Latest / BOB DOLE : 1995 Clinton's Comeback / Episode 449 BOB DOLE The Life that Brought Him There (Part 30) The Senate Republican Leader (A) Defining a Leader

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Episode 449 BOB DOLE The Life that Brought Him There (Part 30) The Senate Republican Leader (A) Defining a Leader · BOB DOLE : 1995 Clinton's Comeback

• 0:25
  SPEAKER_09: In 2000 or 1984, after the uh elections.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_09: How did that play out?
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_09: How was he elected and what happened over the next couple of years?
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: One of the third talents, I think.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: You ran again, I'm trying to remember, you ran against um I was reading your book.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_10: Did I run against book?
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um somebody else's uh was it um uh you know I mean he he tried to appeal in the caucus as somebody who had the experience on the finance committee of um I should do significant tax cuts.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: They'd also worked on the um you know very, very important 1983 um Social Security bailout, it was called that basically Social Security was about ready to completely collapse, much like the financial system.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: And uh similar to the financial system, it was it was an you know imminent collapse.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um so he worked with uh Senator Moynihan and and uh a number of others, and they were able to find a package of uh changes for Social Security.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: One of them was extending the uh page at which one we qualified to 67 after some years in the future.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um so he was basically presented himself to the caucus as somebody who could get things done.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: And they uh you know had a vigorous campaign, they have secret ballots.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the funny things about the Senate, I've I've been around for some of these where you know a senator's running for leadership posts, and they'll you'll ask them how many votes do you think you have and they if they're um not cautious enough, they'll tell you.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: And fairly often they're not running because uh senators promise to each other I'm with you all the way, and then they have a secret ballot.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't really have 39 votes, I had 13.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um they had uh three-way race.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um Senator McCullough dropped out, I think, on the first or the second ballot.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: Then Senator Stevens dropped out all one on the third ballot and became majority leader.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: Uh you know, as majority leader, he um had to work against and with Senator Byrd, who um he always had far smarter um about the ways of the Senate, the rules of the Senate, and how and about the legislative process than he would ever be.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: And uh he said that you know no one is equal.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but that really didn't tell the truth, which was that all was pretty close, second.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um he understood the Senate rules, and he had Robert Dove, who became famous later on as his uh staff person, and then ultimately became the Senate parliamentarian to help him use the rules effectively in the Senate.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: And I look at Bob Dole's ascendancy.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um he was already a national figure, but this is gonna be the moment that he is on, he steps onto center stage completely he gets elected the Senate majority leader, and we're gonna look at in this episode and in the subsequent ones, Bob Dole's you know, the election that got him elected to the major the majority leader.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, kind of explain to you a little bit about what the majority leader is, what it does, um the things that you have to do to to uh run in that office.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_01: And then the characteristics of Bob Dole himself as a leader, because he is widely considered to this day the the measuring stick of a leader on either side of the aisle.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you're gonna try to learn a little bit about you know the the various tools the leader uses to to move legislation through.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_01: And I think uh you'll come away uh with this with a real uh understanding of the United States Senate and how it works uh and and what's changed uh uh uh since the days that Dole was there.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_01: So we're gonna start off listening to his predecessor in that role, who is also considered one of the great majority leaders and minority leaders in history.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_01: It was Howard Baker, who would go on to be the chief of staff for Ronald Reagan uh at the height of the Iran Contra scandal.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh he comes in behind Don Regan in the 1980s uh to become the chief of staff uh to try to clean that up, which he did magnificently because by the time Ronald Reagan left office and Howard Baker had guided him all the way, almost all the way through, I think there's another chief of staff that comes in that final six months, uh Mr.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_01: Duberstein.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_01: But Baker, Baker really writes the ship.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_01: So this is a very formidable man himself.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: He was Everett Dirksen, who is another minority leader, who we've covered a lot.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_01: If you go back to our Lyndon Johnson uh series, we used to call him the wizard of the wizard of ooze.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_01: But he was uh he was the one instrumental in getting the Civil Rights Acts passed with Lyndon Johnson uh in the 1960s.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_01: That was Howard Baker's father-in-law, so this goes to show we we're still a small world, a small town, small country or something, um that you you have all these interconnections with folks in politics and I guess in anything else for that matter.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_08: I was surprised by the that he was elected as my successor.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_09: Tell me about that process.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_09: Um had how only did you decide you weren't going to run?
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_08: When did I decide?
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_08: Right.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_08: Oh, I I decided uh two years, I guess, a year and a half before I and and what led you to Why?
