Graham. The coowner and with my wife and behalf of the entire staff i would like to wem you. A few notes it would be a good time to turn off your cellphone or anything that might go beep. When we get to the q and a part of the session try to make your way to the microphones. We are recording for our Youtube Channel and cspan tv is here. Finally, when we get to the end of the program, before you come up to have your books signed our staff would appreciate it if you fold up the chairs you are sitting in and lean them against something that will not topple over. I am delighted to be detrointroducing evan thomas. He is a wonderfully fluid writer and engaging and someone who has enjoyed two remarkable careers. One living in the presence as an accomplished journalist and the other living in the past as a firstrate historian. In journalism he spent ten years with Time Magazine moving to news week staying for 20 years. He was Washington Bureau chief and assisting managing editor and editor at large. He was lead writer on the most impress impressive stories of the day. He has been a main stay on television as a commentator and among his claim to fame is his number of appearances on charlie rose. More than 40 times and still counting. I guess because he like do is get out of washington he taught writing and journalism at harvard and princeton. He has written biographies about previous president s and wrote about a men running covert operations and told stories about government personality who shape the postcold war period. And in sea of thunder he chronicled the issues in the world war ii. He is giving us an updated review on the 37th president. He notes in the acknowledgment that as a creature of the east coast media establishment, which nixon depised, as being able to approach it with a balanced way. He set out to get past what he calls the Cartoon Version of nixon and explain, when even handedness and insight this deeply flawed but also complicated and intrigueing political figures. Judging from a number of favorable reviews so far he succeeded. Please join me in welcoming evan thomas ladies and gentlemen. [applause]. Politics and pros the greatest bookstore ever . [applause] the first time Richard Nixon ever kissed a girl was on a stage being a senior in high school playing in a play and was supposed to kiss the queen. Nixon was in pain with his boots too small for his being feet and when he leaned over to kiss her the audience of the kids at the high school erupted into cat calls and it grow so loud they had to stop the show. He said it was a horrendous experience. The role of dido was played by a girl quote i just about died she remembered. In her diary, oh how i hate Richard Nixon. That kind of experience might have discouraged another man to get on the stage. But in college nixon was a successful actor. In 1952 when nixon was giving a checker speech to the largest tv audience ever, his old drama coach was watching it on tv and cried out that is my boy that is my actor. What is more is nixon got the girl. Florence changed her mind about nixon and in college she was his girlfriend and they almost got married. She later thought of nixon, i thought dick was wonderful, clever, strong and did add there was no hankypanky but thought he was handsome. We had a dark view of nixon, and there was that but i want to get past the Cartoon Version like i said. We think we know nixon but what was it like to be nixon. That is what i set out to try to find out. There was one question that particularly tugged at me. How could someone who was show shy and so awkward be so successful at politics . How could this shy man become one of the most successful politicians of the 20th century . He was painfully shy and bad at small talk that he could not talk. He was good at blurting things at. Nixon ran into ms. Kennedy, ms. Jacqueline kennedy at part Martin Luther kings funeral and he said this must bring back memories. He was trying to impress the press showing what a tough guy he was. Before starting to campaign in 1968 he talked with the great anchor man walter con creak. Nixon said i will have a sherry and then he thought that might not be mainly enough so he said i will have a double sherry. Nixon didnt like people and he got state dinners down to 58 minutes and did it by eliminating the soup bowels. Nixons explanation was real men dont like soup quote. Nixon was afraid of people and yet at the same time he loved to plunge into crowds. He had this you see this familiar thing he would do. He would do this victory salute he got it from churchill but nick n adopted it. Nixon loved to taunt antiwar protesters by giving them the peace sign. In october of 1970 he is speaking in california and cause as riot by targeting antiwar protesters. And that night, i will read you from hr holdmans diary, nixons chief of staff. The p went home and calling with ideas about how to push the line. He asked how things are at my place and i said fine. He interupted saying he are having a fire and told me to come over. Pete took me in his bedroom. He was padding around in the patio saying there was no problem. It was full of smoke and i said i could hardly brief. He said he loved smoke and would sleep there. He walked about the day and a weird day. He was in tired, but in great humor and pulled down his pjs and showed me a bruise on his thigh. He delighted in giving the bside the piece nicks. Imagine being holdman. He once called nixon the weirdiest man he ever met. How did nixon do it . This shy, lonely poor boy do it . He was an out sider who knew how to play on the hopes and fears of the other outsiders. Nixon responded by forming a paternity for the uncool guy understanding there were more of them and more outsiders and that is how he got elected. He had sticks of gum and got elected student body president. It was a formula he used again and again. In 1970 he came up with the famous phrase the silent majority. He understood most of the country was then of the elite. They were anxious about riots in the streets and student protesters and the inner city and nixon tapped into them by playing to their fears but also their hopes. By 1972 this shy awkward boy one one of the greatest landslide in history and won the catholic vote for the first time for republicans and won 35 of