Another very strong image from the first day was giving my initial press conference in the morning - going down and finding out that everything I had said, the essence of what I had said, was wrong.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Early on I decided that I was going to lie to the press. The best approach to talking about my personal life was to lie.
I was scheduled to give my first official press conference that morning anyway, 'cause I was chairman of the Governors Energy Council and I was making a press conference with regard to energy policy.
The press gave me a voice too quickly, and that could have unsettled a man who had every right to feel he should be in control of the thing he had created.
The press keep asking me, 'What was your biggest mistake?' But if I had made a big mistake, they'd all be writing about it, wouldn't they?
I remember an interview so terrible with CNN's Jon Klein, I nearly blurted out, 'Forget it, I am a loser!' But I didn't need to say it. My face and posture did.
When words I uttered, believing them to be true, were exposed as false, I was constrained by my duties and loyalty to the President and unable to comment. But I promised reporters and the public that I would someday tell the whole story of what I knew.
The press made me something I really wasn't and I tried to live up to what they made me.
I look forward to these confrontations with the press to kind of balance up the nice and pleasant things that come to me as president.
I remember the first time I spoke to an editor. I thought I'd be sick, I was so nervous. The first time I spoke to a large group at a conference, I had the jitters for days beforehand.
Let me tell you what the truth is... I have learned one thing in life: there is no such thing as bad press. There is not. That's a fundamental truth. The more bad things said about you, the more power they give to you.