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Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the thing.

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Speaker 1: A few people were deeper into the Watergate cover up

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Speaker 1: than President Nixon's White House counsel John Dene Then he flipped.

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Speaker 1: He was a star witness for the Congressional investigation. And

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Speaker 1: while some Watergate conspirators had religious conversions in prison, Dean

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Speaker 1: left prison with a commitment to teaching in classrooms and

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Speaker 1: beyond the lessons of the scandal and advocating for better government.

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Speaker 1: I recently had the opportunity to talk with him in

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Speaker 1: front of a live audience at n y US Screwball Center.

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Speaker 1: Tell us the jobs you had in government prior to

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Speaker 1: becoming counsel to the president. I was at the House

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Speaker 1: Judiciary Committee. Was my first job in government, and from

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Speaker 1: there I went to a commission. It was revising the

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Speaker 1: federal Criminal Code. I didn't study enough while they were

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Speaker 1: working on I have a question about I then went

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Speaker 1: from there to become the Associate Deputy Attorney General in

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Speaker 1: the Nixon administration. At the outset of the administration and

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Speaker 1: while they're working in justice, I was invited to become

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Speaker 1: counsel of the president. Who invited you, Richard Nixon, Nixon,

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Speaker 1: someone's making a recommendation to him, or he knew you personally, well,

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Speaker 1: they sent a feeler out. In fact, I over the years,

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Speaker 1: in going through the archives, I haven't collected at all,

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Speaker 1: but I have collected bits and pieces. I didn't realize

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Speaker 1: they were doing reconnaissance on me for many many months

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Speaker 1: before they asked me to come over to the White House,

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Speaker 1: questions like could I really be loyal to Nixon? Literally? Literally?

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Speaker 1: What did you think that they saw in you? That

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Speaker 1: they thought you were a Nixon man? Uh? I? You know,

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Speaker 1: that's one of the mysteries to me is why someone

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Speaker 1: as young and inexperienced as I was was given that job.

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Speaker 1: I was given, actually the title, I wasn't given the job. Initially,

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Speaker 1: John Erlickman had been White House counsel. He was the

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Speaker 1: initial White House counsel. He gave up the title, he

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Speaker 1: didn't give up the job, and I think Nixon throughout

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Speaker 1: really relied on Erlickman for his legal advice. You come

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Speaker 1: from a Republican family. Your dad was he was an

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Speaker 1: executive Firestone. He worked at Firestone. My father's spent eighteen

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Speaker 1: years at Firestone and then went out. He was a. Uh.

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Speaker 1: He was a turnaround expert. He would go into a plant,

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Speaker 1: a manufacturing plant, could see why it wasn't working. He

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Speaker 1: was the numbers man as well as a mechanical engineer

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Speaker 1: from Carnegie Mellon and could straighten these plants out. But so,

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Speaker 1: did you have some kind of Republican credentials throughout your

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Speaker 1: my My family was not particularly political. Uh were you?

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Speaker 1: I actually became interested in politics when I was in

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Speaker 1: prep school and my roommate happened to be the son

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Speaker 1: of a United States senator, and we would go up

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Speaker 1: to Washington and stop and see uh, Senator Goldwater his

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Speaker 1: son and I and uh. And that's when I was

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Speaker 1: became interested in in that world. I can still recall

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Speaker 1: and visualized walking down those marble halls with the Senator

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Speaker 1: leading the way, taking us on a tour here there,

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Speaker 1: and saying, this is pretty impressive. He was also, I thought,

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Speaker 1: an impressive guy. He had a he had one of

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Speaker 1: the first thunderbird for thunderbirds. I was at that age

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Speaker 1: just thinking about getting a driver's life since and we'd

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Speaker 1: ride around in his car that was more like the

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Speaker 1: cockpit of an airplane. He was a ham radio operator

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Speaker 1: and could also talk to any air base he wanted

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Speaker 1: to talk to from his thunderbird. Now, when you finally

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Speaker 1: go to the White House as a counsel to the President,

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Speaker 1: what was your sense of what the job was and

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Speaker 1: what you to discover the job? Actually was? One of

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Speaker 1: the things that I was really strange is I was

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Speaker 1: never given much guidance as to what the White House

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Speaker 1: counsel did when Lackman was there, he never really told

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Speaker 1: me anything about it. Uh. When Hallaman interviewed me before

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Speaker 1: I went in to have the President, say would you

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Speaker 1: take the job? Uh, he said, I suppose you will

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Speaker 1: just do whatever you lawyers do. He wasn't a lawyer,

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Speaker 1: And uh, that was about the guidance I got. What

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Speaker 1: what were some of the things you did? What were

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Speaker 1: some of the things you worked though? You start the

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Speaker 1: job one year? I When I started the job, it

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Speaker 1: was a lot of I realized that Alickman was sending

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Speaker 1: my office all the minutia, things like clearing people for

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Speaker 1: conflict of interest, preparing us for example, there was no

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Speaker 1: staff manual when I got there, so my office prepared

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Speaker 1: a staff manual to tell people, you know, what forms

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Speaker 1: letters had to be in, as well as Uh, the

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Speaker 1: fact they couldn't contact independent regulatory agencies they had to

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Speaker 1: go through our office or uh not at all, sort

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Speaker 1: of just basic mechanics. And I told initially I was

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Speaker 1: a solo, and I think they were sort of testing

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Speaker 1: to see who I was and what would go on,

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Speaker 1: and it wasn't. It was about six months before they

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Speaker 1: let me hire an assistant. And I needed the help

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Speaker 1: because there's a lot of work are in fact today

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Speaker 1: in the archives, the White House Council's office for the

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Speaker 1: Nixon presidency is one of the largest collections of papers. Well,

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Speaker 1: thank god you weren't doing the conflict of interest work

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Speaker 1: in the White House. Now you'd be dead from exhaustion.

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Speaker 1: Depend only but and you need about five or there

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Speaker 1: is no clearance at all and no work at all.

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Speaker 1: They probably just closed that office this this term. You know,

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Speaker 1: we're not gonna bother with that conflict. Just send them home. Uh.

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Speaker 1: But but described for me, because I think a lot

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Speaker 1: of people you get into that kind of CULTI personality

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Speaker 1: with someone like Nixon and what what was it like

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Speaker 1: to work with him? What was he like? Because it's

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Speaker 1: just nothing like being in the presence of the person

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Speaker 1: themselves rather than through the filter of the media. What

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Speaker 1: was he like when you worked with him? You know,

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Speaker 1: when I went over there, I was old enough and

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Speaker 1: been around enough to know there was a tricky Dick.

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Speaker 1: But I believed in the sixty eight campaign that Tricky

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Speaker 1: Dick had matured. He was now a former vice president

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Speaker 1: who really understood how government operated, and he would be

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Speaker 1: a great senior statesman type person. And uh, that's the

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Speaker 1: image that was put out. The White House staff itself

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Speaker 1: was operated so tightly that very few on the staff

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Speaker 1: actually knew what the president did and how he did

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Speaker 1: it and when he did it. Uh, it was more

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Speaker 1: they read what was in the paper that was being

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Speaker 1: cranked out by everybody else. As to the image of

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Speaker 1: the president, I've, for example, really other than in group

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Speaker 1: meetings and and uh just passed through meetings, had no

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Speaker 1: dealings with him until eight months after the arrests at

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Speaker 1: the Watergate and then I'll have some thirty seven thirty

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Speaker 1: eight meetings with him. You become more useful to him.

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Speaker 1: What happens is after his successful reelection. I have been

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Speaker 1: reporting to either Hallaman or Eliman everything I'm able to

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Speaker 1: pick up about Watergate and the investigation and where it's

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Speaker 1: going and what its implications are, and nothing looks good. Uh.

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Speaker 1: At that point Nixon decides rather than of uh, well,

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Speaker 1: not at that point, but several months later, in February,

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Speaker 1: he decided to rather than have Hallman and Lan filtering

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Speaker 1: what I have to say, he decides to deal directly

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Speaker 1: with me. And thankfully it was recorded. So when you, uh,

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Speaker 1: so the news breaks, the burglary breaks in what month

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Speaker 1: of seventy June seventeen seventy two, June of seventy two,

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Speaker 1: he's overwhelmingly elected after that, and when you found out

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Speaker 1: that these guys who had links to the White House,

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Speaker 1: to the Committee to be elect had broken into the

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Speaker 1: d n C office at the Watergate Hotel, what did

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Speaker 1: you make of it? What happened to have been in Manila? Uh?

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Speaker 1: In the Philippines? Convenient, wasn't. The first mistake was coming home? Uh?

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Speaker 1: That's on June nineteenth, two days after the arrest. I'm

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Speaker 1: sent to interview Gordon Liddy, who confesses to me. Uh.

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Speaker 1: He says, it's our men, my men. Uh he And

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Speaker 1: when he said my men, what was his no? No?

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Speaker 1: Liddy was x FBI former FBI hunt was x C

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Speaker 1: I A x C. I A uh, he said, my men,

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Speaker 1: what was well, I was. What he was explaining is

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Speaker 1: that there was on the morning of the nineteen the

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Speaker 1: Washington Post knew more than we did at the White

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Speaker 1: House as far as Watergate, and there was a big

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Speaker 1: story that morning that amongst those arrested was the chief

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Speaker 1: of security for the re Election Committee, James McCord, which

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Speaker 1: was a pretty good clue that it somehow involved the

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Speaker 1: re election Committee. Uh. John Mitchell. Ahead of the re

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Speaker 1: election Committee, the former Attorney General now director of the

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Speaker 1: Election Committee, put out a statement saying, oh, we don't

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Speaker 1: know anything about what these guys were doing. They were

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Speaker 1: freelancing on their own. Well at it didn't take me

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Speaker 1: very long to realize that that was bologny. Today, I

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Speaker 1: know that really the conspiracy was hatched over that weekend

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Speaker 1: and the decision to cover it up, and there was

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Speaker 1: a real reason to cover it up for the White House,

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Speaker 1: which I learned when talking to Lyddy h on the

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Speaker 1: morning of the nineteenth. In fact, I intercepted him rather

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Speaker 1: than come to my office. I didn't want him in

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Speaker 1: my office, but rather walk down seventeen Street. That's when

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Speaker 1: he said, these are my men. Who did this. He said,

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Speaker 1: I was foolish to use McCord, who was part of

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Speaker 1: the re election committee. Liddy himself was the general counsel

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Speaker 1: of the Finance Committee of the re election committee where

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Speaker 1: he was that was his supposed principal responsibility. But he

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Speaker 1: was running this on on the side. And on the

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Speaker 1: way back up, he said two things that were back

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Speaker 1: up seven injuries were really quite startling. He said, you

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Speaker 1: should know John, while I worked at the White House,

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Speaker 1: that Howard Hunt who helped me get the men for

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Speaker 1: this operation. And I did a what he called a

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Speaker 1: national security operation by breaking in Daniel Ellsberg's psychiatrist's office. Uh.

