Conversation 894-002

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But he'll be here.

He'll be here.

I'll let you know.

Well, give me a piece of paper before.

Okay, it isn't really necessary.

Well, no, I'd be glad to stay.

the corresponding associations there are going after.

And her family's awards are presented.

Right.

Just for the dessert and coffee portion.

Right.

For the entertainment.

When you went two years ago, you went to a recession.

No words.

No entertainment.

No.

Who are they?

This is my friend.

Yeah, I know.

But I let them.

You may have forgotten.

They were at the White House.

And I remember I went around and shook all their hands.

And I will not go to a recession.

We should talk to him twice, because I don't want to see the same thing.

All right.

I believe it was recommended purely on the basis of a couple of years ago.

It doesn't make any difference.

You don't have a precedent to follow it.

It's just that it's no longer relevant.

I already saw it in the White House.

It's just that group is in the White House.

So I would not vote for a reduction.

And when will they have to report?

I want to make my remarks after the meeting.

The courts have to be in a change.

The close of the meeting.

Well, I'm not sure we'll get a say.

under the circumstances, because they'd be able to show irreparable injury, you know, if we keep going.

Do you mean he has to go back and get hired?

No, no, it's just those things have set us close.

It's hard in that place.

It's pretty good.

It'd be pretty hard to put it back.

And I don't think any court would mandate that.

I mean, he's just stopped things where they are.

Who is this judge?

Some local federal judge.

I'm not trying any idea.

I don't know.

It's all right.

It's part of the deal.

Oh, sure.

But I have to deal with it.

Of course, around.

Do you agree?

Absolutely.

Yeah.

Go right ahead.

The, uh... As you see, the Mitchell thing is heating up.

Pretty hot.

I talked to Rogers this morning about Tom Clark.

Yeah.

He says that's a bad pick.

Okay.

And, uh...

Who's he?

Well, I asked him for some suggestions.

He didn't have any.

He said, well, she is mentally over the hill.

He's seen him recently.

And so I said, well, you've got to help us now to come up with some names.

He said, well, I'd be glad to do that.

He said, I see us drifting closer and closer to the need for a special prosecutor in this case.

The more Mitchell's name turns up.

So I said, well, uh,

Okay, you can think about some names for that if you want to.

I don't know if we'll get there, but I know I told him Clint East was pushing for that too.

I want to talk to you later, but then I want to think through where that goes.

Well, the point is here that maybe that's one way for you to get out around front on this is to say,

Look, Mitchell's name is now being bandied about.

I'm not prepared to get in with you right now.

I want to think about that before that leaves.

First, what did you work on with regard to timing?

You're going to meet again on Monday.

Well, we're not necessarily going to meet.

I'm going to have a draft Monday.

rules that they would like their committee they now say they will not start until may 1st in any event under any circumstances wild horses should make them start earlier than that because they've been so badly shaken in their

That's right.

Well, they see what they're now doing.

The staff has said to them, look, we have got to have corroboration for McCord.

We're committed to putting McCord on, but we've got to prop him up.

And that's obviously why they're delaying.

That will be, yes.

They said, Irvin said, well, now look, with Chapin, he said, we don't want Chapin.

He said, Chapin hasn't been accused of anything up here.

And he said, I'm not sure that he ever will be.

But if he is, he shouldn't come on until after his name comes up.

Otherwise, it's gratuitous.

That's what caused him to call me.

So he said, all right.

He said, I will tell you right now.

Because as soon as we are finished with McCord and a few corroborating witnesses, we will immediately go to Hollywood and Colson.

A few corroborating witnesses?

Yes.

See, now that's the new element from the previous meeting.

And it's obvious to me that they've had a meeting with McCord.

Well, in fact, they totally did, where McCord stole the document.

And Baker had the whole staff stand up and swear that they didn't have it.

Finally, McCord disgorged him.

So they lost contact with each other.

I think so.

And Fensterwald, they're just wild about it.

Why?

Because he's such a nut.

