Epstein Secrets

rmer presidential candidates — Goldwater, Richard Nixon, Alfred Landon and Thomas Dewey —~ as well as gov

965 to 1969. His success is worth remembering. When Bliss became chairman in 1965, the Republicans. were in much worse shape than in 2013: President Lyndon Johnson had won a Jand- slide re-election over Arizona Sen. Barry Goldwater, and the Democrats held large majorities in both houses of Congress and the state

nch, in Stonewall, Texas, by government aircraft. It worked; Johnson, who was alienated from his party because of Vietnam, mostly kept quiet during Nixon's 1972 reelection campaign, against George McGovern. Ronald Reagan treated the recently disgraced Nixon with deference, which helped start Nixon's

nship between a sitting President and his living predecessors is rarely easy. According to "The Presidents Club," by Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy, Lyndon Johnson sometimes drafted the popular former President Dwight D. Eisenhower into his publicity schemes, which frustrated Ike, who complained to aides about

ed and lost: James Cox, Adlai Stevenson, Richard Nixon, Hubert Humphrey, Al Gore and John McCain. Inter

mstance has been for vice presidents trying to distance themselves from their bosses. Humphrey tried mightily to explain that he was different from Lyndon Johnson without criticizing the latter. "One does not repudiate his family in order to establish his own identity," he would say. Gore faced the same probl

ents. Two presidents, Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon, complained bitterly of such meddling, and yet, A

-Wash.), who forced Henry Kissinger to renegotiate, reconsider and even abrogate various provisions of his contemplated agreements. Two presidents, Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon, complained bitterly of such meddling, and yet, America is better off because of those efforts. The White House might be tempted

might steal a glance at the Reagan playbook. Responding to Regan's confidential memo, Tom Korologos, an adviser to every Republican President from Nixon to George W. Bush, told the Reagan White House that the second term should be viewed from the standpoint of the President's intended legacy. "It s

ence of recent incumbents offered no guidance. No President since Dwight D. Eisenhower had served two full terms. John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Lyndon Johnson, overwhelmed by the war in Vietnam, had declined to run for reelection in 1968. Richard Nixon resigned less than seventeen months into his second

on Papers, in 1971, and who stood behind Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein as they began publishing the Watergate exposés that led to the fall of the Nixon Presidency. I asked Obama how he could reconcile such an award with his Administration's aggressive leak investigations, which have ensnared journa

n party, the G.O.P.— couldn't fail to summon a contrasting portrait. The biographer Robert Caro has also been a guest. Caro's ongoing volumes about Lyndon Johnson portray a President who used everything from the promise of appointment to bald-faced political threats to win passage of the legislative agenda th

tion of JFK, to the forced resignation of Richard Nixon, to the Chappaquiddick investigation of Ted Kenne

re, his private barber was cutting his hair. I was seated next to him while he got his haircut, and he dictated notes to me. It wasn’t as bad as what Lyndon Johnson would do, requiring aides to join him in the bathroom. While working at Kay, Scholer, I had the first fancy restaurant meal of my life. I was asked

tto Preminger. He's much hipper than me.” In 1971, during an interview with F/ash magazine, Groucho said, “I think the only hope this country has is Nixon's assassination.” Yet he wasn't subsequently arrested for threatening the life of a president. In view of the indictment against Black Panther David

roucho somehow got into a negative space. He was equally cynical about institutions, such as marriage-- “legal quicksand” --and individuals, such as Lyndon Johnson, referred to as “that potato-head.” Eventually, | asked, “What gives you hope?” He thought for a moment. Then he just said one word: “People.” |

ned down by court earlier. ANEW LOW! (4:49 a.m.) How low has President Obama gone to tap my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy! (5:02 a.m.) At 6:40 he called Priebus, waking him up. “Did you see my tweet?” he asked. “We’ve caught them red-handed!”

pressed him to invoke Andrew Jackson as his populist model, and he had loaded up on Jackson books (they remained unread). But his real beau ideal was Lyndon Johnson. LBJ was a big man who could knock heads, do deals, and bend lesser men to his will. Trade it out so in the end everyone got something, and the bette