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_09: Yeah.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_08: Well, I I guess I always thought that being in the Congress was not a full-time it was not a lifetime job.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_08: But really the most immediate thing was my wife then had terminal cancer and I had to take care of her.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_08: So I left.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_08: And I had no regrets about that.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_08: I'll always be grateful for the 18 years I served in the Senate, but I had no difficulty in leaving.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_09: Uh when Doe uh ran for majority leader, um you were very active in that.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_05: Oh heavens, yes.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_05: I was so I I I supported him all the way along.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_05: It's close races, I recall.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_05: It was yeah, like what, decide by a vote?
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, did wasn't Ted Stevens the other one?
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_09: And and this is sensitive, but I mean I would think Ted Stevens was not Mr.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_09: Congeniality.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_05: He still isn't, never was, and probably that's what killed him.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_05: Uh no, he's uh considering how close it was, had he had he been he is a smart guy, and had he been as tough as he'd been in congenial, he might have beat Bob.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_09: Did you I assume you supported Dole's candidacy for majority leader?
• 8:03
  unknown: Yes.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_02: He ran in 84.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_02: Without a doubt.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_09: Yeah.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_09: Um were you uh He won by one vote, didn't he?
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_09: He he won by one vote.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_09: Yeah.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_09: Were you surprised that he won?
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_09: Or uh because I've talked to other people who frankly were surprised that he won.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_02: I was surprised, yeah.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_02: I think Ted Stevens was the and Ted was whipped, so it was a natural opportunity for him to go up.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_06: Uh when he decided to uh seek election as uh Republican leader, of course that was a very interesting campaign and involved several senators.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_06: I think there were five or six Republicans who were in that race.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_06: I remember Jim McClure and Pete D'Minichy and Dick Luger uh were all involved.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_06: And uh Bob Bob Dole ended up being being the leader and did a great job.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_09: One of the factors that enter into an election like that, I assume it's not just ideology.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_02: Well, uh, I don't know.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_02: Uh one one of the factors that entered into it was why did Packwood back Bob Dole?
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_02: Because Packwood was going to be chairman of finance committee if Bob Dole got out of the way.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_09: Is it fair to say that that senators will tell you one thing and and no and as long as they have a secret vote, uh reserve the right to change their minds.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_05: Oh, you remember the the famous Mo Udole comment when he was running, I can't remember who he was running against for uh number two position.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_05: I think there was 200.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_05: Let's say there was 200.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_05: He had 109 people pledged to him.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_05: And the book comes and he gets 91, and he says, He says, I want to thank very much the 91 who voted for me and the 18 who said they'd vote for me.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_05: Oh yeah.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_05: You want to be careful though, you don't dare.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_05: Let's say you got two people running.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_05: You don't dare tell both of them that you're gonna support them.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_05: Because they'll have a list, and then they'll start comparing their list with other other people.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_05: And not that they won't compare it with their the guy they're running against, but let's say, let's say I'd be supporting Bob and I'd say, uh Bob, I got these sixteen people.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_05: And maybe I might be talking to the the opponent's number two guy and say, Listen, we got these sixteen.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_05: Let me see your list.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_05: And I said, Let me see your list, and there'll be names on both lists.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, you know, I uh I can only speak for myself.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_02: Bob Dole, in the four years that I was a freshman member of the finance committee, treated me like a brother.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_02: You know, didn't always agree with me.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, maybe didn't always uh uh you know support what I wanted to do.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_02: But I know times that I felt I wasn't getting a fair shake, and probably came came for the fair the lack of fair shake was coming from staff doing what they wanted to do as opposed to what Bob Dole wanted to do.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_02: So I go talk to Bob Dole and tell him what the problems is, and he's you know, he he he'd he would uh see that I got justice.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_09: How do you run for a leadership position?
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_09: I mean it's a very unique electorate.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_05: Oh yeah, it's very you're you know, you're talking about 50-55 people usually.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_05: Uh and this this is a peer group.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_05: This is why a show horse could never win a race like that.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_05: This is in this is an insider.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_05: You try to think to yourself, when is the last time that an outsider Bob Bird beat Ted Kennedy for the number two spot in the Democratic Party after Kennedy had been elected to the number two spot?