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Speaker 1: What I didn't know at that time is that that

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Speaker 1: had been really authorized in writing by John Erlickman, my predecessor,

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Speaker 1: who wrote on a sheet asking his approval. So long

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Speaker 1: is not traceable to the White House. Yeah, yeah, Um,

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Speaker 1: I didn't know that at that time. Anyway, I did

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Speaker 1: go back and report to Erlickman what I had learned.

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Speaker 1: The other thing that Lyddy said on the way back

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Speaker 1: up seventeen Street, he said, I realized I've made a

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Speaker 1: terrible error, and if anybody wants to take me out,

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Speaker 1: just tell me what street corners. Yeah, he literally said,

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Speaker 1: he said, anybody wants to take me out, just don't

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Speaker 1: do it at my house. I've got children there. What

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Speaker 1: do you think was behind that? Why would he, I mean,

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Speaker 1: other than his own having maybe a screw loose or something.

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Speaker 1: Why did he believe that the the operation of the

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Speaker 1: White House, the governed, the executive branch of the government,

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Speaker 1: would want to whack him on a street in Washington. Why.

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Speaker 1: I have no idea. He's just a little dramatic. It

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Speaker 1: was probably mistake not to no, no, just to clarify.

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Speaker 1: And of course the day he was shot, you were

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Speaker 1: in Manila, right right, So, uh but no, no, no

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Speaker 1: explained to people what were they after. It's taken a

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Speaker 1: long time to assemble what they were really after because,

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Speaker 1: uh no one really talked about it, and it was

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Speaker 1: kind of embarrassing. One of the reasons I'm convinced that

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Speaker 1: Lyddy was silent is because of the stupidity of all

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Speaker 1: the activities that have been carried on. Uh the for example,

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Speaker 1: he post Watergate acted like he was some James Bond

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Speaker 1: type character who had been hired by the White House

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Speaker 1: to come in and do these things. As the historical

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Speaker 1: record shows he's not quite at the Maxwell smart level

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Speaker 1: in most of it. His undertaking is another reference from

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Speaker 1: our childhood. So if you don't Maxwell spart anyway, what

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Speaker 1: they were looking for, it appears to me. It appeared

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Speaker 1: to me at the time, and I have since been

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Speaker 1: even more convinced with a pure fast fishing expedition. They

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Speaker 1: were just in there trying to find anything they could

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Speaker 1: of a negative nature and hopefully on Larry O'Brien, the

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Speaker 1: chairman of the Democratic National Committee. Um So during the

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Speaker 1: period where uh, you're called in now and you become

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Speaker 1: pulled into this circle to help solve this problem, when

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Speaker 1: does that commence? On the nineteen I'm the person who's

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Speaker 1: in charge of finding out what's happening and keeping abreast

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Speaker 1: of what what's happening, talking to people in the Justice Department,

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Speaker 1: talking to the FBI, talking to the re election committee

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Speaker 1: that has its own group of lawyers, and in bringing

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Speaker 1: that information in. And what happened is the re election

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Speaker 1: Committee started calling on the White House for help. One

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Speaker 1: of the interesting things is I've always been convinced that

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Speaker 1: John Mitchell, who we know did authorize the Watergate break in,

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Speaker 1: he authorized the money. He authorized the plan. Uh. He

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Speaker 1: did it in Florida, UH with Jeb McGruder, who was

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Speaker 1: his deputy, and McGruder then gave the orders. I'm convinced

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Speaker 1: that Mitchell, from my initial conversations with him on the nineteen,

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Speaker 1: was prepared to step forward and say, hey, this happened

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Speaker 1: on my watch. Uh. He also sent word to the

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Speaker 1: White House over the weekend, stay away from deflect all

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Speaker 1: the responsibility from the president, take it all from That

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Speaker 1: was the original plan. But then what happened is he

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Speaker 1: to uh got a briefing as to what Liddy had

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Speaker 1: done and learned of the Elsberg break, in which he

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Speaker 1: thought was as bad, if not worse, than what had

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Speaker 1: happened at the Watergate, and he and he and Erlickman,

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Speaker 1: who had always had a strained relationship, they often in

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Speaker 1: the room would talk to each other through me. They

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Speaker 1: would turn to me and say, like the other person

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Speaker 1: wasn't in the room. And that's how I slowly became

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Speaker 1: the lynchmen like a marriage counselor yeah, exactly, Uh, because

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Speaker 1: that that's that's how I became the lynchman of this conspiracy.

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Speaker 1: When you're in a room with these guys I only

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Speaker 1: have a sense of them from archival footage from the news,

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Speaker 1: and so when they do seem like a pretty uh,

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Speaker 1: not a very lighthearted crowd, you know what I mean?

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Speaker 1: And uh Holdeman and ran and they seemed like some

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Speaker 1: pretty dark crowd in terms of Because I'm gonna read

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Speaker 1: a quote for you from uh, because you were on

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Speaker 1: the Commission on Reform of Federal Criminal Laws right as

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Speaker 1: the War on Drugs was beginning. And then the next

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Speaker 1: thing you know, you're intimately working with in a room

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Speaker 1: with Erlickman, who uh said the following right before he died.

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Speaker 1: He said the Knicks about Nixon Republicans. He said that

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Speaker 1: Nixon Republicans had two enemies, the anti war left and

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Speaker 1: black people. We knew it couldn't make it illegal to

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Speaker 1: be either against the war or black, but by getting

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Speaker 1: the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks

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Speaker 1: with heroin and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt

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Speaker 1: those communities. And he said, did we know we were

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Speaker 1: lying about drugs? Of course we did. When you're in

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Speaker 1: the room with these guys, when you get a sense

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Speaker 1: that you've never heard that kind of talk, It wasn't

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Speaker 1: until years later. My last book, I cataloged all of

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Speaker 1: the Nixon Watergate conversations. I heard on those tapes things

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Speaker 1: I've never heard those men say in front of me.

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Speaker 1: They were their own small unit that would talk about

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Speaker 1: these things at a level that I wasn't privy. There

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Speaker 1: are some chilling stuff that and racist stuff that I've

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Speaker 1: never seen in Rlickman before in those tapes. Uh, it said,

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Speaker 1: it's a remarkable record. No presidents ever gonna leave that

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Speaker 1: behind again when uh, well, mus not be too hasty now,

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Speaker 1: uh you're hopeful. Well, we're gonna get to the comparisons

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Speaker 1: and contrast in a minute. Both houses of the Congress

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Speaker 1: were in Democratic hands at the time, correct, but it

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Speaker 1: was a different Democratic party. It was a party with

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Speaker 1: Southern Democrats who were today Republicans. So it it it divided.

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Speaker 1: He believed and and held out the belief for a

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Speaker 1: long time. I think that he could with a combination

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Speaker 1: of Republicans and Southern Democrats keep a keep his office

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Speaker 1: through a an impeachment bill of impeachment in the House,

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Speaker 1: if not defeating that, certainly not getting two thirds of

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Speaker 1: the Senate to vote against him for removal. So uh,

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Speaker 1: it's it's a different Democratic party. It's true. It was

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Speaker 1: not controlled by the South either. It was more more

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Speaker 1: moderate to progressive that did. And if you recall, it's

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Speaker 1: very slow that the impeachment process starts with Watergate. It

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Speaker 1: isn't until he removes the special prosecutor, Archibald Coxs that

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Speaker 1: they take this seriously. That while that itself may not

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Speaker 1: be an obstruction of justice or an impeachment or a

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Speaker 1: criminal offense, he had the power to do it. A

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Speaker 1: lot of parallels with today. Uh. He certainly politically had

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Speaker 1: made a terrible mistake. There were Republicans obviously on the

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Speaker 1: Judiciary Committee and in the Congress who were willing to

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Speaker 1: vote for slowly, but surely they did. They were the

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Speaker 1: moderates first and then finally by the end when they

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Speaker 1: heard the so called smoking gun tape, which showed Nixon

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Speaker 1: had based his defense up until the end on the

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Speaker 1: fact he knew nothing of the Watergate cover up until

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Speaker 1: I had told him on March first, in a conversation

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Speaker 1: that was labeled a cancer on the presidency. Uh. Conversation. Uh,

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Speaker 1: he said that was the first he'd learned. Well, that

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Speaker 1: was a pretty outrageous lie, and he got caught in it, uh,

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Speaker 1: just by really the special prosecutor fishing for a tape

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Speaker 1: uh and and one of that and that tape showed

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Speaker 1: him uh telling hall Or agreeing with Holloman's plan to

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Speaker 1: have the c I a block the FBI's investigation in

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Speaker 1: the Watergate. And that conversation with Hallaman takes place when June,

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Speaker 1: right after the breaking, right six days after uh and

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Speaker 1: and and and these are the tapes that he was

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Speaker 1: forced to surrender, which he don't understand that he did

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Speaker 1: surrender the tapes other than the gap, the famous kid,

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Speaker 1: there would have been an interesting constitutional crisis if he

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Speaker 1: had said to the Supreme Court, Okay, I've got you really,

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Speaker 1: I think it's wrong, and I President, I've got the troops.

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Speaker 1: You come get the tapes. But this is my property.

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Speaker 1: This is my You're not entitled to have this property.

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Speaker 1: And history would have been very different. As everybody knows,

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Speaker 1: it's a famous gap is eighteen minutes, eight and a

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Speaker 1: half minute. It's a media it's a media invented event.

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Speaker 1: There was no eraser at all. No a strong man

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Speaker 1: could press the record button uh and cause the eraser

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Speaker 1: and it they're the experts saw seven to nine efforts

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Speaker 1: to erase that material. Well, what do you think it was?

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Speaker 1: Was it based on those tapes? Is there everybody? You know?

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Speaker 1: Because I've listened to the conversations that precede and follow

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Speaker 1: Nixon had a pattern of repeating things that were important

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Speaker 1: or sort of sensitive. They would come up in subsequent conversations.

