Pat Buchanan: The Woodward and Bernstein Legend Is Unraveling
The Nixon-hating legends at The Washington Post are furious with author Jeff Himmelman for pulling the curtains back on their own machinations. You can see the damage in Pat Buchanan’s latest column on how Watergate was over-inflated in the history books.
In a taped interview in 1990, revealed now in "Yours in Truth: A Personal Portrait of Ben Bradlee," the former Washington Post executive editor himself dynamites the myth: "Watergate ... (has) achieved a place in history ... that it really doesn't deserve. ... The crime itself was really not a great deal. Had it not been for the Nixon resignation, it really would have been a blip in history." Buchanan enjoyed how Bob Woodward was put on the other side of the microscope:
Still, what is most arresting about "Yours in Truth" is the panic that gripped Bob Woodward when Jeff Himmelman, the author and a protege of Woodward, revealed to him the contents of the Bradlee tapes.
Speaking of "All the President's Men," Bradlee had said, "I have a little problem with Deep Throat," Woodward's famous source, played in the movie by Hal Holbrooke, later revealed to be Mark Felt of the FBI.
Bradlee was deeply skeptical of the Woodward-Felt signals code and all those secret meetings. He told interviewer Barbara Feinman:
"Did that potted palm thing ever happen? ... And meeting in some garage. One meeting in the garage. Fifty meetings in the garage ... there's a residual fear in my soul that that isn't quite straight."
Bradlee spoke about that fear gnawing at him: "I just find the flower in the window difficult to believe and the garage scenes. ...
"If they could prove that Deep Throat never existed ... that would be a devastating blow to Woodward and to the Post. ... It would be devastating, devastating."
When Himmelman showed him the transcript, Woodward "was visibly shaken" and repeated Bradlee's line -- "there's a residual fear in my soul that that isn't quite straight" -- 15 times in 20 minutes.
Woodward tried to get Bradlee to retract. He told Himmelman not to include the statements in his book. He pleaded. He threatened. He failed.
That Woodward became so alarmed and agitated that Bradlee's bullhockey detector had gone off over the dramatized version of "All the President's Men" suggests a fear in more than just one soul here.
Buchanan is even more startled by the revelation that Carl Bernstein lured one of the Watergate jurors into an illegal interview, The Washington Post's lawyer, Edward Bennett Williams, had to go to see Judge John Sirica to prevent their being charged with jury tampering.
Had one of Nixon's men, with his approval, breached the secrecy of the Watergate grand jury, and lied about it, that aide would have gone to prison and that would have been an article of impeachment. Conduct that sent Nixon men to the penitentiary got the Post's men a stern admonition. Welcome to Washington, circa 1972.
Earlier in the month, Himmelman complained about the harassment of his former employers and friends at The Daily Beast:
During the past two weeks, my former boss Bob Woodward has compared me to Richard Nixon, referred to me in the pages of The Washington Post and The New York Times as “dishonest,” and generally attempted to discredit me and my authorized biography of Bradlee, Yours in Truth, which was released by Random House last Tuesday. The prevailing narrative in nearly every description of my work thus far, much of which has been influenced by Bob, is that I “betrayed” my former mentor to write a cheap “tell-all.” The New York Times, in a Styles section piece published Sunday, compares my book, a 473-page, deeply researched portrait of Bradlee, to the novel The Devil Wears Prada.
Does anyone else find it amusing that Woodward would attack someone else for betraying their colleagues for a "cheap tell-all"? Isn't that what Woodward encourages people to do for his own cheap tell-alls?
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Comments
In one respect the Crime of Watergate was huge
Submitted by needle on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 8:24am.
The crime I am talking about is how the thoroughly biased media bared its teeth and lost all self-control in their rabid determination to wreck the Nixon administration in revenge for his being elected in a huge landslide, against their wishes.
- Looking forward to the self-annihilation of the Manipulated Stories Machine.
Good morning needle
Submitted by cocodrie on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 8:36am.
You're correct and they tried the same with President Reagan but he was a true statesman.
Jesus Loves You so much He died for you
getting their man
Submitted by MidAmerica on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 8:41am.