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_05: But you you go through the leaders that were there.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_05: Everett Dirksen was a showman.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_05: I'll give him I'll give him credit for that.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_05: But Mansfield, Scott were not.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_05: Bob Byrd certainly was not.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_05: Uh Howard Baker wasn't a showman.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_05: Uh Tom Dashwell was not a showman.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_05: George George Mitchell was, in my mind, the toughest leader we had to face with because he was so good in debate.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_05: He he had uh, and most people in debate don't realize this, you want to be very careful of granting your opponent's premise.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_05: If you say to it, you know, George has to be sort of like can we start out this debate by at least agreeing that we will not allow babies to be thrown in the gutter and trampled on by horses.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_05: You better not agree to that premise.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_05: Because you're dead.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_05: And he he was an expert at doing that.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_05: He he had the capacity in lay language to start a one, two, three, four, and you're not quite sure where you got trapped.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_05: But it's uh leaders inside.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_05: If you think you have a chance to be leader and you want to run for it, you do.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_05: I did a couple times and got I finally got beat once.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_09: What do you pro uh what is it you have to offer uh to w to win over the uh the undecided?
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_09: It's it's almost personal.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_05: You you don't say if I'm elected, uh I'll guarantee that more of you get on meet the press.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_05: Uh you don't make first you can't generate that, but you don't say if I'm elected, I'll make sure the Republican conference uh makes the television studio available to all of you on a free basis when you know you haven't got the money to do that.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_05: It it isn't that kind of a race.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_08: But uh the question of my successor came to be very interesting.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_08: I thought, I think most people thought that Ted Stevens, who was my deputy, who was whip, would succeed.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_08: Some thought no, it'll be Pete Dominic, and others thought this, that, and the other.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_08: I don't think most anybody thought Bob No was gonna be elected majority leader.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_09: I ask why?
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_08: No, I don't know why, but uh but that's what I think.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_08: And uh I also remember, you know, I didn't vote, I wasn't gonna be back, but I was there in my role as the city majority leader.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_08: And I remember John Tower was chairman of the policy committee and thus responsible for the election.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_08: And I remember when they announced the vote, and by only, I think, one vote or two votes that he was elected, John Tyre leaned over to Howard Green and said, burn the ballots.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_08: So nobody would ask for a recap.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_08: But Dole was a fortunate choice, and I congratulated him then, I congratulate him now.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_08: He served with distinction.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_09: You've seen several people do the job of majority leader, you'd you'd seen Howard Baker, and then you saw Bob Dole.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_09: How did how did they differ?
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_02: Um how do they differ?
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_02: I think that uh Howard Baker was uh was more of a leader that that was uh very open with people and you knew where he stood.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_02: Um and Bob Dole was more of a loner as a leader, I believe.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I believe that Bob Dole was a better leader, but I think he did stuff more through staff than he did personally.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_02: Um I believe Howard Baker would have worked more one uh senator to senator to get things done.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I may not be fair to Bob Dole by saying that because you're asking me to think back, you know, at least when he started, that would be 20 years ago, you know.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_01: You can tell these races for these kind of majority leader and minority leader leadership races are pretty tough.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_01: We've got a little insider, and we've we've we've played a little bit of this before for you in an earlier episode with Senator Trent Lott, who was the who would go on to be the Senate Majority Leader after Bob Dole left, but um about his race for being uh uh the Senate whip in ninety five.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_01: And this was this was many years after uh what we've been listening to on our timeline, but I thought it was kind of interesting because you really get a feel for uh these these the insider relationships and the insider uh politics that go on for getting these folks elected to these leadership positions and the fact that these guys still remain friends.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_01: You know, Ted Stevens and Bob Doe were very close friends, um, and so it you you have these inner rivalries, but sometimes, you know, that there there's still a friendliness to them because it's inside baseball.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: This isn't uh the guys on meet the press that you see ho hooting and hollering all the time.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: These are the guys who get things done in the halls of Congress.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_09: Tell me about that, Rayce.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_09: Because I think we again people outside this institution have no idea what what a campaign like that is.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_10: Well, it's unique to the Senate.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_10: It's very personal.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_10: Uh thank God for uh secret ballots one by one vote.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_10: Um people not always tell you the truth.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_10: Uh and we are still human beings, yeah, and senators uh are like everybody else.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_10: Uh we change our mind, you know.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_10: It's not they didn't tell the truth, just the circumstances changed it.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_10: But I was the kind of the upstart, and Bob, understandably, he called me and said, you know, I've got a I've gotta support uh Allen.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_10: He's been a friend, a loyal whip, and he didn't deserve uh, you know, to to uh be removed at this time.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_10: And uh he worked very hard.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_10: In fact, I I had uh uh I think I had like uh 32 commitments on Thursday, but when the vote occurred, I think I had uh 27.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_10: So he pulled off five votes for me over the from me over the weekend.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_10: But I I understood that.