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Speaker 1: This is a very early conversation. This is in June,

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Speaker 1: his first conversation back. That's why it was subpoenaed. And Uh,

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Speaker 1: I think it was just a gas that resulted in

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Speaker 1: that probably being erased. Uh. And it could have even

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Speaker 1: the person that occurred to me that could have done

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Speaker 1: it was somebody who had a terrible time opening those

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Speaker 1: medicine bottles you press in turn. I'd see it in

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Speaker 1: his mouth occasionally trying to get the cap off. He

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Speaker 1: had trouble opening its drawers. He hadn't driven a car

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Speaker 1: in years. This was a very foreign kind of machine.

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Speaker 1: Did Nixon order the breaking himself? No, he didn't. No

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Speaker 1: evidence of that. There no evidence of anybody in the

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Speaker 1: White House knew. What's ironic, Alec is that had the

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Speaker 1: mission of the evening actually been accomplished, rather than Lyddy

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Speaker 1: and his men being arrested or Liddy's men being arrested.

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Speaker 1: It was traceable to the White House. Their mission that

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Speaker 1: night was really to go plant a bug in McGovern's

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Speaker 1: headquarters on Capitol Hill. The reason they didn't do that

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Speaker 1: is they got arrested fixing the defective machinery UH that

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Speaker 1: they'd put in at the Democratic National Committee headquarters. You

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Speaker 1: can trace back through tapes and Hollaman memos that Nixon

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Speaker 1: gives an order to put a plant a secretary or

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Speaker 1: a volunteer or something like that, move it from Muskie

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Speaker 1: to McGovern and not particularly a wire tap. So as

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Speaker 1: we come rolling into seventy three, right as he's uh

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Speaker 1: where things changed dramatically for him. What kind of things

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Speaker 1: is he asking you to do? And what was he

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Speaker 1: like to work with here in that Jumping back to

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Speaker 1: August of seventy two, pre election, he had a press

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Speaker 1: conference and one of the early questions he's asked, is Mr. President,

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Speaker 1: giving the fact of your Attorney General, UH is now

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Speaker 1: the head of the re election committee, and if somebody

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Speaker 1: from the re election committee was arrested in the d

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Speaker 1: n C, why don't you appoint a special prosecutor? And

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Speaker 1: he has his response all prepared, and he says, well,

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Speaker 1: if first of all, the Congress is investigating this, the

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Speaker 1: General County Office is investigating it, uh, the FBI is

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Speaker 1: investigating it. But most importantly, my White House Counsel John

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Speaker 1: dene has investigated this matter and found nobody presently employed

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Speaker 1: in this administration had anything to do with this bizarre incident.

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Speaker 1: This was the first I heard of my investigation. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And so after that, his press sectary, Ron Zigler, called

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Speaker 1: and said, John, do you have a copy of your report?

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Speaker 1: I said, Ron, there is no report. Uh. He said, well,

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Speaker 1: maybe there should be, and I said, well, I don't

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Speaker 1: think so. Anyway. I don't think why because I didn't

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Speaker 1: want to lie. I didn't want to You knew that

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Speaker 1: they wanted you to doctor something that it was quite clear. Yes,

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Speaker 1: what happens is when you're we're going back to when

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Speaker 1: I first started dealing with with Nixon. He starts on

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Speaker 1: the report again that he wants a Dean report. He

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Speaker 1: is convinced somehow this will make things go away. Uh.

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Speaker 1: Erlickman makes it pretty clear that what he can do

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Speaker 1: is have this report in his desk drawer and say

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Speaker 1: this is all I knew. Uh. It didn't take me long.

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Speaker 1: You know, I figured that out immediately, that uh, that

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Speaker 1: this would be a setup, and I had no interest

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Speaker 1: in line, had no interest in giving the false information

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Speaker 1: to the president uh, and didn't. But he presses me

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Speaker 1: on that there there were actually three phases of the

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Speaker 1: cover up. For me, I initially thought I was just

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Speaker 1: helping out my colleagues and didn't see anything criminally amiss. Uh.

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Speaker 1: Defense funds were not unusual at that time. Uh. Not

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Speaker 1: announcing them didn't sound horrible to me. I didn't get

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Speaker 1: see any quid pro quo in in anything. Nothing struck

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Speaker 1: me amiss at this point. As I said, I'm not

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Speaker 1: trained as criminal lawyer either, defense defense funds. The Barragan

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Speaker 1: brothers for the had a defense fund the Chicago criminal

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Speaker 1: yet and that's what actually Nick. There's a tape of

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Speaker 1: Nixon suggesting that there'd be a defense fund set up

401
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Speaker 1: uh for the Cubans who had been hired by hunting

402
00:25:23,119 --> 00:25:27,400
Speaker 1: lyddy uh to pay their lawyer's fees and what have you.

403
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Speaker 1: If he had done that openly, he might have avoided

404
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Speaker 1: obstructing justice. It's very curious, and Hallman and Erckman dropped

405
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Speaker 1: that I never heard about that. In fact, when I

406
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Speaker 1: first hear about it, I don't know what he's talking

407
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Speaker 1: really know what he's talking about anyway, phases of the

408
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Speaker 1: cover up for me, I initially don't think I'm engaging

409
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Speaker 1: in criminal conduct. When I realized I am is. After

410
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Speaker 1: the election, Howard Hunt calls Chuck Coulson, and Coulson records

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Speaker 1: the call on a dictaphone. He his phone hooked up

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Speaker 1: to a dictaphone, as many did in the White House,

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Speaker 1: and he brought this tape down to me to play

414
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Speaker 1: of his conversation with Hunt. And he's proud as punch

415
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Speaker 1: of this conversation because Coulson is because it exonerates him

416
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Speaker 1: in the Watergate that he had nothing to do with

417
00:26:18,720 --> 00:26:22,800
Speaker 1: the Watergate break in, I hear something very different. I

418
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Speaker 1: hear Hunt demanding did he get paid sooner rather than later?

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Speaker 1: That promises have been made to him to take care

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Speaker 1: of him, they haven't been delivered and the ready isn't there.

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Speaker 1: I immediately say to Chuck, this is very bad. Chuck uh.

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Speaker 1: He said, well, what are you gonna do about it?

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Speaker 1: I said, I don't know. What I did do is

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Speaker 1: take the tape up to Haliman and Erckmann and played

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Speaker 1: it for them. They said, uh, take it to John

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Speaker 1: Mitchell and get him to solve the problem, which I

427
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Speaker 1: next did that same day and took it up to

428
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Speaker 1: New York and played it for Mitchell, whose first reaction

429
00:26:58,440 --> 00:27:02,200
Speaker 1: is don't you ever have anything good news to report?

430
00:27:03,200 --> 00:27:06,680
Speaker 1: And I said, no, John, I don't anyway. It's after

431
00:27:07,080 --> 00:27:09,680
Speaker 1: listening to that conversation, I let my fingers do the

432
00:27:09,720 --> 00:27:12,159
Speaker 1: walking in the criminal code to figure out what in

433
00:27:12,160 --> 00:27:16,479
Speaker 1: the world are we doing? And I discovered eighteen USC.

434
00:27:16,760 --> 00:27:20,280
Speaker 1: Fifteen oh three, which is the obstruction statute, and I

435
00:27:20,520 --> 00:27:25,240
Speaker 1: discovered eighteen Usc. Three one, the conspiracy statute, and I

436
00:27:25,320 --> 00:27:28,240
Speaker 1: realized we're in a whole lot of trouble. Now. You

437
00:27:28,359 --> 00:27:31,960
Speaker 1: might have thought that the first reaction would beat two

438
00:27:32,640 --> 00:27:35,600
Speaker 1: run for the hills. I mean I had exactly the

439
00:27:35,640 --> 00:27:39,159
Speaker 1: opposite reaction. That's when I doubled down. That's when I

440
00:27:39,200 --> 00:27:42,520
Speaker 1: try to make the cover up work. I know today

441
00:27:42,720 --> 00:27:45,240
Speaker 1: psychologically what was going on. I was in what they

442
00:27:45,240 --> 00:27:48,720
Speaker 1: call the loss frame, where you have no attractive options

443
00:27:48,720 --> 00:27:53,320
Speaker 1: and you do stupid things. Uh it's it's it's unfortunately

444
00:27:53,359 --> 00:27:55,840
Speaker 1: part of human nature. Happens a lot to a lot

445
00:27:55,880 --> 00:27:59,680
Speaker 1: of people. Uh, I don't you feel a loyalty personally

446
00:27:59,720 --> 00:28:02,119
Speaker 1: too of these people. Had you developed any kind of

447
00:28:02,200 --> 00:28:08,000
Speaker 1: closeness with them as a person, as a co conspirator, Yes,

448
00:28:08,240 --> 00:28:10,560
Speaker 1: I did. I wanted to cover up to work at

449
00:28:10,560 --> 00:28:13,199
Speaker 1: that point, and that's when I do dumb things like

450
00:28:13,240 --> 00:28:18,600
Speaker 1: destroyed documents, uh knowing yes, Uh you know, and and

451
00:28:18,600 --> 00:28:21,959
Speaker 1: and I never understood and for years you know what

452
00:28:22,040 --> 00:28:24,920
Speaker 1: had happened. And the last phase of my involved in

453
00:28:25,000 --> 00:28:28,080
Speaker 1: the cover up is when Hunt sends a message to me,

454
00:28:29,359 --> 00:28:33,280
Speaker 1: uh that he's going to have semi things to say

455
00:28:33,320 --> 00:28:37,000
Speaker 1: about John Erlickman and by implication, Bud Crogue, one of

456
00:28:37,040 --> 00:28:41,720
Speaker 1: his assistants, regarding his break in at the Elsberg uh

457
00:28:41,880 --> 00:28:48,000
Speaker 1: psychiatrists office fiasco. Uh. That's when I sort of say,

458
00:28:48,360 --> 00:28:53,360
Speaker 1: my god, this is never gonna end. We're being extorted. Uh,

459
00:28:53,560 --> 00:28:55,480
Speaker 1: there will be no end in it. It's this cover

460
00:28:55,600 --> 00:28:58,200
Speaker 1: up is not going to work, and it's we've got

461
00:28:58,200 --> 00:29:00,520
Speaker 1: to figure out how to stop it and get the

462
00:29:00,520 --> 00:29:04,040
Speaker 1: president out in front of it. And that's March nineteen

463
00:29:04,200 --> 00:29:08,080
Speaker 1: when that word comes in. I have by then started

464
00:29:08,080 --> 00:29:10,640
Speaker 1: to have enough dealings with the President that I think

465
00:29:10,640 --> 00:29:13,640
Speaker 1: he's got trust in me. And so on March the

466
00:29:13,680 --> 00:29:17,720
Speaker 1: morning of March one, I go in after setting it

467
00:29:17,840 --> 00:29:20,320
Speaker 1: breaking precedent because you weren't supposed to go to the

468
00:29:20,360 --> 00:29:23,640
Speaker 1: President of and through Haldeman. When he called me that night,

469
00:29:23,680 --> 00:29:25,960
Speaker 1: I said, Mr President, I really need to talk to you,

470
00:29:26,360 --> 00:29:28,520
Speaker 1: and he said, how about ten o'clock. I said, fine,

471
00:29:28,560 --> 00:29:32,080
Speaker 1: I'll be there. Uh. I called Hallaman that morning and

472
00:29:32,120 --> 00:29:34,040
Speaker 1: said I need to go in and lay it out

473
00:29:34,080 --> 00:29:36,920
Speaker 1: to the president. He really doesn't get it. I don't

474
00:29:36,920 --> 00:29:39,960
Speaker 1: know if Halloman understood what I was talking about or not,

475
00:29:40,040 --> 00:29:42,560
Speaker 1: but he said, fine, you do what you think is necessary.

