What we learned from Watergate

Some of the players included the moneymen: Porter, Magruder, Stans; former attorney general and CREEP campaign chair: Mitchell; the president’s hatchet man, Haldeman, and the burglars: James McCord and Gordon Liddy; Nixon's deputy director of communications, Ken Clawson, who admitted to writing the Canuck letter that ended Muskie’s campaign,

“The whole business was run by Haldeman, the money, everything. The whole thing was insulated, you’ll have to find out how. It involved the whole U.S. intelligence community: FBI, CIA, and Justice. It’s incredible. The cover-up had little to do with Watergate, mainly to do with covert operations. It leads everywhere,” as told to Bob Woodward by “Deep Throat,” in one of the meetings they had in the secret garage, in the movie, “All the President’s Men.”

It's amazing. It all started with a $25,000 check:

With respect to what initiated the Watergate story, Woodward tells it like this:

“In July, Carl (Bernstein) went to Miami, home of four of the burglars, on the money trail, and he ingeniously tracked down a local prosecutor and his chief investigator, who had copies of $89,000 in Mexican checks and a $25,000 check that had gone into the account of Bernard L. Barker, one of the burglars. We were able to establish that the $25,000 check had been campaign money that had been given to Maurice H. Stans, Nixon’s chief fundraiser, on a Florida golf course. The Aug. 1 story on this was the first to tie Nixon campaign money directly to Watergate.” 

Bernard Leon Barker was described by Wikipedia as “a Watergate burglar and undercover operative in CIA directed plots to overthrow Cuban leader Fidel Castro.” “Bernard Barker, who has died aged 92 of lung cancer, was arrested hiding under a desk, with $2,500 in new $100 bills in his pocket” (obituary reported by the Guardian, June 7, 2009).

Imagine seeing “Howard Hunt,” “WH” for Whitehouse, “Robert L. Mullen & Co. (public relations firm where Hunt worked), 1700 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, 20006,” written in the address book of one Bernard Barker (the address book of another burglar also included Hunt’s name) in one of the rooms at the Watergate hotel, on June 18, 1972. Hunt also worked for Charles Colson, White House Special Counsel. When the White House was asked about Hunt’s duties, the spokesperson/P.R. person denied any involvement by Colson in Watergate without being asked about Watergate.

People began lying to cover things up, like the White House librarian covering up Hunt’s involvement in digging up dirt on Chappaquiddick and Senator Ted Kennedy. Little did anyone know, imagine or conceive that this would open the door to an investigation that would eventually bring down a sitting president. What is it about campaigns that make politicians believe they can do anything they want?  

One by one, two obscure reporters, Bernstein and Woodward of the Washington post, began to connect the dots, first, by detecting an unusual degree of interest in the case of the Watergate burglars (some, having worked for the CIA) shown by the Washington elite, whose presence was manifested at the courthouse as counselors to the burglars, a certain “Mr. Starkey” and “Mr. Marcum” (as portrayed in the movie, “All the President’s Men”), and then by finding out information about Howard Hunt, Gordon Liddy, John Mitchell, and his resigning from CREEP, saying that he wanted to “spend more time with the family” (sound familiar?); numerous calls made between the burglars and the White House, tracing a $25,000 check from Barker’s account to the Committee to Reelect the President (CREEP). That check had purportedly been written by a major Republican fundraiser: Kenneth H. Dahlberg, who lived at 15137 Hidden Creek Rd.

According to Wikipedia (Kenneth H. Dahlberg), “It was later learned the $25,000 came from Dwayne Andreas, chief executive officer of Archer Daniels Midland, as an anonymous donation to the Nixon campaign. Woodward later commented that finding Dahlberg's check was a turning point in their investigation because it led to the discovery of how the Watergate burglars were financed through a money laundering scheme.” 

The money was given to Maurice Stans, the head of finance for Nixon. In the movie “All the President’s Men,” Bob Woodward was portrayed as talking to two people at once, Mr. Dahlberg, who had just admitted that he had given the money to Stans, which ended up in the account of a Watergate burglar, Bernard Barker, and Mr. Clark MacGregor, Chairman of the Committee to Re-elect the President (July to November 1972) following John Mitchell's resignation from the position in the Watergate political scandal, who denied ever knowing about the illegal money laundering scheme ($25,000 was a drop in the bucket, according to MacGregor, whose committee had just collected over sixty million to help Nixon get reelected). 

Four women: Judy Hoback (the “bookkeeper” who worked for CREEP), Debbie Sloan (Hugh Sloan’s wife), Marilyn Berger, and Martha Mitchell all led the charge against the assault against the truth: As told to the BBC: “We never thought six months ahead. We just thought "this is what we have to do today" because we have to live with ourselves and teach our children our values” (Debbie Sloan). THE PUSHBACK FROM THE OTHER SIDE WAS ALWAYS THAT THOSE DOING THE DIGGING WERE PARTISAN, OR DOING SO FOR POLITICAL REASONS, “SHOWING THEIR SYMPATHY FOR THE OTHER TICKET,” INTIMATING THAT IT WAS BAD FOR THE COUNTRY. 

Even the FBI was reluctant to disclose that it had been Mitchell who had controlled the fund all along. All interviews with people who worked for CREEP had always been conducted in the presence of an attorney who worked for CREEP, and not at the home of those who could potentially disclose incriminating information about the same, where they would feel more relaxed, and thus be more inclined to do so.

The sabotage was started a year before the break-in, led by one Donald Segretti (“The Head Coordinator”), as relayed by one, “Shipman,” a college acquaintance, an “old friend,” from Tennessee (stories planted included one “Scoop Jackson” having a bastard child, written on Muskie stationary, Humphrey going out with call girls, the Canuck letter on Muskie). 

The list of “15 names,” those who had access to the money, was “destroyed,” according to the bookkeeper, Hoback. In one two day period, six million in cash came in. Liddy asked for much of it after the break in. “Honest” Hugh Sloan (the “set-up guy” for John Mitchell), treasurer, ended up quitting. John Mitchell was portrayed in “All the President’s Men” as a real SOB. Gordon Liddy did a lot of the shredding, according to Hoback. “L “(Liddy), “P” (Porter-got more than $50,000), and “M” (Magruder) were the people who worked under Mitchell, who approved payments to Liddy.

Exposing Haldeman (as the “fifth man to control the fund”) was the proverbial nail on the coffin, even though serious doubt was cast on the Post’s story when it was later discovered that Sloan never implicated Haldeman in his sworn testimony, as Woodward and Berstein predicted Sloan would have to based on evidence they had uncovered from both the FBI and Sloan regarding Haldeman's involvement. It wasn’t that Woodward and Bernstein’s corroborated inferences about Haldeman were incorrect, it was that he, Sloan, was never asked about Haldeman!    

They had planted spies and stolen documents. It had been a Haldeman operation, with Mitchell having done covert stuff previously. “EVERYONE WAS INVOLVED,” ACCORDING TO DEEP THROAT, YET HALF OF THE COUNTRY HAD NEVER HEARD ABOUT WATERGATE.

What we learned from Watergate is that people who have done wrong will fight hard to keep the truth from coming out. They will blame others and make it seem like it is all a partisan operation. They will seek to end investigations, using patriotic jingo, like, “for the good of the country.” But the most important lesson we learned from Watergate is that in every part of this country, there are people representing diverse political views, yet whose moral compass is not defined by the same, but by a strong sense of right and wrong, and who are brave enough to tell their stories. We saw it then as we are seeing it now. God bless all.