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_10: In fact, um I think it would have been out of character and maybe even inappropriate for him not to support uh his his whip.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_10: Um so then after that, I I think he uh he wasn't sure exactly what I was gonna do, but um I was you know I had experience.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_10: I was whip for eight years during the Reagan years in the house.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_10: I knew how to set up a whip organization, and that's what I did.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_10: I just systematically went about my business, set up a whip organization in uh the form that I had learned from in the in the house and uh began to do my work.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_10: And um uh uh I you know I wouldn't wait for Bob to say go do a whip check on this or that.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_10: I'd go do it, and then I would take my card with the results and give it to him.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_10: And at first he'd take it and look at it, thank you, stick it in his pocket, and uh that was about it.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_10: But I think I I think I maybe talked about this in my book.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_10: I know I've talked uh told the story that the day he left the Senate, we gave a beautiful speech, and this everybody in this teacher obviously loved Bob Dole and wished him well, even though the Democrats, you know, didn't want him to be president, but they were very generous.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_10: Tom Dasher was very generous in his comments for Bob that day.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_10: And I walked down the steps of the uh Capitol, the front of the Capitol there, down to where he was going to get in the little scene and and drive off.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_10: And just before he got in the car, he said, Trent, you were a good whip.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_10: He got in the car and left.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_10: That was the only time he ever said that.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_10: So uh, you know, Bob Bob wasn't loquace in terms of expressing emotions uh or feelings, but uh he was at the same time he was very sentimental.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_10: I've seen him get tears in his eyes many times.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_10: Uh he he, you know, he was really a very complex uh person.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_10: Um in a way, I mean he's like a lot of us in Washington.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_10: We're uh we're g uh garrulous and outgoing with crowds and the masses, but to get it sometimes it's hard to get inside the shield and really get to know us.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_10: I I I'm a little bit that way.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_10: I mean, in my life, uh I uh you know, if you go back and look at my my background and where I was born and what I experienced my young years, it's understandable.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_10: But not many people got inside the fence uh with me.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_10: Uh but I had I have had a few really close, close good friends over the years.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_10: I don't want to say that.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_10: It's not always that I want to know everybody a little and nobody very much.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_10: Um but uh you know, uh high school friends, uh my roommate from college is now a federal judge, uh, you know, uh very, very close to him.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_10: And you know, we've uh sung together, played together, cried together, prayed together.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_10: Uh and I think Bob is a little bit that way too.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_10: There are some people in Bob's life that you know he probably uh would die for.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_10: And uh and but you know uh still uh he's a very private person.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_10: In fact, Alan Simpson, again to his great credit, after I uh won that election, he said, I want you to come to my office and I want to talk to you.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_10: So I and I'd be honored.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_10: And uh he was just so magnanimous, and just a great guy, and he is to this day, obviously.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_10: We sat down and he said, Okay, you need to know more about Bob Dole and how you're gonna work with him.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_10: He said, You need to understand that he is the leader.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_10: You're the whip.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_10: Uh, and you've got to remember he's an eagle, got huge wings, and he he will uh overwhelm and you know dominate the process.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_10: You should be comfortable with that.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_10: Uh, you know, he won't praise you a lot, he won't ask a lot, but he'll appreciate it every time you stand with him and and uh go to battle with him.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_10: So uh it was uh it was a very nice thing for him to do, and it was it was helpful to me in understanding uh Bob Dole as the uh majority leader in the Senate.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_09: It's said to be one of the hardest jobs in in Washington.
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_02: What makes it well?
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_02: Because you're herding cats.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I mean it's not like the United States.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_02: It's not like the House of Representatives, where it's run from the top down, it's run from the bottom up.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_02: You know.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I I forget that comparison.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_02: But that's the best if I could think of that, it'd be the best way to demonstrate the Senate of what it what it is, you know.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_10: Um see when you get in a leadership position like Bob did and like I did, uh you you know, you still have your same philosophy, you still have your ideology, but you also have to come to terms with the fact that you're not a dictator.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_10: You are the leader and you're charged with the responsibility not only of leading your party and in one uh body of the Congress, but in finding a way to get things done, which means you have to work with moderates and liberals and you know, Democrats and everybody, and conservatives certainly, to shape uh a consensus or a way to get to an agreement uh that is good for the country.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_10: And uh Bob uh was good at doing that.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_10: Uh you ha if you're gonna be a successful leader, you have to learn to do it.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_10: And the minute you do, your friends uh that share your philosophy or from your region will then say, What happened?
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_10: You know, and they'll start attacking you.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_10: Is pragmatism a dirty word?
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_10: And in some in some uh areas.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_10: Now, I I don't uh I'm not a total uh pragmatist.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_10: I am uh and Bob too, I think.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_10: Uh there is a grain of populism in me, but I also uh I think it's a genetic part of my body to want to get things done.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_10: Why would you want to come to Washington, D.C., for heaven's sake, and and live and serve in the Senate if you're not going to get anything done?
