All the President's Men

Journalism at it's best - both interesting and educational to read about the work that exposed Nixon and his accomplices. Four decades later, it's more relevant than ever. ( )

The possible parallels to modern times engender hope. ( )

The details—how the reporting worked, how it all unfolded—are what makes this story fascinating, but they can also be overwhelming. There's a lot to keep track of. Although not the main point, I also learned some about the Watergate scandal.

> Woodward had worked for the Post for only nine months and was always looking for a good Saturday assignment, but this didn't sound like one. A burglary at the local Democratic headquarters was too much like most of what he had been doing—investigative pieces on unsanitary restaurants and small-time police corruption

> On June 17, 1972, less than a month before the Democratic convention, the President stood ahead of all announced Democratic candidates in the polls by no less than 19 points. Richard Nixon's vision of an emerging Republican majority that would dominate the last quarter of the century, much as the Democrats had dominated two previous generations, appeared possible.

> Deep Throat nodded confirmation as Woodward ran down items on a list of tactics that he and Bernstein had heard were used against the political opposition: bugging, following people, false press leaks, fake letters, canceling campaign rallies, investigating campaign workers' private lives, planting spies, stealing documents, planting provocateurs in political demonstrations

> Bernstein would count to 10. If there was any reason for the reporters to hold back on the story, the lawyer should hang up before 10. If he was on the line after 10, it would mean the story was okay. … Bernstein should not have used the silent confirm-or-hang-up method with the Justice Department lawyer. The instructions were too complicated. (Indeed, they learned, the attorney had gotten the instructions backward and had meant to warn them off the story.)

> Sloan's message seemed clear, though not explicit. Haldeman had controlled the fund; the matter had not come up during his grand-jury testimony. Either the reporters had misunderstood what Sloan had told them about the grand jury earlier that week or Sloan had misinterpreted their question. The telephone conversation with Sloan was at least a hopeful sign; if the reporters could re-establish beyond any doubt that Haldeman controlled the fund, and could explain the error, their credibility might not be totally destroyed. … The mistake had jeopardized all of their earlier reporting, he believed. The stories had been building. Eventually the White House would have had to yield. Now the pressure was off the White House because the burden of proof had shifted back to the Post.

> Several people suggested they might be more talkative after Nixon's victory. The promise of easier access to information after November 7 was not the only reason the reporters wanted the election behind them. With Nixon's re-election, the White House would be forced to abandon the line that the Post was working for the election of McGovern.

> Around this time, the White House began excluding the Post from covering social events at the Executive Mansion—first, a large Republican dinner; then, a dinner for past, present and newly designated Cabinet officers; then, a Sunday worship service; finally, a Christmas party for the children of foreign diplomats … "They're going to wish on L Street [location of the Post] that they’d never heard of Watergate." Soon, challenges against the Post's ownership of two television stations in Florida were filed with the Federal Communications Commission. The price of Post stock on the American Exchange dropped by almost 50 percent.

> Rothblatt and his clients found a cab as Bernstein raced toward them. The lawyer, the stocky Frank Sturgis, and the three other men filled the cab, but Bernstein, uninvited, got in anyway, piling in on top of them as the door slammed. Von Hoffman and Wilkins nearly fell off the curb laughing.

> "That's the difference between Watergate and the Pentagon Papers. In the Pentagon Papers, damn, you had the lawyers involved the first day … getting advice, and Katharine actually making the decision to publish. Nothing like that happened with Watergate. We never called the lawyers and said, Are we okay, what’s the legal view of this? I do think we did slip into it. It was incremental."

> "We spent $8400 on false telegrams and ads to stir up phony support for the President's decision. Money was used to pay for telegrams to the White House, to tell the President what a great move it was, so that Ziegler could announce that the telegram support was running some large percentage in support of the President. Money also went to pay for a phony ad in the New York Times." … "Everyone had to fill out fifteen postcards. Ten people worked for days buying different kinds of stamps and cards and getting different handwriting to fake the responses. … Thousands of newspapers were bought from the newsstands and the ballots were clipped out and mailed in." At a minimum, Dooley said, 4000 ballots supporting Nixon's decision were sent from CRP. WTTG reported that 5157 agreed with the President and 1158 disagreed.

> "When you're involved in an election, you do what you can," Shumway replied. "We assumed the other side would do it also. On that assumption, we proceeded. I don’t know if the other side did." Woodward asked if the other side Shumway was referring to was the North Vietnamese. No, Shumway said, he meant the McGovern forces.

> Gray went to the White House and said, in effect, "I'm taking the rap on Watergate." He got very angry and said he had done his job and contained the investigation judiciously, that it wasn't fair that he was being singled out to take the heat. He implied that all hell could break loose if he wasn't able to stay in the job permanently and keep the lid on. Nixon could have thought this was a threat, though Gray is not that sort of guy. Whatever the reason, the President agreed in a hurry and sent Gray's name up to the Senate right away. … Sachs said that pressuring the White House was "not the way Gray handled himself with those guys. It was plain fear most of the time. … Now it makes perfect sense that some of those guys down there would think he might be pressuring because that's the way they operate, but not Gray."

> Just as the breakin had been but a small part of a massive election-year campaign of espionage and sabotage, the whole undercover effort to reelect the President was, in its turn, part of a broader program directed by the President's men, almost from the beginning, against those who they thought threatened the administration.

> It was another Watergate. In Los Angeles, at the trial of Daniel Ellsberg, Judge Matthew Byrne had announced that he had learned from the Watergate prosecutors that Hunt and Liddy supervised the burglary of the office of Ellsberg's psychiatrist in 1971.

> Woodward typed out a note and passed it to Bernstein. Everyone’s life is in danger. Bernstein looked up. Has your friend gone crazy? he asked. Woodward shook his head rapidly, indicating to Bernstein not to speak. He typed another note. Deep Throat says that electronic surveillance is going on and we had better watch it. Bernstein signaled that he wanted something to write with. Woodward gave him a pen. Who is doing it? Bernstein wrote. Can-I-A, Woodward mouthed silently. Bernstein was disbelieving. While the Rachmaninoff piano concerto played on, Woodward began typing as Bernstein read over his shoulder:

> In May, Woodward asked a committee staff member if Butterfield had been interviewed. "No, we’re too busy." Some weeks later, he had asked another staffer if the committee knew why Butterfield's duties in Haldeman's office were defined as "internal security." The staff member said the committee didn't know, and maybe it would be a good idea to interview Butterfield. He would ask Sam Dash, the committee's chief counsel. Dash put the matter off. The staff member told Woodward he would push Dash again. Dash finally okayed an interview with Butterfield for Friday, July 13, 1973. On Saturday the 14th, Woodward received a phone call at home from a senior member of the committee’s investigative staff. "Congratulations," he said. "We interviewed Butterfield. He told the whole story." What whole story? "Nixon bugged himself." … The existence of a tape system which monitored the President's conversations had been known only to the President himself, Haldeman, Larry Higby, Alexander Haig, Butterfield and the several Secret Service agents who maintained it. ( )

Good book. Enjoyed it when it was first published and it's just as interesting now. ( )

The style is the clipped version expected from reporters, but still an engrossing read into the Watergate affair. Still relevant after all these years. ( )