Hunter S. Thompson on Letterman, Charlie Rose & C-SPAN

Helen Hayes sweet may help you as Regina here Regina well we'll get her hang on I'm gonna put you on hold well there is no hold button sorry our next guest is a writer reporter lecturer and columnist ooh invent it and practice the gonzo form of journalism folks please welcome back to this program dr. hunter s Thompson hunter good to see you again yeah how long ago was it that you were here well it seems like only yesterday yeah yeah you know time life timing yeah it was fun yon winter was here a couple of weeks ago and we were talking about the 20th anniversary of Rolling Stone magazine and so on and so forth when when did you first start working with him and the magazine almost from the very beginning right from the mean what did you do before that where did he find you where did you find him well I was a people don't believe this but I was a respectable straight journalist okay all right just continue talking there okay yeah let me help you with your mittens all right that's right now you're fine you're please put it on there all right great so ya know well how did you two happen to get together actually you three yu-yan and the magazine well let's see let's take it from the top here and be real straight let me ask you a question well huh why didn't you take off your jacket before we started taping I wasn't sure if it's cold behind me here I thought the point of me and I wasn't sure which one was gonna prevail all right okay have an occluded front here we might get showers and I might hit alright so anyway you and the magazine at the time for I was into politics yes I am no and I was gonna run for a run for sure of love where of picking cutty Aspen Colorado and it's politicians will I was looking for uh constituency which we have called freak power the time freak power Peter well we had run one campaign earlier for mayor in lost by six votes this was on the 3 power ticket repeal the old days that were yeah that's plaid yeah it might still work and I noticed that we had trouble registering our people for the mayoral election which we lost fight and I thought well this won't happen again you know I'm gonna run for a row I'm sure we register these buggers I looked around and I thought who's gonna talk to him and I found this obscure magazine you know really nice going on I noticed that they were reading you know and uh they didn't they weren't into politics and I thought well I won't talk to Rolling Stone yeah but that was the beginning of the relation yeah I put my letter C wondering but Mary program in there what are you printed you're still write for them uh yeah yeah I have a well not often yeah you know young he's become a little giddy these his old age how do you feel about what the the magazine is evolved to at this point fun hold got the one hog yeah yeah it isn't is that as much fun well Brad surely can probably the same feeling about you remember your morning show you remember the morning show that's amazing for that that was I do remember that um so what do you been doing lately you're living in Colorado and a deliver for is if they're mostly Freeman stable for what do you tell us a little bit about the the 88 the presidential campaign all right yeah we are what do you think we're testing equipment here hundred no I don't know Japanese it's all kind of thing well let's talk about the the presidential campaign what does it look like what about the Democrats what about Gary Hart he's a friend of yours right yeah yeah Gary it's been a friend for a long time well tell me about his situation how did it strike you know I could you liked the Winston Churchill thing and say what time do you have you know uh thank you it's something that really uh that's head thinking it's often a part of myself but uh it let a lot of people doing because uh Gary was as close as we've had in a while to a president in waiting and a lot of good people work for the campaign yeah and they're not there are good people in politics you know more than you think people paid for it ya know Gary was he was running like 42% of polls over 22 / different Bush did you know that he was flirting with this kind of difficulty of this kind of problem well problem you had a problem like that the good a date that took to Kobe out of television provide a date like that I couldn't write anymore yeah what's the problem and I had I don't agree that's a for long to it it's like you people talking about me if you don't dr. Thompson for a while did you realize he ate a drinking problem well of course haven't written songs do you know it's it's right in front of us I don't agree like a silly you know oh it's tragic kind of so you don't think that that situation should have taken him out of the race I aim is one of one of two people who counsels a thing in and saying to hold it yeah and if it pulls opposes it pointed out recently people were very forgiving about that people horrific giving about the Ginsburg the pasta joint do you think if he'd been more contrite perhaps at least publicly that they he'd still be in there running today I don't know I think people like to see in a president at least and I've been this way myself and it's go in you want to see somebody who can mines a store right and if Gary is that kind of trouble with one of his dates you know what's gonna happen when he looks a Russia that makes the Russian girls I think that that strikes me those Marines over there and are they all on Cornell court-martialed and uh I don't think people may against Berg yeah let me let me interrupt here because I want to get your thoughts on on who we're looking at for candidates both sides of the aisle here who do you think it's gonna be coming out of it the Democratic situation Oh young I see Paul over there we don't know yeah I was gonna show you Paul and TV rather than do this sort of thing Ivan I notice I haven't shaved my song sounds like Richard Nixon well just quickly now okay who is it gonna be contesting for the highest waterfall in Iowa it looks like Paul Clement Paul Simon with the bowtie guy yeah yeah I like the man you like him yeah neck of the woods Illinois yeah well Indiana pretty cross supporters Yeah right you're gonna person there yeah you think so I think so oh you for you know I've really haven't given it much thought that is what that's where we were at now because uh I read your book right now I wrote immediately I booked for Jesse oh it always just a jack yeah I like Jesse he's he brings a kind of a hard rock honesty but don't you think people are waiting for somebody to drop out of the sky as a popular frontrunner so we can then say oh yeah that's the guy well I know I'm a handicapped person you know I'm a gamma gambler and I could talk to you about uh gambling and I could probably tell you four and I would bet with you at eleven to one right now that Teddy Kennedy's gonna agree with you oh really yeah well no that's just it I look at it as a gambler yeah and I'm not sure exactly why I see that but it was okay with Kennedy who beat four Prince's here the main man Biden got blown totally out of the race for some another cheap scramble with some under I get interrupt your work we're out of time that upset you always yeah what will you come back David will be back books [Music] [Music] thank you thank you very much family affair nicely done featuring I have an mo on you don't even celebrate Thanksgiving because in Canada its it comes it's like in June isn't it was earlier in Canada because of course the harvests is earlier in there right cool so do you celebrate to Thanksgiving do you celebrate only once it's earlier in the season that's in October but I mean since you are Canadian but living in this country new celebrate celebrate yes and I have two Thanksgiving dinners every year interesting our next guest has been called the most accurate and least factual reporter working today his latest book right here is entitled generation of swine tales of shame and degradation in the 80s ladies and gentlemen please welcome back Hunter Thompson nice to see you come on over thank you very much for being here how you been oh thank you very much everybody yeah where do you make you your home these days so same please have it I get it for last 20 years running Emerson where's that what do you Greek I invited you out there I was terribly worried yeah and you were born in that area no I'm Kentucky Kentucky originally where you from Indiana originally yeah and what is your life like there is Colorado you said peaceful you're up in the mountains what kind of a day do you have to pick any day for example do you spend you get up early and write and stuff or what yeah I'm regularly in the morning how we're going along yeah yeah then I got the grass you know got chop wood mhm what do you do for recreation there at work give her a hike up into the mountains oh yeah I'll do that for I like to kill and when you say kill you're talking about what neighbors what we don't have over Judy people do know what you're using when you say you like to kill right oh yeah no I'm teasing you know I used to like to kill when I realized that I was running you know you like hundred well I'll do it good yeah but I know that when you pretend I quit because I realized I was out hunting for meat I was gonna go like to kill yeah have you talked to anyone about this stuff huh but I I know I have to yeah I found it interesting that in traveling here to be on the show you brought with you on the airplane a rifle is that correct was a letter to you but they wouldn't let me do it yeah but I found it interesting that you could travel with a weapon on an airplane David I've told you repeatedly if you're innocent you can do anything yeah I am innocent and why shouldn't it family yeah but explain the procedure to me because it's all you do if you do it sign the red tag I was just broke the damn gun haha I would they prevailed on me not to bring it to the beautiful park by whether we like this and collector's item no it's a working piece of did we are killing machine yeah those none guns are killing between that I don't have the either my good but uh it's comforting to know that you can keep enough of that now let's talk about the who we think maybe the the new President of the United States David I heard you earlier and you think it's gonna be uh or was George Bush you know it's yeah before but you know it's uh it went right down to the wires and they're still having trouble counting the votes and so but let's see if it was George Bush how would you feel let's just say if it was if it is now George Bush how would you feel about this well but they've done this thing here is I won't be in the country I have for two years I beat him like my friend Sims look at said I read it a stepchild and you know I was right Donnie Bush was the UH bush so like which is hard to get your hands up well he's not really there and uh I beat him and I uh things about him he actually said threatening things about him did working well the Secret Service give him something that I didn't really know I spent let's go back to that the Secret Service came to you and said what well I was in Milwaukee uh you know how my religious beliefs we've discussed this before I have a morality religious knio knio religious like to talk I'm speaking in a Catholic University of a Wolfie and I Marquette and I said these gentlemen who were after me for uh talk about politics and guilt Catholic is every much of ego you telling you know but I'm certainly into guilt if it if it'll help the story I'm not I'm not that's what that's the whole point yeah and I'm into justice and I I said that he's uh what are you doing I don't know man I said when these people when talk about politics and guilt let me tell you something we get a shortcut right that uh George Bush is the guiltiest man in politics therefore we have our subjects crossed and uh is it just what I said you know I like gentlemen you're smart can mean smart and mean you like the Jesuits characterized as being smart I don't like to talk to argue with business I see although excuse me I've just put up here yeah we get a get a large conclusion I'd like to have nothing better than talking to a good mean just look okay anyway this is the story about how the Secret Service yeah okay uh there's a real story know oh you don't hear too many of those no well I had a pretty good one earlier about a raccoon that no one seemed to enjoy but that's cool yeah is it weird animal Oh tell me about it have you ever we ever had one I'm looking I'm gonna give me a little jumpy hunter it's good for you good okay you're coming me down we have to we have to move along here now so finish the story we're doing okay and I said to him all right uh let me tell you something it's a theorem as it worked and if you people did go to those fellows of them erosion seriously you would uh George Bush this ago Jesus man a politician she would have to come up here on the stage with me and stomp him to death I see well that's true wouldn't you say that I mean if it if the minutes only guilty and if they believe it so now I go in school the Secret Service has been took a booth the vice president to death on stage we take a vote here no we don't take any votes but so what did you get me know what will the Secret Service say they came to you they won't be a journal the next day when a front page etheline saying that the freeze guns will alter advocates stumping for Vice President to do that did not I didn't do that huh I just said if you believe you know if you don't talk about yo when talking about religion I'm just a hillbilly I don't know too much about my religion but we share one thing in common which is the sense of justice I see and they but the Secret Service then Canova came to me I was going to worser than the cover of the iran-contra hearings and I kept hearing I kept getting calls those egos rivers right and I've had to return one and I said well hey this whatever is what do you probably you have is it gonna affect my dress with a told the wasn't no I don't think wanting to stomp the vice president today however you would never print which never thought the vice-president okay wait you know I'm telling you we're we're out of time I'm sorry hey I know we want to want to hear more about this killing machine no I know but we have to the gentleman the musician is something you live it up sorry okay no well I think it's my fault we've wasted a lot of time it was like you were a little late sure anyway the book is a generation of swine 100's Thompson I hope it does real well for it nice to see you again Happy Thanksgiving [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] thank you welcome back to the show coming up in the next half hour Hunter Thompson is here also Marjorie gross now this matter concerns tomorrow night's program this is interesting NBC sportscaster Marv Albert comedian Howie Mandel a visit to the Hall of Presidents and Grace Jones will be here tomorrow Grace Jones will be here tomorrow should be here ah yeah my next guest is one of the most controversial writers in America and the inventor of gonzo journalism were delighted that he could be with us tonight welcome please dr. Hunter Thompson nice to see you how are you oh I am terrible what's the matter you don't I've been going to court every morning