[mlc9852]

I just have to wonder, after all these years, how many really care - other than the media? I vividly remember Watergate but don't care at all who Deep Throat was.

[ElkGroveDan]

I still think it was Al Haig, as outlined in John Dean's second book. Amazingly, the story of Woodward as the Navy courier meeting Felt at the White House that came out this week, is the exact same theory Dean used 20 odd years ago to postulate an encounter and friendship with Haig.

Conspiracies are far more interesting than the mundane truth, so I'm going to stick with this one for a while :-)

[Cicero]

I can't get terribly excited about the attempted revival of Watergate, either.

But I must say that this is a persuasive argument. My own assumption at the time was that Deep Throat was a fiction, made up to cover things that Woodward got from various sources or simply made up.

[Sonny M]

Actually Mark Felt still has his faculties and is looking for a book deal.

Woodward is going ape trying to rush his book out now.

Long story short, if you don't think Mark Felt was deep throat, or deep throat never existed, you have to base that pretty much on faith (and the fact that these guys have bad credibility now), but all the folks who would know say its this guy.

I.E. the media is going to consider anyone who says there is no deep throat or says its not this guy to be a sour grapes kook.

[sgtbono2002]

Woodward and Bernstein were praised as Investigative reporters, now we learn they didnt investigate anything , they had an FBI pimp doing all their work for them all they had to do was write the copy.

[The Iguana]

I wondered when we would hear from Len Colodny.

Colodny and Gettlin both famously claimed that Al Haig was Deep Throat - a less convincing assertion than their case for John Dean as the mastermind of the Watergate breakins.

But I think this does raise excellent questions about Deep Throat. It's possible to think that both Felt and Haig were sources for Woodward - but perhaps not in the ways that are generally now accepted - or represented by Woodward.

[dogbyte12]

Big issue is the white house taping system. Only a few people knew about it. A very select few. It wasn't revealed until 3 months after Felt retired, when Fred "Law & Order" Thompson was questioning Alexander Butterfield.

Woodward credits Deep Throat as giving him the info. How would Felt have access to that? He wouldn't. Why would Woodward even be getting new dirt from Felt at that point when Felt was out of the loop.

Woodward had somebody else at the White House, somebody we know, and Woodward is protecting him, by laying it all off on a senile man.

[Tallguy]

Has anybody heard how Deep Throat (Mark Felt) could have been the source for the famous "gap in Nixon's WH tapes" when Felt had left the FBI several months prior? Also, who was doing all the legwork to monitor Woodwards signalling system?

The only explanation that I can come up with was that Felt had his own little ring within the FBI -- some of them remained active even after Felt's retirement (pipelining him the info on the tape-gap). If I'm right then there were others who knew Deep Throat's identity & kept quiet.

[pankot]

I've watched Woodward many times on TV. Have never trusted him--he's out for his own glory. Time will prove him a consummate liar.

[maestro]

?W. Mark Felt was "Deep Throat's"....control and voice..."Deep Throat" was on the White House Staff.

naaaaw

....While in the OLD..."Hoover's FBI"....UNDER Mr. Hoover,.....

....what religious denomination did Felt claim on his OLD FBI personal (for the record) FBI files?

....Felt may not 'claim' any today,...but,...for sure,...Felt claimed one WHILE UNDER 'service' to Mr. Hoover!!!!!

....exactly,....what does Felt's OLD file state for 'cover' purposes while 'faithfully serving'....'J'...?

....there is a real story here,....for sure!

....he was NOT Jewish,.....how about.....Mormon?

[BonnieJ]

This is all just too convenient. I will ALWAYS believe that Deep Throat was a composite and even more...a creation by that absurd team of "journalists". Think of what would have happened if they had bloggers and the internet then! The whole thing would have blown up in their faces (think Dan Rather, and Newsweek!), and Nixon would have survived it. Who says their story is true? I never believed it all was. AND...the break-ins of all those Republican headquarters last year are far more serious, they represent a trend of the very same thing as "Watergate". Who cares though? NOT the media!

Ask anyone our son and daughter-in-law's ages if they care or know much about it, people in their 20's (30's too, maybe 40's?)...Not many! Just us oldies around 50 and beyond have a solid memory or connection it seems...and we have "moved on"! The media never will, not over a Republican anyway.

[George Smiley]

Silent Coup is a remarkable book.

It takes "who said what" and evaluates for concurrency to figure out who was lying.

Dean doesn't come off well AT ALL as a result of their analyses.

[smoothsailing]

Now, Char, everybody knows that Deep Throat was really Jane Fonda!:)