- I've only got one life motto, run when chased.
Don't order fish at a steakhouse.
Undertakers and chauffeurs are the only people
who should be allowed by law to wear black suits.
White shirt plus tan face equals confidence.
Those are just a few of the rules
Roger Stone lives his life by.
Hell, he's written a book about those rules
titled, quote, Stone's Rules,
How to Win at Politics, Business, and Style.
Now, at the moment, Stone is less well-known
for his thoughts on double-breasted suits,
his thoughts are, quote, never wear
a double breasted suit and a button-down collar end quote,
then he is for his arrest and his indictment on charges
that he lied to Congress and tampered with witnesses
regarding what he knew when about emails stolen by Russia
during the 2016 campaign and subsequently
posted on the WikiLeaks website.
Whew, alright, let me start from the beginning-ish.
Roger Stone's first brush with politics
came in 1960 when we was in first grade.
He supported John F. Kennedy in that race
because, in Stone's words, he had better hair than Nixon.
Fact check, that is true.
Stone told his classmates,
remember we're talking about first grade here people,
that if Nixon won, he'd make them
all go to school on Saturdays.
Ah!
In the class's mock election, Kennedy won easily,
a victory that Stone took credit for.
Kennedy swept the election, he once said,
because of disinformation I spread about Nixon.
It was a kind of first experience.
A decade later, though, Stone was actually working
with Nixon's 1972 reelection campaign as a junior scheduler,
and because he is Roger Stone,
he was doing a lot more than just scheduling.
Stone adopted a pseudonym, does that sound like
anyone else you know, and made a donation
in the name of the Young Socialists Alliance
to Pete McCloskey, the California congressman
primarying Nixon an antiwar message.
Then Stone sent proof of his donation
to a New Hampshire newspaper as evidence
that McCloskey was in league with the socialists.
It was at the end of that decade
that the paths of Stone and Donald Trump crossed.
Stone was running a trio of northeastern states
for Ronald Reagan's 1980 presidential bid when he scored
a meeting with longtime Trump mentor, Roy Cohn in 1979.
Cohn told Stone he had to meet Trump.
They met, and Trump promised support
for Reagan, sending Stone to his father.
Fred Trump promised Stone $200,000 in donations,
and soon checks for $1,000 each,
the maximum donation under the law at that point,
began pouring into Reagan's headquarters.
Stone spent the 80's on Reagan's campaign team,
and then in 1988 served
as a senior consultant to then Pice president
George H.W. Bush's presidential campaign.
During that time, he also started a political consulting
and lobbying business with the Republican campaign
Lee Atwater and, wait for it, Paul Manafort.
By 1996, Stone was back on the campaign trail
as a senior advisor to Bob Dole's presidential bid.
Now that gig ended when the National Enquirer,
everything old is new again, published a story head line
Top Dole Aide Caught in Group Sex Ring.
The piece alleged that Stone had ads
in a magazine called Local Swing Fever.
Stone called the whole thing a set up
but resigned from the Dole campaign anyway.
That campaign largely ended Stone's relevance
as a mainstream Republican campaign guru.
Which dovetailed nicely with Stone's
increasing role in Trumps orbit.
In 1999, Stone tried to gin up excitement
for the idea of Trump running as the Reform party nominee
for president but trump decided against it
and seemingly against Stone.
Roger is a stone cold loser.
Trump told the New Yorker.
He always tries taking credit for things he never did.
Hmm, and yet, Trump couldn't quit Stone,
allowing the self-proclaimed dirty trickster
to remain in his orbit
as the billionaire business man got more and more serious
about running for office.
A quick look at Stone's rules shows why.
The two men shared a similar view on how to succeed
in life and in politics.
Considered these Stone's Rules.
Attack, attack, attack never defend.
Nothing is on the level.
Lay low, play dumb, keep moving.
And finally and most importantly quoting Nixon,
the only thing worse in politics
than being wrong is being boring.
Now given that sort of mind meld, it's not surprising
that when Trump formally entered the presidential race,
Stone was installed as the campaigns top strategist.
It was also not at all surprising
that less than two months later, Stone was out.
Trump said that he had fired Stone.
Stone said that he quit
because of course that's what they both said.
Stone still didn't leave Trump's orbit though
and in the summer of 2016, he allegedly was
tasked by a senior Trump campaign official,
we still don't know who that is, with reaching out
to Wikileaks and seeing if he could learn anything
about the groups plans to post those hack emails
from the democratic national committee
and Hilary Clinton campaign chairman, John Podesta.
Sidebar, we now know those emails were stolen
by the Russians as part of their effort
to sway the election for Donald Trump.
Now according to the indictment from special counsel,
Robert Mueller's office, Stone repeatedly lied to congress
about his ties to Wikileaks
and tried to get other witnesses to do the same.
Stone has pleaded not guilty to the charges
and the White House has said quote
this has nothing to do with the President, end quote.
Maybe but Stones history suggests there's reason to believe
the Mueller indictment is a lot more fact
than it is fiction.
How will Stone and Trump handle whatever comes
next from Mueller?
Stone's Rules, again, come to the rescue.
Admit nothing, deny everything, launch counterattack.
And that is the point.
We make new Point episodes every week.
Check back every Tuesday and every Thursday
for the latest and greatest in political videos.