476
00:29:42,920 --> 00:29:47,360
Speaker 1: I went in and tried to give him enough back,

477
00:29:47,400 --> 00:29:49,600
Speaker 1: given the benefit of the doubt that he didn't know

478
00:29:49,680 --> 00:29:55,240
Speaker 1: anything I know today he knew almost virtually everything. But

479
00:29:55,520 --> 00:29:58,680
Speaker 1: I took him through each step, and every time I

480
00:29:58,680 --> 00:30:01,040
Speaker 1: would raise one of the problems, he'd have an answer.

481
00:30:01,720 --> 00:30:06,080
Speaker 1: I'd raise. For example, Uh, Bud Crog is worried he's

482
00:30:06,520 --> 00:30:10,240
Speaker 1: committed perjury. Nixon's response, Well, John, perjury is a tough

483
00:30:10,320 --> 00:30:14,720
Speaker 1: rap to prove. I raised the fact that Hunt was

484
00:30:14,800 --> 00:30:19,600
Speaker 1: demanding a hundred and twenty thousand dollars yesterday. He wanted

485
00:30:19,640 --> 00:30:25,000
Speaker 1: fifty thousand for his attorney's fees and seventy for his

486
00:30:25,080 --> 00:30:28,000
Speaker 1: living expenses and what have you, because he had by

487
00:30:28,000 --> 00:30:30,400
Speaker 1: then been convicted. What's the line X and the famously,

488
00:30:30,520 --> 00:30:32,360
Speaker 1: we could get the money if we had to. That's

489
00:30:32,400 --> 00:30:35,920
Speaker 1: exactly the line. That's you're coming to it. Uh. And

490
00:30:35,920 --> 00:30:39,320
Speaker 1: and and I and I said, Mr President, I have

491
00:30:39,480 --> 00:30:42,360
Speaker 1: no idea how much this might cost. And he said, well,

492
00:30:42,480 --> 00:30:44,760
Speaker 1: what do you think? What what you give me an estimate?

493
00:30:44,840 --> 00:30:46,600
Speaker 1: I pulled out a thin air what I thought was

494
00:30:46,640 --> 00:30:50,400
Speaker 1: a hefty number. I said, a million dollars. That would

495
00:30:50,440 --> 00:30:53,200
Speaker 1: be what about five and a half today? Uh, never

496
00:30:53,280 --> 00:30:56,400
Speaker 1: having tried to even kind of, you know, calculate what

497
00:30:56,440 --> 00:31:00,280
Speaker 1: it might be. And that's when he said, that's no problem.

498
00:31:00,520 --> 00:31:03,520
Speaker 1: I know where we can get that. Uh. And what

499
00:31:03,680 --> 00:31:06,320
Speaker 1: I didn't know is that went until I actually did

500
00:31:06,480 --> 00:31:10,760
Speaker 1: did this book with all the tapes. Is after that conversation,

501
00:31:11,240 --> 00:31:14,560
Speaker 1: he goes over to rose Wood's door, which is adjoining

502
00:31:14,720 --> 00:31:18,120
Speaker 1: his offer the Oval office, and asked rose And in

503
00:31:18,160 --> 00:31:21,560
Speaker 1: a voice you can hear on the tapes, how much

504
00:31:21,640 --> 00:31:25,360
Speaker 1: is in the slush fund? Uh, there's six hundred thousand.

505
00:31:25,520 --> 00:31:29,440
Speaker 1: He will uh within a week or so be selling

506
00:31:29,440 --> 00:31:34,400
Speaker 1: an ambassadorship to raise money. He's on the job. He's

507
00:31:34,400 --> 00:31:37,040
Speaker 1: gonna he's gonna solve this. He's gonna get the million

508
00:31:37,080 --> 00:31:41,320
Speaker 1: bucks and say take care of it. If John Deane

509
00:31:41,400 --> 00:31:45,920
Speaker 1: was the ultimate Nixon insider, essayist and satirist, Louis Lapham

510
00:31:46,240 --> 00:31:51,080
Speaker 1: was the ultimate outsider. Despite their shared patrician roots, lap

511
00:31:51,160 --> 00:31:55,280
Speaker 1: them skeward the administration and its Watergate troubles from behind

512
00:31:55,320 --> 00:31:58,400
Speaker 1: the covers of Harper's Magazine, where he was the managing

513
00:31:58,520 --> 00:32:03,640
Speaker 1: editor throughout the envill I never liked or trusted Nixon.

514
00:32:04,200 --> 00:32:07,880
Speaker 1: I came out of the you know, the affluent, privileged

515
00:32:08,600 --> 00:32:12,120
Speaker 1: San Francisco society, San Francisco society. My my father had

516
00:32:12,160 --> 00:32:17,120
Speaker 1: been very strongly in favor of Roosevelt. Two. Here my

517
00:32:17,200 --> 00:32:20,560
Speaker 1: conversation with Louis Lapham at Here's the Thing dot org

518
00:32:21,160 --> 00:32:24,440
Speaker 1: coming up more from Richard Nixon's White House counsel on

519
00:32:24,640 --> 00:32:28,040
Speaker 1: lessons from Watergate for Trump and the rest of us.

520
00:32:36,720 --> 00:32:40,400
Speaker 1: I'm Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the Thing now,

521
00:32:40,600 --> 00:32:44,520
Speaker 1: more of my conversation with John Deane. When you talk

522
00:32:44,600 --> 00:32:48,320
Speaker 1: about this period, you say that I'm gonna stop this

523
00:32:48,440 --> 00:32:50,840
Speaker 1: or I'm having my doubts because the cover up. You

524
00:32:50,840 --> 00:32:53,160
Speaker 1: don't think it's gonna work. Would you have kept going

525
00:32:53,200 --> 00:32:57,120
Speaker 1: if you think the cover up would work? You know

526
00:32:57,240 --> 00:33:00,520
Speaker 1: the President at the end of my march the first

527
00:33:00,760 --> 00:33:04,120
Speaker 1: cancer on the Presidency where I used that phrase to

528
00:33:04,120 --> 00:33:08,400
Speaker 1: get his attention, and I had it after that, Um,

529
00:33:09,720 --> 00:33:11,960
Speaker 1: I was, I was. I think that's the day I

530
00:33:12,000 --> 00:33:15,280
Speaker 1: met Richard Nixon, the real Nixon, because I took him

531
00:33:15,280 --> 00:33:19,520
Speaker 1: through one problem after another problem after another problem, waiting

532
00:33:19,560 --> 00:33:22,080
Speaker 1: for his fist or hand to come down on the

533
00:33:22,080 --> 00:33:24,920
Speaker 1: desk and say this has got to stop. Uh, that

534
00:33:25,040 --> 00:33:27,560
Speaker 1: isn't That isn't the man I met that morning. He

535
00:33:27,680 --> 00:33:30,680
Speaker 1: had answers for everything and that it had to continue,

536
00:33:31,040 --> 00:33:34,400
Speaker 1: that somebody should take care of this problem with Hunt. Uh,

537
00:33:34,440 --> 00:33:39,120
Speaker 1: and uh that there was no short term answer. He

538
00:33:39,560 --> 00:33:41,960
Speaker 1: wanted to cover up to go on. I had nothing

539
00:33:41,960 --> 00:33:45,040
Speaker 1: to do with with Hunt getting paid. He did get paid.

540
00:33:45,080 --> 00:33:48,760
Speaker 1: Mitchell took care of it. Uh. And Hunt would remain

541
00:33:48,760 --> 00:33:53,440
Speaker 1: a bought man until the Watergate prosecutor is trying hauled

542
00:33:53,480 --> 00:33:56,440
Speaker 1: him in and Elman and Mitchell in the cover up

543
00:33:56,440 --> 00:34:01,880
Speaker 1: trial in October of nineteen seventy four were which is

544
00:34:01,960 --> 00:34:05,760
Speaker 1: quite remarkable. And then he would decide that he would

545
00:34:05,800 --> 00:34:08,680
Speaker 1: tell the truth. And he was the Perry Mason witness

546
00:34:08,760 --> 00:34:11,359
Speaker 1: that came into the trial and nobody knew was going

547
00:34:11,400 --> 00:34:15,359
Speaker 1: to arrive and explain what the Watergate break in was,

548
00:34:15,640 --> 00:34:18,480
Speaker 1: how things had operated, and was very candid and very honest.

549
00:34:18,800 --> 00:34:20,960
Speaker 1: You mentioned the three phases of the cover up. Did

550
00:34:20,960 --> 00:34:22,359
Speaker 1: you cover all three of those or was there another?

551
00:34:22,440 --> 00:34:25,480
Speaker 1: I did? The last phase was ending trying to end

552
00:34:25,520 --> 00:34:27,640
Speaker 1: the cover up and realizing the only way I could

553
00:34:27,760 --> 00:34:31,080
Speaker 1: end it, and telling my colleagues, I'm going to the prosecutors.

554
00:34:31,200 --> 00:34:34,719
Speaker 1: This has got you know, we've got to deal with this.

