Marshall found that there was no uniform approach. Among the agencies, only the NSA seemed to have a logical method for deciding what to send to the president. Every few months the NSA leadership would meet with its representative in the Situation Room to review current intelligence priorities, adjusting the topics as they deemed appropriate to changing world conditions and whatever seemed of interest to the president and Kissinger at the time. The NSA leadership would then inform its staff to prioritize their efforts to obtain intelligence regarding these topics.

The CIA presented a startling contrast to the NSA. The Agency (as it was often called) made little effort to ascertain what topics might be of most interest to the president. Marshall was told that the CIA tracked issues by using stories run in the New York Times as a gauge for what was important and what was not. Given this sophomoric approach, and his discussions with the CIA representatives, Marshall concluded that the Agency’s senior managers made little or no effort to ensure that their products addressed Nixon’s interests and needs. Indeed they almost seemed hostile toward the president.

Marshall next began examining the CIA’s premier intelligence product, the President’s Daily Report. As the name suggests, it was dispatched to the White House the first thing every morning. He gathered up the reports that had been provided during Nixon’s first six months in office, sat down, and began reading through them. He knew that the president had a strong habit of making marginal notes on everything he read. As Marshall worked his way through the reports he noticed that the president’s notes became fewer and fewer until, finally, there were none. Nixon, Marshall realized, had stopped reading the reports.