The Watergate affair was not an example of Presidential abuse of power but an example of media abuse of power. The media hated Nixon and used a coordinated effort to finally create an atmosphere that eventually drove Nixon out of office. Nixon was no saint but many Presidents before and after were guilty of more serious wrongdoings than what Nixon did regarding Watergate.
Nixon had more political support while in office than what obama can even dream of.
I remember watching "All the
Submitted by Bettendor on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 9:01am.
I remember watching "All the President's Men" in my journalism class in high school and all of us being inspired to want to be reporters. Of course, thinking back on the whole situation now, MidAmerica may have a point on the media's hatred for Nixon. Think about it: How much investigation was done into the Clintons' involvement in the suspicious death of people like Vince Foster? Granted, it was later proven false (http://www.snopes.com/politics/clintons/bodycount.asp), but if Bill Clinton had been a Republican, we would still be reading about it. How much investigation by the media have we seen on our current President's alleged dealings?
blind in one eye
Submitted by MidAmerica on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 9:20am.
Had the Nixon administration been tied to something like the Fast and Furious (much more serious than Watergate) a program that resulted in the death of a border agent the media would have been in non-stop hysterics trying to figure out who knew what and when did they know it. The media attack dogs would not have stopped until there was a resignation or an impeachment.
A President having a 'D' after his name means the media is your private security detail.
Suspicion about Vince Foster’s death false?
Submitted by needle on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 9:37am.
You may buy Snope’s rhetorical refutation of all of the irregularities surrounding the so-call suicide of Vince Foster, but there are millions who do not buy it at all, nor would practically anyone fully apprised of all the facts never discussed by the media. Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, a British journalist without a partisan agenda, wrote about it including Ken Starr in The Secret Life of Bill Clinton. Check it out and see if you still buy Snope’s refutation.
BTW Snopes poses as a fact checker, and sometimes it is but not always, especially where liberals are being impugned.
- Looking forward to the self-annihilation of the Manipulated Stories Machine.
It was very considerate of Vince Foster
Submitted by cocodrie on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 9:50am.
It was very considerate of Vince Foster to clean up the crime scene of all the blood and erverthing after he comitted suicide. It was also very nice of him to do it just before he was to testify against the Clintons.
Jesus Loves You so much He died for you
I have noticed
Submitted by misterbee241 on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 10:27am.
Snopes seems to be a little defensive of liberals in their postings. I dont go there as much as I used to. After all, what makes Snopes credible? Why do they have the inside info on urban legends?
After all, what makes Snopes credible?
Submitted by AFVet on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 3:18pm.
"After all, what makes Snopes credible?" Nothing at all. Snopes is not credible. Might as well get information for wikipedia.com, very biased and not credible.
I don't believe the Foster
Submitted by Semus on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 10:23am.
I don't believe the Foster saga has been fully vetted at all.
I remember well
Submitted by misterbee241 on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 10:23am.
the Watergate days, and the time leading up to it. The liberal democrats and their media hated Nixon with an unbelievable deep seated contempt and hatred. Nixon was not really a conservative, but he was anti-communist. And his anti-communism is what, I believe, got him in trouble with the democrats and media.
On top of that, back then there were no alternative news sources. All we had were the network news and news papers like the Washington Post and the New York Times. I dont think a single major newspaper in the country stood up for Nixon. Even that little liberal rag of a hometown newspaper we had here was against him.
But the truth has a funny way of coming out over time. Time really does wound all heels.
Vince Foster is an odd choice for Exhibit A in making a case
Submitted by Jer on Wed, 05/30/2012 - 5:03pm.
of high-level coverup and insufficient scrutiny during the Clinton presidency, considering that Foster's death may very well be the most investigated incident concerning a prominent administration figure in all of American history.
There were no less than three official investigations--including those conducted by the U.S. Park Service and the FBI--all reaching the same conclusion: Suicide.
Additionally, the first Watergate prosecutor, Republican Robert Fisk, also determined it was death by suicide--a finding which reportedly was one of the reasons he was replaced by Starr. Of course, Republican Ken Starr likewise eventually declared that Foster shot himself.