555
00:34:34,840 --> 00:34:39,240
Speaker 1: We need criminal lawyers in here. I'm going to hire

556
00:34:39,280 --> 00:34:44,520
Speaker 1: a criminal lawyer, and would you hire I hired a

557
00:34:44,760 --> 00:34:49,200
Speaker 1: college law school classmate initially UH to talk about a

558
00:34:49,200 --> 00:34:53,200
Speaker 1: man who later became the chief judge of the UH

559
00:34:53,600 --> 00:34:57,560
Speaker 1: Federal District Court in d C. Tom Hogan UH. And

560
00:34:57,760 --> 00:35:01,080
Speaker 1: we talked about it, and he suggested Charlie Affer, who

561
00:35:01,120 --> 00:35:04,759
Speaker 1: had worked here in the Southern District, was a very

562
00:35:04,760 --> 00:35:10,960
Speaker 1: accomplished prosecutor and had become a very successful criminal defense lawyer,

563
00:35:11,120 --> 00:35:14,440
Speaker 1: and he was terrific. Uh. That would I for a

564
00:35:14,440 --> 00:35:17,879
Speaker 1: while had one foot in the White House and one

565
00:35:17,920 --> 00:35:20,200
Speaker 1: foot out of the White House, but didn't hide it

566
00:35:20,239 --> 00:35:23,200
Speaker 1: from my colleagues. What I was doing. Either you're a

567
00:35:23,280 --> 00:35:26,360
Speaker 1: very young man when this is happening and you're married.

568
00:35:26,360 --> 00:35:28,800
Speaker 1: I mean we talked backstage about how your wife becomes

569
00:35:29,400 --> 00:35:31,360
Speaker 1: kind of a bit player or the whole thing of

570
00:35:31,440 --> 00:35:34,359
Speaker 1: the kid. As you said, the camera found her, Uh,

571
00:35:34,640 --> 00:35:38,600
Speaker 1: your beautiful wife, Maureen Dean, and she was there. Uh.

572
00:35:39,040 --> 00:35:41,480
Speaker 1: She had a huge influence on me. I want you

573
00:35:41,480 --> 00:35:47,360
Speaker 1: to explain about was the anxiety. And you know, I

574
00:35:47,400 --> 00:35:49,799
Speaker 1: did not want to get married, but I did not

575
00:35:49,920 --> 00:35:53,920
Speaker 1: want to lose her. I had been married, uh and

576
00:35:54,080 --> 00:35:58,320
Speaker 1: divorced and had a child from that first marriage, and

577
00:35:58,600 --> 00:36:02,760
Speaker 1: I had fallen in love with and we'd had a

578
00:36:02,800 --> 00:36:06,960
Speaker 1: wonderful relationship. She wanted to get married. Uh, and I

579
00:36:07,040 --> 00:36:09,520
Speaker 1: just knew this was a bad time. I didn't know

580
00:36:09,560 --> 00:36:13,279
Speaker 1: how bad it was. Gotten married how much? When did

581
00:36:13,320 --> 00:36:20,359
Speaker 1: you get married? In October of nineteen seventy two, very

582
00:36:20,400 --> 00:36:25,480
Speaker 1: bad time. We have now been married forty five years. Uh,

583
00:36:25,719 --> 00:36:31,120
Speaker 1: so it you know, the you know, the first time

584
00:36:31,160 --> 00:36:34,080
Speaker 1: that happened to me was not long ago. When I

585
00:36:34,200 --> 00:36:36,400
Speaker 1: when I said that to somebody, I happened to be

586
00:36:36,440 --> 00:36:42,759
Speaker 1: in Nashville, Uh, giving a talk, Uh because of Jim Neal,

587
00:36:42,960 --> 00:36:45,880
Speaker 1: who was one of the Watergate special prosecutors. They became

588
00:36:46,000 --> 00:36:49,680
Speaker 1: lifetime friends, many of these guys and one woman and

589
00:36:49,840 --> 00:36:52,840
Speaker 1: I his former law firm. He's deceased now, but his

590
00:36:52,880 --> 00:36:55,600
Speaker 1: former law firm had a program and I came down

591
00:36:55,600 --> 00:36:58,680
Speaker 1: to speak and there was a boys school there. Uh

592
00:36:58,800 --> 00:37:02,520
Speaker 1: it's very fine academy. And they asked me to come

593
00:37:02,520 --> 00:37:05,520
Speaker 1: out and do their assembly, and seven kids filed in,

594
00:37:05,840 --> 00:37:08,600
Speaker 1: and I somehow, in passing, mentioned that I had been

595
00:37:08,600 --> 00:37:12,120
Speaker 1: married to Maureen forty five years. And the kids broke

596
00:37:12,160 --> 00:37:15,799
Speaker 1: out in applause, and I thought, didn't that nice? I mean,

597
00:37:15,840 --> 00:37:21,200
Speaker 1: I was very can't imagine what that's like to be

598
00:37:21,280 --> 00:37:27,680
Speaker 1: married for years? Like what um really? Now? When you

599
00:37:27,760 --> 00:37:29,719
Speaker 1: go home? I mean, I'm trying to get you to

600
00:37:29,840 --> 00:37:32,800
Speaker 1: talk about something, just in terms of your personal feelings

601
00:37:32,840 --> 00:37:35,800
Speaker 1: and your emotional life. Were you going home and uh,

602
00:37:35,840 --> 00:37:38,480
Speaker 1: you know, and having dinner with your wife and sitting

603
00:37:38,560 --> 00:37:41,480
Speaker 1: having a drink and saying, what the hell am I

604
00:37:41,480 --> 00:37:43,040
Speaker 1: going to do? Or did you try to protect her

605
00:37:43,080 --> 00:37:46,320
Speaker 1: or not? I protected her? I you know, I tried

606
00:37:46,360 --> 00:37:48,360
Speaker 1: to warn her in the mafia. You don't tell you

607
00:37:48,400 --> 00:37:51,400
Speaker 1: even your wife. I tried to explain to her they

608
00:37:51,440 --> 00:37:55,440
Speaker 1: were going to be problems, but I wasn't terribly I

609
00:37:55,560 --> 00:37:58,960
Speaker 1: just got married on the down love and depth about it.

610
00:37:59,200 --> 00:38:02,839
Speaker 1: Uh uh I must somebody recently asked me how did

611
00:38:02,840 --> 00:38:08,040
Speaker 1: I get through it all? And my answer was vodka.

612
00:38:09,080 --> 00:38:12,000
Speaker 1: So you did not confide a great deal in her, No,

613
00:38:12,120 --> 00:38:14,440
Speaker 1: I didn't not none of you know. Essentially, none of

614
00:38:14,440 --> 00:38:16,680
Speaker 1: the men talked to their wives about what was going on.

615
00:38:16,719 --> 00:38:21,040
Speaker 1: I'm sure more lamps would have been overheads if some

616
00:38:21,120 --> 00:38:23,080
Speaker 1: of the women had learned about what was going on

617
00:38:23,200 --> 00:38:25,200
Speaker 1: and when it was going on. I think all the

618
00:38:25,280 --> 00:38:29,000
Speaker 1: wives were shocked at some of this. But anyway, as

619
00:38:29,040 --> 00:38:31,319
Speaker 1: I said, she had a tremendous influence on me. When

620
00:38:31,320 --> 00:38:35,120
Speaker 1: I decided to break rank, one of the reasons was

621
00:38:35,239 --> 00:38:38,319
Speaker 1: I didn't want to disappoint her. I wanted to live

622
00:38:38,400 --> 00:38:40,839
Speaker 1: up to the standards she thought. March sixteenth is when

623
00:38:40,880 --> 00:38:44,239
Speaker 1: you said the meeting was with him cancer on the president?

624
00:38:44,719 --> 00:38:48,200
Speaker 1: How soon after that or do you get canned? Uh?

625
00:38:48,400 --> 00:38:53,279
Speaker 1: End of April? It's tight. But what the tapes are

626
00:38:53,280 --> 00:38:56,600
Speaker 1: fascinating That the tapes. My editor happens to be here

627
00:38:56,600 --> 00:39:00,719
Speaker 1: tonight and he helped me tremendously. There were four I

628
00:39:00,800 --> 00:39:06,479
Speaker 1: ended up with with four million words in twenty thick

629
00:39:06,680 --> 00:39:09,880
Speaker 1: notebooks of transcripts that we had to bring down to

630
00:39:10,360 --> 00:39:13,359
Speaker 1: to narrative and dialogue. And when I got to those

631
00:39:13,360 --> 00:39:16,520
Speaker 1: tapes and in that period at the end, after I'd

632
00:39:16,560 --> 00:39:20,759
Speaker 1: given him the cancer on the presidency, the conversations are

633
00:39:21,719 --> 00:39:24,239
Speaker 1: so repetitive. I mean, they just go over and over

634
00:39:24,680 --> 00:39:27,160
Speaker 1: trying to figure out how to deal with me. What

635
00:39:27,200 --> 00:39:30,680
Speaker 1: are they gonna do? And generally the only answer is

636
00:39:30,719 --> 00:39:33,799
Speaker 1: to make me the scapegoat. He's afraid of me. When

637
00:39:33,840 --> 00:39:36,960
Speaker 1: he lets Hallaman and Erlickman go, he just, in a

638
00:39:37,000 --> 00:39:40,919
Speaker 1: one sentence says and so is White House Council John

639
00:39:40,920 --> 00:39:44,600
Speaker 1: dene Uh. No, no shots at me at all, because

640
00:39:44,600 --> 00:39:46,760
Speaker 1: when I get in there, I start telling him things

641
00:39:47,040 --> 00:39:49,960
Speaker 1: he doesn't even know. He didn't know until I tell

642
00:39:50,040 --> 00:39:53,120
Speaker 1: him on March seventeen that there had been the break

643
00:39:53,200 --> 00:39:59,080
Speaker 1: in at Ellsberg psychiatrists office and Erlickman had been behind it. Uh.

644
00:39:59,560 --> 00:40:02,359
Speaker 1: Erlickman had never shared this with him. The reason I'm

645
00:40:02,400 --> 00:40:05,680
Speaker 1: convinced those men never got pardons by Nixon when he

646
00:40:05,719 --> 00:40:08,000
Speaker 1: was on his way out the door is he figured

647
00:40:08,000 --> 00:40:12,239
Speaker 1: out that they really hadn't kept him informed. Uh, And

648
00:40:12,320 --> 00:40:14,880
Speaker 1: they had their own agenda and they were protecting themselves.

649
00:40:16,000 --> 00:40:20,040
Speaker 1: I actually tried to get everybody to flip inside. I

650
00:40:20,080 --> 00:40:22,440
Speaker 1: thought that was I thought that would be so sobering

651
00:40:22,560 --> 00:40:26,319
Speaker 1: for Nixon. Uh, and everybody else could just stand up

652
00:40:26,320 --> 00:40:30,719
Speaker 1: and take responsibility that his president tried. I tried. Uh.

