Transcript of "Shouldn’t Have Resigned" - Ken Khachigian Reveals Nixon’s Paranoia, Reagan’s Mistakes, Bush’s Secrets | PBD Podcast

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This world of entrepreneurs, we get no value to hate us. How do you run, homie?

Look what I become.

I'm the one. We were planning on doing this interview today, all in Arminian. I said, Most of our audience, they're English-speaking. Maybe we'll make a couple of comments about Arminians here in a minute. But let me tell you why I'm sitting now with a legendary-Muchinj.Muchinj, yes. I'm sitting now with a legendary Arminian who has been in many rooms that you would love to be in while major decisions are being made. Let me unpack it for you. So think about your name is President Nixon. You're under a lot of scrutiny. Watergate. You're about to go be doing the interview with Frost Nixon. Everybody's like, Oh, my God, you're going They're going to resign. They're going to fire. You got to impeach. All this stuff is going to be happening to you. And you're assigned as a chief researcher, and they're preparing him for the interview with Nixon. That's my guest today. I imagine if you get a phone call from a two-time governor in California who was one of the sexiest man alive at the time, loved an actor, married to a beautiful wife, gets into politics, wins as the President of SAG is doing stuff for G on the road, going up there talking about how America is the greatest country in the world.

And this man, this man named President Reagan, calls you and says, I want you to be my chief speechwriter. And he says, Wait, you want me to be the chief speech? I want you to be my chief speechwriter. I want you to write my inaugural address. I want you to... If some of these things were working, I want you to be there for me. This is the man. Imagine those conversations behind closed doors, decisions being made, all of this going on at the same time. This man has personally witnessed, and he's got a book that just came out called Behind Closed Doors, the One and Only Ken Khachikian. I say like that in Arminian, English, we may say Ken Khachikian.

It's great to have you here. Good to be here, Patrick.

So what a resume. I mean, what a life you've lived.

It's amazing. I never thought it could happen. It has been an amazing life.

From Romanian parents who escaped the genocide, who were from Turkey, Armeniaians from Turkey, come here. They raise a son who is from Vaisalya, which I know Vaisalya right outside of, I want to say, McFarland, probably close to Bakersfield, maybe 40 minutes away from Bakersfield, Fresno area, Great area. Then you go to UC Santa Barbara or Cal State Santa Barbara? You go to UC Santa Barbara. Uc Santa Barbara. You go to Columbia. Columbia Law School. Then you come out, and at the time, somebody Somehow, someway, Nixon gets a hold of you, right? If you don't mind sharing that story, how that took place, and it will go into a bunch of questions I got for you.

I was a second year law student at Columbia. I loved politics. I loved it ever since I was in high school. I went to Boys State. California Boys State when I was in high school. Actually, I saw him next to him when I was at UC Santa Barbara. We were on the debate team, and I cornered him when he was running for governor for two minutes. I read six crises, and I was bored with law school, but anyway, I had to finish law school.

Who was he when you saw him? Was he already President?

No, he was running for governor. He had lost for President. He was running for governor. What year is this? 1962. Okay, got it. He was campaigning in Santa Barbara, and I was on the debate team. After he spoke, we cornered him just for two minutes. Anyway, I just saw him. Anyway, flash forward of 1967.

Was two minutes long enough where you made an impression that he remembered you? No, no.

Okay, got it. But he made an impression on me.

The other way around? Yeah. Got it.

Okay. He gave me some time, and I liked the man. Then I read his book, 6 Crisis. 1967 now, flash forward. I'm in law school, second year law student. He's running for president again. Now he has been. He lost in '60. He lost in '62. He was not the front runner for President in 1967. Nelson Rockefeller was the front runner. George Romney was the front runner. Ronald Reagan had just been elected governor in California in '66, and everybody thought he might be President. So Nixon was below the pack. But I liked him, and I thought, this might be an opportunity to get involved in a presidential campaign. So I'm a law student, so I write and I read an article in the New York Times and says it's the new Nixon, and he has a younger crowd around him, and he's developing a new personality. I wrote a letter to him at his law office. I typed it out on a typewriter. Remember typewriters?

Of course I do. I learned how to type with a typewriter.

I wrote a letter on a typewriter and sent it to his law office in New York. I didn't get an answer back. I thought, That's pretty rude.

You did not get an answer. No.

I called his office, and they were very polite. They said, Well, maybe it got lost in the mail. Why don't you send it again? Well, I kept a carbon copy. You know, you had to keep carbon copies in those days.

How old are you at this time?

I'm 23 years old. Second-year law student, close to you. I rewrite the letter, type it out all over again. Now, my wife's working on Wall Street, two blocks from his law office. She's at 30 Wall Street. He's at 20 Broad Street. So I type it, she hand delivers it to his law office. About three weeks later, I finally got an answer back from Pat Buchana. Pat Buchana is working for him as an aide to Nixon. He says, You know what? I'm sorry your letter got mixed up. Come in for an interview. I still have that letter. I have an interview with Pat Buchana. He kids me to this day. He says, I thought you were a spy for Rockefeller because you're at Columbia Law School. So we have an interview. It didn't go great, but still, he let me come in for-What does that interview look like?

What do you ask? I mean, at that point?

Well, he's asking me questions because I was portraying myself from a... I said, I have an expertise in farming because I grew up on a farm. I saw, yeah. Then he starts asking me questions about the Brandon plan and things like that. I didn't know about that stuff. And I said, oh, I acted really stupid. But basically, He saw in me an eager, someone who's eager. There's a word in Armean, jarbiq.

Jarbiq. Yeah, jarbiq is sharp, eager. Resourceful.

Right. And clever. He saw someone who wanted to move up. And so he said, Come on in and you can volunteer. Well, there was only about 15 people there working in the office because people weren't crazy about Nixon back then. I said, I'll do whatever you want me to do. I don't want to start at the top. I I start answering correspondence. But every chance I got, I would volunteer to work, do this, do that. I provided research. And Martin Anderson, who was at Hoover Institution at the time doing domestic policy advice for Nixon, saw that I was an eager beaver, Columbia law student. And when Nixon started doing well, and then he won the primaries, and then come that summer, they offered me a job. And I got hired to work in the campaign in the summer of 1968, working for, guess who? Alan Greenspan.

Wow.

Alan Greenspan was the domestic policy advisor for Nixon in the campaign. Now, Alan Greenspan was an economic consultant at the time. He was a odd character.

Who would he have been today? Who is he today?

Well, me today? He was head of the Federal Reserve.

No, I totally get that. Meaning an Alan Greenspan at that time, if you compare to an Alan Greenspan of today, who is today's Alan Greenspan?

Oh, my God.

Is there a way to make that comparison?

No, I can't even think of. I mean, Alan Greenspan played the clarinet, and I think he played the clarinet in Woody Herman's jazz band back in the '60s or in the '50s, along with Nixon's law partner. That's how they knew each other. And then he became an economic consultant. He was a economic nerd.

Was he sharp when you met him? Was he as sharp? Were you like, This guy's impressive?

Well, He was sharp, but he was spacy. He was a space good day. You know what I mean? He was out there in never, never land. He wanted me to quit law school. He said, you should quit law school because we're going to win this and we'll get you a job in the White House. I said, after all this time, my four years of undergraduate work, two years of law school, you're going to have me quit law school after all this? That's crazy. No, I'm not going to quit law school. He was out in this other world, but he was a genius. I mean, you could tell. He was very cerebral.

Did he think highly of himself? Was he arrogant? No, no, no. Did he think what grand he was?

No, no, not in the least. Okay. No, no, no. He was down to earth. He was very cerebral, very smart. But I didn't just report to him. I reported a lot of others as well, but he was my direct boss.

When you're doing this, what is your intention? What are you trying to be? Here's a guy that is in debate. You're in the debate groups and all the stuff that you're doing at Columbia. You're going through where you're studying politics. You have the interest. Who do you want to be? Are you in the back of your mind saying, One day I'm going to be a congressman, or are you saying, I'm going to be a congressman or are you saying, I'm going to be a speechwriter? Am I going to be a dark president? Who am I going to be? What's the dream?

That's an interesting question because before I got involved in any of that, when I was in high school, I was I was, or let's say, when I first got into freshman year of college, I thought my goal was to become a US Senator. But by the time I got to this point in my life in the Nixon campaign, I just wanted to get a job in the the White House, and I wanted to somehow make a difference. I didn't know where I was going to end up, to be honest with you. I wanted to be in the White House, and I wanted people to see that I could help them make a difference in some way, and I didn't know where I was going to end up. I wasn't like a lot of my colleagues who were searching for power or or looking to move up to be on the top. I just wanted people to notice that I was an eager beaver wanting to help out. I wanted to get noticed, but also I had a family, too. I wanted real life.

What age did you get married?

I got married. I was not quite 20. I was 19 years old.

You got married at 19. So do you have kids already or not?

No, I was between my sophomore and junior year in college, but we didn't have I was, I think, what, 25.

Okay, so you guys waited six years.

Yeah, we waited until I got out of school.

