Women
a pain in the neck, say Nixon
tapes
by
Hugo Gurdon in
Washington
RICHARD
NIXON thought that women in government
were "a pain in the neck" and probably
not "worth the effort", according to
tapes involved in a £129 million
($213 million) dispute.
The
president conceded that they eventually
became "competent", but he was less
sanguine about !he abili-ties of racial
minorities.
"With
blacks, you look the other way," he
said, "The same with Mexicans; you've
got to look the other way. You've got
to find one who's honest."
Mr
Nixon's tape-recorded conversations are
at the centre of an ownership battle
between the former president's estate
and the American government, which
seized them in 1974 when he left office
because of the Watergate
scandal.
The
Justice Department argues that Mr Nixon
said such politically incorrect things
that, had he been alive, he would have
demanded excisions, rendering the tapes
less valuable than the £129
million that his estate claims they are
worth.
The
Nixon estate says that it does not
matter what might have happened: that
the tapes, containing much incendiary
material, will not be edited, thus
retaining their value.
On
the tapes Mr Nixon accuses President
Kennedy of having "murdered"
President Ngo Dinh Diem of South
Vietnam.
He
also refers to his cabinet as "a bunch
of god-damned cowards" and says that
his military top brass are "a bunch of
greedy bastards".
The
case continues this week.
©
The Daily Telegraph,
1998