But Odegaard hurt us a lot there. We did not have to take the abuse that we did from Joe LaFleur (42). We didn’t have to do that, primarily because Odegaard simply didn’t have the guts to go to war. He doesn’t understand war in the sense of fighting for a principle. He understands fighting for politics. He does not understand fighting for principle.
Was the Reagan delegation pretty supportive?
No. Smith was probably in bed with them (43). I know his sympathies certainly were, no doubt about that. Packwood had his own problems (44). We had some help from some of the other representatives.
So Hatfield was involved (45)?
Yes, Hatfield was key to our salvation. Hatfield helped us a lot, and some of his staffers were absolutely wonderful in finessing what Odegaard was catching from these lackeys. Yes, Hatfield people were just outstanding. No question about it. They were there to be counted on. And we did. There was lots of telephoning on that. But he kept out of visible stuff. He didn’t do a lot of hollering, but he was around there with a few bucks here and there, quite a few. Yes, he was a major, major player.
When did you first catch wind of Cal Energy and their intentions?
I don’t remember.
Did it go back as far as ’85 or ’86, or was it more recent?
It went back early. We had some hints [of what was] going on in there. But those kinds of details I just don’t remember. We had some concern, as I think any area with hot springs like the Campbell property, Hawaii, or Yellowstone, would. I think we all worry a little bit about that kind of stuff. No, I couldn’t put a finger on it. We knew there was stuff going on. For a while, we had some pretty good spies in BLM. We had some people in the BLM office that were feeding us some stuff about some of the rotten things that were going on, and that proved very valuable (46).