So now, at this point, when I'm looking at the history to see what happened in 1962, it says in 1962, Reagan was dropped by GE. This is the part where GE didn't like the fact that he was talking too political, and they're just saying, sell how great GE is. He's selling how great America is. It's like you're on a rally. He formerly registered as a Republican. In '64, US presidential election, Reagan gave a speech for presidential contender Barry Goldwater. That was eventually referred to as a time for choosing. We've seen this speech many, many times. Is the temperature high in America with politics Is that like, I want to be like him when I grow up one day. I want to be on the big stage one day. Or not really, not for you.

Are you targeting me? No. At that point, I was focused on just going to college, just trying to get by. I had to pay for my own education. We got married. My parents gave us $300. My wife's parents gave us $300 and said, Now you're on your own.

They were loaded. They give you a lot of money. Yeah, that's right. Very rich oil family from the Middle East.

Congratulations. So from that time, we were on our own. We paid for everything, college loans, working summers, working jobs, whatever it is. So We were just trying to get through school, get through college, get through law school. No, I didn't have any big grandiose goals in life.

So when you started working as a, you said 15 people helping out. Pat gave you a job. He first thought because you're Columbia, maybe you're on the Rockefeller side because school affiliation linking there. Okay. Then you're like, We'll give you the job you're in. You haven't yet made a name. You're like, Let me just get to work and show you what I'm all about. Exactly. At what point do you get your opportunity? Were you working directly Nixon? When did you make the impression on him?

I didn't get to work with Nixon directly until after he resigned.

Until after he resigned? Yeah.

The White House is a very structured organization. You have very few people have direct contact with the President. You have a massive organization, but you have very few people have very direct contact with the President of the United States. It's a very insular circle that has real direct contact with the President. So that's It's the same with the Nixon White House and with the Reagan White House. It doesn't matter. So in the Nixon White House, I never had a one on one conversation with the President. Never? Never.

Never. Not even after he resigned?

No. After he resigned, yes.

Pre, you did not?

Pre, I did not. Pre I did not.

And why is that? Because I don't think Trump is like that. Is that because he didn't trust people? When you watch the Nixon movie with Anthony Hopkins, I don't know if you've seen it, or I'm sure you haven't seen it. Why haven't you seen it? You've never seen it? No. It's actually a pretty good movie to watch. I loved it. I love watching the Nixon. I'm assuming you've seen Frost, Nixon, Frost, the movie. Yeah, of course I have. When you watch the movie, you're in it. I mean, Gabriel plays you in the movie. But when you watch Nixon, And you see the first time the role his wife plays, and he's almost given up. I don't know if I'm going to pull it off. He comes back, he runs, he wins the debate, John F. Kennedy, the tanning bed. He looked good, shave, four o'clock, all this stuff that you hear. And then when he's going through, you You don't feel like he's a guy that trusts a lot of people. You feel like he just didn't trust anybody that he was typically by himself because he didn't know who he could trust and who he couldn't trust.

Did he give you the vibes of an overly paranoid guy?

No. That's interesting. People say that It's just the way... No, no. He was open to a lot of people. He was open to ideas. It's just the way the situation is structured. I wrote memos to him in the '68 campaign campaign that got to him, even though I was just 23 years old, he was always open to ideas and open to... It's just that you can't have people swarming into candidates and swarming into the president, or else you won't have an organization. I don't know how many people come on to you in your organization. I don't know how many people have access to you to tell you what to do or to tell you how to run your organization. Or if you have a structured organization or when you had your insurance company, if you had junior people able to come on and talk to you directly. Maybe you did, maybe you didn't. But I don't know if Jamie Dimon allows junior people come and talk to him. I mean, it's just... And if he doesn't, is he paranoid? I don't know. I don't think you can call people paranoid just because they have an organizational structure.

I didn't find him to be paranoid when I got to know him. So that's a bad rap on Nixon that I always feel.

I actually think it's a good quality. I don't think it's a bad quality. I find it as a... I think, here's Skitzo, Okay, here's paranoid, here's naive. I'm okay with you being here. You cross this, then you're miserable. But if you're here, everyone's taking advantage of you. And this, I don't think you're ready to be a president. I think you need to be a little bit here to size everybody up and study body language. I'm going to get somebody to know where they're at. And Nixon gave me a vibe that he was like that.

Well, he studied people very carefully. And as I say, even paranoids have real enemies. But he did study people very... He was very shrewd at studying people and very good at studying people and knowing their traits. And at the end of the day, it worked for him really well.

So you got close to him after he resigned? Yes. And who When you made the phone call? Did Buchana make the introduction to him or did he reach out to you directly?

What happened was he resigned and left the office on August ninth. Of course, we were all depressed and down. Who was close to him then was Ron Ziegler, his press secretary, went with him out to San Clemente after he resigned, along with a handful of other people, Jack Brennan, his military aid, Diane Soria was with him, as one of the press aides. And after about 10 days, 8 or 9, 10 days, Ziegler called me up and said, Look, we need some help out here. We're short staffed. And I was still on the White House staff. Now President Ford was President. And they said they were short staffed. Ken, you're loyal to the President. You showed that during the impeachment process. Can you come out and help us out? Because we really have a lot of problems. So I flew out there on a military plane, and I had my first one-on-one meeting with Richard Nixon. It was really unnerving to me because now here's the President of the United States, and I'm having my first one-on-one meeting. And they were after him for back taxes. He had no job. They wanted to disbar him in California.

He had no income. They wanted to disbar him in New York. There were subpoenas floating all over the place. I had my law degree. Of course, they had depended on that. They had no structure of a budget in San Clemente, and they wanted me to help put his financial life in order. And so I sat down with them, and I'm depressed because I'm 29 years old, and I didn't know what the hell is going to go on with my life. And here he was. He had lost the most precious thing he ever wanted to achieve in his life. I thought, What is this going to be like? I'm in San Clemente now sitting one on one with him. And you know what? He says to me, one of the first things he says, Ken, don't get down. We have to look ahead. We can't look back. We have to look forward. I thought, oh, my gosh, here I am. I'm feeling low and depressed and thinking my life is shattered because I'm He's going to probably lose my job at the White House. Everything he's lost is gone. He's lost his income. He has no job.

Was he a millionaire at the time? Was he a millionaire at the time?

Oh, I don't think so. No. He had property, but they were trying to go after him on his property. He was going to have to get rid of his property because they felt that he had improperly used federal funds to build up his property. In Florida. This reminds me of somebody. Yeah, that's right.

Except I had a couple of zeros.

It just reminds me. No, no, no. Exactly. No, no. They were after him. They wanted to destroy him. But it sounds like they were successful with him, though.

Do you think they were successful with trying to destroy Nixon?

Well, not in the end, because he was so resilient. He was mentally resilient. And we can get into that because this is how he came We started that he was already planning his comeback mentally. He was looking ahead. The whole point of that conversation was he was already looking forward and looking ahead. And that Those dark recesses of his life. At that moment, he was thinking ahead as, How am I going to rebuild my life? How am I going to come back?

This is August eighth of '74. You're '29. He's '61, okay? He's losing the job that he always wanted to have. This was what he wanted to do for a long, long time. He wasn't shy about it. His dream was to be the President. How much after he gets resigned on August eighth, are you sitting face to face across from him?

This is 10 days later, and I've got about an hour and a half meeting. I'm sure I have notes somewhere, and I'm sitting down with him saying, Here's your financial situation. Here's what our options are. Plus, I'm trying to organize the staff budget. We have certain monies that we can get. There's transition funds, and here's the staff we can organize. It's at that point that he says he's been told by Ziegler how loyal I was, and he knew I was loyal, and I worked on the anti-impeachment. Then he says, Look, I'm going to write a book, a memoir, and if that happens, I'd like you to come out here and work with on my memoirs. I said, I'd really love to do that.

At that time, how are you getting paid?

I'm still on the White House staff working for Jerry Ford. But 10 days later, I return to the White House, and then I get fired.

Ten days later, August 18, you go back to the White House and you get fired?

Roughly in that time frame.

Is it because they found out that you went and had a meeting with Nixon? Yeah, of course. Why? Because they were like, Why are you meeting with Nixon? And you didn't tell us about it?

No, they knew I was out there, but they were eventually going through the White House staff and deciding, Well, now who on the White House staff loyal is to him?

They're getting rid of him.

Yeah, they got rid of Pat Buchana. They got rid of me.

Who's they? Is they Ford?

Yeah, Ford's people. They didn't want us around.

Isn't Ford's people, Nixon's people?

Well, of course. They have Nixon appointed Ford.

That's what I'm saying. So when you're saying Ford's people are getting rid of Nixon's people, it's another way of saying Nixon's people who were against him revealed themselves by getting rid of the people that were fully loyal to Nixon. That's a better way of saying it.

We were baggage because they didn't want anybody around who supported the anti-impeachment.

Was there friction between Ford and Nixon where Ford They don't like Nixon?

I have no idea what went on between the two of them. I think afterwards, there was a little bit of bad blood, unfortunately.

From Nixon to Ford or Ford to Nixon?