democrats in 1972 and yet he was still haunted by the cool guys. One in particular. John f. Kennedy. Nixon and kennedy were friends in congress. Their office was across the hall from each other. And they were both shy. Nixon and kennedy had a lot in common in that sense. They were friends. Kennedy gave nixon a Campaign Donation in 1950 or his father for about 1,000 for is about 20,000 today. They ran against each other in 1960 and many of you saw images from the debate of kennedy cool and tan and nixon sweating through his bad makeup. Nixon prepared by grinding all day long and kennedy prepared by taking a nap and listening to peggy lee records. It was just a terrible defeat for nixon obviously. But what really got to nixon was kennedy was quoted as saying nixon had quote no class. And that was deeply wounding for nixon. Even worse, nixon believes that kennedy assaulted him in the election. In illinois, you know a lot of historians think illinois probably was soletolen. Nixon nixon would have needed one more state. He was a good guy by not challenging this. But he was bitter. Nixon thought the kennedys were better at dirty tricks than he was. That he was catching up with them. His later attempts to use the irs, he thought he was playing catch up. Bobby kennedy had nixon audited three times. Nixon thought the kennedys were better at dirty tricks. He wasnt totally wrong about that. The kennedys were good at dirty tricks but nixon exaggerated and made it worse than it was. The other cool kid that drove nixon nuts were the socalled georgetown group. My old employer ms. Graham and back in the day they really did have powers. Those dinner parties, the heads of the cia and the state department would get together and in 1950 after nixon won his u. S. Senate race, joe also invited nixon to dinner. They kind of check him out to see who this new guy was. They also introduced nixon as russell nixon. And ambassador saw nixon and turned his plate over saying i will not break bread with this man and walked out. You can imagine how mr. And mrs. Nixon, richard and pat nixon, felt. This awkward couple coming to be treated like this. It just left a bad taste he never lost. It got worse after being elected president. Nixon sent kissenger to be the ambassador and he did great with the crowd. He was money and sly but making jokes about the president soon enough joking about fearless leader and talking about his drinking habits and of course this got back to nixon. Nixon tried to be philosophical and he would tease him. But of course it wounded him. He wanted to get even. And those famous white house tapes, he installed those tapes to abut kissengers version of history. Because he was going around saying i am the dove and nixon is the hawk and i am the reasonable guy and nixon is the crazy person. Nixon wanted a record on things like going to china. Going to china was not kissingers idea. It was nixons idea. Kissingers response of going to china in 1969 was fat chance. Now the tapes are terrible. A lot of you have heard parts of them. They dont lie. Nixon said terrible things. Racist things, antiseymmetantisymmetic and it is not unusual for that period or type of male who has to show what a man he is by swearing a lot. The swearing was no more swearing than happens at the Washington Post company where i worked. But there was an arrogance there. When he is talking to word leaders nixon could be very cool. He was good with world leaders. Terrible at small talk so didnt try. He talked about interest and not ideas and got down to business and they liked that about him. He was a cool ham in those circumstances. In his office he could get wound up and say a lot of very bad stuff but there was an inequality to swearing. Lbj knew how to swear. There was another side. Late at night nixon would take his yellow pad and make notes to himself. And those notes he would describe the man he wanted to be. And we would use words like joyful and serene and inspiring and confidant and things we dont associate with nixon. He did all of the time. He aspired to be somebody he could not really be. It would last for a while and he would lash out. The tapes are not wrong. But again the tapes miss things. You listen to enough of the tapes, he has a level of knowledge and expertise particularly on Foreign Policy that is deep. Nixon was saying he hated intellectuals and he would rather talk to an athlete. Nixon was a terrible athlete but a great intellectual. He would read into political theory philosophers political biography, everything churchill wrote. He read more than the normal president because he was shy and lonely and had a lot of time to read. He was going on about harvard. None of them in the cabinet. None of those harvard he hired lots of harvard aids of course. He would give crazy orders chattyorders. Cut had cia in half. The staff knew to ignore the orderers. But not always. Pentagon leak with nixon getting himself wound up partly because he doesnt like leaks at this point because they are conducting secret diplomacy with china and he is afraid that will leak out. He is wound up and want the fbi to come in and spy on the guy who leaked the papers. He wants the fbi to come in and pick up dirt on the man. Hoover refuses. Partly because hoover the slew politician he is, can see the wind is changing. There are starting to be lawsuits about illegal bugging and tapping. The Supreme Court laws are starting to change. Hoover has been running this whole empire on black male is starting to say i think i am going to get out of the business. Nixon, sense the fbi wouldnt do anymore, nixon went in house and created the plumbers. That was an inhouse operation. It sounds terribly sinter sinister but the plumbers were bad at it. They may have once been fbi cia, and all of that but they were ham handed. Hunt was dumped on the white house. And the nixon staffers didnt realize and they hired these guys who were bad at it and got caught breaking into the watergate and the office and all of that. Nixon didnt know anything about the breakin. He found out about it after the fact. Yes, he conducted a coverup. That is absolutely true. But if you listen to the tapes, it is clear that nixon is shy and one of the reasons he doesnt find out about and it and do anything is he is too shy to confront