But that's not all! Two separate Republican congressional committees--one chaired by Dan "Pumpkin" Burton--conducted their own investigations of Foster's death. Alas, they too, reluctantly one surmises, were compelled to concede it was indeed a suicide.
Just how many investigations would it take to satisfy the conspiracy buffs?
Jer
It was always obvious to me
Submitted by celator on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 9:12am.
It was always obvious to me that the WP inflated, pumped up and otherwise spun the Watergate thing into a "see how awful these Republicans are" story. That was the whole point. There was never a "deep throat" as described by the bobsie twins Woodward and Berstein. They might have had a source, but it was not Mark Felt.
If Bradlee had serious misgivings about how his reporters were handling the story at the time, why didn't he challenge them to verify what they were writing? Because he made a bargain with the devil: use these two clown reporters in order to bring down Nixon. That was his primary goal.
Allegation = Destruction
Submitted by Chris Norman on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 9:27am.
I'm trying to recall if there was any other concerted attempts by the media to bring down a politician before Watergate but I cannot recall any. If that's the case, Watergate and the media's non-stop reporting on every last rumor and accusation on it and other non-related events in the Nixon Administration started the trend of just allegations being enough to bring a Republican down.
The press machine was also used against LBJ.
Submitted by drsamherman on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 9:44am.
The media clearly did not like LBJ, because he was not Kennedy and did not carry any of the "Camelot" mystique that turned out to be a huge delusion. The press did not like the fact that he was a Texan, still blamed him somehow for JFK's death in his home state and especially did not like him turning his focus away from appeasing and accommodating them. I am not a fan of LBJ by any means, but the history of the differences in press coverage for LBJ vs. JFK is pretty startling for just how quickly the tone changed and how vicious it became.
What finally brought down LBJ was the press jumping on the anti-Vietnam bandwagon, and they rode him out of office. What also brought the press against Nixon was the fact that the alternative, Hubert Humphrey, was about as palatable as roadkill.
They lost that "Kingmaker" ability with Reagan and thought they had recovered it with Gore. Problem is that Al was so boring and such a self-righteous moron that they were choking while pretending to support him. It always looked like Tom Brokaw (himself a boring moron) was choking while he was pronouncing Al Gore's name. As for Dan Rather, that sociopath would not care if he said the name "Pol Pot"--his obsession was against having another Republican president and he didn't give a damn who the opponent was. It resurfaced with the non-vetting of Barely Zero and the non-entity of John McCain. The target became Sarah Palin, who provided an easy surrogate target.
Now, the old media is in a tizzy over the ability of the internet to reach millions instantaneously and without their propaganda checks. It drives them crazy and their relevance is dying faster every day.
I remember all that
Submitted by misterbee241 on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 11:47am.
I remember all that well.
Every night on the news, it was riots in the streets, American body counts, and "hey, hey, hey, LBJ, how many kids have you killed today?
Yep. Every night.
I have always been convinced
Submitted by misterbee241 on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 10:15am.
the Watergate "crime" was pretty much a big nothing. What was important, though, was the opportunity to take down a well known anti-communist President. THAT, I think was Nixon's crime in the eyes of the media.
Nixon
Submitted by ladeflippinda on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 11:55am.
The "crime" was something out of the ordinary. Nixon was a corrupt president. Let's not forget his cover-up of the crime, which the media did not invent.
That is what got the impeachment going. All he had to do was come forward and none of this would have happened.
But Nixon lied, fired the AG for not caving into his demands.
Nixon stood up to the Russians over Israel, but went on his knees when he visited China.
I don't disagree with you,
Submitted by mattm on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 12:49pm.
I don't disagree with you, but this story is about the duplicitous media. Gulf of Tonkin was a far bigger scandal than Watergate, as was that fear-mongering "daisy cutter" ad Bill Moyers came up with before he started his career in "journalism." Yet, the media covered for the demonrats.
