I’ll never do that again if the Lord ever gives me another chance.” He has enough sense to know enough not to rely on what I said, so I didn’t hurt anything except myself. It won’t affect his judgment one way or the other. He just wanted to hear what he wanted to hear. I said, “The comforting part of it is that I know Johnson doesn’t give a damn what I think, so it didn’t affect his judgment at all. I felt so dirty about it and ashamed of myself that I called my wife and told her what I had done. But as we finished 30 minutes up there in his bedroom, as I was leaving he said, “Bob, what do you think about my policies?” This was during the Vietnam war, and I told him what I thought he wanted to hear, not 10 percent of which I believed, but it’s what I knew the President wanted to hear. He “had my number” and knew it and I knew it. STRAUSS: Even after he was old and sick, when he called on the phone I was still intimidated, and I was strong and young and successful. Instead of feeling a sense of inferiority, I rather had a sense of superiority and kind of hated the fact that I couldn’t mention it it would be in poor taste. But my mother convinced me that I was one of God’s chosen people as a Jew, and I can remember being kind of embarrassed walking around town realizing I was one of God’s chosen people, and I couldn’t say anything about it. I couldn’t spell it when I got through high school, much less then. STRAUSS: People ask me what it was like being Jewish, and I say, well, I really had no Jewish background, except my mother insisted that we know we were Jewish and have some respect for our faith and a feel for it. Diplomatic History On Being Jewish in Texas: You can also read his account of Watergate. Bush, and his time in Moscow, including his speech supporting Mikhail Gorbachev and his own less-than-stellar grades on Russian culture.

He spoke with ADST’s Charles Stuart Kennedy beginning in October 2002 about his impressions of LBJ, Richard Nixon, George H.W. Strauss Center for International Security and Law at the University of Texas is named in his honor. He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1981 the Robert S.

Strauss founded the renowned law firm now known as Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld in 1945, which has grown to be one of the largest in the world. presidents over three administrations and for both major U.S. Ambassador to the Soviet Union, and later Russia, in 1991 and advised and represented U.S. He served as Chairman of the Democratic National Committee between 19 and served under President Jimmy Carter as the U.S.Trade Representative and Special Envoy to the Middle East. Strauss is one of the giants of Twentieth Century American politics and diplomacy, whose service dates back to Lyndon Johnson’s first Congressional campaign in 1937.

Erie Tales by Bob Strauss