And at the time, they were telling me, at the time they were interrogating McCord, Fensterwald was out in the hall telling the press what McCord was going to tell them.

And they just started...

Afraid that Hester Wong is selling him a gold bracket here.

For his own purposes.

Could I, sir, get back to my proposition again about the swerve statements, the subtle swerves?

Yes, and you can get that out soon.

All right.

Now, I think at least some...

Well, tell me what you think.

There are two ways of looking at this.

Warren's safe in business.

One is...

I hate to appear to be advancing reasons for not doing something because I realize you can prove that you shouldn't do anything in this thing every day at the same time.

The problem that I see with it is that it is

impeaching of Dean's investigation.

Now, maybe that's already impeached as a practical matter, but when we say we're soliciting sworn statements and so on, and I'm surprised it hasn't gotten out by now, but we say we're soliciting a sworn statement.

All right.

Is that the person with the Dean's video?

That's the Dean.

All right.

I sent that to him.

All right, all right.

I sent that to the Dean, and that video is a swarm of statements by the whole members of the White House staff.

What I want to do at least is, I'm not concerned about, I am concerned about the White House staff, but I am concerned about the fact that, you know, as I said, the thing that I, you've got young people like the Goldwater Pop-Up Office,

You've got to have something that they can stand on.

They've got to do something.

Apparently, your conversation with Goldwater wasn't leading to the mines, I guess.

Well, I don't understand it.

If it wasn't, I mean, it just couldn't have been planned.

I don't know.

Well, as I told you, I was in England last year.

In fact, Peggy was standing with us.

What did you say?

Was he green?

No.

I said, the person had your letter.

He appreciated it very much.

It was very timely.

He said, well, I think it's been overtaken by what you fellows have done.

I said, yes, I hope you found that satisfactory.

He said, I found that totally satisfactory.

I think you've solved the problem.

He said, which of course was untrue, that he had talked to me.

And that I had told him that we had told him to go to the doctor.

That was untrue.

That's right.

That was his conversation with you over there.

Well, that's the only conversation he's had around here, unless he's talked to Dennis.

What do you mean?

Well, you know, Barry, I think he gave this interview to

or whoever he gave it to.

And they sucked him in.

And then he bounced from that to the television, of course.

Oh, that's right, that's right.

Yeah, tell them that I, that I, or something, there you go.

Let's see how, what Julie did, you call it back, I'll say, Julie, the middle-sex brother that I figured, I'll call, I'll call the judge.

So, that'll be it, Zach, I'll tell him sometime, but I'll, I'll get back to you.

Sure.

Do you want to call Colson, Julie, about the middle-sex brother?

Yeah.

Okay.

Have you been distracted, Colson?

No, I haven't.

Not this morning.

At all?

Well, all I have.

Continuously, uh, up until... Getting his views as to what we ought to do.

Right.

It is not, uh... And then, uh, fielding and talking to Colson's lawyer every day.

Yeah.

Uh, trying to pull him off.

Pull him off.

But he recommends.

Now, I've already told you we've got him, of course, but he recommends that Kansas should not be closed because of our goal.

Our goal is less because of the severe political impact that we've realized.

There are 3,000, 4,000 employees in our state, and I think he'll make this campaign particularly more difficult.

Let's be quite candid about the goal.

Of course the thing is not political.

I made a promise on that.

Therefore, if anything has to look at it, just cut the shit out of it.

I don't give a damn about who you want to scream at or anybody else, but they can cut the crap out of that thing virtually back to us.

Just so it isn't closed, you know what I'm saying?

Right.

All the others should go.

Now, on goal, I think that the situation there is that if you keep the Kansas one, it looks, uh, apart from the fact that you've got to keep the Screamers to the goal, it looks totally political.

Now, on the other hand, keeping the goddamn thing in in Kansas.

I mean, gold is a, is a, is a problem.

It's a, my ambition to cut it and all this other, and so on.

We have every reason not to do anything for it.

On the other hand, are we creating more trouble by closing?