I think Ford to Ford to Nixon. Yeah, because after the pardon, Ford took a lot of heat, and I think Ford felt like he may have lost the presidency because of the pardon.

Got it. So he blamed it on Nixon.

Even though he got the presidency because of Nixon. It's a 50/50 situation.

That makes sense. So going back to Nixon. So how many total hours would you say you've spent with Nixon, just the two of you? Total hours.

You mean in myIn your lifetime?In.

Your lifetime.Oh, my God.If you were to put a number to it.Thousands.Thousands of hours with them?Yeah. Okay. What are the different situations you've spent the time with? Dinner, golfing, reading, vacation, business? What would you say? I mean, thousands is a lot of time.

Thousands would be mostly in the office. We didn't socialize. We didn't play golf together. We had dinners rarely, maybe four or five times, six times, and that would have been traveling. When I went with him, I traveled with him to London and Paris in the post-presidential when he went. He had a speaking engagement in Paris and in London, and he asked me to travel with him. I went with him when his first grandchild was born. I accompanied him to New York, and we had dinners, but we didn't socialize in that way. We spoke on the phone huge amounts of times in his post-presidency to talk politics, to talk about what was going on with Reagan's presidency, Carter's presidency, what was happening in politics. But mostly it was during the time working on the memoirs and preparing the Frost Nixon interviews. There was just hundreds and hundreds of hours accumulated over those years.

Were they in situations like It is like this picture here we're looking at, a lot like that. Exactly. Just like that. Is it a conversation? Are you asking him questions? He's telling you. Are you writing for him? Are many times where you're asking him, What do you What do you think about this, Mr. President? What do you think about that? What's constant processing and asking him questions, or is he just having an open conversation with you?

Well, now, there we're probably talking about the book and what's certain parts of the book. I was responsible for his campaigns throughout the book. He was responsible for the chapters on probably the Supreme Court appointments and all the various campaigns. And so on those various chapters, I'd be going through the sequences of the research I was doing on the books. But then because he would get bored with talking about the book, and this was 1976, and you had the presidential primary is going between Reagan and Ford in late '75 and '76. Then you had the presidential campaign of '76. He would get bored working on the book and say, Hey, let's talk about the New Hampshire primary. Let's talk about the primary in Pennsylvania or the primary in some other state. Or he'd get digressing and talking about politics, or he just love just talking what happened in the past or about personalities. One time, I remember he talked about the 1960 campaign, and just right out of the blue, he said, Instead of putting Henry Kabbit Lodge on the ticket. I should have put Thurston Morton. He was the Senator from Kentucky. I should have put Thurston Morton on the ticket, and I might have won.

What a revelation that was. Can you imagine that? I'm He's giving you a piece of history. That's crazy. That I didn't even put in my book. That's a real piece of history I'm telling you right now. Unbelievable.

What was he like behind closed doors when you're having a conversation with him?

He was fascinating. I mean, when out of the blue, somebody talks about Winston Churchill or somebody that Dwight Eisenhower said or something that he learned from Willy Brandt or that he had a conversation with Willy Brandt. Now, that was not always, but he loved talking about domestic politics or things about Jack Kennedy. He had stories about Jack Kennedy, but it was always and I love talking politics.

What stories did he tell? Do you remember any stories he told you about Jack Kennedy that stuck till today?

Yeah, he was friends with Kennedy. And he said, we talked about Kennedy, talking about Kennedy's women. He said, you know, he said about Kennedy and women. He says, it's not women that will do you in. It's drinking. He felt that was drinking that would do politicians in back in those days. Then he went through. I remember him going through a list of politicians that had... It wasn't this, I don't know, maybe this is a family, a A family program, but of politicians that may have had problems with women. But he said back in those days, it's the drinking that got to him.

Meaning like, if you got you drink too much, you fooled around, you were irresponsible.

No, the drinking affected your judgment is what he would say. Got it. A lot of smart politicians back in the '40s, '50s, and '60s, he said that drinking affected their judgment.

I thought he drank, no? Was a Nixon a drinker Or?

He had a Scotch at night, but I never saw him when he was boosy. I never did that. Got it. I think those were a lot of mythologies.

Let me hear. The stuff that we see on who we are told Nixon is versus your experience. How different is the misconceptions we have of Nixon versus you have spent a few thousand hours with him?

The big misconception about Nixon is that he's cold and unapproachable. That's what people always say about Nixon, is that this notion that you said he's paranoid, that he's cold, he's unapproachable, you can't have a conversation with him, he's not warm. Every, every, every, just about every politician I know is wary of strangers because they're not quite sure what's going to come with that relationship or contact, especially in this modern age, when you can be recorded on an iPhone or whatever. But still, once you got your first contact with Nixon, he was more than approachable. The conversations flowed freely, especially if you started talking about it, something that he was comfortable with, about politics or baseball or his family. So I found him to be very, very approachable. We had the greatest conversations. I'm going to go back and just flash back just a minute about these conversations we had. It was about politics. This is where I learned about Reagan so much is that discussions about the primaries in '76 because he educated me about Reagan. And we would talk about Reagan and Ford, what Ford was doing wrong, what Reagan was doing right, and what Reagan was doing wrong.

He'd He made political assessments. The guy was, I used to say about Nixon, when he wasn't involved with his own campaign, he could make exclusionarily bright strategic judgments. When politicians are trying to make judgments about their own campaigns, they lose their ability to not be balanced in how they make decisions. But when they're not involved with their own campaigns, they can be very open and neutral.

When you're spending time with them, who did you know? And by the way, there's two things when interviews like this has happened. Either you're only to tell the good, which makes for a boring conversation, and the audience is going to walk away and we're going to lose them. And they're going to say, Oh, he's just going to say all the good. And we're not going to hear anything. I watched a documentary the other day. I was falling asleep. I'm like, Please give me something. If they ever make a documentary about me, please don't make it just all good. Tell some of the horror stories, man. No one walks on water. There's got to be some shit that they're dealing with that. People want to know. So When it comes down to Nixon, what were some... Who were the people that really pissed him off? Who were the people that really agitated him or got under his skin? Or what were some area? You read rumors about someone, was he a womanizer? Did he like the girls? Was he good with the ladies? Did the ladies like him? Was he a guy who would curse a lot behind clothes?

Or was he a smoker? What was attractive about him? Was he a sports guy? What were some of those things about Nixon that wasn't coming from a standpoint of somebody that loves him. You're obviously a fan of his. And by the way, many people now that Nixon's no longer with us say Nixon was one of the better presidents that we ever had. Nixon should have never resigned. Nixon should have never caved. Nixon should have stood up and took the things that were coming after him. There's a lot of people agree with a lot of good that he did for the economy, a lot of good that he did for the economy. But no one walks on water. What were some of those things about Nixon?

I actually talk about it in my book, During the Frost Interviews, he was quick to anger during the Frost Interviews when his staff let him down. Especially, he was very angry. There was a scene in there where he felt that we had not provided him the information. He got very upset with He exploded in anger at Diane Sawyer. It was unfair in a lot of ways. I think he was... I have to say it was, it was not childish, but it was explosive anger that he shouldn't have done because she had made an honest mistake and didn't provide him this information. And I said, there was this piece of information that we had that could have helped you in the interview that you just did, and she didn't provide it. And then he just exploded all of a sudden, and he cursed. I'll say this about him. His cursing was moderate. He never used foul words. Really? No, he didn't.

So no F words, no B words, no shit, no stuff like that?

No. Shit, yes, but no F.

Would he say he's such an asshole? Would he say stuff like that?

He'd say that, but no-Get the F out of your motherfuck.

It wasn't that.

No, never that. Never heard him use F word. Really? Ever. Ever? Ever. Wow. No.

He would have been a bad rapper if he got into the hip hop.

But he would say somebody's an asshole or he doesn't give a shit or something like that. But never used the F word. Not once.

I've heard pastors use those words.

Not a single time. Okay. The entire time I knew him.

But he had a temper. So he got upset at that. No, no. You were there when him-I was there, and I calmed him down.

Look, in front of those of us who were, I think, he felt comfortable with, he would rise to anger. And I understand that. I think you probably do that from time to time with your own staff. Walk on water.

I never lose my cool. I'm very calm.

Rob, you know what I'm talking about? There's people in the booth behind here howling now.

They're not laughing. They're actually, they better not be laughing. I swear to God, if you're laughing, we're going to have a prom. See, this is the part, though. This is the part where people see that the person doesn't walk. You have the biggest chop in the world. You are the number one story around the world. You're getting fired. How many movies and Rob, can you type in how many movies and documentaries and books have been written about Nixon? I mean, if you were to talk about the number of times he's been referenced in a movie, I mean, this is a powerful name, right? So you're under pressure. Some of the guys that you gave a job to have turned against you, they're causing you to lose your You're like, You would have never had a job without me. I chose you. I gave you this opportunity. Now you're flipping on me. These are tough situations to be in. But that instance with Diane Sawyer and Nixon, what was the specific thing that was it?

Well, there was a piece of information that he could have used in the interview with-That would have helped him? It would have helped him. With Frost. Yeah.

Do you remember what it was, or?

