The Watergate Scandal

1. The Watergate Scandal "What did the President know, and when did he know it?“ - Sen. Howard Baker

2. The indictment occurred as Nixon was running for re-election in 1972. He defeated Democratic opponent George McGovern. Watergate complex, Washington D.C.

3. The Watergate scandal occurred during the presidency of Richard Nixon; it resulted in the indictment of several of Nixon's advisors and his resignation on 9 August 1974. • The scandal takes its name from the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C., the site of a 17 June 1972 break-in into the Democratic National Committee headquarters. Subsequently, five men were arrested for breaking and entering. On September 15, a grand jury indicted the burglars: • Virgilio González • Bernard Barker • James W. McCord • Eugenio Martínez • Frank Sturgisand • E. Howard Hunt • Jr. and G. Gordon Liddy for conspiracy, burglary and violation of federal wiretapping laws. All seven men were either directly or indirectly employed by President Nixon's Committee to Re-elect the President (CRP, sometimes referred to as CREEP). The five were tried and convicted in January 1973.

4. Ten days after handing over the tapes, Nixon resigned, becoming the only U.S. President to have resigned from office. The additional pressure: impeachment proceedings in the House of Representatives and certainty of a conviction in the Senate. The Pardon On 8 September 1974, President Gerald Ford granted Nixon a full and unconditional pardon for any crimes he may have committed while President.

5. E. Howard Hunt Hunt was a member of the White House "plumbers," the secret team assembled to stop government leaks after defense analyst Daniel Ellsberg leaked the Pentagon Papers to the press. A former CIA operative, Hunt organized the bugging of the Democratic headquarters in the Watergate -- as well as a break-in at the office of Ellsberg's psychiatrist. Hunt's phone number in address books belonging to the Watergate burglars helped investigators -- and reporters -- connect the break-in to the president and his reelection campaign. Convicted of burglary, conspiracy and wiretapping, Hunt served 33 months in prison. By the time of the Watergate burglary, Hunt was already moonlighting as a spy novelist. He has since penned dozens of books, including a memoir and "Dragon Teeth“.

6. Murray Chotiner "Deny what they didn't charge, and charge what they can't deny...If it's our charge, we're revealing the facts; if it's their charge, it's a smear." -Murray Chotiner

7. Murray Chotiner was the country's first paid political consultant, signing on with Nixon right from the beginning. He masterminded such dirty tricks as the "From one Democrat to another..." letter that went out to Democrats re: Helen Gahagan "Pink Lady" Douglas, implying that she wasn't enough of a Democrat for them, an unusual but effective tactic for the Republican nominee. In the '72 election, Chotiner planted Lucianne Goldberg (later to gain fame as the literary agent who encouraged Linda Tripp to tape Monica Lewinsky) as a spy, nicknamed "Chapman's Friend", within the McGovern campaign to feed that campaign's foibles to the Nixon White House. Watergate prosecutors considered charging him for making payments to Goldberg for her work without proper documentation, but could never prove criminal intent. Because of his death, Chotiner's role in Watergate itself has never been fully examined. (mysteriously killed in 1974) Regardless of actual involvement, Chotiner's early tactics clearly set the tone for Nixon campaigns to come, and without his aggressiveness early on, it is likely that Nixon might never have made it to the Presidency. There is also some mob connection RFK/JFK assasination conspiracy theory stuff floating around his name, but really, is any Nixon cohort completely free of Kennedy conspiracy rumour?

8. During the summer of 1972, John Dean played a major role in the White House's attempts to cover up its involvement in the Watergate burglary. One of Dean's key functions during the summer of 1972 was the implementation and supervision of "hush money" payments to Watergate defendants. Dean used such men as Herbert Kalmbach, President Nixon's personal attorney, and White House aide Fred LaRue to carry out the payments. From June to August 1972, Dean had minimal contact with President Nixon; it wasn't until September 15, 1972, that Nixon called Dean into the Oval Office to offer congratulations on Dean's skillful handling of the Watergate cover-up. On April 30, 1973, President Nixon made a television speech in which he announced the resignation of Haldeman and Ehrlichman, "two of the finest public servants" he had ever worked with. The president, in a terse • statement, also stated that John Dean had resigned. Throughout the month of April 1973, Dean had broken ranks with the White House; he had started to "spill the beans" to federal prosecutors about his involvement in the Watergate scandal.

9. Further reading http://www.columbia.edu/itc/journalism/j6075/edit/readings/watergate.html- Watergate Case Study by James M. Perry

10. Elizabeth Drew - A Watergate Diary • Diary-style; • Subjective; • Articulate writing – clear and easy to understand for the audience; • Facts-based (bombings in Cambodia, use of quotes, listing); • Use of low-lexical words – ‘impeachment’; ‘factionalism’ • Use of ‘flashbacks’mentions Hunt and CIA in the beginning of the text and at the end – almost like referring to the point that’s been written before; • Weighs up morals – enables the reader to evaluate the events; • Rhetoric question (end of the article) can we really give people so much freedom and then try to control them afterwards they’ve gained ‘absolute’ and uncontrollable power? Or so…(don’t really know what I am talking about)

11. Recasting task You are part of a production team which is putting together a radio programme about the events of the Watergate scandal. Your role is to research and write the script for a section of the broadcast which will talk about morals and actions of particular political figures in this Event. Use the whole extract for this task. You should adapt the source material, using your own words as far as possible. Write a commentary which explains the choices that you made when writing your spoken text, commenting on the following: - how language and form have been used to suit audience and purpose - how vocabulary and other stylistic features have been used to shape meaning and to achieve particular effects.