653
00:40:30,800 --> 00:40:34,520
Speaker 1: Did you get close to anyone? Um? I think some

654
00:40:34,600 --> 00:40:38,239
Speaker 1: people did, you know, based on the tapes. Uh, there

655
00:40:38,360 --> 00:40:43,840
Speaker 1: is some indication that people did give it some thought. UM,

656
00:40:43,920 --> 00:40:48,080
Speaker 1: but they realized that, uh, it was the end of

657
00:40:48,080 --> 00:40:51,400
Speaker 1: their careers. So in nineteen seven, if you begin working

658
00:40:51,400 --> 00:40:53,920
Speaker 1: in the White House in nineteen seventy an hour in

659
00:40:53,920 --> 00:40:56,200
Speaker 1: the spring of seventy three, which is an eternity to

660
00:40:56,239 --> 00:40:58,040
Speaker 1: be in the White House for a couple of years

661
00:40:58,040 --> 00:41:02,319
Speaker 1: for some people, the do you notice uh? And I

662
00:41:02,360 --> 00:41:04,759
Speaker 1: want to preface this with someone, do you notice the

663
00:41:04,840 --> 00:41:07,919
Speaker 1: old Nixon returning? Because as Nixon, as everybody knows, who's

664
00:41:07,960 --> 00:41:11,120
Speaker 1: the vice president for two terms under Eisenhower, not somebody

665
00:41:11,120 --> 00:41:14,640
Speaker 1: who was adored by the staff of the White House.

666
00:41:14,640 --> 00:41:16,360
Speaker 1: In the Eisenhower man, he was there heavy. He was

667
00:41:16,400 --> 00:41:19,080
Speaker 1: Eisenhower's heavy. I mean that's he He had the job

668
00:41:19,080 --> 00:41:21,040
Speaker 1: of going out and being the hatchet man and being

669
00:41:21,160 --> 00:41:23,360
Speaker 1: a dog. And then he and then he uh. And

670
00:41:23,719 --> 00:41:26,840
Speaker 1: then he obviously loses a couple of elections, most notably

671
00:41:26,880 --> 00:41:30,160
Speaker 1: the the presidential election in nineteen sixty. And then the

672
00:41:30,280 --> 00:41:35,000
Speaker 1: Nixon has always been somebody who's a a bitter, bitter, uh,

673
00:41:35,719 --> 00:41:38,640
Speaker 1: you know type. Who is this what you begin to see?

674
00:41:38,640 --> 00:41:41,880
Speaker 1: I mean, Nixon wins election in six eight, he wins

675
00:41:41,960 --> 00:41:44,560
Speaker 1: re election in seventy two by a landslade, and you're

676
00:41:44,560 --> 00:41:46,480
Speaker 1: in that room with him in the spring of seventy three,

677
00:41:46,640 --> 00:41:50,279
Speaker 1: and this is the old Nixon. What I realized is

678
00:41:50,400 --> 00:41:54,280
Speaker 1: that the old Nixon has never gone away. He's always

679
00:41:54,280 --> 00:41:57,880
Speaker 1: been there. What they've done very effectively is portray a

680
00:41:57,960 --> 00:42:01,239
Speaker 1: new Nixon. You know, in doing the book where I

681
00:42:01,320 --> 00:42:04,759
Speaker 1: listened to all these conversations. As I was telling my

682
00:42:04,920 --> 00:42:09,040
Speaker 1: editor tonight, the I didn't wear hearing aids before that,

683
00:42:09,719 --> 00:42:13,319
Speaker 1: uh experience. I made the mistake of having earphones on,

684
00:42:13,680 --> 00:42:16,840
Speaker 1: which destroyed my hearing. And I told Moe at one point,

685
00:42:17,239 --> 00:42:19,840
Speaker 1: God forbid. The last voice I hear is Richard Nixon

686
00:42:19,880 --> 00:42:23,480
Speaker 1: in this project. But I when I was listening to

687
00:42:23,480 --> 00:42:26,840
Speaker 1: these tapes occasionally I would, in queuing them up, would

688
00:42:26,840 --> 00:42:29,840
Speaker 1: find things that I thought that the archives had removed.

689
00:42:29,880 --> 00:42:34,560
Speaker 1: They theoretically have taken out all the personal material uh

690
00:42:34,600 --> 00:42:36,600
Speaker 1: and returned it to the Nixons. But there are some

691
00:42:36,719 --> 00:42:42,920
Speaker 1: very personal conversations. For example, in uh January of seventy three,

692
00:42:43,360 --> 00:42:47,560
Speaker 1: he learns that he from a lower aid that he

693
00:42:48,040 --> 00:42:51,520
Speaker 1: indeed they may have peace in Vietnam. The first person

694
00:42:51,520 --> 00:42:55,120
Speaker 1: he calls is not Henry Kissinger. He calls Pat Nixon.

695
00:42:55,480 --> 00:42:59,840
Speaker 1: They have a lovely conversation. Uh. It really struck me

696
00:43:00,360 --> 00:43:04,720
Speaker 1: that their marriage was much different than I had perceived it. Uh,

697
00:43:04,760 --> 00:43:08,600
Speaker 1: and that she, you know, is pleased with him, proud

698
00:43:08,680 --> 00:43:11,840
Speaker 1: of him. Uh. It's a lovely hus and wife conversation.

699
00:43:11,920 --> 00:43:16,239
Speaker 1: Same thing happened to occasionally when I found conversations with

700
00:43:16,880 --> 00:43:20,799
Speaker 1: the President and his daughters, Tricia and Julie. They're some

701
00:43:20,840 --> 00:43:25,600
Speaker 1: really nice conversations. I'm sure that family was stunned when

702
00:43:25,680 --> 00:43:28,400
Speaker 1: they when these tapes came out, And that's probably one

703
00:43:28,400 --> 00:43:30,360
Speaker 1: of the reasons he spent so much of his life

704
00:43:30,640 --> 00:43:34,239
Speaker 1: after even leaving to to prevent the tapes from ever

705
00:43:34,560 --> 00:43:38,360
Speaker 1: all surfacing. One of the reason Nixon covers up is

706
00:43:38,400 --> 00:43:42,879
Speaker 1: he's worried about John Mitchell. Becomes very clear from the tapes. Uh,

707
00:43:42,920 --> 00:43:45,239
Speaker 1: it's not that he's worried about his own guilt. He's

708
00:43:45,280 --> 00:43:48,920
Speaker 1: not worried about the Ellsberg break in. He's worried about

709
00:43:48,920 --> 00:43:51,600
Speaker 1: the impact is going to have on his Attorney General,

710
00:43:51,880 --> 00:43:54,640
Speaker 1: John Mitchell, who he thinks will never survive it and

711
00:43:55,200 --> 00:43:58,600
Speaker 1: can't handle it. So he's trying to protect Mitchell. Different

712
00:43:58,600 --> 00:44:01,560
Speaker 1: people have different motives at different times along the way.

713
00:44:01,760 --> 00:44:06,160
Speaker 1: So you you finally get canned by Nixon himself when

714
00:44:06,560 --> 00:44:10,319
Speaker 1: not well, I'm out of town on April when he

715
00:44:10,360 --> 00:44:13,560
Speaker 1: gives a speech, so we didn't fire your face to face. No, not.

716
00:44:13,760 --> 00:44:17,000
Speaker 1: On on April sixt he called me in and said,

717
00:44:17,120 --> 00:44:20,239
Speaker 1: I think you we need to talk about resignation. And

718
00:44:20,280 --> 00:44:22,360
Speaker 1: I've drafted a couple of letters. Well I knew he

719
00:44:22,400 --> 00:44:24,960
Speaker 1: hadn't written the letters, and I immediately read them and

720
00:44:25,000 --> 00:44:29,000
Speaker 1: they were confessions. Uh, And I said, this is obviously, uh,

721
00:44:29,120 --> 00:44:33,160
Speaker 1: John Erlickman's handiwork. So I took them back. I took

722
00:44:33,160 --> 00:44:34,799
Speaker 1: the letters, and I said, Mr President, I'll write my

723
00:44:34,800 --> 00:44:38,640
Speaker 1: own letter and send it to you, and which I did. So. Uh.

724
00:44:39,760 --> 00:44:44,560
Speaker 1: This event in American history obviously is chronicled, and famous

725
00:44:44,560 --> 00:44:47,480
Speaker 1: books and famous movies made of those books. And I

726
00:44:47,520 --> 00:44:50,120
Speaker 1: was wondering, when you first see all the President's Men,

727
00:44:50,160 --> 00:44:52,239
Speaker 1: which comes out pretty quickly after the movie. It doesn't

728
00:44:52,239 --> 00:44:54,799
Speaker 1: it doesn't it does in the film, or will come

729
00:44:54,800 --> 00:44:57,400
Speaker 1: out like within a couple of years, eighteen months. What

730
00:44:57,480 --> 00:44:58,839
Speaker 1: do you think of the film when you first saw

731
00:44:59,320 --> 00:45:03,960
Speaker 1: I first a directors showing of it. Alan Pocula had

732
00:45:04,000 --> 00:45:07,160
Speaker 1: a showing and invited me, and after, you know, there

733
00:45:07,200 --> 00:45:12,680
Speaker 1: were fifty people in a little uh theater. After the movie.

734
00:45:12,719 --> 00:45:15,120
Speaker 1: I went went up to him and said thank you.

735
00:45:15,680 --> 00:45:17,560
Speaker 1: He said, why are you thank you me? I said,

736
00:45:17,840 --> 00:45:20,600
Speaker 1: I'm thank you for not mentioning my name anywhere in

737
00:45:20,600 --> 00:45:25,040
Speaker 1: the movie. And he said that's not possible. I said,

738
00:45:25,120 --> 00:45:27,839
Speaker 1: you might check. It is possible. I said, even when

739
00:45:27,880 --> 00:45:30,719
Speaker 1: that ticker goes across at the end and gets all

740
00:45:30,760 --> 00:45:34,000
Speaker 1: the names that it has not otherwise involved, my name

741
00:45:34,080 --> 00:45:36,759
Speaker 1: is not mentioned. Why do you think that is? I

742
00:45:36,800 --> 00:45:41,160
Speaker 1: don't know. But he didn't change it. He didn't go

743
00:45:41,200 --> 00:45:44,040
Speaker 1: back and add my name. But you appreciated the film,

744
00:45:44,040 --> 00:45:46,400
Speaker 1: You thought it was accurate. I think it's a I

745
00:45:46,400 --> 00:45:48,840
Speaker 1: think it's a slice of the story. From the media

746
00:45:48,960 --> 00:45:52,640
Speaker 1: point of view. Uh. You don't drive by the Jefferson

747
00:45:52,719 --> 00:45:55,520
Speaker 1: or Lincoton memorial every time you cross Washington now as

748
00:45:55,600 --> 00:45:59,520
Speaker 1: you know, But what about Nixon that Oliver stells from

749
00:45:59,520 --> 00:46:01,560
Speaker 1: when you work in Sultan. I was a consultant on

750
00:46:01,560 --> 00:46:04,480
Speaker 1: on Nixon. And that's a far more turgid movie than

751
00:46:04,520 --> 00:46:07,239
Speaker 1: all the presidents. You know, It's much more than Watergate.

