you are coming out with a few book "on his own terms: the life of nelson rockefeller." talk about this. >> it opens with this scene, the defining moment in the history of the party and it certainly is a defining moment in the life of nelson rockefeller. this is history with the a face on it. this is nelson rockefeller, the man that the right loved to hate, in effect, taunting the majority in at a time cal palace over this particular issue of the force of the republican party on the issue of political extremism. remember, this is on national t.v. managers punched it out. it was out of prime time in the east. but they knew what the consequences could be in terms of demonstrating to viewers the meaning of extremism in this scene. host: 50 years ago tomorrow, governor nelson rockefeller of new york. >> precisely one year ago today, on july 14th, 1963, he warned the republican party is in real danger of subversion by a radical, well-financed, highly disciplined charge [applause.] it is we predict. the honest republican liberalism. with the accommodating the mainstream of rep

you are coming out with a few book "on his own terms: the life of nelson rockefeller."bout this. >> it opens with this scene, the defining moment in the history of the party and it certainly is a defining moment in the life of nelson rockefeller. this is history with the a face on it. this is nelson rockefeller, the man that the right loved to hate, in effect, taunting the majority in at a time cal palace over this particular issue of the force of the republican party on the issue of political extremism. remember, this is on national t.v. managers punched it out. it was out of prime time in the east. but they knew what the consequences could be in terms of demonstrating to viewers the meaning of extremism in this scene. host: 50 years ago tomorrow, governor nelson rockefeller of new york. >> precisely one year ago today, on july 14th, 1963, he warned the republican party is in real danger of subversion by a radical, well-financed, highly disciplined charge [applause.] it is we predict. the honest republican liberalism. with the accommodating the mainstream of republican

by april, nelson rockefeller had emerged as a strong contender. not until mid-may did the tide finally turning goldwater's favor. the california primary made his nomination all but certain. the primary season highlighted deep divisions in the republican party and in dirksen's senate caucus. it also proved to be a major headache for civil rights proponents. with senators dispersed around the country and republicans preoccupied with presidential politics, it was difficult to maintain an accurate vote count. even more troublesome was the fact that barry goldwater was among those who opposed cloture in all situations. in the wake of his primary win in california, five gop senators defected to support his stand on the gag rule. this left dirksen short of his necessary 25 votes. there was one other contextual item i will mention only in passing. this could be a whole talk in itself. at the same time the senate was locked and contentious argument over the bobby baker affair, a high-profile investigation of a former democratic party secretary charged with

nelson rockefeller, nixon was not in the initial tier. >> no, romney was running 8 points ahead of johnson. neil: how did nixon do it. >> i said sir you're taking a moratorium for six months on politics. romney is ahead of us. johnson. pat, let him chew on him for a little while. what he meant is the press corps would be working over nixon. let them go after the front-runner and he pulls back, and then when romney falls and crashes, he goes into new hampshire and had the goldwater people he lined up behind him and we lined up behind him and the nixon people, no way a left wing republican. neil: you think he got lucky. luck comes to those who work at it? >> if it hadn't been for the disaster in 1968, the tet offensive, bobby kennedy getting in, robert kennedy shot. neil: you argue had he not been killed he would not have gotten the democratic vote. >> humphrey would have gotten the nomination. neil: humphrey was way ahead in delegates. >> i don't think kennedy could have beaten richard nixon. he was too far to the left. neil: you honed in on the book, i'm not blowing you smoke, nixon got th

one of the reasons they didn't trust him in 1976 was because he had selected nelson rockefeller in 1974. gerald ford was a man of capitol hill. he new the town. he new the lemming slafb process. what he wanted to do was to compensate he wanted someone with administrative experience, someone who had enternational reptation and, also, not least of all, someone who had access to talent and rockefeller throughout his career had a reputation for surrounding himself with the best people. in addition to that, they had a personal relationship. they had worked together on refers new sharing. rockefeller was ininstrumental in leading the fight for revenue sharing and to keep new york precariously balanced and ford had been instrumental in seeing that it was passed in the house. so they had a personal relationship. and ford was completely comfortable. there were people who thought, you know, do you really want to put someone as electric, as c e charismatic as colorfoful and controversial as rockefeller on your ticket? don't you worry he might overshadow you? and ford was always comfortable enough

that's led by vice president nelson rockefeller, a direct response to the family jewels. it was also an effort to get ahead of any congressional response and to kind of take away the political steam for that. this commission looked at the c.i.a. mail openings, the domestic surveillance and very other aspects of it and then the pike commission is the house effort to really look at these processes in more details and see what's happening. the pike committee, there was significant tension from the beginning. the records are really just colorful accounts, shall we say, of the committee chairman who was seen as stalling and stonewalling. he gets removed in june of 1975 and he was replaced with pike and pike turned out to be a difficult character. so there's a lot of tension between the executive branch and the pike committee and, of course, the church committee. with the church committee, we have a bipartisan effort, chaired by frank children with senator tower from vice president as the vice chair. >> the n.s.a., the f.b.i., the c.i.a., other federal agencies, all submitted f

you know, i had worked for governor nelson rockefeller so when senator j rockefeller guessed involved with congress or sports, i think they are stepping over the line here. i also represent john grisma, the author of the perfect game. most people with basketball t-shirts don't even know who invented basketball. he was the first person, the only person whoever invented a sport. as far as congress and the craziness in the world today, our priorities are not in synch. everyone wants to speak, but from the hip. sit down, lay out a plan, you know, that can help the public. you know, sports is in the their own realm. they are doing a great job when these do these athletic coun sizzle, teach the young kids the morals of society and the fashion of playing a sporting. they are interactive. kids used to go out and play in the playgrounds and now, they a are' twitter and computers. they are indoors. everything has changed from my generation, but, you know, i just think that the congress should just put everything on hold, re-evaluate and then, you know, move on to the important issues. >> that's

he was a petty politician like or a low-grade one like hubert humphrey or george mcgovern or nelson rockefellerwould look up to for a long time to come. hence he wanted all that material to later write books about it and also to use it as a grist against his opponents, if somebody said you did this in your policy, he'd say i have a transcript of it, but of course the courts wouldn't let him keep the tapes, and it's really been his undoing. >> posterity cost him. douglas brinkley great to have you with us. of course be sure to watch "the sixties" tonight, 1968, tonight at 9:00 p.m. eastern and pacific only on cnn, watch it live, set your dvr. >>> coming up for us next, a man loses perhaps one of the most valuable possessions on earth, a red sox world series ring. that's bad. but who found it? well, in some ways that makes it even worse. the man has his ring back. that is "the good stuff." we'll explain coming up. you're driving along, having a perfectly nice day, when out of nowhere a pick-up truck slams into your brand new car. one second it wasn't there and the next second... boom! you've had