It had to do with the June 23rd tape that there was something One thing the former Deputy Director of the CIA could have provided, and again, I describe it in the book, who had warned him that he didn't want the FBI to get a foul of CIA operations. And he thought that would have been beneficial to him in the interview with Frost, and she had neglected to provide it, and I had remembered it. Now, look, she had done such a stupendous job in preparing him for those interviews.

Stupendous is a good word. She had done a great job.

Like 99% of everything that she had done.

Some people, Armenia, listen to this. Their English may be their fourth language. I just want to say complementary of the answer. You're being complementary of- She had a work ethic better than just about anybody, and she had done so much.

She had overlooked this one little thing, and I almost felt bad that I had brought this up. Did it bother her?

No, she was almost brought her to tears, yes. But it didn't.

It didn't. But I have to say this, he calmed down right away.

If you're telling this story, if Diane's listening-It was an outburst. If Diane's listening to this, would she remember this moment?

She might have. I don't know. I sent her a copy of the book, and she may or may not have remembered.

Do you guys still talk or no?

We've talked a few months back, but we're not in constant communication.

Got it.

Obviously, Diane- She's a private person.

She's a private person.

Yeah.

Got it. She lived a pretty public life. I'm going on TV doing interviews. She did some of the biggest interviews of all time. If you type in the biggest interviews ever done, she's on the list of many of those interviews. That's the difference.

There's public persons and private persons, though. Public person is also have a private life.

For sure. But you're saying she didn't want her personal life to be out there. She didn't want the fame. She was good at the job, but when she was gone, she was gone. Exactly. Got it. Okay. What else with Nixon? What else did you see There are moments where something bothered him?

Look, I think there's times when he could say something snarky about another politician that maybe sounded petty. But I think that's a quality that's not above anybody. Or maybe it would be, let's say, gossipy. He was not above political gossip. Let's put it that way. He was not? No. Got it. So if you're talking about me trying to say, yes, he didn't walk on water. But that's not a horrible trait in my judgment. That's something people do all the time. But I can't give you anything. He didn't drink too excess in front of me. He was not a womanizer. He was a very generous man. He did good things with me.

Would he ever talk to you? For example, would he ever sit there behind closed doors You're not an economy background, but you had some stuff you did with Greenspan. You have an economy where you're coming and saying, Here's a budget, here's how much money we got, we got to deal with this. So you understand money well. Would he say to you ever any questions behind closed-door second-guess and saying, You know what? When I said this going off of gold standard is going to be temporary, I should have never done it. When it came down to this, I should have never resigned. Did he ever tell you, I should have never resigned? Did he ever say any of that stuff?

Well, he did talk about he shouldn't have fired Haldeman and Eerlichman. That's for sure. He felt that he mentioned that more than once. He felt that was a bad decision that he made. Why? Because it didn't change anything. He said that they were loyal to him. They were his... He He said it was like cutting off his right arm and his left arm. And that he felt that that was a mistake that he made, that it didn't make any difference in his presidency. It didn't help him. It didn't help him out any, and it just hurt them. And I think in the end, probably worked to his disadvantage in a lot of ways. It turned Eerlichman against him. It hurt Haldeman a lot, although Haldeman didn't turn against him. But I think he got nothing out of it is what he meant. And he said that any number of times that- But who's the one that turned against him?

Not Halderman? Who turned against him?

Eerlichman, in the end, was more bitter about it.

But did either one of them come back and destroy him? No. Did he come in any of them? No. So why was he second-guessing that decision there? Is it because he liked them and he misread them?

No, because they were the most important people on his staff.

So why did he fire them initially?

Because there was a lot of pressure because there was all this pressure on them. At the time, the Washington Post and all the... They had been testifying for the Santa Watergate Committee, and the grand jury was after them. There was a lot of public attention put on them that they had participated in the instruction of justice. The Eilichmen had participated in this plumbers operation and everything, and that they were at the center of a lot of the illegal, allegedly at the center of a lot of the illegal activities in the White House. And so they were anchors around Nixon's neck. And so there was I can't remember who all was saying. He was probably getting some internal advice that, look, this is just negative to you, Mr. President. You've got to get rid of these two guys because it's just negative to your presidency.

So it was escape. He needed to fire somebody to say, It's like a football team's got a bad record. They fired a coach.

Yeah.

So it's like, Let's fire these guys to make it sound like, Well, it wasn't me. It was really them that did it.

Yeah. That mess with them. And it doesn't help. Yeah. Okay, so the baseball team is not doing any good, so you fire the general manager, and it doesn't make any difference.

Instead, what should he have done? When he tells you that and it goes down, what does he say? Does he say, I should have done this?

I should have done that. I should have kept them, is what he said, because he leaned on them so much. He leaned on their advice. Bob Haldema was the guy he talked to. The first guy he talked to in the morning, the last guy he talked to at night. Oh, wow.

These guys are very big, influential people in his administration.

Oh, yeah. No, no. They were the two key guys that he talked to all the time.

What did they end up doing afterwards? What big job did they have after Nixon? Did they ever have another big job where nobody trusted them?

Both of them went to prison, and then they both wrote books. I can't remember.

They both went to prison? Yeah. How long did they... Do you remember how long was it a good amount?

It was, I think, several months. I mean, they were not... It wasn't yours and yours. I can't remember.

So Nixon took responsibility for this happening with these guys. He felt like it was his fault that they went to jail.

I think he felt it was his fault that they... I think he felt they got a bad rap. I think a lot of them got bad raps. That's a whole different story.

So did they ever have another job, Rob? They went to what he was found guilty in a prison for 18 months. When he was released, he returned to private life on the success No, Holderman had another... Is that Holderman?

Holderman. This is Holderman. Yeah, he had another job afterwards.

So he came back and went in business. He was fine. He died from cancer at 60 something. Yeah.

How about... Eerlik, he wrote books, and I don't know if he had a real job. He wrote books.

He was also in jail for a year and a half. By the way, did you ever see them after the Watergate scandal? Were you ever there where they reunited afterwards, or I saw Halderman. You saw Haldeman? Yeah. Him and Nixon were together afterwards?

I just saw Halderman. And how was-Personally, one-on-one.

I'm sorry. Got it. But never with Nixon? No. They never reunited with Nixon?

No, they did reunite, but I wasn't with them.

All three of them?

No. I don't think I ever saw Eerlichman again.

Is it because Eerlichman was done with it?

As far as I know. Okay.

When you met with Halderman, how was he? Was he...

What did he tell you? It was a very interesting meeting. Halderman We were all terrified of Haldeman in the White House. Why? Because he was a very... They called him Sweet Old Bob because it was... Because it was the initials for S. O. B.

So he was a tough guy.

Because he was very stern. He had very strict rules, and He had a very stern demeanor and personality, and he wasn't very... He ran things all by the rule book. So I never had... I had one conversation with him the entire time I was in the White House, and I knew he was going to call me to get a piece of information. And I was scared. I was frightened that I was nervous that he was going to call me for this piece of information that I would screw up and I'd get in trouble. And even though it was just a simple, he was going to call me to ask me how the press treated some piece of information. So people were...

He had a reputation. Reputation. What caused What's his reputation, though?

Did he just blow up? Yeah, just don't screw up around Haldeman. You get in trouble. Got it. He's just a tough guy. He ran a tight ship. And even those people who worked for him knew that he was stern and ran a real tight ship. Anyway, so Bob was just-Was he Nixon's number one general? Yeah, he was chief of staff.

Okay. And then how about Eurkman?

What role did he play? He was head of Head of Domestic Council. He was the Head of Domestic Affairs. But he was the lead. He and Haldeman went to school together, and Haldeman brought him into the campaign to run the advance operation. But then, Eerlichman ran the whole domestic affairs operation. So he ran all the domestic. So he oversaw the entire domestic Council and all the domestic legislation and everything else.

So But Erlichman was not as fured as Haldeman was?

Well, he didn't have the same role as Haldeman in terms of running staffing or anything else. Got it. But the Two of them were known as, quote, the Germans.

The Germans. Were they German?

Yeah, Erlichman-Haldeman.

Right. They were Germans, but born here, obviously. Yeah. Okay. So UCLA alumni and interesting. How about Ford? Did he have a relationship with Ford? Would he talk about Ford, or they were not that close?

Well, they were close. They came into Congress. I think Ford came into the Congress, I think, in '48, and Nixon came in '46, and they were colleagues throughout the years in Congress, and they were always close friends and colleagues throughout all those years. I don't think they were real close pals, but they were friends. I don't know that they socialized together that much, but he wouldn't have chosen him as vice President if he didn't have trust in him or feel feel that he can be safe around him or anything else.

Did he trust Reagan? Was he a fan of Reagan?

Oh, yeah, very much so. Well, once he got elected, he was. He was wary of Reagan in '68 because he viewed Reagan as a potential challenger. So once he got elected President, then Reagan was not a political threat to him, yes. But as long as As long as Reagan was a political threat to him, that was a different story.

Were you having a room with the three of them? Oh, yeah.How.

Was that when you guys were together?It's on the cover of the book.

