Geoff Shepard
August 9 is the 45th anniversary of the resignation of Richard Nixon, the only president in American history to resign or be removed from office. We know what triggered his resignation. He was already on the ropes after two and a half years of Watergate revelations, but what ended any and all defense was the release of the “smoking gun” transcript on August 5. It showed that Nixon had concurred with his staff’s suggestion that they get the CIA to tell the FBI not to interview two Watergate witnesses.
As astonishing as it may be to Americans, who have been assured that the smoking gun tape is proof positive of Nixon’s early cover-up involvement, every person connected to that particular conversation now agrees that the CIA gambit was an effort to prevent disclosure of prominent Democrats who had made substantial contributions to Nixon’s re-election campaign under assurances of absolute secrecy.
I should know. I was there: a member of Nixon’s Watergate defense team, the third person to hear the smoking gun tape, the one who first transcribed it, and the one who termed it “the smoking gun.” Here is a much fuller explanation of what actually happened. But the bottom line remains unchanged. Nixon’s Watergate defense lawyers completely misinterpreted the tape, and their mistake ended his presidency.
John Dean, Nixon’s principal accuser, has known of this mistaken interpretation from the very outset, but found it in his interest to keep quiet. He was, after all, the one who had suggested the CIA gambit to Bob Haldeman in the first place. Yet it was not until his 2014 book, The Nixon Defense, that he finally got around to admitting the truth. Read his full footnote, which concludes, “had Nixon known that he might have survived its disclosure to fight another day. In sum, the smoking gun was shooting blanks,” here.
This is one heck of a revelation, albeit 40 years too late, and it is certainly not the testimony that Dean gave at the Watergate cover-up trial, when Haldeman’s liberty hung by a thread and Dean had sworn “to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.”
Nine years ago I posted my personal remembrance of the night Nixon resigned:
He taught yours truly about media bias - Daniel Schorr, Journalist, Dies at 93
In July of 1974 I went to work as a Legislative Assistant to Senator Pete Domenici.
On August 9, 1974 Richard Nixon resigned his Presidency.
Several of us staffers sat with Domenici in his office and watched Nixon's resignation speech. Just as the speech ended, CBS called Domenici and wanted him to come to their studio for an interview. There were several senior staffers there, but for some reason Domenici asked me to drive him to CBS (I later figured out that since I was the last person to go on his staff from NM, Domenici figured I had been least influenced by the system and most accurately reflected the views of New Mexicans, especially rural New Mexicans, on Nixon).
When we arrived at CBS they put us in a waiting room which was surrounded by tv monitors. After a short period of time a CBS employee came and took Domenici away to get his nose powdered for the tv appearance.
That left me in the room alone. Keep in mind that at this point I had not quite bought into the media bias thing.
I was watching the monitors as they interviewed Ronald Reagan who at that time was the Governor of California. In walked Daniel Schorr, chief White House correspondent for CBS. Schorr looked up at the monitors, saw Reagan being interviewed, and with a hateful scowl on his face said,"Burn, Ronnie baby, Burn."
I remember thinking, "You know, there might be something to this media bias after all."
That thought has been mightily reinforced over the last thirty-six years.
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