for two weeks at seven o'clock yeah and uh for me to go anywhere at seven o'clock is real hard so I had to stay up all night yeah date up all night for two weeks that makes sure you don't sleep at all that's about $188 yeah so I want to prove something you know yeah what how much you're what but you feel like you're now in the middle of a mission and you will have proven something I probably will have yeah he's over all right why I came here but yeah all right something didn't I couldn't talk this morning at all my voice was gone but I called to say I can't make it I couldn't say anything uh-huh originally you thought you called me you called here to cancel yeah microphone on or something a sandbag tripper you have a microphone and I don't that's right I'm I'm the only one in the building with a mic on nobody hears anything because Chicago Chicago okay now when you done miked it all right no no really you've taken under this thing okay you're hearing every word you say paranoia yeah so your doctor under Thompson can I ask you what that what these that we allow that we agreed not to discuss these you don't want to discuss the taça discuss your childhood and you know your teeth and stuff like that but really we're not into a an academic credential thing well no I didn't I just assumed that if mine sits on the use of term doctor yeah at certain times and by my doctor chemotherapy or the journalism and of I [Laughter] would guess that let me ask you about you conversely they had many doctorates it's like being rich yeah well no I mean if you went to school and early you shouldn't be embarrassed by alive it's I've worked all my life for these things yeah wellthen doctorates uh-huh why shouldn't I be a little sensitive about you explain I mean something sleazy you know TV I know I know and you just that's what we're doing here trying to have a little fun now tell me about the goings on in Palm Beach let's talk about something else for a second here what you brought here you brought is this a gift hunter or is this innocence yeah that's a good uh huh that's a bomb uh-huh we have here two or three thousand the Firecracker huh well no one's enough that money really see it's a it's a light thing earlier I brought it out to I said it all no you're not gonna be setting these off in here would you well you know no well just maybe like do the same thing maybe later at the buffet upstairs well we'll set those well don't put it back over here no no you get it to get it close to that cigarette that would happen don't worry just go ahead put it down in front of it tell me about you you your correspondence with the American Express company about what did you have in mind for those folks I got offended frankly that the an American Express was offering the the gold card to the rebel and what I considered a fairly a a loose month at sort of greedy gonna way and you have a gold card no I no see that's what I mean that's the in a way that considered the greater the gold car you do you have one yeah yeah now what is that what is that supposed to represent one of those what does that mean don't think I can go anywhere I want and get money uh-huh yeah I can well and have their limits of this and they're certain that dark aspects of that that contract but basically if I like I left a red Chrysler convertible it's all over Palm Beach and hotels and beach houses I can just you know it's like the card I have it I didn't have to register in hotel just wave the card they call me doctor to call you whatever you want really yeah but I didn't feel like she offered to do the NASA's yeah this is the Palm Beach I've been trying to look I've been educating myself to think like the Palm Beach life and I'm somewhat surprised and surprising life stances in this I've been taking a drive me up and down the beach in a red Chrysler convertible with lesbians at night naked people in the drugs this is the power of the gold guard what you have to do but I thought that I found beat I mean the American Express image what I was kind of sullied by the idea that anyone could wander around like this rent convertible by lesbians all that trumpets with a bull card so I wrote him a letter saying that look I think I've a better idea and look that is if I should do your heads from now on for the gold card so i Greenberg's i don't want any part of it i put it down in a very forceful and I think persuasive style and it was a rejected hmm leather swine that I wrote with Johnson shop somewhere so it would be an effective campaign I think you or the America very best card yeah yeah yeah let's put this yes I'm sure you have people here who can work on it yo sure we do we have a full staff of folks who are letting to get you commercial work that's all they do work in the courthouses and stuff yeah I'm a reporter yeah let me now speaking of reporters is it true that you one time were a a bolding reporter for a porter Rican newspaper well that's a Lobo the truth though it is true yeah how does how does one get that position well I was writing a novel at the time about San Juan and I decided that no actually we reverse it I went to San Juan I decided write a novel about it and what I wanted to do was work on this new english-language papers in one store and I presented my credentials and got immediately just horrible who rejected all my several president were hard so what the editor a letter saying uh you're a swine a fool and and a duel and pretty much the same letter you wrote to the American Express guy no I said it was worse and I said when I find somebody to come down here and get you a fizz and lo and behold and the like then way back in the personals ad you know Cullen's the New York Times on a Sunday was a like a three glein ad that said a famous international puerto rican sports magazine seeks a chic editor you know something like that well I call it and it was some swine really a good sort of comes out to me who was starting a what he called the Sports Illustrated of the Caribbean and sounded real good plus it gave me a kind of vengeance I like to hear I just totally scores to the best of my ability me live us this life you know you want to settle scores yeah people will get sloppy to the one so I went down there to working this magazine which I really thought was gonna get slick it sports magazine and turn out to be a bowling sheet a horrible thing where I had a hang around bowling alleys at night and report the scores of the federal lien you know Harold's real estate sales and the pretenders how long did you is that fun for you knowing through the matsudo good as long as you got the vengeance yes yeah yeah it's still going on listen I I want to ask you if you can come back and see us again I'm sorry that we're running short on time I'd like to continue this discussion and there's no I don't think you don't think you'd be back well that saves us making phone calls tomorrow all right thank you very much under the present meeting [Music] what I am pleased at long last to have honor Thompson on this program welcome great to have you here to do this to write these letters as well as they are to keep them to make carbon there's two made two things one you had a sense of warning that you were going to be something and be somebody and this was your way yeah I think I had to be any of it since I had to heaven as a writer I think it opens up my head here because that was that kind of thing is another way yeah don't feel ugly was the Blessed ask me why were you why your writer he said because I couldn't be anything else see I tried cab driving putting on the railroad you know no I didn't even get a job I was evicted from a part Billy Java head please I live so eventually a person could be too I moved to Colorado I've only ended by the place because I couldn't move anymore just too much was like a pissant and yeah I'm getting kind of call in the letter some other had some diltiazem he didn't forward to this book yeah we're talking about his in waiting for you alright copy then you kept them and you kept them in that truck truck truck see ya oh boy why did you keep trying to think I guess because and uh heard of a break-in journalist at that time I was taught and I had since thought that what you want to do is keep copies of your story that your violin you know like this your passport for your next job and I guess I figured that what the hell I'm going to keep loving the stories I may as well keep the learners we can know more about the less but Hunter Thompson from these letters than anything that he has written outside of letters or anything he's done in his life you have every page of your life for any one letter in here they're well over 15 I know but I had to listen to these please for a year with the editors Doug Brinkley and my son and his wife parading these things in front of me I'd say well how about this one hundred calm down and then Lewis who is that and the right light memories and yeah I was like because your life in space as you went back and reviewed had to who in the correspondence yeah he's a real I've never he looked at these things is only came up for the basement like bones of a genie zelner writing was the only thing that you knew you could do that satisfied well I could get paid for ya and then when I learned about these different words I learned that you to work for the morning paper he's been worked late at night you can work at ten o'clock and you know get off the bed beggars home what you learned that I can't imagine going back I went to I do a absolute paper that's right on the air forth Jesus Christ I didn't know the difference totally everyone working at 7:00 in the morning and any last one time did you create a persona for that you thought would serve you that was you I'm afraid the in I created then you know crafter that made it not IP be too much credit nearly hillbilly uh the lazy person physically I had to stick with what I whatever it was hi this document now why use documented what you were well but by doing a logical things on keeping letters yeah I did ever since and it's clear in this look that I was gonna be a writer and if the reason was well I can't do anything else well so because you tried what and give you a job you know as a stockbroker come on use doors but I found myself landing up at 4:30 in the morning in San Francisco down on Howard Street with the winos you know literally and to be selected and I was lining up for the selection process so he picked out and those worthy to be allowed to deliver Safeway you know handle all around the neighborhood in every house allowed to be considered I was rejected why the hell did you people love you all forward helped forwarded in the possibility yes yeah and then was gonna work I could get a job never ever because I had been there long enough and the registered voters yeah oh I tried every conceivable thing the news it was winner every what writer had taught you the most so who have you learned the most from I think maybe the most important lesson I was trying to learn early was that since I wasn't desperate and this kind of you know they deliver the qualifications for anything else I kind of I was probably was that my fate didn't figure out him I can get away with it and what I learned from anyway mainly I think anyway the best wasn't for him I had pearls of some of his prose writing you know but what he taught me was that you can't want to be a writer anyway you can't be a writer and that was very important to the time it wasn't like I was trying some I was enjoy it when I wasn't playing around I had to be a writer and that's been else you know a choice you made a commitment a long time ago in thursday's was races to find out that maybe somebody got know he was and after that I began to look at him to his prose but it wasn't main lesson that we're looking at pros for no no he taught me that you can't be a writer and you said because you don't have to you know think he slings and arrows forever I'm started as Ellington know anyway we that is very important getting away with it yeah to be a writer I can tell that get away with yeah but there's this stories I heard the story a long time ago about you and and it's the the writers changed but the stories you poring over whoever it might be Hemingway of Faulkner or Shakespeare and this legendary story of you poring over and someone honor what the hell are you doing and you think I'm trying to get the rhythm all ever says I would tape it from them just do you you'd be surprised at the type somebody else's wine a ready to be exported I get what he do it feel like a different reason with him but if you take thought somebody's work even learned a lot about it basically his music they're like yeah and oh no some tightening up parts of what this anyway that drill bit easier just video these were writers that were very big in my life and the lives of people around me so yeah I wanted to learn from quite serious when you run talker like that you did right folks it's in here oh yeah and what did it come from he just wanted to connect and say send me some money money is part of the the sort of thinking the hubris of the sixties before the Vicki we have what okay well I mean either I connected previously with oh I would call Jim James rest of you like we have any Virginia yeah and the times where I thought attempted to give me his number and ask him why the Soviet Army chorus what did being wetter than suckers below there that was outrageous yeah until you get into Gaul Jake might fold over every three days but because of this book or because oh no you know they want to talk to you well they is the public unit but I think there's six things we're talking with like when I applied for a job and I was over the American Samoa are you this was a letter to something to Johnson you know well why not exactly what but and we're not afraid if something is he just is now I really believed that I was I was the best person you could probably make an argument I didn't know I was running Vietnam policy yeah to recommend please take my name off a list and that was hubris well but I think if it wasn't it what was it I mean it it was a row you Bruce are something else or I got a deficit well you believe that the authorities are really on your side yeah I don't remain I say one time very well it would Kennedy died Garrity get a belief that if you could get over the White House first you know over the fight to it and run crazily across the yard so I didn't give my service people they made it the white oh the II would the guy on the top ones up was really gonna be on your side through that porch well I was just writing me letters of this book I was just it was my way of reading through it I believe that lizard justice would get these lives well Larry O'Brien into them exactly general yeah specialist with me right right the jack Canyon State on and that's again we go in make sure the NBA right so well brighten every sense of humor but they don't when he wrote back I thought he was serious you know what haven't complied to charge up some white winner and soon yeah do you have any sense sounds like I'm your priest but I can't either I'll try there's all that talent there has it been used well or squandered even could I have even a higher and brighter I could have been higher and brighter just you know I read these letters read these