The tuna fish at the National Archives cafeteria in nearby College Park, Md., isn’t bad. But nothing was quite as scrumptious last week as the coincidence I confronted as I sought nourishment before listening to more of President Richard Nixon’s Oval Office tapes.
Amid the cadres of nerdy-looking archives employees, there was John “Cancer on the Presidency” Dean of Beverly Hills, Calif.
I assumed Nixon’s one-time White House counsel was there to check out some of the just-released 445 hours of tapes. But I was wrong. He had another project that brought him east.
The distinctly amiable man was obviously interested in what I had been listening to. And although he’d spent little time in the capital during the past 20 years, he has been back for extended stays of late because of a cable television gig during President Clinton’s impeachment proceedings and a Nixon-related trial in which he testified.
When he does have time to listen, he surely will be engrossed.
Going upstairs, I continued listening to several hours of conversation from April 9, 1971. There was a flurry of meetings that day that touched subjects such as construction of a new art gallery on the Mall, an upcoming speech to the American Society of Newspaper Editors, the latest developments in the Vietnam War and the right church to attend on Easter.
Oh, he spent time on how to spy on his opponents.
Before the skullduggery, Donald Rumsfeld, the former Chicago area congressman who was then a counselor to Nixon and later the secretary of defense under President Gerald Ford, surfaces with his wife and parents to get their picture taken.
Nixon goes to his cache of presidential cufflinks and gives them as mementos, noting that he doesn’t have anything “for ladies.” The parents are off shortly on a European trip and, for a moment, Nixon graciously turns into a meteorologist.
“It will be particularly nice in Rome,” he says. “Paris is questionable. London really isn’t good until July.”
The Rumsfeld clan departs, prompting discussion among Nixon, top aide H.R. Haldeman and news secretary Ron Ziegler about how to best handle the editors, especially during a question-and-answer session after his address.
“I know these editors, these country editors in particular,” Nixon says. “They’re going to spend 45 minutes on Vietnam. That’s all they care about.”
As for Easter, Nixon asks if they’ve figured out the church. Haldeman tells him they have one in Gettysburg, Pa.
Nixon wants to know if this is the church Abe Lincoln went to.
Haldeman says yes, he went there either before or after the Gettysburg Address. And that Dwight Eisenhower’s widow will be there. Ziegler is sure the photo of Nixon attending “will run on every front page Monday morning.”
Nixon responds with his hope that “jackass college kids don’t gin up some demonstration” involving the war.
They then discuss the latest polls on Nixon and seemingly everybody who’s seen as a potential Democratic presidential candidate, but most intensely the ones on Sen. Edmund Muskie of Maine. They also look at polls involving Republicans thought to harbor ambitions against Nixon, notably George Romney and Nelson Rockefeller.
Then, they matter-of-factly turn to snooping.
“We had a fascinating report from our spies at a staff meeting of Muskie. He held a meeting last week and chewed their asses off,” Haldeman informs.
“How did your spy know this?” says Nixon. “Is he one of those there?”
“Yeah,” replies Haldeman. “(Muskie) said `I get advice from outside, then different advice from staff. I have the feeling you’re not on my side.’ Then his staff director said, `Fine, do you want us to turn in our suits?’ And Muskie said, `No, no. I know you fellas are loyal. But you keep pulling me in these directions that get me in trouble.’ “
It has long been known that a journalist, code-named “Chapman’s Friend,” had been passing information to the White House about the Muskie operation even before this conversation. It is also known that by year’s end there was serious talk of actually infiltrating opposition campaigns.
But this chat suggests that somebody other than Chapman’s Friend was not just helping out but was inside the Muskie operation long before anybody was aware.
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Referring to the Muskie meeting with staff, Haldeman says, “It was a real knock-down, drag-out . . . So he’s got one helluva problem. He’s blaming his staff for his problems.”
Nixon: “If they give you bad advice and you take it, it’s your fault. . . . Who are his staff? Former Kennedy people? Left, right, center? And why isn’t that story getting out?”
Haldeman agrees that would be a good idea, declaring, “Muskie staff meetings have turned into bitter shouting matches” as if that might be a likely headline.
Nixon: “Fine. Get it out that way.”
Haldeman: “But you don’t want to blow her cover.”
Note the reference to “her.” The now well-known Chapman’s Friend was a male.
Could this have been Lucianne Goldberg, the literary agent who was right in the middle of the impeachment mess, given her ties to Linda Tripp? After all, she had spied on the 1972 George McGovern campaign for Nixon.
When I told her about this last week, she said it wasn’t her. She didn’t get involved until the next year.
In the conversation, Nixon, Haldeman and Ziegler turn to other possible Nixon opponents, notably Hubert Humphrey, Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) and McGovern.
Haldeman: “We have fairly good coverage on Humphrey. But we don’t–“
Nixon: “Nothing on Teddy?”
Haldeman: “Not enough on Teddy.”
Nixon: “McGovern?”
Haldeman: “Some of McGovern.”
Nixon: “There ought to be a way. There has to be some way with Teddy. The reason I would cover him is the personal staff. I predict something will happen. It’s a matter of judgment.”
Haldeman: “Did you see that his wife came into the White House again with some crazy outfit?”
Nixon: “Did Pat–?”
Haldeman: “Some wives’ function.”
Nixon: “What did she wear?”
Haldeman: “Some leather gaucho outfit, with a bare midriff.”
Ron Ziegler: “No, they put on a body stocking which is flesh tone, then wrap a leather gaucho-type thing. But you look from a distance and go, `My God!’ “
Haldeman: “She was going to wear hot pants but Teddy told her–“
Ziegler: “They are weird people, they really are.”
Haldeman: “Crude.”
Nixon: “What’s she trying to prove?”
Haldeman: “Whatever it is, he ain’t getting any votes. The super-swing jet set are going to be for them, not you, no matter what happens.”
Ziegler: “The super-swinger jet-set types don’t even relate to that type of thing.”
Nixon: “Hmmmmm.”
Haldeman: “That’s desecration of the White House for most Americans when some broad gets out and wears indecent clothes.”
Ziegler: “She’s got to have some hang-up personally. She knows what Teddy was doing there with that girl, running her into the water, you know, and what he’s been doing.”
Haldeman: “The family’s used to that . . .”
Nixon: “The Muskie thing is so amusing. I think it shows he just doesn’t have any goddamn balance. Starting to yell at his staff! . . . This idea of the candidate sitting down with his staff about what he ought to do is bullshit. Very, very poor strategy.”
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Haldeman: “This will prove it. I have a transcript.”
Nixon: “I’d really like to get Teddy taped.”
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James Warren and Michael Tackett of the Tribune’s Washington bureau are hosts of “Unconventional Wisdom” at 7:05 p.m. Sunday on WGN-AM 720.