his own subordants. Nixon would say do you think mitchell knew . But he would back off and never got all of them holderman, coleson, dean and mitchell never got them into a room and asked them what happened. Huge mistake. By the time he started paying attention the coverup was well along. Watergate which has been pictured as an illegal scheme and it was bad with a lot of illegal stuff happening but my impression is it is his shyness and awkwardness that got him into trouble. His smart political instincts failed him. The end game is painful. His wife pat who had been close to him a loving wife in many ways. Their love letters are tender and moving from the early years. Both started drinking too much. They stopped talking to each other. A guy named frank gannon said that dinner they would not talk about the main thank. They would talk about anything about the main thing but at night they would pass notes to each other and leave notes on each others pillow. Just always avoiding the name topic and trying to be polite as their world crashed. When he resigned he didnt tell pat but told his assistant to tell her. He got the famous scene of getting on his knows and asking kissinger to pray with him on the last night. That is a true story. Kissinger came back sweating and started telling the aids about this and the phone range and it was nixon on the phone asking kissinger not to tell anybody. Kissinger but his aid on an ex tension and it was in the Washington Post. When nixon left office he almost died. A nurse was slapping his face saying wake up. He came back. Nixon was if nothing else resilient. He came back. He would have these dinners for all of the journalist he hated. He would have dinners and a lot of them michaels grandmother was at the house, and found that nixon had not only written out his talking points for the dinner but his small talk as well. The bad jokes and the whole thing. Always prepared. Nixon did repair his marriage. He did. When pat died. The photographs of the nixon, he is sobbing and balling and not consolable. He may have had a weird marriage but in its own way close and she stood with him, he backed her up and he missed had her when she died and within a couple years he was taken. Nixon could never admit he did wrong. He sort of did with david frost. Some of you have seen those tapes. Nixon said i gave them the sword and they stuck in it. But he said he would have done the same. He never admitted to doing anything immoral. Not until of the end of his presidency, his last words talking to the staff with the house, he said to the staff always remember others may hate you but those who hate you dont win unless you hate them and then you destroy yourself. The night before that nixon was talking to his son in law getting books and he said like shakespeare this just has to play out. I looked at nixons school paper said preserved at the Nixon Library to see if nixon was into shakespeare and ancient greeks. He had to write on julius cease but he didnt nail it. His grandmother warned him against hating enemies. She was a quaker and said that will just get you into trouble. He just couldnt get it. It is like nixon had a destiny in virgils play. He thought he was destined to be a great man. And even though he was shy and lonely he was going to be there. Nixon and leonard garner, a new york jazz musician who was a good pal with nixon. They went done to florida together to give a speech and were supposed to spend the night in a new housing development. And nixons great political in instinct and had a twitch that they were going to use nixon to promote their development. They got in a limo and drove 40 miles to an old nixon patrons and got to the fancy estate in florida and it was closed up dark and a gate and wall around it. Nixon said over the wall we go leonard. They climbed over the wall went into the pool house and funedound a couple bed. And nixon, who was a chronic insom insomniac never slept started talking about his fears and his desires and things he wanted to accomplish in the world and said if he didnt get back into the public life. This is in between being Vice President and loosing the government race before running in 68. If he didnt get back into the public life he would be mentally gone in two years and physically dead in four. He had to be in public life saying i will do anything to get back in public life except seeing a shrink. He did see a shrink though. Typical nixon contradiction. And yet, and yet i cant prove this but im convinced that nixon at some level knew that he was locked in this terrible struggle. I think of those, him writing those notes late at night about wanting to be a better person, about wanting to be joyful. He couldnt pull it off, but he wanted to be that person, and he knew i think, that he was locked in a struggle with the darkness. He lost it. He lost that struggle. But its a great tragedy its a great story. I think one of the Great Stories of our time. I hope you read it. Thank you very much. [laughter] [applause] im happy to take questions can. Sir. Im a veteran and i lost four people in nam after he was elected to end it. Yep. I lost four under johnson. Yep. Do you think he really did his best to get us out of nam in an orderly fast or did he drag it out for reelection sake . Yeah. This is a very fair question, and theres a huge scholarly debate on this thing. Its called the decent interval. Yeah. There is a theory and theres a lot of evidence to prove it, that nixon and kissinger were cynical. It goes like this that if we pull out or if we lose pull out too fast, saigon will fall, well be blamed for it, and i wont win the 1972 election. And theres some evidence on the tapes that they talked that way. But theres also a lot of evidence running the other way that nixon did want to win. He would have these he would get mad at this forthright pissant Little Country and he would have these spasms of violence really, a bombing in 1972, he did it a little bit in the fall of 69 famous christmas bombing. So the evidence is somewhat contradictory about whether he really wanted to win or not. It begs the larger question, why didnt we just get out in 1969 . A lot of people argue we got the same deal in 1973 that we would have got in 69. I dont actually buy that. Nixon was hung up on this