Conversation 919-011

Transcript (AI-Generated)

This transcript was generated automatically by AI and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Do not cite this transcript as authoritative. Consult the Finding Aid above for verified information.

we've got some of them you know all of our all of our we've got exactly this is our he must be a damn spot for us you hear about the dean papers he now thinks our foreign domestic intelligence isn't that the god damnest

in the world that a judge would give that to those two senators.

It's a total relief that this is about water.

I remember when we set this damn thing up.

It was right here in this office, you know.

They were all fighting each other.

CIA, NSA, and that guy was in the meeting at that time, he's the NSA, and Helms.

And we said, Mr. Hoover, you're in charge of the gathering of intelligence, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And all of you worked together.

And so forth.

But, uh, the whole point is that, uh, I think that we, we worry about such a stinking guy.

And, well, it shows you that these fellows play a lot.

It's a good issue.

We ought to fight over it.

We ought to.

Now, yes, I got Henry off.

I cheered him up a little, told him that everything was fine, and that he had done right, and so forth and so on, and you better go along.

Well...

What does he call it?

A 10-30 Celsius temperature?

Yeah, that's what I wanted to talk to you about.

We spent about two hours with him last night, and Ron had dinner with him last night.

I think Patrick was the same as both.

Let's get the details out.

With us, Brad and Ashley and myself, we came in very strong, and there has to be a complete housecleaning.

Everyone must go.

Ziegler knew that the liver was special.

He's not going to go.

He said that Ziegler was constantly irritated and depressed.

And it was just, you know, he's just wrong about that.

But also everyone else, every appointee that comes from the White House to the departments.

They have to know way better than all those people.

Oh, I don't think they know how to do it.

Well, I couldn't believe it all.

Yes, we did.

And Ron did, too, last night.

But what he's really after is, he said, the real key change that must be made would be if he is the Secretary of State.

I said, well, are you making yourself available?

He said, no.

I said, well, then the logical candidate would be him.

He said, no, that would be, that would be the Secretary.

Yeah, the verification.

Yeah.

That was the document.

They don't know precisely what the supplements are, but they are related.

After all this crap, I'm wondering over any documents.

Why did he take such a thing out of this White House?

To use the black number?

I can only assume so.

I can only assume he took it for leverage.

But Fred, that's a perfectly proper thing to do.

Oh, it was the proper thing to do.

No, but I had it.

I mean, this is a separate subject.

We have to do it.

It's a separate subject.

Well, you don't have to defend the doing of it with some foreign government, and you'll get a lot of screams about it.

Because we do have some of that.

Well, Mr. President, the way the collection operation works on...

some in and outline this foreign collection.

But some of the communication companies here choose to pick those communications up that go to the foreign country and back at this end of the board.

So actually the tape is here and it's been, and then it's transmitted by the bail.

I think we'll have trouble holding it if Urban gets it because of his special interest, particularly in the NSA participation in anything domestic.

Quite frankly, I've been the one who has hit on with him about this.

Well, we've always told them it's defined as foreign intelligence.

And it's not true domestic.

They don't bother with stuff.

that is terminal to terminal in the country.

Well, let me say this.

I'm relieved, but I'm glad it isn't some crap that this son of a bitch has had now.

They'll let him play until he's drained out, and we'd better start taking the offensive with him.

I think this kid is, uh, I think he's doing some blood on his hair now.

What do you think?

I thought that was it.

What do you think?

Well, I think that he weakened himself quite considerably.

I just thought over a young lawyer this morning.

who has, from my office, to work on some stuff.

And I had him start yesterday, come back and read the clips we were trying to put together.

And when he started reading in detail, he found out that Dean admitted that he had never seen you but ten times the whole time he was here.

And only three times before, very recently.

It had quite an impact on him.

or even you mentioned it to me earlier this morning this whole walter story for example is badly bother john got to answer somebody

Because basically, it's Dean that went over, that Bob and Johnny Gobert did that thing, and came out of that meeting, they might say.

But goddamn, Dean went over and asked for that cover.