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_10: When you could be living back home, better life, making more money, more time with your family.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_10: You have to really want to be here and want to get something done.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_10: If you're in the Senate as a job or just to survive, man, I feel sorry for you.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_09: Well, that that that's fascinating because as as the conservative movement has evolved and grown in many ways, you know, there is this libertarian streak here.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_09: Sure.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_09: Oh, yeah.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_09: Yeah.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_09: And and I'm wondering about the the conflict.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_09: There are a lot of Republicans who basically believe the government is the problem.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_09: So how can you become the party of government if at the same time you really harbor those profound suspicions about it?
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_10: Well, it is a conundrum in a way.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_10: Um, but I'm not a libertarian.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_10: I do think there is a role for the government, and if it's not what it should be, then we ought to do something about it.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_10: Uh I think that uh, you know, uh I do think government uh, you know, is not effective, not efficient, doesn't, you know, bureaucracy's not good, uh, it's hard to make them function properly.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_10: Um, but uh, and I think government tries to do way too much.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_10: I mean, I still hew to that same basic philosophy.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_10: I still believe that the uh the best government is the least government closest to the people.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_10: I still believe the private enterprise will always do a better job than FEMA, uh the Federal Emergency Management Administration.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_10: I think uh, you know, agriculture policy uh uh that's run out of Washington, D.C., probably doesn't relate a lot of times to the Kansas uh wheat rule or the Mississippi cotton planter.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_10: So uh you know, I still have I have that strain in me.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_10: Uh but I've also been uh reading a book uh recently I find quite interesting, but maybe because of my background, but because of what it says.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_10: The title of it is How the Scots Invented the Modern World.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_10: And if you go back and study the history of Scots and what they did for the world, uh one of the things they did, David Hume and others, talked about uh, you know, the human nature, uh passions, you're inclined to have your passions override your good judgment judgment.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_10: Uh the bad is a very powerful force.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_10: And one of the ways you control that is you begin to have a rule of law.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_10: You have a government that says, no, wait a minute, you can't rape somebody, you can't steal somebody's property, you can't just shoot somebody if you're getting uh angry at them.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_10: And you've got to have some entity that uh brings order to man and to society.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_10: Now the problem is when that government become, you know, wants to become too powerful and starts trying to dictate and uh take and give uh too many things.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_10: So there's a there's a delegate balance there, but that is a uniqueness of uh our uh American former government.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_10: Um I think about it a lot that we don't take an oath to the people, we don't take an oath to some particular leader, we take an oath to the Constitution.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_10: We take an oath to support and defend a set of principles and ideals unique in the history of mankind.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_10: And uh we should, you know, be careful how we do that.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_09: Is the chief job of a majority leader persuasion?
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_08: That's a combination of things.
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_08: Certainly, persuasion is part of it, but not the only part of it.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_08: Uh it's too complex to define in a brief short time, but it's not just persuasion.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_08: You're traffic cop.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_08: I mean, just you are, and that that has great power.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_08: When somebody wants, especially with the younger members, want to get on the uh uh uh agenda or want to get a particular point across, the majority leader has almost unchallenged uh authority to deal with that.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_08: I cannot remember a single time when I was a majority leader that uh set a schedule and anybody successfully challenged it.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_08: That's a powerful thing.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_08: And uh that may be persuasion, it may be intimidation, but it's powerful.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_08: And it's more than just persuasion.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_08: But I'd say, yeah, the majority leader is ill-defined, it's not constitutional, it's not statutory, but it's the second best job in Washington.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_02: It's probably Mansfield is probably the reason that the Senate is so hard to operate, because Mansfield, uh, I'm told, I didn't serve with him, but I'm told that he had the view that every senator is an individual senator, and uh every senator ought to have a chance to offer his amendment uh to say what he wants to say.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_02: You don't push him around, you know, just the opposite of Lyndon Johnson, as you read about Lyndon Johnson and the master of the Senate, you know.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_02: And Bob Dole and you know uh uh Howard Baker and and other people kind of inherited that new Senate.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_02: And that Senate's still that way today.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_09: Because someone who had to the public the reputation for being having a jump for being almost having a short view seemed like the worst job in the world.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_05: And it is a meeting, we're leadership.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_09: Um what is it that Dole did behind the scenes and made him dull?
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_09: Um I've never really seen it spelled out, you know.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_09: But beyond that, there's this whole question of institutional leader.
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_09: What are the tools at the disposal of a majority leader to to get the desired result?