In other words, let's face it, is it worth keeping it open in order to get the dog to behave a little better, or is that a loser anyway?

That's what I want to ask you.

I would want to see tenants talk cold turkey to dog about his behavior.

And to just say, look, we think you're cutting us up behind our backs.

We're not deceived.

And the price of keeping these open is good behavior.

I don't know if that's good or not.

I wonder if Harlow, I'm talking to him, or George Bush, Harlow maybe.

Or McGregor, or... Well, I'm not McGregor.

Harlow knows him the best.

Yeah.

But I don't know him.

I don't know him.

Or maybe if Harlow went to him and said, look, your bases are going to be closed, I may be able to save them for you.

Yeah.

But I need your solemn promise.

And...

I need support from you.

What do you think?

In other words, Dole is an effective spokesman.

He is.

And he is a good nut butter, and he also can be a very vicious fellow against it.

That's right.

Get out of there.

I think you saw and see my point.

Yep.

Sure did.

Uh, shall I talk to Harlow about that?

Yes.

Let me just say, I'm going to put you and Harlow to side, okay?

And don't...

If you don't bring it back in part, or if you've got a deal with the gold, we don't want to do that.

I've got a lot of heritage for it.

Okay.

And getting back to this, John, what I'm trying to do is this.

I tend to see things on the floor, and maybe that doesn't mean anything, but I just want people in the country, I just want people in Congress,

At least the president isn't sitting here on something.

Not knowing that in other words, if somebody goes out and is lying to me, it's not my fault.

I don't think enough people have ever even thought of it in that respect.

You see my point here?

Sure, mine.

Let me say it.

I haven't thought of it enough that way, I think.

I think I've been thinking of it.

And actually, so I would have, personally.

These guys all did what they did for the best of willies.

I don't want to give a purge, but it is important.

Here I am in the presence, at least the presence, and I'm sure we appoint a special prosecutor, but doesn't it have to be said at some point that everybody in the White House staff has given a snore and said that he was not involved?

You don't think that'll work?

I think it'll help at the margins.

The gravamen on the charge here is that people are lying.

I think your idea of this being Dean's move is very helpful.

It rehabilitates Dean to some extent.

And it's the ongoing thing.

And it does permit you to say,

I don't think it's enough at all.

I just want something set so that

I go, I think the dean angles it.

Right.

Yep.

Right.

Now that raised another question that has been running through my mind.

Let's suppose that somebody in this place doesn't sign the damn thing.

Nobody's refused.

Nobody's refused so far that I know of.

But it's occurred to me that we might get a refusal.

I know, I know.

Okay.

Look, let's get the problems out of here.

That's the main thing.

All right.

Okay.

I think the dean- It should be done.

But no, I'd like that done today.

All right.

I'd like that, you know, or at least tomorrow.

I'll talk to Ron and see what's the best time to do it.

All right.

President had asked, let's say the president asked for a swerve.

I mean, he's on the investigation.

I didn't say that.

At the president's request, he has concluded that no one on the white list is involved.

And at the president's request,

I can't say today or tomorrow through Ziegler or any other way that everybody signed this thing.

I will say that this process is going on.

Oh Christ.

Good God, we've had it going on for weeks.

Let's just get the people that, uh, let's just get the top people, you know what I'm saying?

Well, all right.

That's what I mean.

All right.

I'm sorry, I didn't mean just, just physically, uh, uh, with...

I understand, John, but we all know who they need the statements from.

Okay.

For Colson.

You need a, uh, you ought to have one, too, of course.

Sure.

Anything, because it might come into attention.

Sure.

Uh, you need one from all of them.

You need one from, uh, you know.

All right.

Not as far as the shape of the Colson.

Okay.

All members of the White House.

Wait a minute.

Yeah.

Whatchamacallit.

Chairman Colson, who were members of the White House staff during this.

All the members of the White House staff.

And I would just say, and then as far as the others are concerned, when you get down to the lower levels, it doesn't really make a difference.

I'll do a little white lie on that.

Just to be on the big list.