letters and they're huge talent I would have to say I didn't know it's like a better place recently loquitor recess of loquitur yeah and I have I probably stole this Phyllis you can imagine how many collections that head Department of way with me on the idea over all right you know it's the final day of reckoning he says or she says hunger have you done everything and the best with what I gave you have you said I had black they're the ones were a bushel yeah probably Archie said I gave you this did you all brought away and what's your best evidence that you used it well well I'm on trial line to get in I got the keys and the boys was not going to have it either well I'll just tell you not just between the fingers and open our minds right here with that I am a lord man I rode man a road man for the Lords of Burma yeah the great hole yeah I know what happened to you and everyone else with me suppose we die it's a message around the Great Loop yeah and they come likely to be judged before the Lord and their lives visions already been made yeah and the one man I am a cog in the wheel I know that I have to go back around way too often frankly and unable go back around in the for that they deserve now you can come back as a three-legged dog in Bangladesh in a hurricane yes that was the judgment of the Great Hall but if they said Charlie I know what you do know and if the old Buddhist scheme of things karma takes a long time to hear you're like your son's gonna you go back around it had to be the slave and her son but no he clearly spent up stop maybe that your karma no you said you said in this to do two things that you wonder about one did all the people do the same thing did they keep their red letters do they have their letter did they write these letters right ain't you worried about any other thing you concerned about is where all those who helped you why didn't remember that I ain't that basically responded to a level of Correspondence you know letters I got for it good and sometimes better than the ones I said you know here's another challenge it didn't feel like at the time that was the way we were on the committee today with each other I don't know if he came into some strange cocoon in Louisville you know the other place no no something North Carolina like degenerate saying your tires if you get the rule yeah but Diane Sawyer it's either from Louisville or Lexington one of the two Kentucky stranger yeah you know the girl industry I mean enough most of the settlement in the country moved westward like great horizontal lines say I know most my ancestors here from Virginia and Virginia moved to Kentucky and then further yeah today you get the Carolinas very specifically from Tennessee then Arkansas all over the grand smog you go all the way to Mississippi right thanks in the North like Wyoming Colorado every different state because they were settle differently Germans settled in a horizontal line out to Wyoming and attended avians above them you know while people free blue Colorado let me read some of these letters because we're talking about him so much of that one I'm gonna just take a bite out of this one a sad day November 22nd 1963 Woody Creek I'm tired enough to sleep here in this chair but I have to be in town at 8:30 when Western you know ppens so what the hell besides I'm afraid to sleep for fear of what I might learn when I wake up there is no human being within 500 500 miles to whom I can communicate anything much less the fear and loathing that is on the F today's murder God knows I might go mad for lack of talk I have become like a psychotic think I want to kill because I can't talk I suppose you will say this is to William Kennedy the rotten murderer has no meaning murder the rotten murder has no meaning for a true writer of fiction and that the real artist in the little magazines are above such temple of things I wish I could agree but in fact I think that what happened today is far more meaningful than the entire contents of the little magazines for the past 20 years and the next 20 if we get that we now you know the era of the Train neither your children nor mine will ever be able to grasp what Gatsby was after no more of that you misunderstood it of course peeling back only the first and most obvious layer take your realism to the garbage dump or the little magazines there like a man who goes into a phone booth to pull his pod not an auto the killing has put me in a state of shock the rage is troubled I was not prepared at this time for the death of hope but here it is ignored at your peril I have written summon in that cheap bookstore Marxist that he had better tell his boys to buy bullets and forget the dialectic this is the end of reason the dirtiest hour in our time I mean to come down from the hills and enter the fray tomorrow a cable job request to the reporter failing that the observer beyond that God knows but it will have to be something from now until the 1964 election every man with ball should be on the firing line the boat will be the most critical in the history of man no matter what today is the end of an era no more fair play from now on it is dirty pool and judo in the clinches the Savage nuts have shattered the great myth of American decency they can count me in I feel ready for a dirty game I was read one for me you read one for me there's only one sake let what he wants no you take it there's open the item here's one to Charlie cool adventure that I used to read maybe I could use the book I give them daily over the hell yeah I know what a horrible desert there is no surgery for that exactly they're getting better at it retinol love your laser yeah all that stuff yeah you know I think one of the great things I can do for human waste is we didn't solve this problem my purchases damn glasses dangling all over the house or not to be able to read well I'll get a lot worse not to have any glasses they were they know what the hell they're people do in the thirteenth century but imagine being half blind and the middle of some war and we're gonna Virginia's car all right this is a letter to crawl those here so the researching the held Angels had an air at danger where 26 ladies 85 318 pronounces services hope dear charlie it's been a while there what's something maintain it's been a wild day here at 6:30 this morning I finally murdered the last Hells Angel out of my living room and went to bed justice and II was getting up to do her for our steps at the real estate office I'm doing a piece on motorcycle gangs for the nation no money the 20 inch thick before I before I let them into the house last night I explained that I didn't go much for fits writing so well but preferred to settle my beefs with a feral 12-gauge shotgun they seem to grasp this time's up and we get along funny Cindy my wife Penny's of stereo I baited that was a gallon of wine and a case of beer pour but in the end I think I got the makings of about five good story very real that's what property to write to you tonight I have done many more hours of research on this than any nation particle magazines at hundred dollars eat dessert and right now I'm wondering what to do with the rest of it well as you know I guess more time a Newsweek did pieces on this but it this week but mainly arms legs both despite the news we claimed that their man submerge himself in the action of a half thought sports games out of clinical has that part of old clips every funny and colorful series led by my old friend George Draper and my new friends Bernie German so here it says wait for him Jarvis both worked for The Prodigal drivers who appears as Preet I'm Bobo in those angels introduce Thompson to the budget and here's my question do you in going back over these and reading them for this book what did it tell you when you reread these what did you what did it tell you this sounds like more than two big receivers but actually lived in fear this is for a year and I couldn't say anything but he said that whatever they brought out of the files was below and I kept thinking why playing the he dances or LSB for a long time people told me that was far too violent that was pointless a feeling but I kept waiting for like all your letters a day for ten or more years I guess nobody would volunteer for that I don't think it's really a madman or silly I've had some kind of a role into the record yeah I didn't find out that I was really a monster yeah I have betrayed my friends of you and walk on their heads and with a liar wasn't about money so I don't know the justice feel like the great wheel comes around and I miss getting paid for my work that was not paid so my work and no wonder yeah I was writing ten pages the dance ending none of them to people all in the world okay they justifying yeah picture I'm not sure what I was thinking I mean everybody oh you know sometimes I write for day almost similar today a computer how do you write today computer no I still work on the word of the new IBM Selectric yeah I didn't even knew they had IBM Selectric now holy war one heaven set up yeah right one for doing it is like a computer yeah no more those we owe them well but no I use a computer one I know some other ones talk about one is mainstream press in America today your indictment is nice all right that's why I think they've I don't blame them necessarily but accepted the the truly heinous or after they kill equipment administration we did things Hardy look like some kind of edgy angel I think the president except for that is sort of normal ninety people and I guess in something said I have because I might have their on the wrapper despite the traces and this is to everyone to judge the 60s know well you say you have more I mean you you judge Nixon higher than Clinton them your camp for Clinton is wrong and we think we had rid of to President Johnson and next year gives be go order elected the objector these that that was a pretty active serious the really good deal a part of politics you know if you didn't really feel with the viscerally or end of mind you would get beaten a few times forget your may that your guys I really can't wait to get there I think I'm pulling a drift I think everybody should be in the military civilizing the military that's what we get everything done wrong we still be plenty if it hadn't been for the the draft and the people who've got Cranston Yeah right we may be in a war know we might not know it may be towards me wonder enough yes you've wanted but never recruited from the unemployable for the ranks of those and one that recruited from campuses on the country for a limited boys from the campus didn't want to go a lot of way yeah I believe that some of their lives of you the military the point that we were able to flee they saw the in terms of this president the mainstream press is not yeah I guess you better get after these whitewater or your the war really they putting that bed it's kind of hard I don't see that conflict right with 21 you voted for min 92 yes I did I wanted to be George Bush I totally what he's worried my Dorothy and I was input and I would the mother for a dull black I didn't look what either but what do you do whatever wealth danger right every inaudible vote but yeah in the late sixties can't be honorable boats Volvo then you know then it's nice but it helps to really change me a couple of things before we go gonzo journalism came when you what went to cover the Kentucky Derby and I think it was a the whatever description were good try we use them call whatever I did was not in the book so I think I just take that gonzo journalism they came from the letter when you just set off your notes with this a great story yeah and that's not me ended up definitely discovered the would have done the faxes you yeah then it was the direct Stella copiers yeah a horrible thing that slopes and put all a page from this from here to there was this hope a minute and then to the printer if you really does what is there one letter in your collection that you prize the most that you have received gradually short of but there are some correspondences here clearly Tom Wolfe Kuralt we didn't get there the love whether that's a yeah you know I couldn't yeah they've been an incredible pleasure enough and they they're exempted to go through this first one he kept the skill sharp didn't you the proud highway Hunter s Thompson saga of a desperate Southern gentleman [Music] by Doug Brinkley forward by the famous William J Kennedy thank you my thanks to Hunter Thompson up next Isabella Rossellini as well as this newly released novel entitled The Rum Diary here's the one and only dr. hunter s Thompson doctor [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] by all means make yourself at home hey Ben I'll move us away from you know it's been a long time since I've seen you let me refresh my memory doctor your doctor is what what if what area what discipline are you a doctor in of doc I said last time it was divinity oh you know therapy huh and journalism where did you go to study yet where did you get your divinity where it was like we've been through this is that old story really yeah where did you go to Yale were you a seminary I go to the Yale Divinity School where did you go under David I'm not gonna discuss these you'd rather move on yeah okay you went to bold State is that it I went to Ball State not bolster hey you been yeah you're 60 years old now is that is that right yeah it seems weird I thought you were good to it you know I'm really uh alone yeah does this mean anything to you turning 60 is it no I think yeah the guys lost have kind of some dark sense of humor keep him around this one yeah are you in good health you feeling all right yeah I noticed she's still smoking and obviously you're still in for you know our lifelong addict and elderly dope fiend yeah you still you still use the Controlled Substances only when there are prescribed and necessary yeah yeah how often might that occur you know help us set up an on situation that you know actually there was something before three days in a row you feeling okay though oh yeah you have a physical when's the last time you had a physical OS week Oh how'd it turn out Oh fine how's the cholesterol fine oh I have a very low cholesterol really yeah well what is your weight about where you'd like it well not quite you know I'd like to be whipped them yeah yeah buddy what do you weigh really I say what do you weigh about to turn 90 really you weigh nearly 300 pounds yeah carry it - two points there buddy fat super well let's get on to other things how do what is a typical day like for you I think still I have a home in Colorado don't you yeah yeah what do you out there what kind of things going on for you mainly we work David yeah your writing is that you're working here you serve an Amber writer I've been a writer all my life and uh how many words do you write a day when you're working on a book it sound like one of the Thomas Mun or anyway kind of regular producers ooh Thomas mine used to get up in the morning and put on a white shirt like yours and a blue jacket black jacket sit on the typewriter anyway we get up at five in the morning that's right that's right no I don't do you know a binge writer I only I only know I only know one thing about Hemingway used to write 400 words a day yeah and then he just couldn't always at wickham