On July 11, 1973, President Richard M. Nixon and Ronald L. Ziegler met in the Oval Office of the White House from 5:16 pm to 5:41 pm. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 948-018 of the White House Tapes.
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 Do not cite this transcript as authoritative.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.
He did fine.
He was stuck by his story and so forth, wasn't he?
Hellos are demonstrating that they're a flat political body.
They're violent.
I watched the white cross-examination of Mitchell.
I was, as you would expect from a demagogue.
But Mitchell held his position well, and he's cool.
I think probably he was the better of the whiteners.
But this is just a god damn silly.
I get upset with, which I often don't with this committee.
I mean, I just can't wait for the day that we take him off.
Irvin handled them well, but it's the most incredible thing.
We just can't let these pompous, old, unintelligent, political, egotistical, demagogic type of people proceed this way without taking them on.
Well, no, Mitchell's doing very well.
Mitchell had a very wry comment.
at the end of his testimony, that went off camera.
He said, there's quite a trial of these fellows that could not be up here.
But I mean, when we take them on, we're going to take them on in the most effective way.
And that might not be the harsh attack, but just the very direct reference.
Well, we'll have to see.
We'll have to wait and see.
But Mitchell was a gentleman, so... Great, great courage.
William White said that he thought Mitchell displayed himself as a very courageous man to do this.
Oh, good.
I understand how the plans got close from that.
That's, uh, but I understand that.
What the hell did he do all that for?
Well, there's a point of view that they're afraid of him.
But, uh... Well...
I don't buy that.
I think they probably don't feel they have that much on Colson.
And I don't know, but I don't think it's because they're afraid.
Well, thank God, though, they aren't falling on our hands again.
I think it'll be all pretty well wrapped up by July 1st, you know, if they get the big ones on.
early parts of the nation.
Well, I think there's no question about that.
He just says, look, he says they shot their bulls.
He says, I told you about their plan to run on through the fall.
I don't know if it works.
There comes a time when people get tired, and they get tired of too much ice cream, too much candy, too much sex, and they think to God that they get tired of this town.
And they asked for it.
And they knew it.
And they pressed for it.
And they harassed him.
And they harassed him.
And they harassed him.
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He probably would be, but I think the case on Cox could be based on the fact that we've had it with us.
We're not going to allow the institutions of this government to be destroyed by distortion of this type.
And therefore, these activities, these investigations, these inquiries are being placed by the President of the United States, which is your authority to do, into the framework of the Department of Justice where they belong.
Cox, we're leaving here your responsibilities, period.
Let Ms. William Archibald Cox will not be remembered.
Any other major stories today?
No, sir, nothing major breaking today.
I don't know what you're talking about.
The pressure started to knock down on the rovers, and we had the rovers close to the effect of the actual white men receiving each other a great deal.
Oh, did we have a... Well, if they saw one on another great deal, they must have had a hell of an argument.
It should not have been reflected in any spirit of cooperation between them.
A lot of the rovers out of this thing have been incorrect.
I'll say.
I think our judgments on what was happening and how...
I was going to be, but I'm told yours have been.
Correct.
Connolly believes that we're right, though, in not responding.
We're going to have to pass it on.
On this subject.
He feels it at once and then drops it, huh?
Yes, sir.
That is the way it is.
It's the whole thing.
It's the whole thing.
It's the hell out of there.
Maybe not.
Well, you know, this would have been a bit of a jerk if they hadn't given us the alarm and tried to save us.
That's right.
A lot of money.
If they came out and said, over, after four months of the kind of crap that had been poured on here, it would have been great.
Absolutely.
That's the point.
That's right.
Absolutely.
It would have been a good start.
The power of presence.
There's a time to use it and a time not to use it.
It'll be there.
In fact, we haven't used it in over years.
It means that we have a lot of perspective on this year.
I'm not going to show you this, but I'm going to address a few exceptions.
I have a lot of loss of other things.
because of the dust man, that's what it is, the fireman.