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_08: Richard, the majority leader is not a statutory position.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_08: It is certainly not a constitutional position, it is a device created by the Senate itself to bring orderliness uh and dispatch to the uh operations of that body.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_08: It had to be.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_08: And I'm told that early on, before the majority leader was so designated, that the chairman of the finance committee or the chairman of the appropriations committee did that.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_08: But in any event, by now the uh majority leader, whether Republican or Democrat, has taken on special and unique opportunities and responsibilities.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_08: But the power of the majority leader resides in only two things, really.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_08: One is the tradition, the precedent, that in the case more than one senator seeking recognition on the floor, the chair is obligated to first re uh recognize the leader.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_08: It doesn't sound like much, but my friend, it is a lot.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_08: Because it means that uh you get a chance to speak first, it means you have a chance, if everything else fails, to adjourn.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_08: Or to have a quorum call and try to reason with these people.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_08: But that's a powerful thing.
• 31:23
  SPEAKER_08: The other is purely by example.
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_08: I guess it goes back to the human condition that everybody has to lead, everybody has to have a leader someplace.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_08: And even though it is not statutory or constitutional, that role falls to the majority leader.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_08: And to a degree to the minority leader.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_08: Uh I but I was minority leader the same length of the time I was majority leader.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_08: But uh, as minority leader, there was a special opportunity to go over to cross the aisle to Mike Mansfield or later to Bob Byrd and say, boys, look, I I know what you're doing, and I understand it, I'm even sympathetic, but that's not gonna work.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_08: And as long as you had enough to stop it, meaning uh at least 39 votes or uh 44 votes, that you could stop it.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_08: So both leaders uh have an important role.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_08: Let me let me say this is a self self-serving statement, but recognizing the importance of both leaders, majority minority.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_08: When I was first elected majority leader, and first went on the floor that day, the first thing I did was go over to Bob Byrd.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_08: And I said, Bob, I will never know the rules and precedent of the Senate the way you do.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_08: But I'll make you a deal.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_08: I will never surprise you if you won't surprise me.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_08: He thought about it.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_08: He came back later that afternoon and said, Okay.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_08: And we never did.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_08: And I think that tradition is carried on.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_08: I think Dole adopted that point of view as well.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_08: And it's a good sound position, even if I did first advocate it, because the the system itself and the rules of the Senate are such that there's plenty of room for disagreement, plenty of room for controversy, and to do so within the framework of the organization without sneaking up on your adversary.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_04: I've read in a few cases where people observed that uh he tended to be somewhat abrupt and impatient if you didn't come forth right quick with uh whatever he was looking for or w your expressing your own ideas.
• 33:45
  SPEAKER_04: That may have been more staffish.
• 33:47
  SPEAKER_06: I was gonna say it sounded like somebody who worked for him, not with him.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_06: But his his relationship with other senators was uh anything but that.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_06: Uh he was very accommodating and very easy to be with.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_06: I d I don't ever recall seeing him lose his temper or berate another senator or have any get into any kind of argument with a with a with a senator.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_06: He could disagree, stay a point.
• 34:12
  SPEAKER_06: That might not be consistent with what the other person had said, but it was never in an argumentative way.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_09: What what are the weapons that a majority or minority leader have?
• 34:25
  SPEAKER_09: I mean there's the legend of Lyndon Johnson, and clearly that Senate's long gone.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_09: Um the political culture of that political culture's long gone.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_07: Um what carrots and what sticks?
• 34:43
  SPEAKER_07: Well, you use available.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_07: You use the word weapons.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_07: If you're a leader, you don't use weapons, use implements.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_07: Uh and uh and uh my dad was in the Senate when Lyndon was president, and uh he needed dad's vote.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_07: Hell there were only 33 Republicans in the Senate.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_07: Think about that.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_07: And dad was supposed to be right of Goldwater, so he wasn't, but he was described that.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_07: But Lyndon called him in.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_07: He said, now Millward, Millward, here I mean, you're from Wyoming.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_07: It must be very arid out there, and probably just jackrabbits starving to death, carrying their own water, laughing, you know.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_07: He said, I can give you a dam, I can give you a thing out there, something would really be good for you.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_07: Just because just for your little old vote.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_07: And that's it.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_07: I don't play that game.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_07: God, old Lyndon was just furious.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_07: And that was Lyndon.
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_07: He he and that wasn't leadership, that was clubbing people to death.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_07: What did they call it?