laughs you just did open the gin at around 11 or 12 and start shooting at cats d'hubert says I wait until I get really cranked up and shooting I guess until I start reading anyway was a very common discipline writer and let's talk about your buddy a Bill Clinton how's that going what do you think of that sly buddy yeah that's young winters buddy man that says that's a rock and roll president he's got himself although he's gonna go it's clean now he's I mean this whole thing he's weathered the storm already please please don't give me that this this sleazy treacherous animal as he may weather the storm himself but we're not going to if this keeps up isn't gonna leave a mark on the office [Applause] were you aroused the the rum diaries is your first miss your first attempt at fiction is that what it was when you were like 22 years old yeah I was like the first novel when I was I started in Puerto Rico hmm is it any good because often Oh first first first novel often is not you know in a nascent girl you try going back 40 years ago and pick up a manuscript that you wrote you know and people know you know the stories there yeah and somebody says well it's going to be published and I was I've always been thinking well after I'm dead all men are different doesn't matter but I had to confront that myself and the work yeah one of the hardest things I've ever done why wasn't it published originally it was no good yeah he told me though it's very good but it's very good now yeah yeah well that's what that's what work goes all right it's the the long-lost novel Hunter s Thompson The Rum Diary doctor pleasure to see you thank you for being here [Applause] pains the world with a novel he began the novel called The Rum Diary in 1959 as a 22 year old journalist now 40 years late has been resurrected it is a story of a group of hard drinking hard living reporters living in San Juan something that he knows a little bit about I'm pleased to have him back at this table my friend dr. Thompson welcome back and I think it is entirely appropriate surgery i deceived yeah did you bring me in the grand tradition is everything from where did you steal this I don't want to take my bouquet receiving of it the humor of Wade might have come from this time I didn't steal them from me you know yeah thank you sir yeah yeah yeah yeah but you know what is the thought behind it event makes a real difference yeah like I kept the other part so I have a gigantic I'm gonna put those right there so I can take them all right put them in a place of honor yeah all right so let let's say an hour make use of this time you started this 19 what 55 more like 50 59 yeah so so some might ask Yeah right like 40 years oh I was a novice then you know I went well I was on the road yeah like you could do it 8:22 yeah felt and I went to said one used to do the noble jobs you know like we've done all of us on the soldier circuit we're talking about I was writing a book and Bill Kennedy the great yeah yeah yeah eminent novelist was then the managing editor of his own one store Hey he was a journalist I was a novelist yeah I refused to hear me call this one he called us why yeah yeah fool yeah be thick and we go way back but uh it kind of helped me it was a good time but one of those there when you there's a kind of confluence of talents and people it's not off with you you know try to get a job on a newspaper and find Trinity struggling along as a managing editor you know he guides you know where these drunken Swedes we can't get any police reporters maybe the real it was a real thing and it started writing at then and I gave it up did you give it up because he told you you ought to publish it after you die post timelessly I gave it up because it felts about seven times because what develops about seven times I got the standard list of rejections live yeah right yeah I came back from South America and I got into the politics of the sixties and seventies it was a full-time job and yeah I became the journalist and Kennedy became the novelist this is a very eerie better job but you you very much wanted to be a novelist at that time I mean that was the drive yeah yeah I thought anybody got give me a writer was a novelist I brought something over here for and it was a fun read thing yeah Joseph Conrad thing oh we can't do that now so so you you it's taken so long to do it because well I wrote you've been writing all those letters did you were keeping all of those copies I did that before yeah break loose job sorts of letters yeah I have to live a bit but I this I've been talking about this it's all these you know books about her stops in France right everybody said well I can't seem to find the rub Harry yeah I remember and I uh I thought I've had a little time with this it's kind of old medic notion you know that money and I was faced with the idea with a fact I'm having to dig up my 40 year old you know story you can't change it and confronting it like ye gods this is me this is the world I lived in so I got purged it as a rigger it's a good story it's a it's what's the story what I call a vagrant journalist yes they're still all over the world wherever the english-language newspapers you know you people have travel from the Bangkok poster always there's always an english-language newspaper in some right there wasn't because Locke has done no here's a margarita villain that's like it's done well speaking of Margaritaville here's what Buffett says oh yeah The Rum Diary shows a side of human nature that is ugly and wrong but it is a world that Hunter Thompson knows in the nerves of his neck this is a brilliant tribal study and a bone and throat of all decent people that from the kid from Margaritaville yeah well Artie Buffett those that world all right but let me just say well yeah he does he does let me stay with it here's what we've been talking about William Kennedy you know the Pulitzer Prize winning author of Ironweed the tools Hunter Thompson would use in the years ahead bizarre wit mockery without end redundant excess supreme self-confidence the narrative of the wounded meritorious ego and the idiopathic anger of the righteous outlaw I would we're all there in his precocious imagination in San Juan there too were the beginnings of his future as a masterful American prose stylist I said that that way so it could just ring in your ears yeah masterful American prose stylist yeah that's I I better that that's that you really do I mean deep inside of you I mean those of us who it is this sense of how much the word despite everything despite everything what most meaning is most meaningful to you is prose stylists is the written word like the music and the music freak so I yeah I go don't leave my rhythms and I went to Conrad the influences that I were I was under the time which is very hard for 22 year old when rylann from the preface to the the vinegar the narcissus if you ever read that book no whole bit it's a it it maybe it's a final statement on write the writing of prose in America and in the world what's the title it's just the preface to the of the nurses unread great story and he says uh any work that aspires to the condition of art was carry its justification in every life Wow art is long vacation art is long and life is short as he says is very far off I tried to just do that at the age of 22 will you think god damn it I had heard teachers and Kennedy horses worthless at unread is the most merciless alone features Conrad gives no ground that sets a high bar they really they bought the highest more no and I mean I've always reminded when you really get into it you know where the bars are and who the Japanese you know champions or yeah and I haven't gotten to Conrad yeah he's a very solemn man you know he didn't laugh much but this was a great waiter who the champions for you as novelist in America well when I was growing up yeah that was I'm not sure how Hydra to do this but I got into the influence when I lived here in New York yeah I went to Columbia and took poison the new school I fell in under bad influences but it was like it was garcia lorca Fitzgerald anyway of course Faulkner I'd take no pride in this question but Paul campus you know really I didn't know since I was doing it right there that was very careful not to make any one character me but it's not your sensibilities it's not well my sensibilities really inform all the characters but I tried to split myself up I tried to do what this girl did with with Gatsby in the using the Nick Carraway character and the Gatsby the Jimmy gets you both the same people what I was looking you know for about side right and I don't I'm with it a lot of things look very simple but you try to do them yeah it's I get quintuple flip off of no high board and yes I was really both of those characters and uh the whole thing is it's very real I'm not sure where I find myself sometimes in Heyman sometimes and Kemp right what's the relation between foot shaming and his girlfriend oh that's one of these uh young love things you know you fall in love at Party of New York and they will drop and put a Rico yeah we have a beach house you know yeah little girl they Chennault your ex-wife well not really look not any I tried to inform the situation informed by everything you did yeah yeah you know how much I like you and so having said that no come on okay why is it that this is the I mean here's a guy you with your dedication to prose why is this this the first novel you have written when you wanted to be a novelist and don't tell me the answer is because you've been doing all these other things I mean is the answer that you sort of you know he was not rewarding well I didn't get paid for it you know and that what I saw you love Conrad this much and then you still can't say that that art is not its own reward have you been living right where have you been living at yeah I know I have a yeah it's like no no it's not for a writer professional writer yeah I think abou T's in it if it's not published yeah it's not there I didn't do it I know it's it's it's for the the process and the other part is a you must have fuel oh and you will never expense money all things are possible okay so what's the answer they nobody paid you enough money to write a novel or are you you know you had to go off and do things that you could make money so you didn't have time I mean these are rather flimsy excuses aren't they robbery's over compared to Conrad I'm you know I just know repaired to your potential floozy potential this is you know this is about 35 years too late charlie fewer journalists now what have you and had a choice between here you're in an assignment you have to write a book about the Hells Angels right and yours dirty or a novel long he's been rejected seven times my seven your best friend Judy told you well really that sucks yeah right and then suddenly that might comes along with an offer to walk with hails there's a war on yeah you know and then there was a in the sixties it was a war right and I was paid and all these lenses I needed to go everywhere oh yeah on the front it really was like a war and I didn't another time you know to work okay then why now why do you have the time now I had to make to it ah sir you know is this not self contradictory no no we had to make time you got a made time in the eighty no but I could have had well the book was gonna go be published oh I see I had to finish I was prepared to like anything you know what let him go Jenny after I did yeah but I'm really glad I didn't do that did you think this was gonna be the great American novel when you were writing it I had that hubris I guess you know but if you repo tarika in the hole yeah yeah yeah and since it was gonna be yeah in that sense about everything I was doing well it's just what do you think of the movie about you that's funny Johnny Depp ask me that question I say on the telephone by the way I like him along other - man yeah yeah he's gonna do so he's gonna work in this we're gonna make a movie of this one it's the melancholy book this is a no he's good go play it'll play doctor T - huh look I call him there's this room for the movement here this is this isn't the rigid kind of a interior monologue yeah the cell that the biggest book was like you know what what does that mean is what you're thinking is that what's going on nobody thinks much here you know they do know it's not a lot of thinking it's like how did you answer Johnny Depp's question what do you think of the movie oh I like that really is it experience the hell you have to you have to go through the fire and I would have maybe done it differently but I'm not a movie Parker I uh yeah I'm look I'm good at books so I liked it yeah but I wouldn't know I would recommend that I wouldn't have my you know my children to see it every night since that book was structured it's not gonna really be edified you know there's no way to make that the hero story yeah what people of all kinds of for no reasons and different Heritage's and criminal backgrounds go into a stub ridden place like Las Vegas and behave works to me the people are viewing yeah so that's not it that's not one of those uplifting books but I that was a beautiful work of work yeah did I read the way that your British publisher asked you not to come over and promote it don't then right they've been doing to get me over there oh they are so that's not true surely I just don't you mentioned that I'm sorry but everyone like this this is a great table there's one of those things like it's a wall you get hit yeah exactly I don't lose to you can look more likely lose your hand than you are I hit a wall last night you have to know the difference you know living this way hey I got him pop though oh wait woman look just the same was there it was stone country so why were you doing it what what what precipitate about having everyone is having fun yeah I've been reading this remedies book about I believe your anything on Muhammad Ali yeah yeah that's a great book everyone's I mention him here you like boxing I liked it when holly was there yeah the Bucks are the real thing yeah I don't know oh there's no one to like now like wrestling I believe that uh all of this away hey barks again wrestler about to it kind of word oh god really oh I hope not oh yeah well it mean no words what they doing is it promoting all these older guys who it's all about show and not about skill yeah but all these thugs being thrown out of the NFL and you know people who slit you know roommates throats in college and right still run for a thousand yards I think they're all gonna be in some kind of weird wrestling league that's gonna happen but you know maybe two years yeah baby somebody will pick it up yeah you think they're mm you're gonna see bill and Monica in Paris together what do you think about Bill and money and what do you think the president you admire no no I did endorse him you know you know war was know I think he's uh never destroyed the standard for what fund in politics for good people I think once I said that Nixon was great was he but the best people into politics and Clinton is going to be famous for driving all but the worst ones out and I think that's what's happening you know the this is a democracy if you don't participate somebody else is going to for you and that's what's happening here lesson for