Monica Crowley - Nixon off the record

Monica Crowley

This book was produced in EPUB format by the Internet Archive.

The book pages were scanned and converted to EPUB format automatically. This process relies on optical character recognition, and is somewhat susceptible to errors. The book may not offer the correct reading sequence, and there may be weird characters, non-words, and incorrect guesses at structure. Some page numbers and headers or footers may remain from the scanned page. The process which identifies images might have found stray marks on the page which are not actually images from the book. The hidden page numbering which may be available to your ereader corresponds to the numbered pages in the print edition, but is not an exact match; page numbers will increment at the same rate as the corresponding print edition, but we may have started numbering before the print book's visible page numbers. The Internet Archive is working to improve the scanning process and resulting books, but in the meantime, we hope that this book will be useful to you.

The Internet Archive was founded in 1996 to build an Internet library and to promote universal access to all knowledge. The Archive's purposes include offering permanent access for researchers, historians, scholars, people with disabilities, and the general public to historical collections that exist in digital format. The Internet Archive includes texts, audio, moving images, and software as well as archived web pages, and provides specialized services for information access for the blind and other persons with disabilities.

Created with abbyy2epub (v.1.7.0)

NixoN

_ OFF THE _

Record

HIS CANDID COMMENTARYON PEOPLE AND POLITICS

MONICA CROWLEY

Cook Memorial Pub

3 1122 00503 4850

C7

973.24 CRO /o-N-%

Crowley, Monica, 1968-Nixon off the record

DATE DUE

NOV -6 1996

NOV 2 q TO

DEC23TO

MAY 2 8 7005

-?'/--?*

FEB 2 4 1998

fEB 2 2 lJ

HAy I 5 39

AU6 0 2 tgqq

DEC 1 1 1999

, !

MAR 1 4 2002

The Library Store #47-0106

COOK MEMORIAL LIBRARY

413 N. MILWAUKEE AVE.

UBERTYV1LLE, ILUN03 60048

II\(

a>

t

Ir1c

s

e(tv

n

Nixon

OFF THE

Record

For President NixonMentor and Friend

AUTHOR'S NOTE

I began this project as a single book, a memoir of my four ex-traordinary years working with President Nixon. As it began totake shape, however, I realized that the story would be bettertold in two volumes: the first to focus on Nixon's views onAmerican leadership and the political process, and the second tochronicle his evolving thoughts on foreign policy and his finaljourney toward personal and political resurrection.

This first volume is a guide to twentieth century Americanpolitics and the leaders who defined it, past and present. As thecountry prepares to select another president, Nixon's views willgive voters uncommon criteria by which to measure the candi-dates and their ability to exercise effective leadership.

At the heart of the story is, of course, Nixon. I will be forevergrateful to him for giving me such an exceptional opportunity.The Nixon I knew was kind, trusting, magnanimous, warm, andwitty, willing to share his wisdom, experiences, joys, and regretsopenly and freely. He was a brilliant teacher and a fine man.

A first book is an exciting and daunting enterprise. Nixonoften referred to the writing of his first book, Six Crises, as his"seventh crisis." I now know what he meant.

vHi Author's Note

I owe a great debt to many individuals who helped me as I de-veloped this project. For his wise counsel and kind support, Iwish to thank William Safire. For their early and enthusiasticencouragement, thanks to Frank Gaffney, Roger Robinson, andRinelda Bliss. For providing superb computer technology andtechnical support, thanks to Paul Palumbo of Network Integra-tion Consulting, Inc. And for his good-natured patience with afirst-time author, thanks to my agent, Carl Brandt.

I extend my deep appreciation to Harold Evans, president ofthe Random House Trade Group, for his faithful commitmentto the project, and to Bob Loomis, for his insightful editorial ad-vice and direction.

I am particularly grateful to my mother, Patricia, my sister,Jocelyn, my grandparents, Stanley and Florence Baron, and myuncle and aunt, Donald and Nancy Blanchette, for their re-markable generosity, guidance, encouragement, and support.They are truly selfless.

Above all, I thank God for blessing me as He has.

M.C.Warren, New JerseyMay 17, 1996

CONTENTS

Introduction / xi

PART I

"Head, Heart, and Guts" / 1

PART II

The 1992 Presidential Election / 39

PART III

Nixon's Third Term / 155Index / 225

INTRODUCTION

C3C3

I was born in Arizona in 1968, the year Richard Nixon waselected president. My first memory of Nixon was formed at agefive, when I watched him announce his decision to resign onAugust 8, 1974.1 was vacationing with my parents on the NewJersey seashore, and I remember seeing Nixon's face fill the tele-vision screen, speaking words that I did not understand. I knewenough to know, based on my parents' reactions, that what hewas saying was important, but I could not have grasped thatthat brief speech was the culmination of a tragic series of eventsthat had brought down his presidency, nor could I know that Iwould work for him sixteen years later.

On July 3, 1990, I became former president Nixon's foreignpolicy assistant. I served in this capacity until his death, on April22, 1994. During those four intervening years, I became a pro-fessional confidante of a man who had transformed Americanpolitics, changed global balances of power, and become an iconfor those seeking both good and evil, brilliance and deceit, self-lessness and selfishness, greatness and baseness. Visible andcontroversial even in death, Nixon remains a source of endlessfascination. "In politics," he would say, "the only worse thingthan being wrong is being dull." He was sometimes wrong but

xii Introduction

never dull. His life's journeycompleted on such a grandscaleattracts analogies to all that is right and wrong with theworld, America, and human nature. Nixon himself had a vagueawareness that his life had, in a sense, taken on a life of its own.My four years with President Nixon were not White Houseyears, vice presidential years, or years in Congress. They werethe last of the post-presidency years. What Nixon had accom-plished during his years in power determined how others wouldjudge him; what he did during his final years out of powerwould determine how he ultimately saw himself. UnderstandingNixon at the end of his life is crucial to understanding him atthe beginning and at his political prime. In many ways, theseyears offer a richer, more profound and unqualified guide to theman than any other time of his life. This is when Nixon wouldbe most complete.

I came to work with Nixon in an unexpected and extraordi-nary way. My political values were formed during the Reaganpresidency and were based primarily upon Reagan's aggressiveapproach to the Soviet Union and his determination to restorethe military, economic, social, and political forces that had al-ways contributed to America's unique power. Although my pri-mary interest was foreign policy, I was fascinated by thepolitical process and the leaders who had dominated Americanpolitics in the late twentieth century, particularly Ronald Rea-gan and the man who made Reagan possible, Richard Nixon.