Essay - Watergate the 'Watergate Affair' Began Early in the Morning of...

Watergate

***** "Watergate Affair" began early in the morning of June 17, 1972, when five men were caught in the middle ***** burglarizing the Democratic National Committee Headquarters, which was located in ***** Watergate Office Building in Washington, D. C. The ***** were making adjustments to bugs they had previously installed (Staff writers, p. 467). Investigation revealed that one of the men arrested, Jams Mc*****ord, was the security coordina*****r for the Committee to Re-Elect the President, who was Richard M. Nixon. *****cCord's involvement laid sus*****icion on the Presidency, and a loc*****l newspaper, The Washingt***** Post, began intensive investigations about whether the President was involved in "dirty tricks" against the Democratic Party.

However, Watergate didn't just appear out of nowhere. Politicians have used all sorts of ***** tricks as long as elections have been held, and Nixon had particular concerns about in*****mation leaks. In 1969 and 1970, ***** approved illegal wiretaps (without court permission) on government officials and journalists in an attempt to find out who had leaked informati***** regarding Viet Nam bombing campaigns in Cambodia (Staff writers, p. 467). Even these attem*****ts went too far ***** Senator Edmund Muskie, a contender for the Democr*****tic presidential nom*****ation, was wiretapped. Nixon stopped these practices only after the head of the FBI, J. Edgar Hoover, complained ***** them (Staff writers, p. 467). Another leak ***** distressed ***** Nixon was the publishing of the "Pentagon Papers," a study by the Secretary of Defense on ***** ***** Nam c*****flict (Emery, p. 39). Some of the information included real ***** breaches, such as information obtained from ***** United States Embassy in Saigon (Emery, *****. 40), giving some credibility to Nixon's concerns over leaks. However, his response violated federal law, and the violations continued as both Nixon and many of his most trusted advisors continued to stonewall, lie, and distort facts in an effort to prevent the Watergate incident ***** being traced back to him.

*****, it w***** not the burglary *****self that brought ********** presidency to an end, but rather ***** extended attempts ***** cover up any connection to *****self. The new acting director of the FBI, L. Patrick Gray, resigned after acknowledging that he had destroyed evidence as well as giving false testimony (***** writers, p. 467). Nixon learned as early as six days ***** ***** break-in ***** the Attorney General, *****ohn N. Mitchell, ***** ***** the *****. By the end of the scandal more than 70 individuals had been convicted of crimes, including cabinet members. Nixon would have been ***** first President in history charged with committing felonies while serving as ***** except that Gerald Ford, who became President after ***** resigned, gave him a presidential pardon (Feldstein, PAGE).

Washington Post reporters, led by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein and followed ***** ***** from other *****spapers ***** television stations (Feldstein, PAGE) embarked on extended investigative journalism that finally discovered a tr*****il of money leading ***** campaign contributions to the burglars (Staff writers, p. *****). While Woodward and Bernstein got the credit for first bringing