How was that when you guys were together?

Oh, that's the last chapter of the book. It's an amazing story. I call it the Lion's Gather, and it was fantastic.

Didn't you have a nickname? The Lion's, they called you. What was your nickname?

Oh, no. Anoda.

Yeah. I read another nickname for you that said... What was the other nickname I read for you? That was another nickname I saw. There you had. Let me see if I can find this or not. But they had a nickname for you. Maybe you don't know this nickname. You're going to find out about it years later. Who knows? I saw nicknames. I'll find it. I'll tell you what the nickname I saw. The Line of...

.

Line of California. Exactly. Elections since '80s. He's registered, regarded as the Line of California GOP politics.

Yeah.

How many-I had a lot of nicknames.

People People who work for me probably gave them to me.

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Okay, got it. It was such a fascinating meeting. That's why it's the last chapter of my book.

What is this picture? What's this moment here?

That's the end of the meeting. It was two days before we opened the Nixon Library. I oversaw the opening of the Nixon Library in 1990. We opened the library on July ninth.

I can tell you, you're a very good-looking man. Look at that picture right there. Look at that smile. You look like an Hollywood lawyer. Look at that big time. Yeah.

Well, somebody said they'd never seen me so happy. I don't know.

After you're working with Nixon, was your relationship with Nixon what helped you get President Reagan to make you the chief speechwriter? Yes. That's obviously a sign that Reagan trusted Nixon to call and say, Who do you recommend? And Nixon made the recommendation, I would assume.

It was not directly to Reagan. It was indirectly.

What do you mean indirectly?

When Nixon finished the memoir and was basically had gotten... The purpose of the memoirs and the Frost interviews was to get Watergate behind him to reinvent his life, to restructure, to get his financial house in order. He got paid a lot of money for his memoirs in the Frost interviews. And then by that time, he didn't need a staff like he did for the memoirs or anything else. Plus, he was bored living in San Clemente because People had a hard time coming out to see him. So that's when he wanted to move to New York. That was late '79, early '80. So I was going to be out of his job. So he kept me on. Nixon kept me on in '79 as a consultant part-time. And then I started looking for work. And then I had friends in the Reagan campaign that he started up for President in late '79. These are old pals that actually also had worked for Nixon previously. And so I had some consulting arrangement with them as well. Nixon said, then he announced to me, I'm moving to New York because I got to be where the action is.

And he said, about this time, he said, I'm going to introduce you to Stuart Spencer. Steu Spencer ran Reagan's gubernatorial campaigns in 1966 and was his political adviser for all those years, the Spencer Roberts. Spencer Roberts organization. So Steu Spencer was previously Reagan's campaign manager. And Stu Spencer was somebody that Nixon knew from political campaigns.

He managed Nelson Rockefeller's campaign in '64. Yeah.

But Stu Spencer had also run Jerry Ford's campaign in 1976. So even though he had run Reagan's campaigns previously, he was no longer on Nancy Reagan's Christmas card list. But he had an office in Newport Beach and had a lot of political contacts. And so Nixon said, go sit down with Stu Spencer and see if he's got any work for you. So I met with Stu in 1979, and Stu said, well, why is Dick Nixon sending to see me? And I said, well, he said, you have a lot of contacts. So I started meeting with Stu, and I had actually did a little help with him writing some stuff. I write about this in the book. And so Steu and I stayed in touch. And in 1980, Reagan's campaign started getting into trouble in August and September. It wasn't doing well. Nancy and Ron Reagan said, We've got to do something to get things in order, especially Nancy did, because she was the boss. And she said, You know what? Even though we're unhappy with stew, we got to get stew back. And so they called stew up and stew said, Okay, if you're going to get me back, even though we've had the All these problems with each other in the past.

The problem with your campaign is you're trying to run it from the headquarters. If I'm going to be in this campaign, I'm going to run it from the plane. You can't run it from the headquarters. And if I'm going to run it from the plane, I have to make, I get to choose the policy person, the press person, the person who runs the campaign tour, then I get to have a speechwriter with me. And that person turned out to be me. So Steve Spencer, this-Interesting guy, by the way.

Yeah. He's 97 years old. Last time he voted for a Democratic President was in 1947, '48, Truman. In 2020, he voted for Biden over Trump.

Yeah, he doesn't like Trump.

No, he's not a fan of Trump. No. Okay, so you get into the Reagan family. You're now his chief.

Yeah, I had been begging to get involved in the Reagan campaign for months and months and months, and they were not letting me get the job I wanted, by the way.

Did they give you a reason why?

Was it because they just didn't trust you? They said, We don't have the money. We're having trouble with our budget, blah, blah, blah.

They were giving me all kinds-What was your first meeting with them? When was the first time you met him?

First time I met him was at UC Santa Barbara again. I was student body President, and I introduced him. I got him to speak to the campus, and That was one of my jobs. I got to introduce whoever spoke to the campus.

Who was he then? The governor?

No, he's running for governor.

This is '66?

'66.

Was UC Santa Barbara a party school back then or not really?

Well, It was a party school, but I was married.

I mean, you see Santa Barbara had a reputation when I was in my early 20s, late teens. Yeah. Yeah. Great bookstores.

Yeah.

Long bookstores. That no matter what you wanted. Everybody you wanted was there. There was something in the water.

I don't know what it was. Okay, I'm going to start interviewing you now.

Well, I will plea the fifth is what I will do if we go through that.

I introduced Reagan to the student body back in '66. That's the first time I met him. But we had no conversation with each other other than I talked to him on the stage for two minutes.

Pleasant guy?

Yeah. Oh, yeah. He was genial. Always genial. But then I briefed them. I did have a consulting arrangement with them in early in 1980. I briefed them on issues along with several other people. But then I lost all contact with them because they had all these BS issues with their budget, this, that, and the other. So I didn't get hired until there was five and a half weeks left in the campaign when Steve Spencer says, How did you get to choose the speechwriter. That's how I got involved.So.

Now you're in.

Now I'm in. You're a speechwriter. I'm on the airplane.

You're on the airplane with him.

Critical.

Tell me.

It's critical because That's where the campaign is being run. Right. The day to day.

On Air Force One.

No, no. He's a candidate. He's a governor.

He's a governor. You're on a plane with him.

I mean, We called him governor. He was ex governor.

How many hours did you spend with him versus Nixon? Was it more Nixon than Reagan?

Oh, one on one, I spent probably in aggregate more hours with Nixon because I worked on his book with him. Got it. But I did spend a lot of time with Reagan.

With Reagan. Was Nancy more present when you're talking to Reagan than Pat being present when you're talking to him? I can see that. Yes. Did Did she give you vibes of a control freak or somebody that was just protective of her husband?

Both.

Give me examples of control freak.

Well, This is why people need to read my book. I called her the Chief of Staff when she joined the campaign, which was a positive thing because he trusted her. He trusted nobody more than he trusted Nancy Reagan. He called her mommy. When I first joined the campaign, she wasn't on the plane. She was still in Los Angeles. And then she joined us a week later and things were wobbly, wobbly, wobbly. But then she came on the plane and it steadied him because he always... He just needed her by his side. But there was an occasion I describe in the book where, for example, I was under great pressure to get this speech to him. We were on our way to Lima, Lima, Lima, Ohio. It was a Lima or Lima. I can't remember how they pronounce it now. And we were doing a speech and we were 45 minutes away, and we're under pressure, and the plane's on final approach, and we're trying to get the speech, and I'm under pressure trying to type it in the back, and we have to write it, but on the half sheets to get to him. And she walks back to me and she says, Ken, where's the speech?

Ma'am, I'm working on it. We're trying to get it done. Where's the speech? I'm almost done. She says, Roni is looking for the speech. So you get the feeling now. Urgency.

Let's go. Where is it at? I need it.

Yeah, he needs it right away. I get it, rip it out of the typewriter. The secretaries have to type it up. They have to put it on half sheets, get it up to him, take it up to him. That's her role as being a control freak and being in charge all at one time.

Was this a she thing or was this him? Certain CEOs are afraid of firing people.

That's him asking her to do it.

Got it.

It's-he can't be a confrontation.

I got it. He was a guy that would avoid conflict. If he needed Can you fire somebody? He couldn't do it. Nancy, can you fire this person?

Exactly.

Interesting. So it's not her taking the initiative. He was relying on her and delegating to do the tough job.

Several times. Wow. Oh, yeah. Wow.

Do you ever have a moment where President Reagan gave you direct criticism, 101?

Yes.

When was that? Once.

It's a famous moment in the book, and it's It makes a very big difference in policy. And that's when it's prior to the first Geneva summit with Gorbachev. And he brought me in. I was back in California, but he's going to prepare a speech before the General Assembly to the United Nations in the fall of 1985. And I I get called in, I think, the speech is in October of 1985, September, October 1985. And the basic speech is written by his speechwriting staff staff. And I get called in because they want me to shape it up and put it in his words and make sure it's edited properly. So I get called in from California, and I have two meetings with him. And I'm assuming the initial speech is written by the Ben Elliott, the head of the current speechwriting staff, and it's pretty tough anti-communist speech. And I'm assuming he still wants it to be a pretty tough anticomunist speech because this is Ronald Reagan. So I edit the speech and work it out, and I make it the tone just pretty much the way it's supposed to be. And I finalize it, get the final edits in, have my secretary ship it in to him the night before, and then we have a meeting.