I think it was taught in the South by Robin C. Evans in the New York Times, in the New Orleans, in the Reuters, that they couldn't match their teeth, not because of it.
They had to investigate the team over high and big, where he and I were the baddest.
I really think they built the team.
I can't help but think, the more I think about it, the more I just think about those two covers.
They all went together.
Did you ever read the alphabet or something like that?
Yes, I did.
Maybe over there on the right.
That's pretty close to me.
Those two covers, the fact that they went on all three networks, I think they thought this is the least we could knock the sum of their job apart.
I think so.
What does that mean to all of us?
All of us have a little time to build ourselves a career.
Of course.
We've got a lot of media.
We've got things sucked in by now.
Into the hole.
Sure.
New York Times internal political process.
Well, if you descend a minute, the public would maintain a little bit.
One thing I know that we have to do here, I hear, is to be able to do your .
I haven't done it.
Bastards.
.
Go ahead, .
No, I mean that.
I was talking about this when I heard your view.
I think we can use the press.
Oh, I agree with him.
I think we can.
I've asked this question.
I think we can pop their bubble.
We have a chance.
We can use it.
We have the time.
The press members will be used to go to the president.
They will be.
And...
I think the way they'll see it is... Don't let them know.
Don't let them know.
What do you mean?
Don't let them know.
How do you feel about it?
calling them on what they do and do.
But in terms of how many people on their own observe the things that maybe we, I say this wrong, attempted to point out to the networks, and by so doing, or to the press, and by so doing, made them bristle up and do it more.
Forget it.
No, I don't think we forget it in sight.
I'll tell you, it's very much more effective to pick up on the phone and talk to an Art Taylor in just a general way and say, Art, what in the hell are you guys doing?
You don't kid them about the antitrust thing and say, God, I kind of did the CBS today and I didn't get to see the commentary by your boys and Askers and Mitchell and stuff.
They didn't have it.
No, see, because it was only one network.
That, you know, that, that lets you know that, you know, and then their response is such that, um...
Isn't that what I, uh, wanted to do?
Yes.
What the hell is happening with the cable television?
I don't know.
I don't want something a little wet around here.
I didn't see it on that part.
I thought it would be a little special.
Well, well.
joint session of Congress for the AIDS War.
People want to do it.
They want to make it.
Please come join the session.
Also, you can't go prior to time.
You've got to close it together.
It's a very complex, convoluted, technical setting.
It's got to be handled in a way that's not like how it is at this time.
But at this time, I mean, I'm so opposite of the person.
I don't know.
I don't know what I mean.
I don't know what I mean.
I have a great deal of respect for the government of all those men.
But I just don't know.
I may just be 100 degrees off base here, but I just cannot see you going up to the Congress, creating a crisis, ordering them to solve it or asking
knowing that their response would have to be negative.
Now, that's where my judgment is.
You should cancel your office vacations and stay in session and act as a legislator.
There's a crisis about this and the dollar.
There's a crisis about inflation and the rest of it.
You have to get it because if you don't stand well, they're never going to pass it.
Now, they go back to the life of a true leader.
Uh-huh.
It seems to me that that's the right strategy, plus the fact that we get out and
When we get out into the country, we talk about the economy, and we talk about these other things, which I think Sapphire agrees with me.
I may be too melodramatic in this, but I really do firmly believe that the issues that the president talks about, the economy, peace, all of the rest, will fit together and will get more play on
talking about this not emotionally, but in a calculated way, we get more play if they are couched within a framework of a philosophical point of view being expressed by the president as we move into the final years of the administration, which is what they've always done as you've presented programs in your campaign.
and Indian public life over the years, it was always framed within a fixed point of view, accepted by a whole hell of a lot of people.
I think we have to get out and talk about the economy.
I think the economy is a battle.
I think the administration has to get stirred up in talking about it, the cabinet and the rest.
But I think it is a mistake to say that we are going to solve all these problems by simply the president going out and talking everywhere he goes about the economy.
Now, that doesn't do it, because that in itself, I think, to a degree, creates more crisis and concern amongst a lot of people.