This is the danger of having a politically activist press. They cover for one side, which allows that side to become so corrupt that it actually endangers the people of this country, while they blow the tiniest little errors of the "opposition" way out of proportion, and even promote lies like "Bush Lied, People Died," (As if Clinton and the democrats hadn't been warning of Saddam Hussein's WMD for at least two years prior to Bush ever taking office) which creates an atmosphere of distrust, which also endangers the country.
This isn't about whether Nixon was corrupt, it's about the media, especially the Washington Poop, being corrupt.
Nixon campaign or Walter Cronkite - who's bugging is worse?
Submitted by Gary Hall on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 1:48pm.
That one political campaign tries to bug the offices of the other's campaign comes as no surprise - and indeed, it was the cover-up in the Watergate scandal was the crime that stands as what was truly unacceptable - but which is worse, campaign's doing the bugging, or the most trusted man in the news doing it?
Howard Kurtz writes: "he [Walter Cronkite] secretly bugged a committee room at the 1952 GOP convention . ."
I'm not surprised at either; however, I'm more pissed off at Cronkite and the hypocrisy which defines our national media on just about every issue under the sun.
(;~/ gary
PS: I'm also struck by this excerpt in Howie Kurtz's column (my bold):
Four years later, after Cronkite had belatedly turned against LBJ’s Vietnam War, he met privately with Robert Kennedy. “You must announce your intention to run against Johnson, to show people there will be a way out of this terrible war,” he said in Kennedy’s Senate office. Soon afterward, Cronkite got an exclusive interview in which Kennedy left the door open for a possible run—the very candidacy that the anchor had urged him to undertake. (Kennedy announced three days later.) I am shaking my head at the spectacle of a network anchor secretly urging a politician to mount a White House campaign—and then interviewing him about that very question. This was duplicitous, a major breach of trust.
I'm sorry - well, perhaps the difference in the 2008 campaign, is that there really was no secrecy involved in the entire national MSM's urging and support for Obama for President. And certainly, why would the name of Fareed Zakaria [as only one example] pop up in my little head right now? Isn't this the M.O. of our national media on most any issue today?
Joe McCarthy was the first.
Submitted by Rightfromthestart on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 3:44pm.
I continue to defend Joe MaCarthy, he was the first victim of the leftist/media pile on. I even heard Glenn Beck refer to people being 'rounded up'. Senators can't 'round people up' It simply never happened. If it did, where is the testimony of the 'survivors' of the McCarthy horror. All McCarthy could do was deny someone a security clearance and thus a cushy government job. This doesn't ruin someone's life! Get a job outside of government. Read M Stanton Evans book 'Blacklisted by History'. All the horror stories of the 'McCarthy Era' lack specificity, who exactly among the innocent was harmed? It is no accident that the Hollywood - media complex keeps conflating the HUAC/Hollywood Ten and Alger Hiss stories where people actualy did go to jail with the 'McCartyhy Era' which was about security clearances and blaming it all on McCarthy who came along 5 years after the other two. Why? As above with Nixon, he was an anti-communist this is an unforgivable sin to the left.
What does this mean?
Submitted by JLin on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 5:05pm.
Can we finally put Watergate in it's proper minor perspective compared to the real crimes of the Obama cabal? And what of Ben Bradlee? What editor would keep his mouth shut when he knew the truth and allow a travesty like this?
All these characters need to be held up to public contempt.
A conservative "Deep Throat"
Submitted by James Youngblood on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 5:12pm.
Can you imagine a conservative reporter in the early 1970's going to his editor and explaining he has a story about a Democrat President that will show this Presidents administration is up to political high-jinx. Then imagine the editor asking the reporter what does he have as evidence of this story. The reporter responds that he has a secret source that he refers to as "Deep Throat". This "Deep Throat" insists on remaining anonymous but the reporter has the utmost confidence that "Deep Throat" is telling the truth. The editor may ask how does this "Deep Throat" know so much about the President and these so called political high-jinx. The reporter responds by telling his editor that "Deep Throat" told him he knows so much because he is in a position of the government to have such knowledge. The editor then asks the reporter if he can substantiate the information provided by "Deep Throat" with any other source. The reporter responds that he has another reporter working with him that will substantiate everything "Deep Throat" says. The editor then says "Oh, another reporter, that's good enough for me. We'll start reporting everything "Deep Throat" provides to us in tomorrows headlines."
