World Blog by humble servant . 46 YEARS BOB HALDEMAN GORDON LIDDY HOWARD HUNT JOHN DEAN POLITICAL SCANDAL RICHARD NIXON SATURDAY NIGHT MASSACRE SCANDAL US WATERGATE See other tags What was Watergate? Here are 14 facts that explain everything. 1-2
1. Richard Milhouse Nixon 1.To understand Watergate you must to some degree understand the mind of Richard Nixon. He was a former lieutenant commander in the US Navy during World War II before he became a Californian congressman and senator. He was vice president to Dwight D Eisenhower for eight years until 1960 when he himself ran for election against John F Kennedy, the youthful and idealistic Democrat, who he lost to in one of the closest elections in US history.
Nixon was deeply hurt by this, blaming the media for favouring his opponent and he long resented the success of the Kennedy clan, a resentment which lasted all the way to the White House which he was elected to in 1968. But his administration’s early years were hampered by the unpopularity of the Vietnam war which the US had been bogged down in since the late 50s. Tackling the unpopularity of the conflict was just one of many of Nixon’s ‘wars’. 2. White House Plumbers, Nixon’s Enemies List and Rat F***ing
In marking the 40th anniversary of Watergate recently, the two journalists who were pivotal in helping uncover much of the scandal, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, wrote that during his five-and-a-half-years in power Nixon waged five overlapping wars – on the anti-war movement, the media, Democrats, the US justice system and history itself.
From the beginning of his presidency Nixon sought to undermine anyone who he considered an enemy. People such as the man who leaked the Pentagon Papers, Daniel Ellsberg, whose psychiatrist’s office was broken into by members of the so-called ‘White House Plumbers’. This was a group set up within the White House and tasked with stopping the leak of classified information to the media.x-CIA officer E Howard Hunt and behind him ex-FBI officer G Gordon Liddy were both ‘White House Plumbers’ (AP Photo)
The ‘plumbers’ eventually branched out into other covert and illegal activities, working for the appropriately named CREEP (Committee to Re-elect the President [Nixon]) and engaging in activities known as rat-f***ing – dirty tricks – where opposition groups would be infiltrated at campaign events. These tricks undermined Democratic presidential candidates such as Edward Muskie and included everything from forging the infamous Canuck letter – which torpedoed Muskie’s presidential hopes - to stealing campaign workers’ shoes.
Nixon was deeply hurt by this, blaming the media for favouring his opponent and he long resented the success of the Kennedy clan, a resentment which lasted all the way to the White House which he was elected to in 1968. But his administration’s early years were hampered by the unpopularity of the Vietnam war which the US had been bogged down in since the late 50s. Tackling the unpopularity of the conflict was just one of many of Nixon’s ‘wars’. 2. White House Plumbers, Nixon’s Enemies List and Rat F***ing
In marking the 40th anniversary of Watergate recently, the two journalists who were pivotal in helping uncover much of the scandal, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, wrote that during his five-and-a-half-years in power Nixon waged five overlapping wars – on the anti-war movement, the media, Democrats, the US justice system and history itself.
From the beginning of his presidency Nixon sought to undermine anyone who he considered an enemy. People such as the man who leaked the Pentagon Papers, Daniel Ellsberg, whose psychiatrist’s office was broken into by members of the so-called ‘White House Plumbers’. This was a group set up within the White House and tasked with stopping the leak of classified information to the media.x-CIA officer E Howard Hunt and behind him ex-FBI officer G Gordon Liddy were both ‘White House Plumbers’ (AP Photo)
The ‘plumbers’ eventually branched out into other covert and illegal activities, working for the appropriately named CREEP (Committee to Re-elect the President [Nixon]) and engaging in activities known as rat-f***ing – dirty tricks – where opposition groups would be infiltrated at campaign events. These tricks undermined Democratic presidential candidates such as Edward Muskie and included everything from forging the infamous Canuck letter – which torpedoed Muskie’s presidential hopes - to stealing campaign workers’ shoes.
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