I don't think you have... I don't know if you have the picture of it. It's a picture of Of us sitting around in the oval office. I'm sitting right next to him in the oval office, and there's several of us in the meeting. It's in the oval Anyway, there's me next to him, and there's Pat Buchana, Don Reagan, John Poindexer, and Bud McFarlane. And so I sit down. I think I'm going to get a pat on the back for doing a nice speech for Reagan. First thing he does is he says, Ken, if we're going to have a different relationship with Gorbachev, we can't be using this harsh rhetoric regarding the Soviet Union. And I go, whoa, where did this come from? All of a sudden, Reagan is going soft on communism, and I'm getting spanked in front of all these other guys. And it's really... I mean, my feelings are getting hurt, and I think I'm getting sabotaged by somebody in the White House. And then he starts going on and on about he doesn't like the language. It's too tough, and it just doesn't sound like him at all. And so he wants it changed.

The meeting is around 10:00 or whatever it is, somewhere around there. I've got a flight going back to California at 5:00. So now I've got just about four hours to reedit this whole speech and change the language. And all this time I thought I'm being sabotaged. Well, it turns out that This is a whole change in philosophy that he wants a different strategy. Strategy? Yeah. Strategy. Strategy approach to Gorbachev before the summit. Now, I write a whole chapter on this because I found out years later, talking to Bud McFarlon, that the influence on him was from Lady Thatcher, who told him he needs to have a different view towards Gorbachev. And then Nancy, Mrs. Reagan wanted him to soften up. Anyway, that's when I got That's a long way of telling you that you asked me if I ever got negative vibes from him. That's when I got.

Aside from that?

No, aside from that- You were some loser's cool? Yes. Not badly, but just he was angry. He got angry in private when he felt that he was, this is again towards the end of his administration and complained about... Not angry in the sense of his voice rising or anything else, but He was angry about how he got taken by his staff on raising taxes in 1982. That bothered him. Really? Yeah.

Why?

Because he was lied to by his staff, and staff manipulated him.

When you say staff, is there a name or two?

Well, there are several of them. Richard Darman, Jim Baker. Jim Baker? David Gergen. They all work together.

And they lie to Ron?

David Stockman. Well, they manipulated him in ways that they wanted him to go. Let's put it that way.

Would you say- I write about it, so I don't.

It's not like I'm telling you something- Would you say James Baker?

I read his book, Phenomenal Story of Who He Was, Tough Guy. What was your impression of Jim Baker when you were on him?

He was a very pleasant guy. He was very affable. Basically, I always got along with him. And very charming. Comes from Texas. He has that Texas charm, but he can be very tough. But we had-Was he an SOB?

Was he a qualified SOB? Yeah, he could be.

We crossed swords later on in the 84 campaign. But then we... Basically, I think he decided that he and I would be We're better off not getting in a pesty match with each other. But I think at the end of the day, he preferred not to have to do battle with me. But it's clearly we had different views of where Reagan should go. And he wanted Reagan to be much more... Had a softer view of America than I did. I want to take that. He wanted Reagan to be less Ronald Reagan than Ronald Reagan was. Let's put it that way.

Jim Baker. Some people say he was the first Dick Cheney before there was a Dick Cheney. Would you agree with that?

I don't know what that means.

Meaning, you know how they say Dick Cheney was the guy that was making a lot of decisions behind closed doors with Bush, and Jim Baker was the one that ran the show, or no?

Well, there's a lot to do with that, but I I think, yes, I would say that, but not in a positive way.Not in a positive way?Yeah. Because, again, as I write about it in the book, especially on domestic policy issues, he did things. It's not just him. He brought in people that worked against Reagan's interests. And I write about it in the book. And it's important that people read about it. It's that. And Reagan talks about decisions that were made that were not in Reagan's interest. Now, Reagan doesn't name names because he didn't realize what was going on. And it's just that I found information in the archives. And when I researched the book, I found more and more information that led me to find factual reasons to believe that Reagan was taken to the woodshed on these things.

Did you ever read the book, The Man Who Ran Washington? Yeah, I did. What did you think about it?

Well, I thought it was a fluff job on Jim Baker. He embellished his... A lot of it was good in the sense that it exposed a lot of things about him, and a lot of it was a fluff job.

Was Baker more a Bush guy or Reagan guy?

Well, he was more... Look, He did his job. He did mostly what... He was a Reagan guy in the sense that if he was required to do something that Reagan really wanted to do, he did it. But if he could get away with doing something that he believed that Reagan should do, even if Reagan did not want to do it, and he could get away with Reagan doing it, he would do it. And that was like the tax package in '82, raising taxes. They all thought that was in Reagan's interest, and they convinced it was in Reagan's interest. And Reagan called it one of the worst mistakes of his presidency. And he told me that twice.

Behind closed doors, how did Reagan feel about Bush?

He liked him.

He liked him?

Yes. Yes, he did.

Did he trust him? Yes. He trusted him? Yes. Senior?

Yes. He liked Bush, and he felt Bush was a good vice President, and he trusted him and liked him. I didn't know any different.

Did you ever read the story about Bush senior and his son Neil meeting with Hinkley's brother, coming down to dinner a day before the shooting, the same day as shooting, and then that guy canceled?

No.

You never heard of that? I'm trying to see what... Rob, can you play the clip? I think Tripoli talks about that. No, not that one. I texted it to you, and there was an article written about this. If you're saying no, that means he never brought it up. You follow Joe Rogan? You know who Joe Rogan is? Yeah, I know.

He is.

Okay. Rob, I texted to you. So if you just look at your text, you'll find it. I texted to you right before us getting into it. It's a clip that just came out, I want to say last week. I don't know if you have it, Rob, or not. I don't have it in my mind. Okay, so there is a clip of... Let me find this thing for you. Hang on one second.

Is this it? No.

Yeah, it's on Twitter. If you go on Twitter, you should be able to find it. Let me see here. Let me see here. It's very It's interesting. Then I went and looked at it. I'm like, Is there really any credibility behind this? Then you see some of the stories about... It's so funny, Rob. I literally watched this before we went live. So your impression is they were good. There was no issues there.

No. And I have high regard for Bush himself. It's just that when he brought Baker... See, Baker brought in people to work for him that did not have Reagan's interest in their heart. They felt like they were independent. I mean, again, you have to read my book. This guy, Darman, was a terrible influence, and Baker gave him a free hand. And it was destructive to Reagan's domestic presidency, in my judgment. And it's a story that needs to be told. And he was an abrasive personality. Baker or the guy that he brought in. Darman. And Darman admitted in private conversations with reporters that he didn't want public until I found them, that he wanted to change, that he came to the White House to change Reagan's economic program. Now, he had no business doing that. He had absolutely no... You don't come to work for the President to change his economic program. Do you want somebody to come to your organization and secretly try to change what you're doing? That's wrong. They can't come to work for-But how do you not catch that?

How do you, as a president, not catch that?

Because you're trusting your chief of staff.

But you still get criticized for the person you hired. I've made a lot of bad hires. How did Reagan hire somebody that he didn't trust like Baker? Did he have a relationship with Baker? Or would Baker be somebody that was part of the swamp?

That's a good question. Baker's working He's working the press all the time. Reagan's a really trusting man. And he's assuming that the staff is doing the best thing for him. And plus, at the end of the day, they convinced him he was doing the right thing. Look, Reagan called me in in December of 1981 to consult on his '82 State of the Union address. And he gives me this long lecture about how Lady Thatcher is screwed up by raising taxes in Britain, how she, by changing her mind, by reneging on her plan that she had cut taxes, by raising taxes. Well, he gave me this long economic lecture about what a stupid mistake she made. She should have never done that. And I thought, boy, good for him. He's sticking by his guns. He's not going to raise taxes this next year. And then he signs on to this Tax, Equity, and Fiscal Responsibility Act, Tephra, in 1982. Now, once he does that, He's going to sign on to this bill. He starts calling in. He calls in Marty Anderson, and he calls in Lynn Offsiger, and he calls me in, and he calls us all in in order to tell us, I don't want you guys arguing against me on this out in public because I'm changing my mind, obviously.

They've convinced him that he's not actually raising taxes. Mr. President, these are only excise taxes. They aren't real tax increases because they aren't income taxes. And then they've convinced him that we're going to get three dollars in budget cuts for every dollar of excise tax you raise. And then in 1988, when we're working on the his speech, the speech, Farewell Speech to the Republican Convention, He does pounding on his damn desk to me. He says, The fellows misled me. He says, damn it. He says, they promised me three dollars in budget cuts for every dollar of tax increase. Instead, for every dollar of tax increase, I got a dollar 70. Excuse me, I got a dollar 70 in revenueing I got a dollar 70 in tax increases for every dollar in budget cuts. I got just the opposite. And he felt that he got screwed, and I got lied to.