752
00:46:07,320 --> 00:46:12,160
Speaker 1: And what what happened is Originally Oliver had in that

753
00:46:12,239 --> 00:46:17,040
Speaker 1: movie a conspiracy theory that claimed that Watergate was about

754
00:46:17,080 --> 00:46:21,920
Speaker 1: a break in at the Democratic National Committee to UH

755
00:46:21,920 --> 00:46:26,720
Speaker 1: to expose a call girl ring that my wife worked

756
00:46:26,719 --> 00:46:31,960
Speaker 1: at UH. And I had already sued the publishers of

757
00:46:31,960 --> 00:46:34,799
Speaker 1: that story and was in litigation which would go on

758
00:46:34,880 --> 00:46:36,879
Speaker 1: for nine years. You're saying your wife did not work

759
00:46:36,920 --> 00:46:38,520
Speaker 1: at the call girl. She did not work at the

760
00:46:39,680 --> 00:46:42,320
Speaker 1: She did not work at the win't been walking anyone

761
00:46:42,320 --> 00:46:49,040
Speaker 1: with any misconceptions. People might dream that, but UH, anyway,

762
00:46:49,120 --> 00:46:53,239
Speaker 1: they I told Oliver, I said that this is a

763
00:46:53,280 --> 00:46:57,880
Speaker 1: fraud and and you'll end up being named in the lawsuit. Anyway,

764
00:46:57,920 --> 00:47:00,279
Speaker 1: we we got off to that start, and he said,

765
00:47:00,320 --> 00:47:02,200
Speaker 1: I don't want to do that sort of thing in

766
00:47:02,200 --> 00:47:05,680
Speaker 1: this movie. He said, I am trying to get as

767
00:47:05,760 --> 00:47:08,560
Speaker 1: much vera similitude as possible. What do you think he

768
00:47:08,680 --> 00:47:11,879
Speaker 1: captured that was accurate about Nixon? Uh, a scene because

769
00:47:13,200 --> 00:47:15,480
Speaker 1: one of the scenes, the last scene I objected to

770
00:47:16,560 --> 00:47:18,960
Speaker 1: was a scene where he has me meeting with Howard

771
00:47:19,040 --> 00:47:22,279
Speaker 1: Hunt on the Memorial Bridge. And I said, Oliver, that

772
00:47:22,400 --> 00:47:25,840
Speaker 1: never occurred. Harris ed, Harris, right, it's a great scene

773
00:47:26,239 --> 00:47:33,680
Speaker 1: and you're played by uh David Uh uh. And I said, Oliver,

774
00:47:33,719 --> 00:47:36,919
Speaker 1: that scene never happened. He said, I've paid for it.

775
00:47:36,920 --> 00:47:43,239
Speaker 1: It's gonna happen. How many people applaud if you've ever

776
00:47:43,239 --> 00:47:46,839
Speaker 1: seen Oliver stones Nixon? I don see that found guy.

777
00:47:49,719 --> 00:47:53,879
Speaker 1: I thought, I thought that I can actually suspend disbelief

778
00:47:54,320 --> 00:47:58,880
Speaker 1: with Anthony Hopkins. I think I know you admire him greatly. Uh.

779
00:47:58,920 --> 00:48:02,360
Speaker 1: And I've met him when he came back from a

780
00:48:02,400 --> 00:48:05,920
Speaker 1: tour of the Nixon Library with Oliver and they had

781
00:48:06,000 --> 00:48:08,440
Speaker 1: kind of slipped through with nobody's seeing them, but one

782
00:48:08,480 --> 00:48:10,759
Speaker 1: of the dozens spotted them at the end of the

783
00:48:10,800 --> 00:48:15,000
Speaker 1: tour and she said to Hopkins, who's reporting this to me?

784
00:48:15,080 --> 00:48:17,960
Speaker 1: At lunch right after they had come back, he said,

785
00:48:18,320 --> 00:48:21,120
Speaker 1: the dozent stopped me and said, I understand you're playing Mr.

786
00:48:21,200 --> 00:48:26,440
Speaker 1: Nixon And he said, yes, I am, and he said uh.

787
00:48:26,480 --> 00:48:28,000
Speaker 1: And she said to him, he said, well, I hope

788
00:48:28,000 --> 00:48:30,480
Speaker 1: you're not doing a job on him. And he turned

789
00:48:30,520 --> 00:48:32,560
Speaker 1: to me and said, I'm not doing him a job

790
00:48:32,640 --> 00:48:34,600
Speaker 1: on him. I am I. I said, I don't think

791
00:48:34,600 --> 00:48:36,799
Speaker 1: so in this script. And he said, well, he said,

792
00:48:36,840 --> 00:48:38,960
Speaker 1: I want to tell you, I kind of sympathize with Nixon.

793
00:48:39,239 --> 00:48:42,399
Speaker 1: He said, I, I said, Tony said that. He said,

794
00:48:42,480 --> 00:48:46,720
Speaker 1: I grew up in very humble beginnings, and like Nixon,

795
00:48:46,760 --> 00:48:50,080
Speaker 1: I could hear the train whistles and have dreams. And

796
00:48:50,120 --> 00:48:52,080
Speaker 1: he said, I, you know, I want to play this

797
00:48:52,120 --> 00:48:54,640
Speaker 1: guy straight and and and that's what I think he

798
00:48:54,680 --> 00:48:58,160
Speaker 1: tried to do. I he had. I noticed. I was

799
00:48:58,320 --> 00:49:00,600
Speaker 1: visited the set a number of times, and they had

800
00:49:00,600 --> 00:49:03,200
Speaker 1: a voice coach for him there, and they tried to

801
00:49:03,239 --> 00:49:07,759
Speaker 1: take that clip out of his accent. Uh, And they

802
00:49:07,800 --> 00:49:10,000
Speaker 1: don't always. But that's the only thing that sort of

803
00:49:10,120 --> 00:49:13,520
Speaker 1: distracts me with him. I can believe this is Richard Nixon.

804
00:49:13,560 --> 00:49:19,120
Speaker 1: He's he's really tries to capture the man. With the

805
00:49:19,160 --> 00:49:21,200
Speaker 1: time we have left, I want to ask you, obviously

806
00:49:21,200 --> 00:49:26,120
Speaker 1: about the comparisons and contrast to how we live our

807
00:49:26,160 --> 00:49:29,600
Speaker 1: lives now. And UH, it's unlikely that every Public and

808
00:49:29,680 --> 00:49:32,560
Speaker 1: Control Judiciary committee in this particular Congress is going to

809
00:49:32,640 --> 00:49:36,359
Speaker 1: return an article to impeach. I think that's very true. Yeah,

810
00:49:36,920 --> 00:49:39,560
Speaker 1: but they have You'll have a president, a sitting president,

811
00:49:39,560 --> 00:49:43,200
Speaker 1: who's indicted for a crime. Well, it's not possible right

812
00:49:43,200 --> 00:49:46,279
Speaker 1: now to indict a sitting president. What happened is in

813
00:49:46,400 --> 00:49:50,480
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy three, Sparrow Agnew was being pursued by the

814
00:49:50,800 --> 00:49:54,279
Speaker 1: by a grand jury out of Maryland, and they went

815
00:49:54,320 --> 00:49:58,120
Speaker 1: to the Department for tax evasion and he claimed he

816
00:49:58,160 --> 00:50:01,120
Speaker 1: couldn't be indicted, he could only be in peached. Uh.

817
00:50:01,160 --> 00:50:03,520
Speaker 1: They took the question to the Office of Legal Counsel,

818
00:50:03,640 --> 00:50:07,120
Speaker 1: which issues those sort of opinions by the Department of Justice,

819
00:50:07,440 --> 00:50:10,719
Speaker 1: and said, no, Mr Vice President, you're wrong. You can

820
00:50:10,760 --> 00:50:14,120
Speaker 1: be indicted. Uh, it's the president who can't be indicted,

821
00:50:14,200 --> 00:50:17,239
Speaker 1: can only be impeached, and issued an opinion in seventy three.

822
00:50:17,640 --> 00:50:23,280
Speaker 1: That opinion was upgraded or revised and readopted in two thousand.

823
00:50:24,040 --> 00:50:27,920
Speaker 1: UH when Robert Ray Independent last one one of the

824
00:50:28,000 --> 00:50:32,440
Speaker 1: last independent councils, raised that issue regarding Clinton and said, no,

825
00:50:32,760 --> 00:50:35,560
Speaker 1: he cannot be indicted as a sitting president. So that's

826
00:50:35,600 --> 00:50:40,319
Speaker 1: the policy right now of the Department. No, no corp

827
00:50:40,320 --> 00:50:43,360
Speaker 1: has ever ruled on it. And and many scholars disagree

828
00:50:43,400 --> 00:50:45,880
Speaker 1: with it that they think that no presidents above the law,

829
00:50:46,200 --> 00:50:49,239
Speaker 1: and indeed the amendment makes it possible to have the

830
00:50:49,280 --> 00:50:53,480
Speaker 1: president step aside who would be impaired in his ability

831
00:50:53,560 --> 00:50:57,320
Speaker 1: to govern and function if he was in a criminal trial,

832
00:50:57,840 --> 00:51:02,839
Speaker 1: and to sort that out it could be done. Uh,

833
00:51:03,120 --> 00:51:05,560
Speaker 1: the issue has not been resolved. There are some who

834
00:51:05,600 --> 00:51:12,279
Speaker 1: think that Special Counsel Mueller might uh test it. What

835
00:51:12,360 --> 00:51:16,680
Speaker 1: do you think Muller would do? You're a lawyer, have

836
00:51:16,760 --> 00:51:21,800
Speaker 1: a fascinating case. It's a it's a tough issue. I

837
00:51:21,880 --> 00:51:25,880
Speaker 1: you know, I um, there are arguments on both sides,

838
00:51:26,440 --> 00:51:29,080
Speaker 1: but I think that the bottom line argument is that

839
00:51:29,239 --> 00:51:32,200
Speaker 1: no person in this country is about the law. I

840
00:51:32,239 --> 00:51:36,040
Speaker 1: mean the country right now it seems like it's just

841
00:51:36,120 --> 00:51:39,120
Speaker 1: so much trouble. You know, the country is in so

842
00:51:39,239 --> 00:51:43,320
Speaker 1: much trouble. And you've got I have never had a

843
00:51:43,400 --> 00:51:47,279
Speaker 1: knot in my stomach before before an election. I did

844
00:51:47,520 --> 00:51:51,840
Speaker 1: before this election. I've that not has really never gone away.