Reference to the economy, mention of the economy, the programs and so forth are important.
The foreign policy side is important.
But I think also all of those accomplishments will be put in a context of your putting into perspective this country and where we are going in the last three years.
I'm saying this as a pragmatist, not as an emotionalist.
Because I do agree with Sapphire that that's what people want to hear now.
Then we'll start to.
Well, that wasn't really television.
I think it really is.
I wonder if he said that.
I should have peed at the time.
Maybe that means we need to update something.
I don't know.
There is no question.
I think what Sapphire reflects is correct.
We also have to remember though that they're socks.
And I'll never forget the period of time, the way that they were used, and the way you use them.
But then I think it bears up the point I just made.
I know I'm not being specific enough, and there's a need to be more specific, but it bears up this point.
I remember just being around these press guys in 67, 68, particularly 68, when you gave a series of radio speeches, very thoughtful, very productive statements on America, your philosophy in America and so forth.
Now, and a series of speeches.
Not only did they get good play, but if you look at the press corps and the other play of the story during that period, and the attitude to the press corps during that period, it's the best we've ever had.
Now, they were being appropriately used.
Now, I'm not saying by this... Well, of course, that factor is always there.
I'm not saying this is the dominant factor.
Now, by saying that, I don't mean that
in your radio speeches and so forth on the presidency of Indian Americans.
You weren't playing to them at all, to a degree, a little bit.
But really, you weren't playing to them.
But it was a very thoughtful, provocative presentation of direction for the nation, which you have taken to.
Now, in the end, over the first term,
you said you felt the emergency should be.
Now we've gone through the four years of, well, I don't have to even characterize the G. When I say that the Watergate is over, the crisis has really passed.
That means that the callus has been formed against the constant buffering of the thing.
That doesn't mean that we still don't have to move, and we agree on that, through the
through a procedure to come back from where we are, which is Sandbach Point, and to do so in a very calculated campaign way.
Getting back to my original point, my view is that that campaign is not a campaign based on simply an economic program or simply
a foreign program, I think it means that added dimension.
A philosophical base.
I'm not saying a philosophical base that you have to develop for yourself.
That's there.
I'm saying a philosophical base or a basic tone for them.
Not a tone.
A philosophical base of the nation bridged into the
actually not coming.
So, until we really get through this year.
We really screwed up the year.
Well, we lost the year basically, right?
But, uh, I think September is going to be a good start.
It's going to be a good start after the start of the campaign.
How will we
My view is that if we come up with the right approach by November, by Thanksgiving, before Thanksgiving, September, October are really the key ones.
Why didn't you try?
Well, we're out then.
Well, we shouldn't have tried.
Collie has told us that we'd be out in a few minutes.
We're on a huge street in New Jersey.
Is he?
for you to withdraw.
They're predicting that.
Withdraw, I don't know.
Well, just, they think that it's easy to withdraw.
This is why it's so predictable.
What they're looking for, Mr. President, is fire.
No, no, they're thinking this up.
Okay, yep.
Many people say, God is the greatest thing, you know, he's a good president, he's led the nation, foreign policy particularly, and he's
I'm going to be there for 76.
That's great.
In their minds, they feel that because of this, they recognize the buffeting from the press, and they recognize the unfairness of the press, but many of them will favor themselves and won't admit that they've been unfair, but they know that you must serve them and must realize the truth.
Therefore, their point of view is, well,
What the president's going to do is just say, well, we're lucky we'll have one fresh guy to be here, and God, forget anything with him.
I bet he won't even say hello to you.
You know, it's that type of attitude.
Now, let him think that.
We're never going to get close to him.
See Doug, you have to go the other way.
Go too far.
I agree.
I wouldn't argue that.
I'll tell you, a press conference and a cake, I think,
This has to be calculated.
A guy like William S. White...
Sit down, talk to him on the record.
William S. White, those types, by God, start working with you.
Sure.
In case we dribble in a moderate, just keep them off the balance.
I'm not talking about a lot of that, but I'm just... You're right.
I know.
I'm just...
Delighted.