Okay.

The big vision.

Dean.

He's got it?

Yeah.

Would it not be to slow it down a bit?

We got, we're gonna strike the captain in tomorrow, but maybe we ought to have Brennan have to hold his hand.

That'd be great.

Yes.

I mean, we don't need to do it for debt.

We don't need, I don't see any other member of the captain that really needs his hand.

Brennan would be very good.

Brennan ought to come in and say thank you for the good fight, right?

Yep.

And also to talk to me a little about what I said in the building trip.

All right.

What up?

Now, what with regard to this whole, uh, special prosecutor deal... Well, let me back off that.

You see, I would not go down that trail if it's going to inevitably lead to Terry on the beat, I mean, frankly speaking.

I understand.

Let's face it, sir, you know what I mean.

Well, let me back off that, because I haven't thought it through.

And the other point is that, however you get me and Brandon, uh, just anybody can sit on top of this goddamn heap.

Exactly.

You see, the problem is almost any lawyer is supportive of the Supreme Court.

I mean, we can't do this without the support of the government.

And there are very few of them, very few of them.

And as far as the judge is concerned, most of the part of the judge he can honor is dead.

Well, how do you get a law school professor or a dean or something of that kind?

Now, if Snead weren't here, he'd be the type of right of attention.

He was a decent man, a strong man.

Law and order type.

This fellow Wilson of Harvard is another one who's a law and order type.

He's a dean of the school of government.

James Q. Wilson.

I don't know.

He's done a lot of legal writing.

He's a common dependant.

Head of Henry's Department.

Yes, Captain.

He has a lot of writing on law enforcement, criminal justice, stuff of that kind.

Just to say that I've asked him to make a total evaluation of this thing.

We don't want to get into the situation, John, as we did with that horrible video.

I know, I know.

That's just running through my mind.

I like the Texas guy better than the teens from Austin, Florida.

The Texas guy got very good reviews up and down the line.

Right, doesn't he have pretty good reviews?

Yes, sir.

Sure does.

And he's not known to be in our pocket in any respect.

When they go back, back, they got some sexual polonite.

But I don't think that's, I don't think that's a disability here.

He doesn't have to be confirmed.

Shoulder shake, knock, cough.

Volunteer to gear for the ranger.

That would be my concern about Haldeman volunteering, would be the signal that that sends to Mitchell.

That's right.

If there's a leak on Haldeman, then I think it would be appropriate if you could say to Mitchell, look, we didn't have any choice.

I would really like to get that out.

Why?

I really would like to get that out.

I think I'll answer the yeses here, I didn't just get, well, I didn't get a statement on that, so I'll be about to find out, I'm sorry.

But I knew that he could get, is there a way to divide it up as the best there is?

Isn't it very important to divide it up and go right into that right away?

Maybe what we ought to do is think about showing some motion.

Mr. Haldeman put his statement out this week.

It's on full space, sir.

Yeah.

And in the statement say, I want to go before this urban committee at the earliest possible time.

Yes.

Well, I would like that very much.

I understand.

I don't want to show motion to the city.

You know what I mean?

I don't want to do it if it's going to save somebody else.

But

All of them, I think.

I think that's better than volunteering.

See, to volunteer to go to the grand jury says to Mitchell, their job is to make it happen.

Yeah.

It's ready.

It's ready, virtually.

Well.

It's pretty good, in my opinion.

Yeah.

Alright, how does he get his statement out?

We just put it out.

That's right.

Just, there it is.

Saturday or Sunday papers?

Is that what you have in mind?

Right away.

Uh, that's fine, yeah.

Or, well, at least it's Thursday.

You mean like today?

Well, I was thinking tomorrow, but it would get lost.

Saturday is better.

Saturday or Sunday papers?

Now, on the other hand, this is something that evolved out of that tree.

Well...

Something could leak from the grand jury, but it hasn't been.

Hasn't been.

Too bad.

I'll tell you what, I've got a note I've got to call claimants this morning.

And I've got some feel for how the evidence went in.