every ten voters or they go to the polls and we have this the subsequent mess where it's all left in the hands of Nazis like the star and I believe well fascist yeah mr. Jesse Helms these people should all be on whether heels like you Cellini and maybe click along with them that's my hope we don't go that far Oh what the hell it is uh you know the decadence the last 10 years of the century weird things whatever where do you think you'll be when that we leave the clock ticks forward for the year 2000 that's a tricky one I don't really expect a bigger but you know I have come on you don't expect to be here we're talking about a year off Charlie I go every time I get an airplane every workday with these people temporal life is I don't have my tools you know yeah it really is it's a think about that whenever you get on a plane this thing could could be over here in a minute yeah yeah oh and what's gonna be your last thought well I know I have to go back around and I like get little rest between trips you know I have a road man really for the for the Lords of karma we've been through this I guess that's all right let me let me say one more thing cuz I got to get out of here the next novel polo is my life hot dog person that was me know where there's innocent stuff yeah what's Paulo is my life oh how I got how I joined the the polo crowd by accident yeah many situations where I remember that's what we the title comes from it it sounded to this woman that I'd developed a bond it's Fort Hood for me a bolo person and I would say well you know if you know violet husbands and cops all over me Jamie and I said what just go to Australia get on the train across Australia and deep that you don't understand poni was my life I can't run away with you who would take care of my ponies [Laughter] with her priorities right all right ona Thompson this is the long-lost novel The Rum Diary thank you my friend for coming we'll see always a pleasure my own hey what are you doing later on you uh we're over in Doug Brinkley is reading tonight yeah the art club yeah couldn't see at Bradley a convocation of all of these well has a little fun yeah yeah where's the girl I don't know what you're if you're wandering around let me say goodbye to this audience thank you very much for joining us on arrest Thompson the rum dari thank you participation where each person on the panel is going to just say a few comments general comments either we're at their seat or at the podium whichever they're more comfortable with it's a little crowded there we want to try to bring the audience into a discussion of Vietnam and the 72 campaign they're both interchangeable in many ways so instead of doing the large warm-ups air or introductions here I'll make them very brief and I think well it might be the best Steve do you want to clubs this is talk there yeah what he's just gonna make a few comments on his paper and then we'll just very briefly then we'll start going through each panelist to make a couple remarks thanks a lot Doug and it's certainly an honor for me to be associated with this symposium and in particular this distinguished panel certainly I've considered staying up here all day just to receive the globe from them but I I promise you I will be very brief amid the aftermath of the 1968 election George McGovern chaired the Commission on party structure and delegate selection a name the press simplified to the McGovern Commission ultimately its members developed a series of guidelines designed to increase the number of presidential primaries and to make delegates to future conventions more responsive than in the past to rank-and-file democrats the commission also served as a catalyst for the birth of a new brand politics in the party the relatively successful efforts to reform the party not only vaulted the Commission recommendations into party law but also diluted the traditional influence of labor and local party bosses in favor of more progressive activists Democrats you all know the the story of the 72 campaign so I won't go over that but suffice it to say that the in general the regard for the campaign has remained unchanged since 1972 as New York Times put it McGovern ran a gallant campaign and showed his confidence in the rightness of his vision of America but the editorial acknowledged that because of his political political base being too narrow the social outlook allegedly too radical McGovern lost since then neoconservative analysts have come into the fray as well as subsequent presidential elections have seen the demise of a Democratic Party Ronald radish offered the newest of these of this interpretation and his title is in fact the book of his is called divided they felt that the demise of the Democratic Party it focuses on the political effects of the reform movement and he places the demise of the Democrats squarely on the shoulders of George McGovern and the reform commission he chaired I quote from him gearing the party to liberal constituency groups and activists rather than to traditional traditional Democratic electorate McGovern opened up the party to a course that would over the decades result in a steady loss of electoral support and she'll be all glad to know my papers a rejection of this interpretation I was expecting applause very good erroneously critics of the McGovern Commission depend upon the clarity of hindsight to distort the party's reaction to the events of 1968 by focusing on the Republican victories in the presidential elections of the 1970s and 80s and moving backward radish and other NATO conservatives have neglected the context in which the Democrats formed their political strategies in the late 1960s and early 70s instead of viewing the McGovern Commission as a reasonable response to Nixon's victory in 68 critics dismiss it as ideological folly they inferred that had the Democrats not reformed themselves the party would have chosen a stronger candidate in 1972 and perhaps defeated Nixon in turn they conclude that the party would have stemmed the tide and conservatism that's that surfaced in the nineteen ladies radishes work suffers in particular from his attempt to defend this Nook negative supposition in his book he not only ignored the strategy that the Democratic Party developed in the aftermath of the 68 election but he also overlooked evidence suggesting that the reform effort had rejuvenated the party by 1970 my paper examines the first two years of the McGovern Commission 1969 and 1970 during this period McGovern and other party leaders focused almost exclusively upon the results of the election of 1968 and followed a path that they believed would revitalize the Democratic Party those who served on the McGovern Commission and supported its work did so as a rational and well at well intentioned response to the election results indeed the McGovern Commission soon became the most dynamic entity within the party eventually the fervor of reform oriented groups the vast voting potential of a new generation of young voters and the results of the midterm elections of 1970 convinced party leaders including George McGovern other reform paths promised in some McGovern and the Democrats chose to reform the party for the most compelling reason a reformed party structure appeared to offer the best chance for future electoral success thank you very much [Applause] should have mentioned Steve Ward's at American University and he's working on a project on this so he I'm sorry you had to give him a truncated version of that but it'll be one of the papers in the book we have so many people here from 72 campaign and we'll just start with Bob strum on that end and it will go to UM 200 Thompson but let's begin with Bob strum I think we all know covered the campaign and is a leading journals hunter covered some version of the campaign I was lucky enough and fortunate enough to have senator McGovern and John holem and Frank mankiewicz let me join the campaign as a speechwriter it was one of the best experiences of my entire life I believe the campaign made three singular contributions first senator McGovern told the truth about two great issues Vietnam and Watergate I remember at one point in the fall we got some polling advice saying people weren't really buying this and we should talk maybe about some other things and I remember his reaction is then what am i running for it was a rare example I think of what one ought to do in politics which is actually stand for something one believes secondly he became and I think this is often forgotten a Tribune of issues that we're gonna move to the center of future debate and change in America I think first of tax reform and simplification which Time magazine at the time in the middle of the campaign wrote a piece saying this will be an issue for the next generation secondly of campaign reform and Public Integrity when he said this is the most corrupt administration in American history he got a lot of criticism it was true and he really advanced I think the whole cause of running different kinds of campaigns and thirdly at least for a lot of us in a time of disillusion and cynicism he gave an example of integrity and grace he wasn't desperate he didn't run around looking for something he could say that would please people at the moment and ultimately he was driven by principle and not polls and gimmicks I think there were three tragedies in the campaign first the nation never really saw Senator McGovern for the principled and sensible person he was that was partly our because the acceptance speech was given at 3:00 a.m. in the morning wasn't his fault he couldn't do anything about it at that point I mean we were trapped in a process that was very protracted secondly I think 72 with the exception of Hunter and bill greider and a few other people saw the rise of horse race reporting in the decline of substance coverage I remember at one point the senator gave a very serious and proposal on the environment big speech the only place that was covered was in the New York Times and I asked several reporters what happened and they said people don't wanna hear about that thirdly the Eagleton affair I think damaged us very greatly I do not myself think that we would have won without it but I think we would have won ten states or so and then I think George McGovern would have been viable far into the future as a presidential candidate I have two vivid memories of election night the first is personal it's John holem and sandy Berger and I sitting on the floor in the room with Senator McGovern and he looked down and smiled at us and said there they are the man who wrote the words that move the nation if in his in his concession speech he quoted at least Stevenson quoting Lincoln and looking back over 25 years and I find it hard to believe it's 25 years I'd paraphrase that quote if you look back at that campaign 25 years later it still hurts too much to laugh but it was way too glorious and too authentic to ever cry we wanted to have Bob go first because he may be having to take off in a few minutes that's why we were trying to get him to the beginning of it huh Humphrey rail well well well the our next speaker is dr. hunter s Thompson who I think you all are familiar with a political journalist fiction writer and also wrote of course the campaign trail 1972 is a new book coming out now called the proud highway which is a collection of his letters which will be on in June and I think general senator McGovern's called the book campaign trail 72 fear and loathing on the campaign trail the best book that emerged out of that out of that campaign so hunter thank you George for that all right all right hi I'm George it's a but you're talking about Sioux Falls South Dakota isn't right that night pleasure tonight yes that remains one of the truly heinous nights of my life and in memory it's like a deep you know scars it heals but it has nerve endings loosen it and you know it's just on time or we could hang it on something or when it rains yeah I was a nasty night but the I might have speaker I'm I'm just going to hello we can talk to people I was that prepared for a speech like Bob's happy hour here mega wits try to explain why and this happened and what everything's been criticized in the moments of other people speaking white all praises backs right to you I like my life well I don't blame George he's a decent man but hey guys I mean we have to look at the root of maybe perhaps wasn't the most decent delegate may be foolish campaigns ever and David takes it over by a dork up like Frank here that was another one of my major experiences that campaign just dealing with mankiewicz I didn't know he had water well but I understood but the principles that made him move and let me tell you that frankerz frankerz darker than almost anybody ever seen no I'll give you my moments here for a second so you can indecency this it's my good friend Frank mankiewicz Frank do you want to jump in on this I was right just every once in a while I'm gonna come hunter I guess he hasn't for a while but he used to come to Washington fairly regularly and stay with us I think I used to know when hunter was due to come to Washington because I would start to get his mail he would have it forwarded which was a sure sign that soon he would be on our doorstep but he hasn't done it lately I'm not sure why I I don't know what the senator McGovern said about hunters book fear and loathing on the campaign trail but I haven't quoted many times and I'll say it again it was the most accurate and least factual account of that camp you want to think about that just a few brief comments here I think there's a lot to maybe think less of the rules the new rules and the government Commission and the all the rest that I don't think it had that much of an impact I think George McGovern would have won the nomination under any set of rules because he had the issue no question that overwhelming majority of voters in what was it twenty-one Democratic primaries felt strongly about a Vietnam War as he did and I believe we the one as it was he won eleven primaries I think he probably would have won that many maybe a few more so I just I don't think the rules changes had that much impact and I don't think it's rather widely known the George McGovern didn't even favor all the rules changes I think if you go back and look and listen to some of the things he was saying he probably thought the Commission maybe went a little too far in some areas I think George would have liked to protect winner-take-all at least in California at least in 1972 and maybe a few other less drastic changes but as I say I don't think it mattered I've read something of what mr. ravish had to say I don't understand why anybody spends any time on him at all here's a guy along with others along with others in in the in the mid 90s early nineties who decided the Democratic Party was finished and wrote a book about it only to discover we've now won two presidential elections in a row and probably are set to win a third and maybe take back to Congress again or certainly it's far from a party that is what's the word that has had its demise people maybe they read the New York Times enough and they read about all the angry white males and decided the Democratic Party was indeed finished and then found out they were wrong so I think we can we can do without