fred thompson called fred buzz hart to let him know and found him not overly concerned. i think buzz hart had figured it out by then, that there was such a system because he made the memo sent to thompson that so closely had the notes of my conversations.

fred thompson called fred buzz hart to let him know and found him not overly concerned. i think buzz hart had figured it out by then, that there was such a system because he made the memo sent to thompson that so closely had the notes of my conversati conversations. today i know and you know from reading the book, what happened is nixon himself listened to his conversations with me. most of them. he never listens to until years after the fact to the march 21st conversation. but he listened to the earlier conversations. because he said his defense on being no information before march 21 about a cover-up. so he listened to the earlier conversations to hear if there was anything in there that put the lie to his defense. well, it is marginal. you could argue either way on some of the conversations. it's clear today, we know that he knew of the conversations -- of the cover-up before i came in to tell him. but then it wasn't quite so clear. so he's confronted with the question of what to do with the tapes once they have been revealed. lend garment is his -- is one of the peopl

>> yeah, the pause is because fred thompson said, are you aware? during the time of that testimony, i had already come to the faa, i had been there four months so i thought to myself, we might as well be accurate here about everything we say in this testimony, and i didn't have a clue if they still had listening devices. i just paused and said i was aware rather than i am aware. >> let's talk about that moment. how did you come to work for richard nixon? >> i do tend to -- i can't be brief. but i will say this, i had just learned, i was in australia as the senior u.s. military officer in the country. with my office in the american embassy, i had just heard, before the nixon election, in '68 when nixon squeaked by hubert humphrey to win the presiden presidency. i just received word that i was to be extended for two years. that was like the kiss of death to me, it seemed that way. i was going to be coming up on eligibility for brigadier general. i was a career officer. i admit i was fairly ambitious and if i was going to stay in australia, which was

joining us tonight are cornell bellchar, a veteran of obama campaigns and a veteran of fred thompson2008 campaign. cornell, i'm a little surprised the independents care so strongly about the tax returns and it looks like the clinton campaign knows it. >> one thing is you got to understand the context here. given all the craziness that we've seen in this political year. there's lot of numbers not far out liars from what the continuum has been over the last couple years. obama, on his way to winning back to back majorities lost independent voters by 12 points and she's losing them by 13 points. you can't have that grow but certainly democrats have not necessarily been, at least under obama, has not been winning independent voters. i think my old boss, howard dean, was spot on. can she hold that obama coalition together? it is a way to hammer at him on this question of trustworthiness. we've talked a lot bot that over this campaign cycle and she's struggled with it and he's struggled with it. and she's plus two on the area of trustworthiness. but -- and there's not a silver bull bullet.

thompson: i rise today to recognize fred fencemeyer, who will be recognized with the oil museum's yellow dog award intended to recognize the leadership and dedication of those who have helped preserve the history of the bradford oil field and its unique culture. the bradford oil field is an essential part of pennsylvania's history since it was there that oil was first discovered in 1859 when colonel edwin drake drilled the world's first commercial oil well. even today, bradford is home to the nation's oldest continually operating oil refinery. fred's cricks are vital to the region as c.e.o. of the world's oldest family owned and operated independent oil firm which was founded by his great grandfather, louis emery jr. in addition to his activities in business he's an active member of the penn brandt oil museum and serves on multiple boards in the community including the airport authority, the pennsylvania oil and gas association and the drake well foundation. i congratulation him on this acheem and wish him continued success in serving his community in the years ahead. thank you, madam sp