Dean did all that.

He did the 30 points.

Well, anyway, that's a good job.

Right.

I congratulate you for your brilliance in getting to the forehand.

No brilliance, just asking questions.

I went home last night and I had the guy in here at 7 o'clock this morning.

There's a young major out there that I asked him to find out what kind of document it could be.

He found out that they had participated in writing one of someone, M. Bullock.

He came in early this morning to answer it.

We'll get together later today.

I've got a comment coming in a couple of minutes, a few minutes.

But, Will, right now, though, I told Fred last night, Hal, that we've done the right work around it as much as we can.

Put the heavy burden of this son of a bitching thing on his shoulders.

You and I and the rest of the government, as much as possible, they are going to do the right thing.

And he's willing to do it.

And by God, we'll follow what you do.

And this can be, this is going to be a tough fight, but we can win.

I mean, this is one of the wrong things to prove.

In fact, while they were on hold last night, I don't know what they're trying to do.

I think he was well-informed, though.

This is a damn bluff.

But I never believed, Mr. President, that this was part of our problem.

We were never given a month's good.

They were left with good, real good.

Thanks a lot for a great job.

Well, tell me if the result is tough.

I'm ready to kill.

I'm ready to kill, too, and I'm not going to rebel.

I mean, if you're going to rebel, how are you going to replace me?

I'm supposed to throw a cigarette out.

Who are you going to put in?

Klein?

No, quite frankly, I wanted to talk.

So I could point out what he was saying.

What did you tell him?

Well, I said, well, you know, there are only two men that could do this job, John.

I said, unless you have an alternative.

He did.

I said, one is you, and the other is Henry.

And I said, quite frankly, I don't think Henry would be a problem if he were doing the right things, because he's the one guy who can put the screws on the Israelis.

and get away with it.

And he just shut up because what he's after is fake.

I'm convinced of that.

Yeah.

Well, we may have to leave another apartment.

Well, that's right.

I don't think you will.

Not an apartment today?

Destroy that house.

But I sure as hell will leave it.

No.

No, I want to see how he behaves.

Yeah, I mean it.

He's a hell of a good guy.

He's very dramatic in discussing the impact on the economy, on confidence, the market.

I know.

He's worried about the market.

He's given me that, too, and I understand it.

We've got to do something about the stock market.

We've got to inspire confidence.

I've got to do something.

We've got to do something more dramatic than energy.

We've got to do something more dramatic than weight and price.

That's why I wanted to sit in on some of this so that he could see whether we could or couldn't be done.

Hell, I'm all for doing something.

Your main thing is, let me say this, this is the critical point.

He hasn't watched his death sentence.

He isn't talking about checking out.

This is where I want to emerge.

I think his typical style, he's going to say, this is what has to be done.

If it isn't done.

If it isn't done, I'm going back to Texas.

I have a very strong feeling that that's the way he's going to play.

Well, let's let it, I think we should let it go.

No, really.

You thought you agreed?

Yeah.

I'm not going to play that.

What I was going to say is I wouldn't, I wouldn't make it too hard, but maybe I would just say, well...

And we have human factors here.

We've got the grind of this government, and goddammit, a lot of innocent people, I don't think should be ground up just for a new broom.

It isn't going to satisfy anybody who came with it.

You know, I told him we needed something dramatic.

I agreed with that yesterday.

Yeah.

But I was really trying to find out whether it was stating or not, or so we'd been off.

And he never, he never agreed that he would serve something that he said he wanted to.

But Ron said he kept coming back all week, during their dinner.

But that's what we really need, is a good dynamic set of characters.

They can't quit.

Now that, I couldn't agree with, but...

It takes ten minutes to go, right?

But his attack on Slytherin, well, it was not an attack.

It wasn't an attack.

He's personally very clear on Slytherin.

He's very objective about it.

He says just that Ron is a red flag.

Ron, to a degree, is a red flag.

Let's not kid ourselves, but that doesn't mean that he's a liability to us.

He's anything but.

He's a crucial aspect of the subject.

