let's see what they'll work out with regard to the limited questions, knowing the advancement is going to be carried out.

Here's the thing.

I'm for the Rivne Rockers, but I'm for nothing.

And I go to Rivne Rockers.

But if you go beyond that, you've got to realize that if the committee is eventually going to come down unanimously,

Or are you going to talk down the line and say, no, I can't talk?

Or is that a mind that is impossible?

All right.

I understand.

All right, here's another way.

Ziegler's point is that we were talking about this yesterday, that the damage that you take is as a result of something like me or Bob or somebody walking up the Capitol steps through the gauntlet of television cameras, regardless of what's said inside.

All right.

Supposedly you were to say to Urban and Baker, look, you and your two counsels, come on down here and talk to anybody you want.

I tried that.

I said you could come down and examine you and Urban and so forth.

Now, it may be that I should put that then, too.

I should put that to them, yeah, as is our position, that we all, that we have the team, the new council, the earth, the new council, and they come down and have an episode.

Clint East could carry this.

He could say, we're afraid of this becoming a circus.

Yeah.

In some way protecting the... No, it might is.

No, it might is.

But did you realize that does not protect Colson and that it's going to protect him?

And they go right into Colson at the same time.

Colson will handle himself beautifully.

Yeah.

He's righteously indignant.

He's been on the list of Drew's show.

He's taken the Today Show questions and he says, hell, I have anything to hide and I'm fine, I'm clean and all the rest of it.

Right, right, right.

I don't know.

I can't tell you that's perjury.

All I can tell you is...

Oh, sir.

That's right, and this would be a circumstantial case.

Well, that's what I'm saying.

It's very hard to do PR lines, but I just bring the money.

You had, you had a confrontation.

You had one man.

You had a dramatic confrontation.

And also, we got a typewriter.

Yeah.

That was hard evidence.

The confrontation proved it in the public mind.

In this case, the public mind is probably going to be convinced.

They're going to believe the worst.

They're going to believe the worst probably, maybe about Bob and maybe about Colson.

Maybe not Bob.

I don't think so.

I see.

And just being dragged out of the White House, dragged across town, dragged up those steps.

I'm against it, of course.

I don't mean to make or carry the hot horse.

He said, if you decide it, we'll do it.

If you decide it, he said, but this is what I want.

Let's take the other case.

Let's suppose we said, as a matter of long-standing policy, in fact, seven generations,

The President's immediate status is not testified, regardless of what the matter is.

So, in effect, we take the Fifth Amendment.

And we sit here.

And we just sit it out.

Is that worse?

Yeah.

It's a cover-up.

It's worse.

Well, I think so too.

I'm afraid, John, I'd like to do this from a personal standpoint, but believe me, I'm not sure the cover-up is worse than whatever comes out.

It really is.

Unless somebody's going to go to jail, and I'm not going to let anybody go to jail.

That is the worst.

The cover-up is worse, believe me, than all of them walking up the campus steps.

It's worse than walking up those campus steps.

Let's suppose my niece

who negotiated quietly with her to try and get depositions or informal interrogation, whatever you want to call it, here, and comes back and says they can't get them.

Then it seems to me the strong position for you to take is totally open-handed.

Let it all hang.

Let it go.

Let the breath of freedom flow.

And everybody votes.

And he's saturated.

Right, right in the office.

Yeah, well, that's the major antenna.

Well, let me say, I'll start with written interrogatories.

Written interrogatories at the beginning.

I mean, with blanks.

And then I'll, I'll tell you what's the backup position.

And, uh, and, uh, you can go to the, uh, this is their, uh, uh, of a deposition.

A deposition by the two chairmen and so forth.

But not every company.

Now, that would be the other, that would be the other possibility, to go to the committee chambers, not in a televised proceeding.

What does that look like?

Well, I don't know.

No, no, if you go to the committee chambers, you're going to have still pictures.

Oh, in and out, going up sketches and all that.

Yeah.

Well, I didn't want to interrupt you, but...