any further serious consideration of those guys and riders of course only exemplifies a large number I want to talk about one thing in the campaign that Bob's from talked about which was the the emergence of I think an entirely different view of campaigning and politics in the American media it was as it turns out the hinge between print coverage and television coverage by 1976 you have a purely television campaign 1968 I think it had been largely print 1972 you also found however an extraordinary overtaking of campaign coverage by what has been called I think accurately the the Teddy white syndrome Teddy was a marvelous political reporter who wrote a book in 1960 all the making of the president 1960 and then wrote one each four years after that and he really did revolutionize political coverage because he stayed with the campaigns and he wrote about things that nobody had written about before money how campaign contributions were developed endorsements how you got sheriffs to support the campaign what it meant in West Virginia to have certain people for you and against you how campaigns were conducted polling fundraising all the rest of a speech writing all the the techniques of campaigning and very little on the substance which he wasn't trying to get at but he was talking about how campaigns were conducted and how eventually they were won and lost and that book had a profound influence on everybody I think almost everyone who wrote about politics for a living and I think the American press the political press ever since have tried very hard without thinking about it to write that book every day and those are the issues that you hear about those are the issues that are endlessly chewed over I remember one memorable day and in Illinois senator McGovern I think I think it was sandy burger maybe it was Bob Shrum but in any event they had uncovered another terrible scandal in the Nixon administration which was that to put it fairly bluntly the administration sold out the wheat farmers in order to get the Soviet Union to shut up when we bombed the harbor and Haiphong that's about what it came down to and the result was that there was this terrible green scandal the administration had downplayed the amount of grain that the Soviet Union was going to want and finally when they wanted a great deal price was low they made a disadvantageous deal for the wheat farmers the Assistant Secretary of Agriculture wound up with a new apartment in New York and a job with one of the big grain companies it was a hell of a speech and he gave the speech and his first stop in downstate Illinois in wheat country and I remember going over with the reporters the key phrases in the speech to be sure they caught it all and got all the basic charges and when the speech was over senator McGovern entertain the press that was traveling with us and some of the ones who had come over for the speech and the first question on the second question of the third question and the fourth question all concerned this key Teddy white issue here you are in Illinois for your first visit in the campaign how come Mayor Daley wasn't here to greet you legitimate question to be sure but hardly the most important one that day at that time for that speech and I think that's that became fairly typical of the coverage in 1972 it has been fairly typical of the coverage ever since me only indirectly we'd like to get Morris Dees in on this Morris is one of the sponsors the Southern Poverty Law of this symposium which were grateful for and Morris was involved with fundraising the 72 campaign I thought he might want to say a few words about that thank you doing well I was I was rather glad to get the call in 1971 from Santa McGovern to come to Washington to help him get a letter out announcing his campaign I was glad because having sued George Wallace to integrate the all-white state troopers in 1970 I'd rather limited in my political career in my home state when I was I was driving to the airport to take the flight to Washington I was listening we have other conservative state in central grandparent one Hill and two high regard considered unpatriotic and I was listening to Merle Haggard song okie from Muskogee and I never will forget the line when you're putting down my car my country halls she walking on the fight inside of me so I arrived in Washington with some trepidation but I was met by Henry Kimmelman who I wish was here today in Miles Rubin and Stan Kaplan and others who helped me work on the fundraising that made this campaign possible turned McGovern certainly was supported by millions of individuals in this country and in direct mail it only took getting the letters to the right people with the help of Tom Collins who's a brilliant copywriter we wrote a letter announcing his campaign in 1970 to central government I think through some of his aides had written a little one-page letter and I said senator you know we've got to tell the whole story and he allowed me to read all of his speeches and we wrote a seven-page letter to mail out he didn't like the seven-page letter because some of his educated friends at Harvard said it wasn't gonna work he'd be the laughingstock so we mailed the seven-page letter anyway without him knowing it and I never will forget a touching instant in that campaign cuz I've been in the direct mail business all my life and I knew that long letters out for little short letters so Pat Donovan who's sitting here today called me on the phone and said come to Washington senator want to speak to you well some of those letters had come back to the Senate office we use the Senate letterhead and today you can't do that but we did then and those letters had come back to return bad addresses and central government parentage seen one of them and so he I said well I can't come I'm trying a case back home I'll come soon I wanted some results to hopefully come in well central MacGuffin called me and he may not remember this but I remember well he called me and said Morris it said in East began to read a letter he had gotten from a woman who had received and sent to him a ten thousand dollar check and that's what the federal government pays them out who lost their son in Vietnam and she had sent that cheque in an envelope to send to McGovern and said that he wanted him to have that check instead of her she didn't want that blood money and from the end it's always history since we collected twenty four million dollars from some six hundred thousand people and I think that was just a token though that was a token of the grassroots support and it wasn't just some young people we got letters from people sending their Social Security check saying that they had been around long enough to know that President Nixon and others was wrong and Senator McGovern was right I want to thank senator govern here today also when that campaign was over for letting the Southern Poverty Law Center have full access to those six hundred thousand people and he wrote the first letter out say asking them to support our organization and today we have three hundred and fifty thousand supporters Senator McGovern is one of our biggest ones thank you you know it was absolutely it was very interesting this morning when that one of the speakers pulled out a check but she had sent to Senator McGovern for $5.00 because most of those checks that Morris is talking about were in very small denominations $10 $20 $30 dear senator McGovern I don't have much money but I want to stop the war the little bank that we did business with across the street from the K Street headquarters which in itself was an adventure was getting around 5,000 10,000 checks a day and that the manager of the bank came across the street to see Gary Hardin and me and said these are essentially uncollected funds somebody is gonna have to sign for these uncollected funds who can stand good for them because we don't know whether they're good or not and you keep asking me for the money because you want to buy television time that day or radio time long story short I signed for them and out of 24 million dollars and out of tens of thousands of checks there were seven thousand dollars worth of bad checks there that which is the smallest percentage anybody ever heard of anywhere and there was a kind of innocence with that political contributions to the McGovern campaign and what George McGovern deserves great credit for since he is the last presidential candidate to do this was to spawn a group of people who refused to be cynics some of them are old like me and some of them are younger and a lot of them are in the Clinton administration the Bob's that's more than enough pardon then and we learned something well I think I think it's important to believe in what you're for and I detest the fact that there are so many young people today who are constantly telling me in Charlotte North Carolina that politics doesn't matter when in fact it matters to everybody and it's because the nature of the candidates and the compromise with television and the compromise with principled because otherwise you can't get to 400 and our contribution from the Liggett Meyers tobacco company and that bothers the hell out of me because all I give a damn about are my three grandchildren and I want them to have the better world that I thought we were working for that I worked for in many campaigns with Frank in Kennedy campaigns and in the McGovern campaign and I regret none of it I am grateful for all of it to hell with the Nixons of the world we're now and forever in or out of the grave and I'm not sure he won't come back I think when we open it up to the audience a little bit and you could direct your questions to the group or an individual anybody want to start off come on speak up somebody up there yes sir has to be some Nazi yes I'd like to address this to mr. mankiewicz we heard what my franco said when he called you he quoted you as as saying that you would not have that the the candidate senator McGovern would never have said to the lady on the Ozark Airlines plane of what he said I'm wondering if you might comment on the Ann Arbor Michigan incident Ann Arbor huh oh alright well I don't for a simple matter senator we're going to get a lot of heat those days I think it was in it was the site of the Jackson State Prison in in Michigan and he was working the fence and when he finished some reporter who had been following him for the pool I guess came to me and said well you know some kid was giving senator McGovern a hard time and the senator said to him listen buddy you can kiss my ass and the story began to get around as being at the pool report and as I recall I indicated not wisely but it was likely that since senator Kennedy was the Democratic minee that he would have said kiss my elephant and it did it did deflect the incident a little bit but but to me to me it made the senator McGovern team although all the better a candidate and I noticed you've got a KMA button on your lapel left over from that moment I think on balance we've probably benefited from it other questions is it shameful to pray yes denying responsibility from the campaign mr. Thompson in fear loathing 72 your rhetoric was actually much harsher against Hubert Humphrey than against Nixon I was wondering is that because Nixon was essentially unavailable or your expectations for the Democrats were so much greater I think it was because uh I was offended more by Humphreys treachery that it was by Nixon's pure evil like giant I still miss ya was a joyous and it was Humphreys treachery that find him Christ what the Nixon the treachery didn't work did it it was like a ingrained uh sort of the price of doing business but next one was assumed he was treacherous and fuel treacherous bad evil treacherous I remember George in California we went on that's a some big stage or theater somewhere and you would Humphrey were there together yeah just he he had hundreds um utterly treacherous thing like I'm a Jew too and I'll fight to the death for them you know there was against Jews I don't know there's some utter double-cross that yeah I remember you we were back into the caverns of some kind of a film studio and you crossed paths with uh without bring and California was a nasty went wasn't it that was a bastard yeah and at that point I remember your anger I forgotten exactly what the issue was I don't know what things the dollars they get that landed somewhere in the desert you you told me about companies money coming into the Frank is so inscrutable I remember real anger in there and then that so many commercials were somewhat of some show sunny news show or something that I can't believe we went band those days when those satellites yeah we actually had to deal with film moving it in he's what was for precious I remember George and thank you were never thought humor was a bad person until I had to deal with even you know in front and he was a treacherous bastard he had no more honor no more ethics or no more decency despite all of his bleeding or at that he put out he wrote an anti-communist goddamn wave and wherever he was he was a liberal in the word but I remember George and Hubert meeting there and that was that pure anger [Music] George was offended that I was and I think that I yeah but that time I got pretty nasty I'm gonna personalize the campaign and ivory offended me very question and it bent the gorge and I believe that's the that wasn't Sherrod instinct I mean I Senator McGovern how did you deal with Hunter Thompson in Rolling Stone on the campaign trail it was me trial was the book jacket in which it showed hunter and I sitting on an airplane and the inscription under the picture is senator George McGovern is showing is showing here imploring dr. Hunter Thompson to be his vice president I I don't know whether that sold books or not but I must say I run into that book even yet all over this country it's become a kind of a full piece of the 72 campaign I hope hunter has gotten this rich from it as it appears to me traveling around the country running into it everywhere I go the little boy is low story there's thing that book was written for Rolling Stones as they as the campaign progressed it wasn't something written from the hindsight of the campaign those chapters rolled off his typewriter as the campaign moved along and it was really rather remarkable the of course that he had is what was going to happen he forecast the results of the primary bed and described a lot of things in a in a rather I thought prophetic context though you may be a little bit startled by some of the language you've heard here today but with Hunter what-you-see-is-what-you-get this all I can say is that Frank described that book accurately I'd forgotten exactly how he worded it but I remember it was something to the effect this is the most inaccurate book about the campaign but the most truthful and there's a lot a lot of thought behind that statement I think it pretty well describes it and it's the reason I enjoyed traveling with him during the campaign there are other questions from the audience let me just say that George you were the most fun I ever had on any campaigns it's uh it was all like that I'd still be running around here with a notebook in my hand wondering what the people were talking about but that didn't they don't care anymore but uh I know