Youre dare going to say that i care about my reelection more than i care about the truth about this country. Thats i mean, thats as you can tell. Yes. People dont care about it. But i think its because of a failure of leadership to actually put what the stakes are out there. I hope youll join me thanking our input and show strong willed people in the arena on a frank discussion. Thank you, guys. Thanks. Its funnyhow did you first geto washington . What was your first job . Well, okay, first of all, it was i had heard about government a number of years, more than exceeded my appointment. This time. But i actually what came from the i came up with when i finished High School One the navy turned out to the first couple of years of post in over in asia and and then i was called back by the Selective Service system to reform the Draft Convention with them in the white house. They promised a random lottery right . It would go too far with it. Nonetheless, there was a there was an initial lottery that was prepared handle and would go through and lawsuits were filed against white house. My mother had truly been a random lottery and i got a call from one of my roommates from college from law school saying, would you would you mind if we would you like to be reassigned . Wed like to have you come back and work on this project. So i came back, worked on the project. We got it straightened out. And from then, from there i was i was starting to go home to north carolina. I thought thats where id wind up. And when i got a call again from my old roommate saying, theres a position open under the west wing of white house and to help run the speechwriting, speechwriting and so forth. And then i said, why dont you why dont you present yourself so i did. I did. And i said, this is a lark. I wrote it for you were however and i i didnt know you were a diversity hire. I was a diversity. I was a d, i was a d i without knowing it. One of the first. But i came in then with, with and started working for nixon and one of the interesting conversations i had was before i came, they they werent quite sure if all of them were a price running, a speechwriting operation. Harold tripp guy, harold tripp guy who wrote the big on goldwater way back when. In any event, id gone to yale. Hed gone to yale, and we had it all. And we both okay, i didnt vote for the ill give him one year before the election start and thats what i said. Well, take one year to write. Tell me pat buchanan actually likes, diversity. I didnt believe that i would write the lets be clear that pats idea of diversity was protestant yes but i think thats where im i, i think thats where i first met you early. What you werent writing for. Well that that was a bit later. I just look old that clinton. That was clinton. Clinton her clinton. Were going to get to. Okay, we will. Okay. Anyway, how we got into the white house is you are the fortenberry force of the clinton administration. So you worked for nixon . Yeah, that was 71. Yep. 71, 72, 73. So what was the Nixon White House like . Oh, oh, it was it was a little scary, actually it was, you know, there was a time when the nixon house, you know, seemed to be well run operation. I did a first class job in tracking some really talented people in the government. I think it was the best group of republican weve been in have been tracked. Moynihan yeah. Moynihan pat moynihan was a major, major figure like that. But you know, the greenspans of the world the various of their various people who ran programs that were fugitive estate of secretaries of state. There were future secretaries of the defense department. Rumsfeld was there, but baker was there, and he started as chief of staff, moved over to the Treasury Department, went from the Treasury Department to run a state department over this was over two term. So it it was really good. But then, you know watergate hit and that was just cataclysmic event i was in a position of run by this time i was running the speechwriting and Research Team was pretty big big team and i knew bob woodward from college and woodward to call me when they had a hot story at the post. They would call me and say, i need read you the first two or three paragraphs of this and see if this factor it. Im not im not going to change it just because you dont like the way its written. But i do need to know if the facts were right. So we had a sort of relationship and and nixon blessed the relationship, knew i was talking to woodward, but for a year and a half or so, we talked a lot and it helped to bond behind the scenes. It helped to take some of the out of the process, but not all it was a Richard Nixon was the stuff of shakespeare. I mean, yes this was a man who was one of the most talented ive seen in washington in the last 30 or 40 years. He was easily the best strategist along henry kissinger. The two of them together. You know, they really it out there at that at that point the both china and russia were where we were locked at the hip and opposition to the United States and Kissinger Nixon understood that if you can simply you can split them apart you can have a divide and conquer strategy. And thats why kissinger went to beijing. Thats why nixon had, you know, got going along with the chinese and that sort of thing. And those and those were big, important changes in American Foreign policy. I dont know. Richard haass is here. Good to talk about this much more than i can. But anyway, that had that been all there was to Richard Nixon. This bright side that i saw periodically, he would have been one of our better president s that his problem was what happens to so leaders when when, when, you know, victory goes through their heads too easily and they decide, you know, think i can go for the moon. And nixons case he he not only thought he could conquer everything, but could do it surreptitiously. He could do it in violation of the law. No, i mean, he was he was a forerunner of donald trump