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_07: Uh bourbon and water and a twist of the arm, uh, was the Lyndon Johnson cocktail.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_07: Anyway, uh uh Dole, uh uh he uh he knew what you were interested in, what you needed.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_07: But where he was particularly uh with his leadership was when, you know, I I don't know when he slept, you know.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_07: I was it was, you know, he he just and and all the crew, you know, I was right across the hall from him where the media couldn't see when I snuck over there to do my business.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_07: It was right next to the rotunda.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_07: And then I'd go right across the hall into Sheila's office, Sheila Burke and Joyce and all the rest of them, and uh and then right into Dole's office.
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_07: I could get in there at any any point.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_07: He said, just come in whenever you got something.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_07: Well you know, he'd visit him with people of affairs of state, you know, and very respected majority leader of the Senate, and then a minority.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_07: Anyway, he uh when he'd say uh when you get a little message, uh, hey Dole would like four or five of you to meet in the office, you know, you knew that it was time to get off your butt.
• 36:52
  SPEAKER_07: There was something going on.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_07: He'd sit there.
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_07: Well, where are we with this thing here?
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_07: You know, you guys have been working on that now for a couple weeks.
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_07: Getting close or anything?
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_07: Well, no, we're we're working on it.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_07: And he'd just he'd just keep pushing, pushing.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_07: He had an amazing persistence.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_07: Push, push, push, and you never knew.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_07: I mean, you could be at a cocktail party or or you could be on the floor between votes.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_07: He'd say, How you doing on that?
• 37:19
  SPEAKER_07: Yeah, you know, and going like that.
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_07: And he'd say, Oh, well, we're working on it.
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_07: So he he never forgot.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_07: He could juggle all that.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_07: I never saw him carry notes around.
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_07: But he never forgot uh the lay of the land.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_07: Uh and uh and he he his his his charm of leadership was persistence, trust, and integrity of his own extraordinary uh uh worth.
• 37:52
  SPEAKER_07: Uh but uh he just kept silently sometimes and and pushing, but never getting in there and saying, look, I'm gonna crack heads now unless you get this damn thing done.
• 38:05
  SPEAKER_07: He just he just would say, Well, I'm gonna check back with you in a couple days, see where you are on that.
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_07: And he'd do that with Democrats and Republicans.
• 38:14
  SPEAKER_07: And then I don't know what George Mitchell shared with you, but I'm sure you could see a deep admiration that George had for Dole.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_07: And and while he was doing his business uh with uh Mitchell and Byrd, uh I was doing my business with Cranston and uh and uh my old pal from Kentucky.
• 38:40
  SPEAKER_07: And uh and uh uh sometimes things would break down between Dole and Mitchell, and then I'd go over to Cranston uh and say, you know, he'd say, well, this isn't going anywhere because we know that Jesse's really messing around with this and going to blow something up, you know.
• 38:59
  SPEAKER_07: They were always talking about Jesse blowing something up, and we were always talking about somebody else on their side blowing something up.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_07: And uh I'd say, no, Al, here's the real story.
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_07: The other is Wendell Ford was the other one.
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_07: He called me a big skinny cowboy son of a bitch, and I called him the worst governor of Kentucky ever had.
• 39:22
  SPEAKER_07: But anyway, we had a very nice uh relationship, Wendell and I, and Al Cranston.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_07: And and we would, there weren't many times, but but there's a reason for everything, and then there's a real reason.
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_07: And in Washington, people hang up on quote, the reason or or the truth, and then there's the real reason or the real truth, and so I would just say, let me tell you what's happening.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_07: We got a guy in there, and I wouldn't use names, who's doing this.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_07: It ain't Jesse, and I tell you why he's doing it, because your guy, Ted, stuck it in his ear about two years ago and he never forgot it, and he's feeling very petty, and he's gonna screw you, and and at least then they'd go back to their leadership and say, This is not about some giant trick.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_07: It's about pettiness, but it's real stuff instead of you know hypothetical stuff.
• 40:14
  SPEAKER_07: So we could we we could always get through.
• 40:17
  SPEAKER_07: And when Cranson went down in flames, you know, that was very sad because all he had done was what the rest of us had done, except none of us liked to raise money like Al did.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_07: He'd get on the phone, raise money all day in a separate place, like you couldn't do it, but forgot to tell his staff that, you know, two weeks before he'd talked to this guy who dropped uh a cycle on him of five grand each election, forgot to tell them not to have him come in a week later on an appointment.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_07: And they tied it together.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_07: Cranson asked the guy for money.
• 40:55
  SPEAKER_07: Now, three weeks later the guy comes in for a for a visit.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_07: And they said, This is just ghastly.
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_07: And he was nearly in tears.
• 41:04
  SPEAKER_07: He got up on the floor and said, you know, all of you have done this.
• 41:09
  SPEAKER_07: Except except your staff told you.