845
00:51:52,960 --> 00:51:55,839
Speaker 1: Just the damage that prove it and divorce alone will

846
00:51:55,840 --> 00:51:58,160
Speaker 1: do in their departments is going to take a decade

847
00:51:58,280 --> 00:51:59,920
Speaker 1: or more to undo. You know. It's just the thing

848
00:52:00,040 --> 00:52:03,200
Speaker 1: are really bad and too little attention is being paid

849
00:52:03,320 --> 00:52:07,719
Speaker 1: to what's happening out in those departments and agencies. And UH,

850
00:52:07,960 --> 00:52:11,960
Speaker 1: most striking to me, Alec is the fact that he

851
00:52:12,000 --> 00:52:14,480
Speaker 1: has no competence for the job. He had no training,

852
00:52:15,000 --> 00:52:19,280
Speaker 1: he had did no he has no knowledge of the office. Uh,

853
00:52:19,320 --> 00:52:23,839
Speaker 1: he's winging it from day to day. Um, he's got

854
00:52:23,840 --> 00:52:29,880
Speaker 1: a constituency that uh is unshakable for lots of reasons.

855
00:52:30,400 --> 00:52:34,080
Speaker 1: I think he was he was shocked to win, unprepared

856
00:52:34,120 --> 00:52:37,839
Speaker 1: to govern, and but is growing into the job as

857
00:52:37,880 --> 00:52:41,200
Speaker 1: he learns it. He's learning it on the spot. What

858
00:52:41,480 --> 00:52:43,839
Speaker 1: worries me is he is going He's not dumb, He's

859
00:52:43,880 --> 00:52:47,200
Speaker 1: going to learn how the machine reworks, and then I

860
00:52:47,280 --> 00:52:50,719
Speaker 1: think it's ripe for even greater abuse. Well, that's sort

861
00:52:50,719 --> 00:52:53,160
Speaker 1: of my ultimate question is is that is that do

862
00:52:53,200 --> 00:52:56,160
Speaker 1: you think, because I said this to people before, that

863
00:52:56,160 --> 00:52:58,680
Speaker 1: that to remove the President of the United States from

864
00:52:58,719 --> 00:53:02,160
Speaker 1: office is a tremendously painful and difficult that was also

865
00:53:02,239 --> 00:53:05,080
Speaker 1: painful for the country. Yes. Do you believe that what's

866
00:53:05,080 --> 00:53:08,239
Speaker 1: best for the country is to not impeach Trump and

867
00:53:08,280 --> 00:53:10,520
Speaker 1: to wait until the next election cycle and vote amount

868
00:53:10,520 --> 00:53:14,080
Speaker 1: of office or do you think impeachment is a healthy

869
00:53:14,200 --> 00:53:16,839
Speaker 1: path for the country? I think it's I think it's

870
00:53:16,880 --> 00:53:21,080
Speaker 1: a an appropriate path because it's it's a constitutional path.

871
00:53:21,520 --> 00:53:25,000
Speaker 1: The system is designed to deal with the president who

872
00:53:25,120 --> 00:53:27,960
Speaker 1: is not uh playing the game as it's supposed to

873
00:53:28,000 --> 00:53:30,719
Speaker 1: be played. And that's a determination made by the House

874
00:53:30,760 --> 00:53:34,319
Speaker 1: of Representatives, which is the closest to the people, UH

875
00:53:35,000 --> 00:53:37,400
Speaker 1: is the House, while we might have a highly gerrymandered

876
00:53:37,680 --> 00:53:43,400
Speaker 1: house ryant house to write that, I'm not I'm not

877
00:53:43,480 --> 00:53:48,880
Speaker 1: sure that. I'm not sure. I think, uh, the next election,

878
00:53:49,480 --> 00:53:52,080
Speaker 1: the off r election is going to be very telling.

879
00:53:52,120 --> 00:53:54,719
Speaker 1: In so I wonder if if they get swamped in

880
00:53:54,719 --> 00:53:56,799
Speaker 1: the in the in the mid term and you come

881
00:53:56,840 --> 00:54:01,600
Speaker 1: out the other side of that into January, and uh,

882
00:54:01,760 --> 00:54:06,719
Speaker 1: if Pence were to succeed a Trump that designs Pence

883
00:54:06,760 --> 00:54:09,920
Speaker 1: would want to come in right after January of so

884
00:54:10,000 --> 00:54:12,839
Speaker 1: he was eligible for ten years in office because if

885
00:54:12,840 --> 00:54:16,000
Speaker 1: he steps if they impeach Trump, now Pence is only

886
00:54:16,040 --> 00:54:19,840
Speaker 1: eligible for that piece of Trump's term and only wonderful

887
00:54:19,960 --> 00:54:22,400
Speaker 1: term of his own. Well, you're assuming he could get reelected.

888
00:54:22,440 --> 00:54:25,120
Speaker 1: I think this is going to splash over on Pence.

889
00:54:26,080 --> 00:54:27,600
Speaker 1: I don't. I don't. I don't refute that. I'm just

890
00:54:27,640 --> 00:54:30,560
Speaker 1: saying that, but that right now. In their hope is

891
00:54:30,600 --> 00:54:32,840
Speaker 1: that they're gonna wait and see what the damage is

892
00:54:32,880 --> 00:54:35,080
Speaker 1: in the mid term, if if Trump can be rehability

893
00:54:35,080 --> 00:54:37,120
Speaker 1: to I thought Trump would be gone by the summer.

894
00:54:37,480 --> 00:54:39,040
Speaker 1: I thought they'd say to themselves, we've got to get

895
00:54:39,040 --> 00:54:40,600
Speaker 1: the smell of the cord out out of the room

896
00:54:40,640 --> 00:54:43,640
Speaker 1: here and bring Pence in here and let everything clear,

897
00:54:43,960 --> 00:54:47,799
Speaker 1: if not for, and prop up Pence as the as

898
00:54:47,840 --> 00:54:50,239
Speaker 1: the nominee. But they've hung in with him. But I

899
00:54:50,280 --> 00:54:53,200
Speaker 1: don't think Trump has that idea of leaving either. He

900
00:54:53,280 --> 00:54:56,440
Speaker 1: likes the attention, He likes the fact he can demand

901
00:54:56,520 --> 00:55:01,799
Speaker 1: the kind of seven coverage he gets. His narcissism is

902
00:55:02,239 --> 00:55:05,120
Speaker 1: large enough to handle that. Are you a Republican now?

903
00:55:05,320 --> 00:55:10,319
Speaker 1: I haven't been since then? You haven't. I'm an independent California.

904
00:55:10,400 --> 00:55:14,600
Speaker 1: We don't have to declare, and I have not declared,

905
00:55:14,680 --> 00:55:19,080
Speaker 1: and I have voted, uh, both Republican and Democrats. What

906
00:55:19,160 --> 00:55:20,360
Speaker 1: do you think it's gonna What do you think is

907
00:55:20,360 --> 00:55:26,880
Speaker 1: the future of the Republican Party? Bad? Bad? Yeah, bad bad.

908
00:55:27,160 --> 00:55:28,640
Speaker 1: We were going to do a sketch on S and

909
00:55:28,760 --> 00:55:31,760
Speaker 1: L the other day where Trump was going Christmas shopping

910
00:55:31,760 --> 00:55:39,560
Speaker 1: with Roy Moore of the mall I think we didn't.

911
00:55:39,800 --> 00:55:43,560
Speaker 1: You know, they killed that idea. And the the the

912
00:55:43,719 --> 00:55:48,040
Speaker 1: greatest mistake I've made since Watergate was when Lauren sent

913
00:55:48,080 --> 00:55:51,799
Speaker 1: out a feeler if I would host Saturday Night and

914
00:55:51,920 --> 00:55:55,319
Speaker 1: not too late and and and and Saturday Night or

915
00:55:55,440 --> 00:55:58,279
Speaker 1: Simon and Schuster said no, we don't want you doing that.

916
00:56:00,400 --> 00:56:04,600
Speaker 1: It's a very tough, tough, painful time for this country

917
00:56:04,680 --> 00:56:06,960
Speaker 1: right now because I think that I think we need

918
00:56:07,000 --> 00:56:10,520
Speaker 1: both parties to be healthy and not have an effective opposition.

919
00:56:10,520 --> 00:56:11,880
Speaker 1: And that's one of the things that's sadden to me

920
00:56:11,920 --> 00:56:14,840
Speaker 1: about this Republican Party either going down the drain with

921
00:56:14,920 --> 00:56:20,920
Speaker 1: this between opposition and polarization, and we don't seem to

922
00:56:21,160 --> 00:56:27,239
Speaker 1: have distinguished that. When when when majority doesn't rule, Uh,

923
00:56:27,480 --> 00:56:30,040
Speaker 1: we're in trouble in a democracy and right now a

924
00:56:30,160 --> 00:56:34,839
Speaker 1: minority is controlling the country. Well, I want to say,

925
00:56:35,239 --> 00:56:41,400
Speaker 1: please go ahead. Well, I want to say I'm grateful.

926
00:56:41,640 --> 00:56:43,640
Speaker 1: I'm sure you've heard this before too, that I'm grateful

927
00:56:43,680 --> 00:56:47,080
Speaker 1: that you found your conscience back then in March of

928
00:56:47,160 --> 00:56:50,879
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy three and did the right thing coming out

929
00:56:50,920 --> 00:56:54,439
Speaker 1: of Camp David and UH exposed what you did, told

930
00:56:54,440 --> 00:56:57,080
Speaker 1: the truth about what you did, and UH I want

931
00:56:57,120 --> 00:56:58,680
Speaker 1: to say thank you very much for coming and sitting

932
00:56:58,719 --> 00:57:09,520
Speaker 1: with us tonight. Thank you, thank you. M. John Dene,

933
00:57:09,719 --> 00:57:13,359
Speaker 1: whose life was forever changed by the bungled break into

934
00:57:13,360 --> 00:57:18,040
Speaker 1: the Watergate Hotel in nineteen seventy two. I'm Alec Baldwin

935
00:57:18,280 --> 00:57:39,760
Speaker 1: and you're listening to Here's the Thing. M