That's part of his legacy, though. He raised taxes. A lot of people say that, and it's unfortunate because it stays. And years later, they're like, You say Reagan is such a great president. He raised taxes, right? That's right. If I was the president, I would do it. I don't know how you... I would have a... Because when I do calls, I have lawyers who hold and the lawyer is accountable. I don't know if that makes sense. Let me just say this lawyer is writing a contract form, you're looking at an agreement, and you'll send me the red notes and all this other stuff. Then I'll go to this lawyer and say, Do you think this lawyer is doing a good job doing this? And he holds them and he's like, No, he missed this one part. Then I'll go I'm just going to this lawyer and I'll say, How about this one part? Oh, I missed that one. I fixed it. Sometimes if you get the accountants that are doing numbers, finance and taxes, you almost have another team over here that no one knows about, a shadow team that holds these guys accountable, or else Sometimes you're not going to know everything about every law, about every IRS, about every code, about every CP, every account.

But if you can do that, that allows you to hold people accountable. This is the clip I was sharing with you that happened two weeks ago. This is literally the same day when Trump's interview dropped. This was dropped 6, 7, 8 hours prior to that interview. Rob, if you can play this clip. The gentleman that he's having on right there is a comedian talking to Rogan. Both of them are very good. He's very funny, but he is what he had to say. Go ahead, Rob. One of the things I wanted to I wanted to talk to you about. I wanted to play this, but we decided we shouldn't play it. We don't want anybody to have any way to get it down. The episode of you when you're on the view. Make this. That's not the one, Ron. One of the things I wanted to talk to you about. No, that's not the one.

There it is.

Okay, go ahead, Rob. It was related to Obama and Bush. The Bushes had dinner with the Hinklis the night before Reagan got shot. What? Yeah. Is that crazy? Okay, I always thought Hinkly was a lone nut that was infatuated with Jody Foster.

I had the delusion back in 1981 that by shooting the President, I could impress Jody Foster. Foster, which me saying that now, it's ridiculous, but that's what I believe back then.

There's actually interviews, dude, where he said, Uncle George told me to do it. Oh, Jesus. Okay. Then they just let him out. Yeah, and now he's doing like playing in coffee beans because he's put out an album or something like that. By the way, so I go up. Rob, pull up the story that we saw. It was our connection between John Hinckley Jr. And the Bush firm. Can we give credit to whoever wrote this? What was it called? It's called grunge. Com. You ever heard of those guys, Rob, before? No. Okay. Go a little lower to see who it is. And by the way, the story, matter of fact, this is the better way to do it. This was written on New York Times many, many years ago. So if you go, morning, at the moment, Washington D. C. Raising on camera. So witnessing arm, go a little lower up. At the bottom, it talks about the Bush connection. Go lower, go lower, go lower. If you type in Neil, why don't you just type in Control F Neil? There it is. Scott Hinkley had met with Neil Bush earlier that year at a party and became friendly with the fourth child of George W.

Bush. According to Garnet News Services, after news of the assassination of Tim Broke, Neil Bush canceled a dinner in the shooting aftermath. The media swarmed the Bush family on their connection to the Hinkleys. The fact that they had a dinner schedule with Scott Hinkley, and obviously, Scott Hinkley, his brother, is the one that tried to shoot him. You've never heard of this story. No. Rob, can you go to John Hinkley's Wikipedia? Who was the dinner with President Bush? Neil Bush, President Bush's fourth son. Okay. So if you can, there you go. I need to zoom in a little bit, Rob, right there so I can read it. Right there, it right there. It says, New York Times, The eldest, Hinkley, child, Scott 30, the vice President of his father's company and friend Neil Bush, the son of the President, Scott Hinkley, and a date had been invited to have dinner with the young Bush's home last night, but the dinner was canceled after the shooting. That's New York Times, by the way, which is weird. You've never heard of this before. No. Wow. What do you think about this? Do you give any of this any credence?

Or it's like, No, this is...

So what if they did? What if they did have dinner?

Well, you know how Lyndon Johnson became a president, and the one story that no president ever wants to leak is how John F. Kennedy got assassinated. I interviewed a guy named Jim Jenkins, who was one of the four men, right after John F. Kennedy died, that held his brain. These were the four military folks who held his brain. They said, Look, he said, He left alive. He said somebody had messed with it before it came to us. I said, What do you mean? Somebody had messed with it before it came to us. I went through the rabbit hole. I interviewed another man who worked on that day, and I interviewed a bunch of different guys. I went through the whole thing. A lot of people point to Lyndon Johnson being behind what happened to Kennedy and the reason why it goes to Lyndon Johnson.

Lyndon Johnson was a Texas guy.

In this case, the fastest way to become a president It is, God forbid, something happens to the president, you're the president, right? The VP becomes a president. Why would you meet with the brother whose brother tried to kill the President?

Now, I see where you're going. It's just that if you knew George H. W. Bush, he was such a gentleman and such a It would be so beyond the pale for him. Now, I don't know about his kids, but that would be something beyond anything he would ever- What was he like when you were around him? He was such a nice... Look, I first connected with George H. W. Bush when I was in the Nixon Whitehouse, and he was head of the Republican National Committee. This is an interesting story. And I had to write speeches for people to support President Nixon against impeachment and Watergate issues. And so Bush was at the Republican National Committee. And so I had to write a speech for him defending Richard Nixon. So I wrote this tough speech for Bush. And so he went out kicking butt and everything else. And he called me afterwards. So this is in 1974. I'm guessing it had to be late '73 or somewhere in '74 when he was head of the Republican National Committee. And he had the courtesy to call me at the White House. I was Deputy Special Assistant President, just a small fray.

And to thank me for writing that speech. And people almost never did that. He thanked me. It was a courtesy call. And he said, Ken, I just want to thank you for helping me with that speech. And he said, that's tough duty out there. And he was carrying the water for Nixon, and he didn't want to. It because that was a tough job for him to do. But he was head of the Republican National Committee, and he knew he had to do it because he's loyal to President Nixon. And so I'm just saying that's the guy he was. And every contact that I had with him when he was vice President, when he was a candidate for... And when I saw him as President, he was just always the nicest gentleman I've ever known. I can't say anything else about him.

Yeah, I had a moment-I have different views about his other family.

Who? Jeb? Or-w.

Oh, really? Did you ever have an interaction with him?

Just indirectly. But I mean, I just wish that he was more active on behalf of his party. That's all.

You mean today? Yeah. When you say that, are you yourself, because you've spent time with Nixon, with Reagan, with a lot of different... I think you even helped, if I'm not mistaken, you were an advisor to McCain's camp. You were an advisor to a couple of other people, if I'm not mistaken. Mccain, Dole. Mccain, Dole, some of these other guys. You've been around. Are you someone that's supportive of President Trump right now going against Kamala? Yeah. The Bushes are not fans of Trump. They haven't been since he made the comments that he made. He's not somebody that is liked by the Bushes. And the way he went after Jeb, that's like the last time you heard anything good from Bushes towards Trump.

Look, President George W. Bush doesn't have to like Trump. He doesn't have to campaign for him. But there are hundreds of other Republicans he could be out there helping Interesting. And he isn't out there doing it.

And why do you think that is? I have no idea.

But I wish he's got the ability to raise a lot of money. He's got the ability to raise a lot of money, and he's a former President of the United States.

Do you have any reasons why you think he does that? Everybody has a reason.

No. Speculations why? I think probably the reason is that he'll be asked about President Trump. I think there's ways to do that without... You don't have to answer that question. Just saying, Look, I'm out here to help. I'm out here to help Ken Calvert got elected Congress in Riverside County.

Is that part of his duty, you think? When he ran, did other previous presidents help him out? I wonder, can you pull up which?

Here's what I'll is that President George W. Bush got elected because Republicans all over the country helped him. Everything good that happened to him was happened because Republicans all over the country, no matter how they felt about his politics, helped him. I go back to Richard Nixon. In '19, throughout his career He campaigned for Republicans, whether liberal, moderate, conservative, left wing, right wing, whatever. He campaigned for Jacob Javitz, who was a liberal Republican. He campaigned for Barry Goldwater, who was a right wing Republican. He campaigned for Republicans all over the country. And so if you're part of the party and you owe your livelihood to him. Look, people say to me, are you a Trumper? I say, look, I'm a Kacheean Republican. I believe in lower taxes. I believe in a strong national defense. I believe in anti-crime policies. I believe in a strong border. I believe in a strong foreign policy. That makes me... That's the Republican I am. I think Nixon believed in that. I think Reagan believed in that. I think Trump basically believes in that. I can't defend understand every element of his personality. I don't have to. But I believe those things as against Kamala Harris being a left-wing nut.

If she's a left-wing nut, Arnold just came out saying he's endorsing her. No. Shane came out, they're endorsing her.

They're just angry at him.

At Trump?

Yeah. Well, the Chinese are. Liz is.

Because of comments made.

I guess, yeah. Yeah, I guess.

What do you think about Trump?

I think there's a lot of ways he could improve. I think he could have made this a landslide, not a big landslide, but he could have won this election very, very comfortably.

