U.S. Needs To Relearn The Lessons Of Watergate

The following editorial is by the editorial board of The Washington Post:

Fifty years ago Friday, burglars broke into the Watergate complex — and the rest is more than just history. The scandal that ended in President Richard M. Nixon’s resignation from office helped shape our modern politics, reforming the government, revitalizing the press and redefining the parties. Now, the country confronts another generation-defining crisis, and events half a century old feel as relevant as if they happened yesterday.

The Nixon White House’s illegal sabotage of its opponents and the coverup that followed were examples of government going wrong. What happened after these crimes showed government going almost exactly right: Congress investigated, the news media reported, the people read, watched, listened and spoke — and eventually, enough members of the Republican elite put country over party to lead to the departure of a corrupt, dangerous president.

Today, Congress is investigating again: A select committee in the House of Representatives is examining what happened on Jan. 6, 2021, when an armed mob stormed the U.S. Capitol seeking to overturn the results of a lawful election — in part because a president, Donald Trump, exhorted them to. Yet most members of the GOP appear afraid to utter a word against the ex-president, who continues to hold their party in his grip. Worse still, most refuse to engage at all in this truth-seeking effort, or even to put much stock in the concept of truth itself. Not only do the two sides today share little when it comes to policy or philosophy. In many cases, they don’t even share a reality.

So in 2022, as Congress tries to get to the facts when facts have gone out of fashion, is there anything to be learned from 1972? Scandals happened in the decades before, from the Red Scare, to the Bay of Pigsinvasion, to the misguided decisions that mired the nation in the Vietnam War; scandals happened in the years after, from the Iran-contra affair, to the claims that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, to the mental and physical torment of prisoners during the war on terrorism. All surely contributed to the erosion of trust in government to its depressing low of 20-some percent today.

Yet Watergate shook the nation as little else before and changed it — in some ways for better, by encouraging the press to hold government to account and the public to pay attention, as well as by ushering in legislation that served the same goals in areas such as campaign finance and intelligence, and in some ways for worse, by planting the seed of anti-government sentiment that has since grown like a strangling weed.

Jan. 6 has shaken the nation, too. The environment for needed change — whether updates to the Electoral Count Act and safeguards for voting rights, or a broader attempt by both parties to reconcile over common causes such as democracy and the rule of law — looks, admittedly, hostile. But enough people — from those in the chambers of Congress to those in any spot in the country near a television set or a newsroom desk — cared 50 years ago to make government work again when it appeared to have broken. The worst mistake anyone can make today is to give up on it because it has broken again.

Rather Says Russian Scandal Could Be As Big As Watergate

The following post from Dan Rather is well worth reading and thinking about:

Watergate is the biggest political scandal of my lifetime, until maybe now. It was the closest we came to a debilitating Constitutional crisis, until maybe now. On a 10 scale of armageddon for our form of government, I would put Watergate at a 9. This Russia scandal is currently somewhere around a 5 or 6, in my opinion, but it is cascading in intensity seemingly by the hour. And we may look back and see, in the end, that it is at least as big as Watergate. It may become the measure by which all future scandals are judged. It has all the necessary ingredients, and that is chilling.

When we look back at Watergate, we remember the end of the Nixon Presidency. It came with an avalanche, but for most of the time my fellow reporters and I were chasing down the story as it rumbled along with a low-grade intensity. We never were quite sure how much we would find out about what really happened. In the end, the truth emerged into the light, and President Nixon descended into infamy.

This Russia story started out with an avalanche and where we go from here no one really knows. Each piece of news demands new questions. We are still less than a month into the Trump Presidency, and many are asking that question made famous by Tennessee Senator Howard Baker those many years ago: "What did the President know, and when did he know it?" New reporting suggests that Mr. Trump knew for weeks. We can all remember the General Michael Flynn's speech from the Republican National Convention - "Lock her up!" in regards to Hillary Clinton. If Hillary Clinton had done one tenth of what Mr. Flynn had done, she likely would be in jail. And it isn't just Mr. Flynn, how far does this go?

The White House has no credibility on this issue. Their spigot of lies - can't we finally all agree to call them lies - long ago lost them any semblance of credibility. I would also extend that to the Republican Congress, who has excused away the Trump Administration's assertions for far too long.

We need an independent investigation. Damn the lies, full throttle forward on the truth. If a scriptwriter had approached Hollywood with what we are witnessing, he or she would probably have been told it was way too far-fetched for even a summer blockbuster. But this is not fiction. It is real and it is serious. Deadly serious. We deserve answers and those who are complicit in this scandal need to feel the full force of justice.

The "Deep Throat" Garage To Be Demolished

(This photo is from Getty Images and was found at the website of the Wall Street Journal.)

It looks like a historical site is fixing to bite the dust -- the garage where reporter Bob Woodward met with his inside source "Deep Throat" when trying to expose the scandalous behavior of the Nixon White House. Here is how the Wall Street Journal is reporting it:

A piece of history is slated to be demolished after a county board voted to allow the parking garage where "Deep Throat" relayed information that fueled the Watergate scandal to be torn down.

The five-member Arlington County Board voted unanimously Saturday to allow developer Monday Properties to move ahead with a plan to replace the 1960s-era office building in Rosslyn, Va., across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C., with a 28-story residential building of 274 units and a separate commercial building housing office and retail space.

The project also will include a grocery store, a public park, underground garage bike facilities, pedestrian walkways and improvements to nearby streets.

Monday Properties has said it hopes to start construction in early 2017. The county board and developer have promised to commemorate the site by keeping a historical marker added in 2011 and working with the community to find other ways to memorialize the site's history.

Death Of An American Hero

Last Thursday, a true American hero died. That hero was 95 year-old W. Mark Felt. Although almost all Americans know what this gentlemen did to save and serve his country in a time of crises, I doubt if most Americans could tell you who W. Mark Felt was. That's because he is much more widely known by a nickname he was given by two young reporters. Mr. Felt was "Deep Throat".

During the Nixon administration, Felt was the second in command at the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). He was the anonymous source that tipped reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein to the criminal actions of Nixon and his cronies, and guided them in their investigation of that administration.

Felt put his job and his reputation on the line because he felt that no one, including the president, is above the law. To protect Felt, Woodward and Bernstein gave him a nickname and never referred to him by anything except that nickname. They called him "Deep Throat" -- taking the moniker from a popular porno movie of the time.

The anonymous "Deep Throat" became famous after Woodward and Bernstein published their book All The President's Men, and a popular movie was made from the book. But Felt never tried to capitalize on that fame, and did not reveal that he was "Deep Throat" until 2005.

He didn't help the reporters to become famous or make a lot of money. He did it because he loved America and the Constitution she is built on. Our nation could use more men like W. Mark Felt.

This is what Carl Bernstein has to say about Felt:

"Watergate was a constitutional crisis in a criminal presidency. And he had the guts to say, 'Wait. The Constitution is more important in this situation than a president of the United States who breaks the law.' It's an important lesson, I think, for the country and for people in our business, as well."

Our nation could have used a "Deep Throat" from the Bush administration, which has turned out to be even worse than the Nixon administration.