Jack Kennedy - Chris Matthews [126]
“Do you want some makeup?” Hewitt asked Kennedy. Hearing the Democrat’s “no,” Richard Nixon also declined it, ignoring the fact that his opponent had just spent days campaigning in the California sun and that he, himself, hadn’t fully regained his health. Kennedy’s people were taking no chances. “I was in the greenroom,” recalled Wilson, “and they were playing with him, asking him all kinds of questions. Bobby was there. Anyway, I said okay, we’ve got to close it down, he needs about ten minutes before he goes on to get quiet and I’ve got to put some makeup on him.
“Ted Rogers, who was Nixon’s guy, said, ‘When’s your guy going to get makeup on?’ And I said, ‘Well, after your guy’s going to get it.’ Rogers was wary. If the other guy didn’t ask for it, his guy wasn’t going to. ‘Nixon’s not going to get his makeup,’ he said, ‘until John Kennedy does.’ And I said, ‘Well, it looks like it’s a Mexican standoff.’ “
Both candidates now retired to their separate rooms. Wilson understood the dangers of going on without makeup, even for the already telegenic Kennedy. “So I went back and I said, ‘You know, we’ve got to do makeup. You’ve got a great tan; you look fine.’ But the lights in 1960 in studios were just broad and heavy, not like anything you see in studios today. They were just hot as hell. And if you put a little bit of makeup all over the face, it closed the pores. They wouldn’t sweat.”
Finally, Wilson quietly ran out to get makeup, and when he returned, cleared the room of the others. “And the last thing Bob Kennedy said after I said everybody’s got to get out, was ‘Kick him in the balls, Jack.’ It was a beautiful moment, because that was the whole strategy.”
The Kennedy guys had one more trick up their sleeve. Nixon was nervously waiting for the clock to tick down to the debate’s starting time. The countdown commenced over the loudspeaker. “Five minutes to airtime.” Nixon was staring at the studio door. Now there were only three minutes left. As Wilson described it, “Nixon was still watching the door, as tense a man as I had ever seen. By then, I was sure that no one had summoned Kennedy, and I was about to dash after him, when the door swung open. Kennedy walked in and took his place, barely glancing at Nixon. Kennedy had played the clock perfectly. He had thrown his opponent off stride. He’d set him up for the kill.”
In fact, Nixon may have arrived already off his stride, for reasons other than his impaired health. His running mate, Henry Cabot Lodge—Jack’s old opponent, who should have known better—had warned him to try to “erase the assassin image.” In other words, Nixon was not to be his hardfisted self, but rather more of a gentleman, a Nixon who’d be unrecognizable, say, to those citizens of California who’d seen him in action against Voorhis and Helen Douglas. “Kick him in the balls” would have been more useful counsel to him as well.
“The candidates need no introduction,” the moderator, Howard K. Smith, announced to 70 million watching Americans. Richard Nixon, for his part, looked ill at ease, unshaven, middle-aged. Jack Kennedy, by contrast, seemed poised, with his legs crossed and his hands folded on his lap. Nixon sat in his chair awkwardly, his legs side by side, his hands dangling from the chair arms. He was wearing a gray suit that didn’t flatter him in the harsh light, and soon he would be perspiring profusely.
By agreement, the focus of this first encounter was domestic policy. Believing the size of the audiences would grow with each debate, the Nixon people had insisted on saving foreign policy until last. In his opening statement, Kennedy showed he was intent on playing the game strictly by his rules, but hardly by Nixon’s plan. “Mr. Smith, Mr. Nixon,