You didn't hear it?

Well, I know what Strong said, or at least what Strong told Bob.

I haven't heard it out of Chapin yet.

But let me get that in motion.

Well, he didn't get fixed.

He only went about 40 minutes.

And he's back today.

Well, I'd like to get this grayed out.

Basically, it is totally distinguishable.

Yeah.

I can see some real pluses in that.

Yes, sir.

You bet.

Because he covers the gray.

Yes, and...

He covers it, I think, in his statement in the right way.

He might even start out saying, the statement might start out saying, this is the statement I would have made to the urban committee if I had had an opportunity to testify in the near future.

Senator Irvin's public statements now indicate it's going to be as much as May.

And leaks are coming out.

I'm being assaulted by ambush.

Right.

And, you know, they said that we cannot have any aura around the community.

We can't have the... And therefore, I'm releasing the statements that I would have made.

You made doubts about the, at this point, releasing the statement covering those charges that have been made.

Right.

I'm not convinced it's going to be on television yet.

Really?

Really not.

It was interesting.

I think I made some real headwind with these fellows last night.

It will remain to be seen.

Now, of course, I've got a problem here.

I'm only talking to two out of seven.

And I'm not talking to the staff.

And I could tell between the first meeting and the second meeting that they were given backbone on some of these points by reference back to the staff.

They haven't had a committee meeting, so I know it's the staff.

And so, but it's not a dead issue by any means.

I'm convinced we're going to have to appear.

There's no two ways about that in my mind.

And I want to appear.

The television thing, I think, is still a viable question.

And they'll come back to me now.

See, Monday they're going to come back with what amounts to a counteroffer.

And then I'm going to bang them by telephone.

And then we'll get together Monday afternoon and hopefully we can iron the thing out.

But Bob's saying that he has to go right away.

I agree with that.

He has to go right away.

Before something happens.

And maybe, maybe, I don't, I don't know Cole, that Cole I'm calling, he's just going to make a little bit of a shift.

Well, I have to find out, if I can, how pervasive his name was in this grand jury process.

I don't know if I can get that from, he's not very, he's not very forthcoming.

Now, the, the shuffle that we've been talking about of Cole being out and so forth,

and a new FBI director could be seen as the kind of bold stroke by the president.

I know.

That might be coupled with this, the appointment of this right for somebody like him to work with the new attorney general to report to you to have this special assignment.

I heard because we feel that the committee is on its own.

What I have in mind here, let's assume the worst.

Let's assume that Monday we just can't get an agreement.

And the committee goes ahead unilaterally and publishes some rules, some ground rules, Tuesday or Wednesday.

And then the ball's in our court.

We've got to decide what to do.

I think no matter how crappy the rules are, we're going to have to go.

I've been invited to meet the press the following Sunday.

What I would propose to do

is to background between Wednesday and Sunday about how forthcoming we were, how we initiated these meetings, and all that belonging.

And then, thank the committee.

Can we, uh, just cover one other thing.

We've got a rehabilitation team.

We've got to face the second incident.

We've got to get a hold of the committee.

I think, I think you'd better go a little bit more and see what the hell he's come to do.

I realize, we didn't know that McCord was a discredited witness.

And of course we realize McCord is saying only that Liddy told him that he gave the trust to Mitchell.

But now the answer is McCord is going to say also that Liddy told him.

Did he give these reports to the White House?

Evidently not.

How do you mean evidently?

Well, I say evidently because I don't know.

I mean, you know, Dan McCord says something different every day.

And he's got a press conference coming up that Urban apparently hasn't been able to hit him on that.

He's liable to say any damn thing.

But the best guess right now is he won't say that.

Where did you ever check out the two copies?

I tried and nobody seems to know.

I don't know who told you that.

Well, I did.

He says he doesn't recall ever telling you.

Well, I'll check again.

Yeah, the story comes up that a copy was sent to the White House that we've got to take some goddamn action here.

You know what I mean?

Yep, yep.

When I say action, I...