This scenario did happen, but it was not a conservative reporter nor a Democrat President. The reporters were liberal (Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein), the newspaper was liberal (Washington Post) and blatantly anti-Nixon. "Deep Throat" was never revealed during the constant reporting of Nixon's political high-jinx. When the supposed "Deep Throat" was finally revealed many years later, it was learned he was not in a position to know the majority of the accusations that was attributed to his knowledge. But this didn't matter to the major media. The goal of punishing the Nixon administration had been attained. They even got a bonus due to Nixon's reaction to the circumstances. His efforts to cover-up the mess his lower echelon staff had made resulted in his resigning from the Presidency.
J. Youngblood
unlike a certain president
Submitted by MidAmerica on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 5:21pm.
But one thing about Nixon, he never was impeached for lying under oath.
And furthermore...
Submitted by GeneralAl on Wed, 05/30/2012 - 7:44am.
And furthermore, there was not enough evidence to convict Nixon of anything. As bad as everyone regards him, he cared enough about this country to avoid a long drawn out process that the Democrats would have made out of the impeachment procedures that he resigned honorably, not in disgrace as the press always reports. One more thing, he got our butts out of Vietnam, a DEMOCRAT WAR.unlike that ruthless scumbag, LBJ,he was our President!
"Old Soldiers never die, they just fade away"!
down with the ship
Submitted by MidAmerica on Tue, 05/29/2012 - 5:33pm.
But what we must not forget that it was not Bernstein or the Washington Post who 'got' Richard Nixon. It was Nixon's own secret Oval Office recordings that he could have destroyed and nothing could have been proven. But Nixon wanted them preserved for their historical significance.
Just imagine the porn we could have gotten out of the Clinton Oval Office.
Richard Nixon, the insecure and paranoid psychopath
Submitted by Jer on Wed, 05/30/2012 - 4:31pm.
presided over an administration absolutely awash in criminality--a veritable felony industry in which he was involved up to his eyeballs. The conspiracy to obstruct justice, buy silence, pay hush money, authorize break-ins, interfere with FBI probes, direct the destruction of evidence, mislead federal investigators, and engage in various other acts of wrongdoing was not the partisan fantasy of his "enemies", but a cold hard reality firmly established by irrefutable evidence.
Mr. Nixon's defense: As long as the president does it, it's not illegal.
Sorry Pat, but if not for a pardon--which I thought then and still think was the right thing to do--your boss would very likely have spent substantial time behind bars.
Jer
And yet
Submitted by HockeyKid on Thu, 05/31/2012 - 7:52am.
the late Chuck Colson spent time in prison as a convicted felon for the single act of holding one FBI file on one political opponent of Nixon. The Clintons had at least 50 of the exact same files FBI files on their "enemies" that they "lost" and later found--remember?--in Hillary's closet. But no ramifications for the Clintons, Woodward and Bernstein could care less, etc., etc.
"Beauty is only skin deep, but liberal's to the bone." - me
Nope...I don't remember.
Submitted by Jer on Thu, 05/31/2012 - 7:05pm.
I think you may be confusing the FBI files controversy--btw, Clintons were cleared by Starr, cleared by his successor Robert Ray, and the federal judge dismissed the ridiculous lawsuit filed by Larry Klayman--with the snit over Hillary's Rose law firm billing records.
Colson copped a plea to a lesser charge. Nixon WH tapes released years later showed Colson was heavily involved in obstruction of justice conspiracy. However, his great work during and after his seven-month incarceration more than atoned for his misdeeds.
Jer
Was Nixon as bad as Post article contends? In a word no.
Submitted by piblogger on Sat, 06/09/2012 - 9:37am.
Was Nixon As Bad As Woodward and Bernstein Contend? (http://wp.me/pydAP-2Y1)
I personally do not believe that this is the case. However, and by his own admission, his was The Presidency that set into motion the overriding cynicism that plagues the political process to this day.