The record's a bet, but I really think the compromise position, which is an honest and decent compromise, is urban.

The two senior vets plus the two councilmen.

Or we could say that the board would know.

Well, I think you could leave it this way.

If you really turn up something, and of course, I'm confident you won't.

We'll look at it.

Then, come on in and talk to me.

Yeah, yeah.

And I'm not going to leave you.

You should, you should.

Now, what do I know about these with regard to how we deal with the facts?

Obviously, it's obvious.

Baker, Baker is an ally.

He was there to give a salute for that.

But Baker said it was a great mistake with Corlow, as he called him.

And it was.

I didn't know if Corlow was going to suggest a Western council.

You see what I mean?

That's what blew that.

That's silly.

Who did that?

Who suggested that?

I don't know.

I see you were working with him.

His chemistry is the most clever of all the times.

Harlow would not have made such a mistake.

When Harlow was gone, he said he liked Tom and the rest of it.

I had mentioned this idea of what you made.

It may be that Bob, in cases like this, is a little bit too direct.

That's too bad.

We've had better channels, Howard, than that.

Well, I thought so.

But I want you to check that.

And I sure would like to check that.

I sure will.

That's a different .

I think some of our relations with Congress are complicated with the fact that we departmentalize everything.

Bob will come.

Hey, we can go tell him what to say.

Coral will understand.

That's too bad.

That grew that much, I couldn't believe it.

Well, okay.

He was nice about it, but I can see he was very vulnerable.

He just thought it was stupid.

That's all I can do.

Dean would be the ideal contact, but Dean...

Suspect.

Well, he's really not.

Who likes him?

I don't know about this case, but how is it with my niece?

Fine.

Should be fine with my niece.

So let me ask you this, two or three, before we go on to some other subject.

Among the matters of the race, and I'll talk to you about these later, this veteran's got that information.

I think John, you have got to watch him.

on the basis of this, you've got to watch Weinberger more closely for where he now is.

I mean, Weinberger has no, strangely enough, very little political sense in that.

That should have been brought to my attention before it was done.

The same thing is true of

For example, the other thing that is vitally important, and I want you to get on right away with funds.

Andrew Nelson, who is a very niche guy, has worked out a deal with Bob Gold for a compromise on that REA thing.

He said it's a good compromise for our people and our activists.

And the committee meets on Monday.

I would like to see that done.

All right.

In other words, we've got to do something to at least play to our friends.

Let me tell you.

I'm willing to do some things for the markers, but aren't you going to ask me to do places?

But let me say that on the matter of this, markers, those are two of our efficiencies.

Now, on this tax thing, we're going goddamn far to play to the fat cats.

Those assholes haven't got any place else to go.

Veterans at Barnard's Head.

I don't think this was the smartest thing to do.

Veterans thing, we caught.

We pulled off of them.

We're off of that now.

No, we were off.

We took damage both ways, getting on and getting off, but we're off.

And I'll get on, but something else.

He was also talking about the two bills.

He did go down.

I'm going to take another look.

Veterans bills?

All right.

Take another look at them, too.

The other thing, Dager gave me a no-no.

And that is, and I, and they should have been robbed of my money because I would not have done it, explained the cost.

He said that the OMB had decided not to appoint the members of the commission for his husband.

No.

And that we were sinking.

No.

I was on this yesterday.

But I've been talking to Elliot about this yesterday, and I was over on OMB, and it is going through.

I've been very short, and I want you to call Dave there today.

I want the president to raise hell about this.

Don't tell him that.

Tell him that I got a machine, okay?

Say, look, it was just simply a matter of legs or something.

The president's kicking the asses all over him.

Okay?

And he wants you to know privately that it's going to be done.

And just sit back, okay?

The president keeps his word.

I ran across that yesterday.

Papa announced this morning that he's going to move down to Freiburg.

He wants to be president of Freiburg.

All right, what did he say?

Just say that that's not to be.

How does he do it?

Well, he does it a couple of ways.

He can either revoke his parole right now, or he can pass the word that he tries this.

Okay.