Anybody would be a red flag out there.

Anybody at this time.

And there's a damn few.

And you can't permit a new clown to go out there and make and handle this kind of stuff.

It's just, it has to be a man that you have confidence in, and knows the background, and who's totally dedicated to you.

If you bite out of it, the parents would state that nothing had been done before, so it would be a sign that you couldn't do it.

He feels it has to be done very quickly.

At least the announcement.

for Christ's sake, should announce it.

No way.

He couldn't put him and Henry in the same bag.

He could for a period.

Well, maybe we made a bad move there to try to bring him in.

I guess that was sort of... No, no, no, no.

It's all right to bring him in and talk to him and make it up to him.

But if he goes, he's not going to go.

A lot of things might happen.

You think I should get someone to let him go, then?

No.

See, I'm not going to take any of that crap from anybody, I don't believe you.

I bet that we maybe have the...

I ain't got to run this country, God damn it.

This is my job.

You know, I think I listened a little bit.

Tell you a little bit about it, and we've done a number of things, and I'd like to get something on the rest of the handling marker, and tell you a little bit about this, and...

Let's keep our powder dry.

I don't know where it went.

I could have been bad for it, but it went away bad.

Yeah.

It's got a big mouth, and it goes far.

I don't know if you can expect that.

Well, I was hoping that when Conley came around, he would sort of be a, sort of a, one of our sturdy litigant spirits.

He always was earlier, you know.

I think he's still gifted.

Because you need somebody that's going to lift a little bit, not a man.

God, you know, Alex, for you as a ziggler,

Nobody comes into this office except to, frankly, except for me to chair them up, you know.

There comes a time when, you know, I remember in Eidolon, I don't need it very much, but that's why I'm going to try to cheer me up a little.

That's right.

That's what we're here for, quite kind of, and that's what you should be doing.

No, I'm not complaining, I'm talking about Eidolon.

For these people to come in and whine and bellyache around,

Well, he's a perverse lord, and he's damn good.

I don't think he's, with the exception of his ambitions, there's advice from each of them.

It's over, Dale.

Any over, Dale?

He always said everything else like he did on the other.

But I mean, I still recognize him as having more thought on matters.

I know there's another one, a cruel man.

Anything he wants, we'll do.

But does he think he wants to talk to you?

Yes, he wants to talk to you.

He thinks he's fairly close now.

He read to me his charge in the special investigation.

Right.

That's right.

It's very autonomous.

Right there.

Come on.

To this point, there's only three guys left now.

And one of them is a California fellow that's bad.

He's a son of a bitch.

He's bad news.

And I just don't, I'm afraid to tell him that he is bad news.

But I've got to get to work to him.

And I'm glad I've done him directly.

Okay.

He's a... Well...

We've got to get someone who's outside that is not traceable here, who is strong enough.

Maybe someone from California, maybe...

Someone to say, look, you've really got yourself a bad habit.

Ask a bench if he knows of a liberal type of person in California.

who is not a particular connection.

But somebody could call me and say, I've noted Warren Christopher's name used, and he would be an utter disaster.

Get to the point.

Get to bench on that right away, and ask Klein.

Klein ain't no good.

I mean, I don't know.

Those are the only ways I'd like to get at it.

And it's going to go, but if he gets into these bad news, what the hell is this?

I mean, do you think?

I get to the point where I don't think they can do a hell of a lot.

They're going to have to indict.

They're going to have to try.

It's going to be a long, miserable thing.

You know, it's not worth doing anything that has any risk to it.

Now, we're going to program Ron's body to take on the Senate Committee actions on Cambodia from a very narrow perspective.

Yeah.

Because I think we just can't sit here like folks on the law, goddammit.

We're going to take these things on.

Unbelievable, just before everybody goes on a trip, they don't send any, I mean, I haven't sent any foreign policy tool, whatever it is I'll be using.

Well, I think it's all getting off and survive for a year.

I'm not a high order.

If it does survive for a year, then, you know, then by God, we'll put it right on them.

You know what I mean?