in that respect. So nixon had this dark side. He had a bright side near a dark. And the clash in that house was which one is going to prevail . And it was a close call all the way along. But roy price, who had been my mentor at that point, called me and he said, you got to understand the fight in here is between people who want to go for broke and break the Brookings Institution and do all these crazy things versus about four or five of the rest of us who were trying stop him. And we to do it very quietly and we we failed. I mean, nixon and nixon, we did not truly understand it, but he had demons inside him that he never really learned to. And they eventually him down. He was he was asked by david frost, a british journalist, and on tv interview to explain watergate, nixon said, i my enemies a sword. And then they ran me through, which was exactly what i and they twisted it with relish very much. So they do it. They it with relish. Exactly right. Yeah, right. But Richard Nixon was a complex person we dont understand. But i think gives us warning about can happen if you got the wrong kind of person in the white house. And thats why whats coming is so important its really important that you watch the country. Let me ask you, using your harvard and your your experience, but participating and observing, there is a crucial between nixon and the 45th president , which is hes like voldemort. I just try to say the name which really irritates him. So i dont do it a lot. In the end. Nixon a sense of shame. Yes, he did actually he believed in the institutions enough that it wouldnt have occurred when goldwater and john rhodes, hugh scott, you know, come down i think on the fifth or 6th of august and say you havent got the votes to survive in the senate. He didnt say, all right, lets get the proud boys together. Yep. And to and equally whats often forgotten but you know so well was beginnings of the nixon when when there was actually a legitimate Congress Controversy about whether in fact nixon had won the election. And there were a lot of voters in chicago, for example, in the of chicago, you know, who brought forth a lot of voters kind of it made a big difference. And nixon was urged to challenge in court the case against him because people around him said will win this case. And nixon, we cant do that. We cant do that to the country. And it was a call on his good. Yeah, it was a good side. Yeah yeah, absolutely. And the other kind of offer a thesis and you you assess the validity in your witness and a participant so much of this i have a theory that. One way to understand america from 1933 to 2017 is that it was a figure debate between fdr sr and Ronald Reagan that you we debated the relative role of the state in the marketplace, you know, the relative projection of divorce against commonly agreed upon foes and rivals and truman and lbj are over here as part of that conversation, president reagan and george w are over here. But eisenhower, nixon ford, bush 41, clinton are all kind of in the middle of the field. So yeah. Yeah. And that conversation in many ways ended in 2017 and part of the biden project i think is to restore that conversation. Do you agree with that . I agree with up to a point. I think that there was a there was an alliance or alignment of people who in public life who could who learned who did believe in with each other and working across lines. Senator jack danforth, a republican adherent as today and was he worked as so many of their leaders though these earlier years he worked really to bring a bipartisan set of solutions. But i think it had partly to do with as far of the intellectual conversation. But it also had to do with the fact that we had a rise of World War Two generation after the war. And for like in the late forties and then through the fifties and into and, you know, into the sixties, there was a lot of bipartisanship that that came through at that time. And it was partly influenced by the fact that the members of the World War Two generation were so tied the military and to sacrifice the country that made a big, big difference in a conversation starting with jack kennedy going through george bush senior. Those were our world war president s. There were seven of them. Every single one of those seven president s or a military uniform, six of them were in the war. And jimmy was in the Naval Academy when the war ended. And he went on to serve honorably those years in the military were bonding experiences that help people understand is a set of values that guide this country. And were in this together. We all came, i said. But as the saying goes, were we all came on different ships. But now were in the same boat together. And i think i think the the World War Two generation ethic of service, of sacrifice has sort of passed from a stage. And were into a different era now. It was you know, its just people were trying to pulverize other we havent seen it since 19th century and and its been a big, big and i think the the challenge now can we revive some that and Richard Haass talked about this earlier that can we revive some of those civic commitments and civic feelings and a sense of civic principle can we make those kinds memory and reunite the country with a different kind of generation . I believe that instead of the military what have right now what we ought to be building is a National Service program, a serious National Service. But the way if we could do, i can just assure you that for a lot of young people will get out there and spend a year the weather and the forest and the woods, as they did with the old civilian conservation corps in the 60 or theyre there working as First Responders to the storms and fires and Everything Else there are a lot of there are working hospitals there are a lot of things our young people could be doing. They give us a year back we take a year off of their tuition, debt and we set them up with some of the things they help them