You think he will?

I think if he wins, it's narrowly, but I think he could have done it comfortably if he had changed a lot of things. But I'm not in the business anymore. Have you already voted or no?

I voted.

If I had to give my... If I gave my advice, I mean, I knew Susie Wiles when she was Susie Summerhays. And campaign worker that worked for me and others in the '84 Reagan Bush campaign, and I like her. But if I called her up and gave her advice, and she'd probably listen to me, but it wouldn't matter because she'd pass it on and he'd ignore it.

Wow. Last thing before we wrap up, were you ever there? I once had Michael Reagan at an event I called it Saving America Doing the Impossible. July of 2009, where I was dressed as George Washington, my wife was dressed as Lady Liberty, and another one of my guys was dressed as Lincoln. And he said, What would you like me to speak about? I said, Just tell stories about your father. And Last time he's seeing him, he went to visit him, and then he's leaving, he looks back, he forgot to hug him, and he looks back, he's going like this, and Michael comes, gets out of the car and goes, hugs him and leave. Were you with him at the last days when his memory and he was going through his challenging times or not really?

No. Well, yes and no. Okay, I can clear up one thing. People ask me, was he losing it in his in the last days? And I said, no, his brain was working perfectly at the end of his presidency. I met him in 1990, worked with him on some stuff in the '90 midterm elections. His mind was working good. I helped him on this 1992 Convention speech, and his brain was fine. But in '92, I did run into him at I can't remember. It was a fundraising event, and it was the first time he didn't recognize me. And that was two years before he declared his Alzheimer's.

Two years after the end of his presidency?

No, that was four years.

You felt the major difference where he didn't recognize you?

That was the first time, four years after his presidency. That was the first time I walked up to him and he drew a blank.

What was the exchange like?

I just walked up to him, and normally, if I walked up to him, he'd have a big grin on his face and say, hello. Oh, hi, Ken. I said, Hello, Mr. President. That, wow, great to see you, or something like that. And he had this blank on his mind, which... It's like I've I had that running into high school classmates that I haven't seen for 50 years, but that's a little different. But this was... I mean, he never didn't know who I was.

What was the gap between the last time?

You said four years? No, it was two years. Got it.

Four years after the end of his presidency, two years of the last time he saw you. Yeah. And was Nancy... Did this happen accidentally, or was it a schedule thing that you came to the house and-No, this was accidentally.

But I mean, I mean, it wasn't a shock thing. I mean, I walked up slowly to him.

And did you try to explain yourself? Like, what was the occasion?

I just said, oh, I told him who I was and put it in context. And then we started visiting a little bit. But I tried not to make him feel uncomfortable. Let's put it that way.

What was Nancy like at that time, at the last days?

I didn't have any real contact with her that much. And so I didn't... After the presidency, I didn't keep that much contact. I was so active with my other things. I was running political campaigns, and I had my own business. I ran Oh, jeez. I was running Governor Duke Majan's campaigns in California. I was helping with attorney general campaigns, and I guess I should have stayed in better contact with Reagan. I should have visited with him more. It's funny. I didn't. And he was not one to do phone calls. With Nixon, we talked on the phone all the time. We talked on the phone constantly. Reagan was not that relationship. Reagan, we didn't talk on the phone.

Interesting. And with Nixon, did you speak to Nixon when Pat passed away? Did you have an interaction with him at that time or no?

No, that would have been awkward. He was devastated.

I It's the only time I think I've seen him cry. There's videos of him crying.

No, he was sobbing. Yes.

You ever seen that?

I've seen the videos. Yes.

You never spoke to him?

I was at the funeral, obviously.

But did you guys ever have any exchange after the Is he in a funeral or no?

Well, probably. I'm sure because I was on the board of his library foundation and we were still very close. At that time, I was with him. He felt a tremendous sense of loss because he depended on Pat. She was a very strong woman, and she never did leave him or turn her back on him in any of the controversial things he was involved in. She stuck with him, and he leaned on her and depended on her.

That's the voice of Billy Graham. This is watching a man. That's like watching a man that's strong. In tears. It's like Trump crying. It's a very tough thing to see with folks like that. Between the two, just a wild question. Curious to know what you'll say about this. If you even have an opinion, some tells me you're not going to answer this. You're going to be very diplomatic about this answer, but I may be wrong. Who do you think was a better president, Nixon or Reagan?

They were two different presidents.

You started diplomatic with your answer.

There's no answer to that question. They had two different times of history. They were the two leading Cold War presidents. Nixon set the groundwork for Reagan to be a great president.

Nixon set the groundwork for Reagan to be a great President. Then, indirectly, I take that as Nixon.

No, I'm just saying they were collaborators.

If there's no Nixon, is there a Reagan?

I don't think it was an answer. You can't answer that question.

Yeah. Did you ever spend time with the young Roger Stone back in the days or no? Were you ever Ron Roger Stone?

Oh, yeah. What was he like? He's just as crazy as a lun as he instead of being. Really?

Do you have a Roger Stone story?

No. He's just always... No, I don't have any special stories about him. Just he was always the pain in the ass back then. Was he?

That's a picture of...

No, I know him back in The Nixon days? Back in the early '70s.

He was a big Nixon guy.

Yeah. If Roger Stone is listening, every Roger Stone story, you got to cut it by 80% and then cut half of that to 40%.

Okay. You're saying exaggeration is what you're saying. Yeah. Got it. Well, have you seen a recent movie about the President, Trump, that just came out? I'm assuming you wouldn't see it.

I wouldn't see it.

Roger Stone's in it. It's actually very interesting how they pain him to be.

I love Roger. Super entertaining. No, I was just on his show. I love the guy. Look, the fun thing I've had, I've been in politics since 1968. I've had a wonderful career. The personalities I've been with. I turned down Clint Eastwood to run his campaign for mayor. Clint Eastwood? Yeah. He called me up and wanted me to run his campaign for mayor. I turned him down. Why? Did he scare you? No, I didn't have time. I said, I don't run mayoral campaigns. I'll get you somebody to do it for me. Arnold ever reach out or no? No.

You're not a fan?

No. I don't know why he didn't reach out. I think probably somebody told him I was more conservative than he was, but I have no idea.

How was Duke Medjian?

He was great. Wonderful man. We had the biggest land, one of the biggest land slides in history. 1986. Just totally underestimated. There needs to be a book written about. I don't have. I should have written. I should have write a book about it. Somebody needs to write a book. He had a great governorship, had more integrity, probably the man of most integrity in politics that I've known.

Respected? Was he a fighter? Was he a tough guy?

Tough guy. Respected.

Is he the highest He's the highest ranking Arminian, right, in politics. Governor, I'm assuming, right?

Yeah, ever. We got him elected narrowly in 1982, and then got him reelected by a massive landslide in '86 by 23 %. 23 %?

The chance of that happening today in California is not that high. There's a guy there. I don't know if you're a big fan of or not. This guy named Newsom. I don't know if you've heard of him. You're not a fan of Newsom? No. Well, look, it's been great having you on. We're going to put the link to the phone.

Well, I hope I haven't disappointed you.

No, I like stories. That's what I like. I like stories. I'm fascinated by politics. My parents, I grew up in a weird family where one side, they were communists. The other side, they were imperialists. And that was my introduction to politics. Once I thought-Yeah, your mom was a Communist.

She was.

She was part of the Today Party. They were part of the Today Party. Their Bible was the Karl Marx Communist Manifesto, which I read, and you had to find out what that was all about. But now I see this game. It's a very interesting game. Very, very interesting game. This political game. Very. I learned politics and business when I started competing, and I'm like, Wait a minute. You guys flipped on me. You were nice to me. Now you're a son of a bitch. What happened to you? Oh, because we're taking a market, and you guys teamed up together? So this is all politics. No problem. Let's have some fun. It was actually fun seeing what that was like. So anytime I hear stories like the ones you're telling me right now, I'm fascinated by it. But I appreciate. By the way, do you know how this interview came out, happened? Somebody on Manecd reached out to me, and they said, Rob, did you know the story? They reached out to me, they said, On Manect, hey, you need to have him on. Ken You got to get on the podcast. I'm like, You got to be kidding me.

Yeah, let me look into it. I'm like, Oh, wow, what an interesting story. Let's figure out a way to get this work in.

You need to meet her. She's a jarbig little Romanian girl.

I got to meet her if she's outside. Respect That's the power of Manec, by the way. You have to respond back because people are paying for Respond. That's why that app works so effectively.

Yeah. Well, she's a jar big Romanian girl.

I look forward to meeting her. Sir, it is a pleasure to meet you. I really enjoy this two hours with you. I got to tell you, good for you. You went 2 hours on a podcast. Not a lot of people can do it. How old are you? How old are you today?

Eighty years old.

Eighty years old. You did a two-hour podcast. This is so impressive.

Hey, I'm going to go outside and tell you I Patrick's butt.

By the way, no bathroom breaks, no edit, nothing. You got to respect that. So great to have you on. Absolute pleasure.

All right, we'll have a cigar sometime. I look forward to it.

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