So what about... Is it obvious that I never saw it?

I think he does.

He says that in his statement.

What does Strong say?

I never saw it.

There was no indication that it was... Nobody ever gave me a copy of it.

Uh...

Yes, it is.

I don't receive my promise.

I don't know the facts.

Facts are irrelevant.

Let's suppose they didn't come.

All right.

What does it mean?

They don't say no?

No, then they don't say no.

Then they don't say no.

They say they didn't see it.

But my point is that I would expect that you'd have to assume that's what it's going to come out.

Okay.

Let's plan for that.

Okay.

Get the sworn statements out and so forth.

Goldwater's left now, so you can't do anything with him.

Let him go.

No, he's going to call me today.

So I'll be talking to him.

I will be very helpful.

I will.

I just don't understand.

Because look, we're dealing with Irwin on this goddamn thing.

What do you want?

You want to service up there?

The President has given the sworn statements for every member of his staff.

What else do you want done?

What do you suggest, Senator?

I think he will.

That's right.

or a special counsel.

He reports to you.

You say, that's the panel that I have conducted my own investigation.

Well, now, why don't we say that why we didn't do this before?

Well, you know.

Because the charges isn't loose.

Because the wild charges are being made.

We have confidence in the process.

Right.

It's our confidence in the process.

That's about all you can say.

Bill's point, though, is

It stems from an assumption that Mitchell's going to be implicated heavily.

Then he says you've got to have a special product.

Mitchell is implicated on two scores.

When I say he's implicated on the money afterwards, he can get out of that.

I mean, I think he can cover that.

You agree?

Yes.

If he just says we're sure, he's got to say we did it.

But he's got to say it early, and he's got to do it in a way that explains it.

That's all.

What does Dean say when he's asking about that?

Well, Dean says I was just a, he says I was pretty much a messenger boy here.

I was just trying to help out.

Right.

All right.

What do you and Bob say?

When they say, well, why didn't you, like when they came and asked about this, didn't you then, did you even smell a rat?

No, I didn't smell a rat.

Uh, I don't speak English, but I'm sorry.

But, uh, Bob and Mr. Hogan and Mr. Dane asked me for money and, uh, so forth.

So if you had to have money for these people, what did you think it was for?

Well, I thought it was for legal counsel to help them clear their debt.

So I just told them I couldn't, couldn't do anything about it.

It was a committee problem.

It was a problem with the committee.

And we have, we have struggled and striven mightily to maintain a separation.

Did you tell Mr. Dean not to engage in this, get out of this, quit fooling around with him, Mr. Hallman?

You were his chief of staff.

No, sir.

Get off me.

Call him, Steve.

We have to do right now.

Roger says he's working on it with the chairman of the membership committee, doing everything he can.

And I just wanted you to know we were following up.

I got one of the people on the staff here who

Okay, nice.

Okay, good.

I guess you want to see, I guess.

You have to do, we have to do a hell of a lot of changes.

There are two people on the staff, currently on the White House staff, we have to realize, who are special in charge.

One is Dean and one is, of course, most important is Bob.

And coming back to what I said to you yesterday, the thing to do is without

wishful thinking.

We've got to look down the road as to what the hell is going to fall off them, right?

And, uh, we'll not get to the position where I've got Barry Goldwater and George Bush and George Kerry Ford saying, Alderman has to go.

Because if they do, he cannot stay.

I know, I understand.

I understand.

Um, now, I, I said, I'd invite you to the death point, but I, but, but I'm bothered to want to stay there because he doesn't, in effect, he can do his job because I know that

I've been giving some talk to him and I listen very carefully to Urban last night because he is sending signals very quickly.

He's very partisan.

Extremely partisan.

And he thinks he's sitting in the category seat.

He has temporary setbacks.

I'm like, boy, this thing's built just the way he likes it.

Sure.

And so I think we're not going to know to any degree of certainty at all what's down the road to those two cops.

Yeah, well, be my guest.

You better get on with this.

Now, we can do some hypothesizing, but that's all I can do.