I get it that we're goddamn cynical about this.

You can't, you can't force down the throats of this goddamn Congress something that, uh,

No, but we ought to throw one there so that they get the body to arrive and find out that it's clear what we did.

You know, I think we need lots of follow-up on yesterday's initiative, which will balance this.

It's coming up better now, even though there's some carpet.

You mean about the commission?

Yeah.

Oh, certainly.

Of course there'll be carpet.

But, you know, everything, everything, you've got to have some controversy.

H.K.

Smith called me last night.

He said, I'm sure I can help you with this president.

And I said, no, I can't do it.

I did what you can do.

I saw anybody I could see, but I must admit that the president is not going to make it.

He's going to hear it exactly.

I think that's the important thing, that this is so, the matter is so sensitive, and the grand jury is close to action, and that he, that any state that he makes any circumstances here, that he messes with the jury, will not, I say, handle that, the grand jury, that's the line I'm gonna go around calling back to just say that.

I don't indicate the grand jury, I'm not suggesting that that's the next few days, but it's coming.

I mean, they are now in the process of their actions, and the president, as he is, if anything, he will reach it, but he's,

You can be sure there will come a time he'll be glad to see you.

But he's not going to see anybody else.

He's not going to have a press conference until now.

And also, let me say this.

We can't allow the feeling here in Washington.

Sure, we know it's affecting the country, too, and particularly the politicians like Conway.

But we've still got to have some confidence in the fact that we've got a lot of support in the country.

We're going to have massive, huge support.

We've got massive support.

I think we have.

I do.

There's some sympathy out there.

There's some people who are sure.

They believe in elections, but a lot of people, you know, they say, God damn it, we're for you because you're under attack.

Now, this damn thing is a chicken-chip thing.

The more you put it in perspective, they go all over the place.

So they try to get the CIA to cover it up.

So what's wrong with that?

It was wrong.

It was stupid.

And it didn't, and it wasn't done.

It wasn't done.

Walters didn't do anything.

Incidentally, on Walters' memorandum, it said, what about these secretaries' demographic notes?

Bill, he asked them that thing, and he said that there are them.

All right.

On these, we're going to send that Walters memorandum, but the hell freezes over.

Absolutely.

You should get that out.

No.

You see, there are two things that were in that that were not in the affidavit or anything like that.

Yep.

One of them, I sent it.

Asked him to go in.

And the other one was that Grady said that if you had called him and asked him for it, he'd see it.

See, that would be bad anyway.

Which I had not done.

That's what I...

I was in a conversation with Gray.

Yeah, but just a minute, because I called Gray.

He raised the watergate, and I said, have you seen Walter?

But the point was, it was totally unrelated to the first conversation.

Well, what was involved was, and I knew that Walters was investigating in the CIA, and I really might be done.

We were all trying to find out what the crash was going on here.

And I think Bob and John were trying to find out.

Dean then became a free agent.

You think that Bob and John would have had John Dean go over to the CIA and tell them, look, will you put these passengers on your payroll?

How?

I said, I say, they're too good for two brains.

That's right.

They never did that.

And I think that's the way the whole thing's going to resolve itself, too.

Resolve itself.

We would have told them to put, to have the CIA out there.

We, I guess a lot of them, as I told you, everybody hoped that maybe, maybe that was the case.

But it wasn't, you know.

Now, Helm has got to stand up.

Do you think he will?

What he has done, in trying to do anything else, because he did, when I say staying back, I think he'll keep himself as far from the whole thing as he can, and that's just fine.

Well, this comment ain't gonna be rough on him, because he'll really lay it to me hard.

you know what you might say

This man is taking one hell of a lot of heat.

He's getting pretty strong this way.

Just around here, you know, we don't have anybody that goes in and says, look.

Give him a little, you know, a little encouragement.

Because he's going to move.

He's going to move in his own way.

You know, a little of that.

Do you think you can talk to him more?

Why don't you go to him now?

Say, I've been doing my radio speech.

And as soon as you go through with it, you might try to get in there.

Go ahead.