better but you we cared then about that I care what you said and you said some wretched wretched disastrous things uh I remember one of the Barnes Hospital and James st. Louis driving out there and it's reading it legal to his medical records chattering about a thousand percent anyway oh he did care of that it was fun and I thank you for that for bringing me into a humdinger though that's the way of participating in politics and I'm into local politics well but that's way it shouldn't be even at 22 percent loss there's also out of that there's a book called boys on the bus which became out Tim Proust became a famous book from 72 campaign and I just wanted to ask Morris Dees what what it was like climate was like when you were on the road with some of these journalists and on the bus and kind of capturing so when you write when you write letters you can fax them in and you can have a lot of free time on a campaign after being on the back of the bus with a hundred for a while I had to go to al-anon and that was just that was just on the smoke because I didn't don't do stuff like that I grew up in the six pack generation it was fun to be on the back of the bus I got to know a lot of people Gary Hart was there occasionally and Shirley MacLaine and Warren Beatty and everybody and Frank dropped in occasionally and set us all straight it was it was a great experience for me and it obviously took a person who from Alabama and from a small cotton farm never been outside the state much until soon but Garvin called me for some reason he thought I ran a direct mail printing company because one of his age Yancy Martin a black guy who's from under me misunderstood what I did down and the government get this letter out and he just asked me to come do the printing that's when companies could give money and Dwayne Andrus another coin that pretty well but as it turned out it was a great opportunity for me to meet a lot of people dug and and to then go on to work and it's called as finance chairman and Senator Kennedy's than others so it was a great education I saw it as a crusade also because I was very very much opposed to the war in Vietnam and as much as I was any outrages that the Ku Klux Klan and in brutal Southern sheriffs and others had committed against blacks in the south I thought it was a civil rights moral outrage what our country was doing to the citizens of North and South Vietnam so it gave me a chance to be a part of a a worldwide crusade for human rights just curious if the panelists recall the the four that were on the campaign if they recall where they were when Watergate occurred Frank do you have any when the winter break and it comes in the hotel well I I think I was probably the first to know the the morning after the morning after the break-in I was in New York having breakfast with Larry O'Brien we were going over things like where the delegates were gonna be seated in the order of the roll call and important matters and agenda and in the middle of breakfast headwaiter brought over a phone and said mr. o'brien you got a call and Larry took the call and he's listening and he was talking to Iraq a pristine who was his deputy and a wonderful man and who had been calling him then from Washington and I'm listening to Larry and he's saying things like they did really how many of them and and they all had Spanish names that's odd but then he got to the crucial question he said well what did they take really well he said keep me posted IRA and he hangs up and he said doing well now that's fascinating he said there's somebody some people broke into our office last night the cops say they all have the Spanish names they didn't take anything we had a lot of typewriters a lot of TV sets they didn't take anything and as well okay you know now let's get serious about hotel rooms and how many we get and where and then Larry said something that that kind of stuck with me he said you know it's odd he said the cop said it looked as though they were prepared to stay there all weekend and I thought my first thought I must say was in Washington without air-conditioning well it's the water humidity but then I began to began to think about I thought that really is odd and of course a couple of days later it turned out that James McCord who was head of security for the Nixon campaign was one of the burglars the only one without a Spanish name and that sort of convinced us that the Nixon campaign at least was in on it and knowing Nixon's character over the years it seemed to us highly unlikely that he would not be involved himself and that's how it turned out but I I must say that first morning it didn't didn't strike me as an event that was going to shake the nation make one thing clear what a great high pleasures of I and my life was meeting Frank mankiewicz and thinking and being friends with him through this campaign I've never before since seeing that situation where I could drive out to Chevy Chase you know 2:00 in the morning hammer on the door and wake up Frank and demand to know what the real story was we got to be good friends that he was the best of that brief our things were good person to work with but maybe the best ever I hate to think but if you came oh this really good I do I'm waiting there's some questions from the audience yes but in the far back they're good stories are memorable quotes from Spiro Agnew regarding George McGovern I don't know about that Doug but central McGovern made a decision early on he probably doesn't even know he made and he may not have made it but Gary said he did dispel this fella named McCord in the White House also is a the Security Director for the committee to re-elect the president and the National Republican community RNC and being a southern trial lawyer when we heard that four days after break-in that this McCord fella was in a you know I said well I call Gary cuz McGovern you know had said and I think he was rather naive but if he became president I would be his attorney general now I was only twenty something years old but maybe that's how he lured me into the campaign so I took him serious though and so I said Walter Gary I said let's file a suit against the Republican Committee and the community really liked the president and all that because you know it's just no coincidences McCord guys their security director both of these groups and also got caught in that Watergate building so for five days after the break-in with central government approval we file a civil lawsuit they had Bennett Williams and Joe Califano signed their name to it and I drafted it and and filed it in federal district court here in Washington DC and I had lunch recently with John Ehrlichman because he was one of the fellows we serve we sued Ehrlichman Haldeman stands Mitchell we should held everybody and in community reelected president Hall I mean early Ben told me he said you know what because mr. Bennett Williams quickly took their depositions of everybody and it nailed them down to stories that screwed him later because they could never change their story say there had been no Watergate scandal at that point nothing had broken out and mr. Williams had the inside story from the Watergate and the deep throat and everybody else so he knew what to ask and he and he deposed all those officials and all of them had to take a story under oath about their relationship with everything and later as mr. Ehrlichman told me the other day at lunch he said he said you know that lawsuit really locked us into a position and that was a maybe had something to do with this mr. Nixon demise Ehrlichman incidentally Erlichman incidentally this August has a documentary he on Watergate he's been working on and it apparently has some new revelations about that unless that's just a ploy to get us to see it but no he's he's been working very hard on a documentary which will be coming out on the water gave this August yes the lawsuit was filed really I was thinking of money because creep had a lot of money and I was hoping to get it for the campaign but actually it was settled for land $700,000 after the you know understand step down excusing to that was it they were they were dealing with like millions and brown bags they had lots of business if he would get friendly bigglesworth with lunch bags full of Hank million dollar bills yes sir for Senator McGovern I understand he flew with Bob Dole and gordon Liddy to richard nooks Nixon's funeral what was that like senator McGovern to say that it seemed to me that the thing to do is the former President of the United States and I thought it was the proper thing to be there to recognize his office he was a dominant figure in American politics during most of my public career so I didn't share in some of the more excessive praise of the president after his death but I did think the least I could do is be a present for his funeral day buddy in here see Hunter Thompson's obituary of Richard Nixon when George rolled over I wouldn't written in a weary but had been for George kayvyun that's a good rule haven't so outraged I watched that thing and he's a what dole Wilson Kissinger and then you George of all people I thought this can't go on I was sitting on the beach somewhere smoking marijuana with Steve Ambrose and I was so sentimental was that Steven convinced me that Nixon really was a good guy development writer's block like well yeah he really was you give us a lot of fun but then when I saw you that's all Kissinger and I saw dole it just was all pure rotten politics today but in front of me like a red orange blaze in my eyes and then that's when I wrote the thing about Nixon yes sir the role of the press the presidential campaign is always interesting one thing I've enjoyed about the 72 campaign reading about it is the stark comparisons of how journalists described Nixon versus McGovern for example Thompson described Nixon as a werewolf and went on with an long bit about McGovern's incredible smile Norman Mailer in Saint George and the Godfather had a nice passage with McGovern flagging him to an astronaut and he referred to Nixon as a sober Undertaker's assistant and even more moderate journalists of showed a clear bias in favor of McGovern in light of the fact that for his whole political career Nixon talked about the bias of the press I wonder if the panel's would address Nixon's view he was a lying dog I and had every reason to fear the president I remain I remain amazed that serious observers of American politics have anything good left to say about Richard Nixon or even that they had it then you know there's a there's a portion of the Nixon tapes that's referred to in the Haldeman Diaries and which sy Hirsch wrote about a couple years ago and the AP chronicled as well but I to me it's just it's the beginning in the end of Richard Nixon and I followed him a long time I was in California when he emerged as a congressional candidate in 1972 on the 15th of May George Wallace was shot out here in Laurel I think and the FBI very early on had a report turned out to be accurate that the would-be assassin was a man Arthur Bremer and he lived in Milwaukee and within an hour two Nixon has a conversation with Charles Colson in the White House in which he tells him that what he ought to do is get somebody to go out to Milwaukee to Bremer's apartment break-in before the FBI gets there and seals it off and plant McGovern literature right that's the President of the United States talking and I think once you see that read that story you you lose whatever shred of respect might remain yeah I know he went to China you know while we were in California together at the time of the thing Frank and I have two distinctions we were both going to UCLA with two other distinguished California's named Haldeman and Ehrlichman and many years Frank has always amused me with remarks that at least he and I were still voting was still alive but the Jerry Voorhies campaign I didn't know who Jerry Voorhees was it was one of the first votes of my life and I voted for a Democratic congressman who was called a communist because he had visited Russia with a congressional committee during the war and the campaign which fought against Helen Douglas Unleashed a degree of malevolence that I have that always followed Nixon for me and I remembered rejoicing each time he was defeated I remember saying after the California gubernatorial thing hurray no more Nixon it's why I'm nervous even here talking about it [Music] this is his town I'm just a country boy that sumbitch comes back he ain't gonna be lookin kindly on me it's also important to remember that the press could have probably been harder on Nixon than they actually were he did not have you know he didn't hold any press conferences did not make himself available to the press and basically Bobby Wilkinson throwing up softballs that every one of those televised things do you believe in the Good Fairy and motherhood we didn't I think the I think a major contributor to the to the situation also was the was the media's total unwillingness to pick up the Watergate story at all except for the Washington Post part partly because there is this inbred reluctance on the part of any media outlet to begin a story by saying the Washington Post said today and the alternative to that of course was to get some investigative reporters of your own go out and do some work and that there's a great reluctance to do that to don't bring in the result is impulsive most carried that story all by itself versus the st. Louis New York Times editorial which was one that did that they didn't throw themselves in that statement that I quoted that you know they've really had happened one of the few papers in the yeah the television left it alone except for one piece by Walter Cronkite Morse you wanted to get in this not on that exact point but one of the legacies I thought that the 1972 campaign would leave would be campaign finance reform and we did come in with the limit on contributions and I think it's sad today to see how both parties have abused that which hope some kind of way would that could be straightened out because the governor's campaign provement prove that small contributors around the country would support a campaign the Republicans know this works they have a very large mailing list yet we still see that we have to go to Indonesia and other country to raise money for our campaigns and I think that just sullies the whole process two questions here john Prados first and then we'll get you okay mr. mankiewicz mentions the the story about Bremer and Coulson and that illustrates I think a certain attitude towards dirty tricks other than Watergate at the lower level at the campaign level in the Republican campaign in 72 I know those kinds of things were prevalent in New York City which where I saw I would like to get some kind of reading on on how detrimental to McGovern's efforts do you think were sort of counter political activities by Republican campaign organizations dirty tricks I'm not sure I understand the question how much dirty tricks affected the campaign oh I think I think to some extent it's not not an extraordinary amount I think the they affect the campaign if they're ignored if they've been adequately adequately reported all of them including the let's say the Bremer thing results could very well have been different I was impressed