get started in life. But become the foundation for moving forward and reuniting the country. I think we desperately need that and weve got weve got people john and both have been watching. Oh, does it wes moore we talk more about him. Hes got governor of, but hes very much interNational Service in a really heck of an interesting and inspiring and individual. But along with that is gavin newsom, governor, california, on the other side of the country, west morris in maryland. Heres gavin newsom in california. And in the two officers that are talking to each other about how to build this National Service program because theyre both champions and i think something similar to that could make a huge difference theres a great in davids written about this wonderfully if you look at the who are on page 109. Yes it was a plumber from brooklyn a agricultural worker from california, a couple of Irish Catholics from boston and, this scion of an immigrant. Yes. And our mutual friend who we just lost, charlie peters, used to tell a story about. There was an old jfk war friend named omalley that always loved and he was not out to put it. He was not Jackie Kennedys idea. A dinner guest, i think a fair way to put it. And so mrs. Kennedy would say, i just dont see what jack in omalley. Well, what he saw in omalley was they had fought the japanese together. Yeah and theyd served together. Yeah. And i think that thats exactly right, gerald ford. Yeah. What was he like, sweet guy. Sweet guy. Gerald ford was one of the only president s that ive done in the last six years who didnt really want to be president. They never they thought he would be. That is a very small category. Its a very small. But i bet its its like French Military victories in the 20th century. The but anyway, gerald ford came into the white house and and i and i got recruited back into the white house staff to be there and and it was a very difficult situation because ford always, always gave his speech. It were so simplistic that it was hard to build a comfort. It was hard to build support for them. But they tended to he tended to use a lot of one syllable words, and it just didnt make. It very, very interesting. So but that thats the foundation for this point. Ford goes through the period he hes seen as not very smart, but a nice guy, you know, a guy trying and he commanded a lot of respect. It just people he wasnt ready to be president. But there was ford because he was sort of, you know, just of going slowly through them, through on the path and then he left office. Well, three months after he after he left office, i got a call from his Office One Day and i said, the president s got a speech to give in the future. And he would really like to have you read the speech and give me your feedback. I said and i said, good. And i said, oh, fine okay, send it to me. I said, well, okay, well get it to you overnight. Call us tomorrow from now. So he got me the thing and i got the speech. In a beautifully written speech, gorgeous page, long two or three syllable word, really excellent argument. A lot of like a boy compound sentences good and so and said i could hear he was puffing on his pipe sort of behind things there listening to me sort of laughing at me. And he said to me after he heard the lesson and said, no, because i told him, mr. President , i dont know. And its a beautiful speech, but im not sure why you want it by your column. I do you want me to rewrite it for you and put it in your your name . You know, write it as you would have written it and said no. He said no. And he said, the point is, david, this is the first time ive had enough free time on my schedule to write my own speech right. Thats right. And it was like, oh, god, we let that guy go for a year and a half without challenging his speeches. And he was sitting here capable of giving really eloquent speech. He lincoln, but he was darn good. And it was just in some ways i came away admiring that. Sure. You know, i have a lot of i think in the Rearview Mirror of history. Jerry ford is going to be will remember because he he was one of the last people who upheld and ethics and sacrifice. That go back to those seven president s all wearing military uniform. Since that time, weve had five president s, not one has worn a military to five. One has been and the car and have to give him credit for this one. George w but its not exactly heavy duty left in to defend great state of texas from the state of oklahoma in the well not if you ask texans theyre very wary those folks. Yes so this is the four year carter period. Then you came back with president reagan. Yes, i do. I did. And it was and part. Jim beam. Jim baker had been a mentor of mine a long time and he was partly responsible for rounding up a group of people to be on staff. And i think reagan understood better than anybody else how important it is to be before you got there and and what had happened to two or three other president s just before that was the president got elected and he would bring with him the who had been with him when he would back home in the state, but he wouldnt bring any new people. And it was you know, it was a very closed little circle and it didnt work. You know as as a way of governing. And so that was an issue. And reagan understood that, convinced him of that. And a lot of time went into preparing the white house staff and baker really did that. We had two groups of people we had we that were the california people who were on his team. They basically were in of setting up a lot of the ideas. And because we feel it was the conservative wing of the Republican Party got elected and we felt, you cant you cant you cant walk away from that. You got to make sure you honor that. So they we set it up so that they california people were the guardians of the faith. But the watching people knew how to get done. And were very, very that baker and company. Baker was a best to single chief of staff. I in Ame