• 41:12
  SPEAKER_07: And he didn't blame his staff, he just but he he he he loved, he spent the whole any any free hour was spent and getting it from Republicans.
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_07: Well, enough of that.
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_07: I won't romantic.
• 41:21
  SPEAKER_07: Where did Helms fit in in all of this?
• 41:23
  SPEAKER_07: Oh Helms, he could handle Helms, nobody else could.
• 41:27
  SPEAKER_07: Nobody could handle Jesse, uh, but Dole.
• 41:30
  SPEAKER_07: Dole could handle him.
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_07: And never, never in any harsh way say, Jesse, now, you know, we need this.
• 41:37
  SPEAKER_07: And I know you feel very strongly.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_07: We're not gonna bring up abortion every, you know, three months.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_07: We're not gonna do that.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_07: Maybe every year.
• 41:46
  SPEAKER_07: I'm not gonna bring up parent schools every three months, maybe once a year.
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_07: I know these are very important to you, but we don't, we're not gonna do it every three or four months because it's destructive and disruptive.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_07: Well then Dole would agree, but then the the battalion of warriors over there in that hole where they met every Tuesday, you know, what the hell is that guy's name he was with?
• 42:11
  SPEAKER_07: Well, you know, he injured himself severely in his back, uh, and uh and uh you know he had he they all met over there, you know.
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_07: They're still around there, you know, part of the Abramoff crew, uh the one guy, uh the taxpayers for America Norquist.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_07: What?
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_07: Grover Norquist.
• 42:34
  SPEAKER_07: Grover Norquist.
• 42:35
  SPEAKER_07: He may be wearing orange pajamas uh someday soon.
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_07: He was just savage.
• 42:40
  SPEAKER_07: He he cut me to bits and and Mazzoli, he he passed out barcodes that you soaked in water and said, put this on your wrist.
• 42:47
  SPEAKER_07: This is the Simpson Mazzoli I ID, national ID.
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_07: Uh anyway, uh Dole uh uh they were furious at Dole.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_07: They said, You're gonna bring up these social issues, they mean something, and we have this base.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_07: And and I remember one day Dole in all calmness said, you know, uh, I hear you keep using this club over us here if we don't bring up this or that.
• 43:12
  SPEAKER_07: I'm gonna bring them up, but I'm not gonna do it all the time.
• 43:17
  SPEAKER_07: And by the way, uh, if the quote base doesn't like it, who the hell are they gonna vote for anyway?
• 43:25
  SPEAKER_07: He didn't say who the hell, he'd just say, where do they go?
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_07: Well, I'll tell you where they go, they go home.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_07: Well, so what?
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_07: Then if they're that strong and deep believers, and they go home, suck their thumbs just because they don't get their way.
• 43:41
  SPEAKER_07: What what what can I do with people like that?
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_07: He had a way of just packing the lunch and putting it right back on them, and uh, and uh, but but when you get to supply side and and all those things and and the tax code and the and things, he knew the themes.
• 44:01
  SPEAKER_07: He was the virtuoso of the theme, he was the conductor of the orchestra.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_07: Uh he had a guy playing the oboe and another guy playing the strings, and but he was the orchestral manager.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_04: Can you think of some uh you mentioned five uh financial matters, some of the bills that he uh pushed through uh Senate really critical in in your in your mind?
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_06: Well, he he did a lot of things for people who were disadvantaged, and this includes uh education, um education initiatives.
• 44:36
  SPEAKER_06: Uh the Americans with Disabilities Act comes to mind as one that he absolutely was the father of that.
• 44:43
  SPEAKER_06: And uh not only did he have these good ideas and good instincts and uh good sound judgment about what the federal government ought to be doing and could be doing to be helpful to America's citizens, but he had the skill to bring people together and work out problems.
• 44:59
  SPEAKER_06: If you had a suggestion that was a modification in effect or some uh other idea, you would listen carefully and incorporate your idea in the bill.
• 45:12
  SPEAKER_06: Some some way uh by addition of supporters uh giving you an amendment to to the bill or suggesting that you uh you know provide some language that you thought would could improve the bill on some point or another.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_06: Uh he he didn't have he didn't have to have it his his way all the way.
• 45:33
  SPEAKER_06: And he he reached out for ideas and suggestions about how to improve legislation that he had already introduced or was handling on the floor.
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_06: And you know, if you feel like you've been a part of the work product, then your tendency is to support it and defend it and help make it work.
• 45:49
  SPEAKER_06: So um it's an it's an interesting uh way he had of going about this.
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_06: And it wasn't like he was conniving or thinking about this uh strategy all the time.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_06: It was just a part of his nature.