with what Bob Shrum had to say to which is that that the the tragedy of 1972 was not the george mcgovern loss but the the nature of the loss if he if three or four things had gone differently including I think the problem with the senator Eagleton he probably would have lost but he would have won ten fifteen states in a reasonable number of electoral votes at worst maybe one and then have been and then have been a fairly obvious choice for the Democratic Party in 1976 and served two distinguished terms as president sure in wait oh I hope you present me exactly because because a lot of the true events of the campaign went on covered including Watergate for openers if the coverage had been better you think that would have altered the yeah.what of all been the outcome whether it would have changed the weather it would have meant the difference in winning and losing I don't know but it certainly would have meant the difference between a landslide and a respectable loss Nixon's a player in this as well I mean his foreign policy and domestic maneuvering is late in the term also you know showed him to be a better leader than perhaps people had thought since 1970 but any incumbent president has many many coins in the fountain to use to take advantage of the position and that's considered sort of fair game but what I objected to about the whole Nixon thing was coming to Washington of all I'm not wild about Washington as a place to be every politician that ever lost an election still lives here and it makes me a little nervous somehow I feel I'm supporting them but the thing about not just Watergate and not just dirty tricks but the campaign itself was a foul campaign almost all of the public statements were lies most of the commercials which were run by the Nixon campaign were untruths and they did it with a straight face and and the American press supposedly so vigilant let them get away with it today they run little things about commercials and say well this isn't really true in that and there was none of that in 72 and here we are with wonderful fellow named Guggenheim making honest commercials from a governor that are truly representing him and his position and so we were here we were operating in an absolutely marked deck and not getting any cards I mean it's hard to win under those circumstances I don't care what the game is you know I fought the press I fought every element of the press for not at some point in time saying wait a minute if it hasn't proved that he's in soon you think I don't think they've improved now all they were everybody pulls everybody else he's worse no I mean I think today every news organization even in Charlotte we run polls on sheriff's races to the degree that they used to do for presidential elections a campaign to you know we of course I don't have real senators like other states because we have Jesse Helms but he spent he spent so much money spent 31 million dollars defeating Jim hunt one time and I at my house got 22 mailings some of them in color anybody who has a dumb enough mailing organization to send me 22 mailings for Jesse Helms either has an excess of money or a lack of brains but the whole president the lower levels today and I'm in that business and have been for most of my adult life the press today is that absolutely derelict I mean with every pet time I pick up the paper they say the whole business about the campaign reform thing of this and that is that's what everybody in America is thinking about nobody in Charlotte I can't talk to Washington DC betraying a soul in Charlotte that's the least interested in campaign reform because they view that as some rich guy giving money to some other rich guy and not coming to them for and they don't care Stan yet that's all the press seems to be involved in he owns I believe the Charlotte leaders is that correct to your feet that's right I'm just a little weekly newspaper but I didn't get to write in it and I say what I think and what do you make of the numbers and the more untrustworthy Clinton is perceived to be in the electorate the more electable but I'm not so sure the electorate feels that no the media thinks the media the baby I understand the polls for our polls of polls I ought to be in Warsaw the point I make is that everybody wants to know is the president working for me and nobody much gives a damn about what happened in Arkansas 15 years ago in those terms I live in a time with 2 percent unemployment I live in a town of just racial justice because all of a sudden there's no employees defined and people change colors overnight in some racist establishments so I live in a very successful town as is in our many places where they don't give a damn about these other things let me get this gentleman and he's been patiently waiting enter the fray I think we have a clue as to what the panel thinks of Richard Nixon could you get into what the campaign's relationship was with former President Johnson earlier abrade well it was not terribly important Johnson had taken himself out of the presidential race and in effect taking himself out of a lot of politics he was not well obviously he certainly didn't admire senator win over its position on the war talk to him as I recall the president advised him to take a nap every day which is good advice but but not that that relationship I don't think was very good at the beginning of the campaign but I don't think it had very much impact on the election the president in effect let it be known had obviously had let it be known that the senator McGovern was not his choice as the nominee but he didn't do very much about it he respected the judgment of the party and the primaries and the convention and he stayed out of it thank you I think we're gonna have to stop I'm sorry I can't get the other questions but I'm trying to keep us on time I'd like to thank all of our panelists okay one last question of again Georgia I've been going over this and say it's going to be great why did Harold Hughes betray you that day in February I've been going back over that book and in the details what Harold Hughes went off for muskie it's an unanswered question it's one of me ever since then even see him he had died by then no no man it was somebody - I don't recall they either really which I get Talia met Jesus and then so mystery though we're gonna take we'll take a break just for about five minutes like to thank our panelists very much [Applause] here's a look at upcoming programming this Saturday on c-span a canadian-american welcome back i'm vicki liviakis firearms and firewater are a dangerous combination but don't tell that to Hunter S Thompson both figure prominently in his formula for creating something he calls gonzo journalism looking for Hunter Thompson that's dr. hunter as Thompson the self-declared mad doctor of gonzo journalism was hoping you'd want to write something for us why not we will chase them like rats across the tundra billed as a media critic the writer who took a generation of readers on a mr. Toad's Wild Ride with Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas on the campaign trail the great shark hunt the Hells Angels and of course his own drug-crazed exploits he's a roving reporter for Rolling Stone a character for a comic strip he was recently accused of assaulting a woman in his hot tub who is the man who not only writes the headlines but makes them we tracked him down near Aspen Colorado outside his favorite watering hole in Woody Creek dr. Thompson I presume it was after all 10 o'clock in the morning right yeah a grapefruit all right time for a Bloody Mary Thompson the notorious in vibrant Thompson the chain smoker with his trademark plastic filter Thompson the infamous mumbler and I'm proposing was under ballistamon but they just follow me and Thompson the gun freak there's no way for the liver get bigger with these revolvers I hear no grip in the back Hunter Thompson lives in a cabin with iron vultures at the front gate there are bullet holes through his windows visitors are warned not to arrive unannounced weird inside he is King Arthur at the round table talking with his hired guns the lawyers the ones he credits with keeping him out of prison turned him into whimpering news really honored Thompson came dangerously close to losing his liberties because of what he calls too much sex drugs and rock and roll it was my abilities week hearing a visitor 116 years a speech it all started when a former porn producer by the name of Gail Slater Palmer claimed he tried to attack her in his hot tub so that led to an 11-hour search of his cabin and that turned up 39 hits of LSD a trace amount of cocaine and a vintage machine gun a case against him was eventually thrown out of court Thompson emerged victorious but also passionate about the Fourth Amendment and search and seizure laws he's forming what he calls the Fourth Amendment foundation he's also written a book about it called songs of the doomed his latest act of gonzo journalism gonzo Hunter Thompson is now official he is in the dictionary this year that it's F first used in the phrase gonzo journalism by u.s. journalist Hunter s Thompson you invented the term we talked to some people earlier today and they they referred to you as the last wild men on the west he killed that'll make Wildmon his wife there let there well do weird weird and at that Thompson went outside into the snow to take his red convertible for a late-night run fortunately the battery was dead crazy you know this may not make a great deal of sense means an account Lee Miller than time and there's no waiting for car batteries convertible but after all we are with that are tossing yeah well I thought you'd be surprised transcripts and videotape starts flying be it mink or sable or not an Indian girl all the foxes around whoever said money can't buy happiness apparently never shopped in Aspen it wasn't for people like me there would be no bars there would be no cocktail waitresses there'd be no jobs and hotels there'd be no street sweepers I mean who do you think that this community caters to obviously rich people like Floyd Watkins Lloyd made millions in computerized bill collecting retired and bought this sixty acres spread outside Aspen in a place called Woody Creek Woody Creek was unspoiled full of cattle ranches and rough hewn fences and unpaved roads and then Along Came Floyd they asked me one time why are you building the 17,000 square foot house I said because I can't afford a 50,000 square foot house along with the big house there's a big guest house and a big barn 10,000 square feet and well stocked we have plenty of toys I think there's one two three four five six seven eight nine 10 motorcycles here and little cars and then there's the summer dining area that seats 60 and the trout pond and in the pond there's lights at night that light up the entire underwater area there's a waterfall over here that's lit up and what with the giant musk ox he's got stuff for display in the living room and well you can sort of understand why Floyd's more down-home neighbors call his home Walley world and I think if I owned Walley world I'd be pretty proud of that Lloyd Watkins and we'll get back to Floyd later Floyd's a vivid example of the changes here slowly but surely the money crowd the Jet Set the private jet set has transformed this town sometimes income as vacation retreats so they're empty all but a few weeks a year about 60% of the homes in Aspen have absentee owners it's not that the hiking trails are overcrowded with these people it's not that they're killing all the fish or the game what they're killing is the community spirit the sharing of a place their neighbor named us that's what you're killing well this is one of the neighbors Stranahan likes Hunter s Thompson father of gonzo journalism a legend for his bizarre drug and booze-fueled writing he's also fond of guns and when Thompson shoots everyone shoes thou'rt and strangely enough it is once these posters are riddled with holes Thompson drizzles paint on them and sells them no kidding who is that supposed to be maybe but it sells one of these went recently for a reported 22,000 bucks the artist is also an activist owl farm in Woody Creek has been Thompson's home since the 70s and he's a vocal critic of what he calls the greed heads who are ruining the area we tried to talk to him about that all right thing is listening to ill words can be as mind-bending as reading them whatever that of the theater who's gonna double the billionaires I'm the white French oh dear oh dear yeah well Thompson expresses himself better in other ways like the time not long ago that he made a surprise visit to a neighbor he thought was ruining the neighborhood you remember Floyd Watkins baby mmm mmm and about 40 shots now look up and you could see just pull around you could see or hear coming from right here turned on the Jeep and pulled around here and I shined that million candlepower light right on Hunter Thompson had shot up the place as a warning to Floyd to stop messing with the land the last straw was when Floyd rerouted Woody Creek so it would run through his front yard Floyd got the message but he wasn't impressed it's my personal amusement park and anyone who really doesn't like it can buy it bulldoze it down and put it back the way it was there aren't many who could afford it in fact there aren't many who can afford to live here at all 70% of the workforce lives 20 to 30 miles down the road hey but we really look good not to worry there's always the movies well be movies very being I did karate movies in the Orient I got hit a lot get I was always getting a hit I think though I spent like two years with like a bag of ice on my head cuz like because they always miss and hits you Playboy opened many doors for Roseanne artwork music karate and a famous boyfriend gonzo journalist Hunter s Thompson I had put it down in my cell phone is one of my favorite authors and so I got a phone call and I've been told one of your favorite authors so no I don't believe that I really don't believe it and boys referred to me as the negro he actually gave me a wonderful lecture on not taking drugs I brought another playmate with me at one point and he she thought he was a real doctor and she kept saying oh dr. Thompson I have this thing wrong with my eye and he said oh you block meetings I'll just clear that up really don't think anything he says don't drink anything that's open in the refrigerator today Rose Ann and her husband dedicate themselves to a helmet I'm ready to learn what's the first lesson give me the topic sentence give me that your problem you're living up here you got a lip down here in the impulse down if you want to be like me you got to make that decision we're going to break the bank at the monkey burns casino Homer they blew that up yesterday oh yeah right then we're going to Las Vegas we'd exactly back in that direction [Music] nobody gonna take my net gonna teach Jim to have that sure was a fun trip to Las Vegas so many kids who going on 8:30 I better call Maude and tell her where I am bags I called her from the gas station thanks buddy [Music]

Channel: phoenixrai

Views: 9,880

Keywords: Hunter S. Thompson, Charlie Rose, Letterman, Gonzo Journalism

Id: JjQZrYjnkWM

Length: 168min 0sec (10080 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 13 2018