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'Watergate's Secrets and Betrayals': Nixon's Defense Team Gets a New Day in Court
military.com ^ | August 01, 2024 | Military.com

Posted on 08/01/2024 11:37:43 AM PDT by ChicagoConservative27

In the summer of 2021, President Richard Nixon was put on trial nearly every day for six weeks. The trials came in the form of an off-Broadway play called "Trial on the Potomac," which imagined the president going through an impeachment trial in the U.S. Senate for his role in the Watergate scandal and subsequent cover-up.

Nixon's defense in the play is based on documents uncovered by Geoff Shepard, who worked as deputy counsel for Nixon's Watergate defense team. The audience became members of the Senate who, at the end of every performance, had to vote on whether Nixon was guilty of impeachable offenses. Of the dozens of performances, only one crowd ever voted to convict President Nixon.

Shephard, now in his late 70s, compiled the Nixon defense documents into a 2015 book, "The Real Watergate Scandal: Collusion, Conspiracy, and the Plot That Brought Nixon Down." Playwright and director George Bugatti adapted Shepard's nonfiction book into "Trial on the Potomac."

"Everyone talks about 'the smoking gun,'" Bugatti told Military.com, referring to the Nixon tapes transcript that many believed was proof Nixon was guilty of obstruction of justice. "But the smoking gun was shooting blanks."

(Excerpt) Read more at military.com ...


TOPICS: Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections; Your Opinion/Questions
KEYWORDS: betrayals; defense; secrets; watergate
I find Watergate so fascinating. August 9th it will be 50 years he resigned
1 posted on 08/01/2024 11:37:43 AM PDT by ChicagoConservative27
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To: ChicagoConservative27

I guess things haven’t really changed at the DOJ.


2 posted on 08/01/2024 11:44:04 AM PDT by Armando Guerra
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To: ChicagoConservative27
The audience became members of the Senate who, at the end of every performance, had to vote on whether Nixon was guilty...

Stolen from The Night of January 16th.

3 posted on 08/01/2024 11:49:07 AM PDT by jeffc (Resident of the free State of Florida)
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To: ChicagoConservative27

Not even including conspiring to murder his predecessor, what LBJ committed and got away with makes Watergate a major nothing.


4 posted on 08/01/2024 11:50:17 AM PDT by katana
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To: ChicagoConservative27

An old story. The press lies, the GOP caves.


5 posted on 08/01/2024 11:50:58 AM PDT by alternatives?
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To: ChicagoConservative27

Agreed—once you dig deeper there is so much to be found.

I was never a fan of Nixon.

However, Watergate fascinated me because it was obvious that he was in a down and dirty fight with the Deep State over a variety of issues.

Imho some of those issues are still secret today.

The CIA had moles in CREEP and the White House.

I am convinced that is how the Deep State plays—up to this day.

The best analogy is the old Soviet Union. The KGB would have moles hidden throughout the government to make sure all officials were following orders and of course not stealing stuff.

:-)


6 posted on 08/01/2024 11:52:45 AM PDT by cgbg ("Our democracy" = Their Kleptocracy)
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To: ChicagoConservative27

Daniel Ellsberg tripped this off.
NSA had determined he was going to sell advanced nuclear weapon details to Russia.
At one time he worked for Sandra Labs in weapon design.
Considering he became a lefty activist, they were right to be concerned.
To this day, I feel the FBI setup Nixon using Ellsberg as the weapon.


7 posted on 08/01/2024 12:05:43 PM PDT by Zathras
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To: Zathras

there is zero proof Nixon committed any crimes. He just wanted the illegal leaking to be stopped. All the “horribles” the media and the dems put on him never happened. Daniel Ellsberg was an extreme National Security threat. He was made into a hero despite committing treasonous crimes. Mark Felt, bitter after being passed over for the top FBI job, committed felony after felony leaking to the press. Main reason he resigned was his health. He was drinking very heavily and on the verge of cracking up. The stuff on the so called “smoking gun” tape A/ never actually happened, and B/ He had every right to do on the grounds of National Security.The media etc hated Nixon almost as much as they hate Trump. Whole thing was inside THE BELTWAY GARBAGE THAT NOBODY TO THIS DAY REALLY UNDERSTOOD.


8 posted on 08/01/2024 12:49:44 PM PDT by basalt
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To: ChicagoConservative27

Nixon’s greatest crime was defeating McGovern in an historic nationwide landslide. No one in the national media voted for him or knew anyone who did. Therefore he must of cheated and had to be removed.

Nixon’s other crime was going after communist friends of the media.


9 posted on 08/01/2024 1:00:14 PM PDT by Bubba_Leroy ( Dementia Joe is Not My President)
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To: basalt

I agree the press was anti Nixon but not to the extent it was anti Trump. Nixon had some civil tax problems and some cash found itself into his campaign from an oil company but nothing that I saw at that time was pushed to the extent of calling him a traitor in the press or using the entire security and criminal apparatus of the executive branch and foreign intelligence agencies to bring him down.

Trump with the Russia crap from before the get go was called in the press being a Russian asset. It did not stop from allegation to allegation right up to Jan 6th and beyond.

One common element, they both thought the dem party was evil.


10 posted on 08/01/2024 1:16:01 PM PDT by Mouton (A 150MT hit may not solve our problems now but is a good start. )
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To: katana

Did Nixon have nothing to trade vis a vis what he knew of JFKs assassination to trade “not revealing it’ in exchange for dropping of Watergate issues?


11 posted on 08/01/2024 2:33:15 PM PDT by desertsolitaire (Perhaps the Great Ape Lawgiver in the series Planet of the Apes was correct in his view of humans?)
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To: Bubba_Leroy

Nixon’s greatest crime was taking down Alger Hiss.


12 posted on 08/01/2024 4:10:13 PM PDT by T Ruth (Mohammedanism shall be destroyed.)
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To: cgbg
Imho some of those issues are still secret today.

I think about 90% of the Watergate mystery has been solved. The big breakthrough occurred when Mark Felt, the former deputy FBI director, revealed himself as Bob Woodward's "Deep Throat" source in 2006. Felt gave the findings of the FBI's own internal Watergate investigation to his attorney, John O'Connor, and O'Connor published these findings in 2022.

The CIA had moles in CREEP and the White House.

The two Watergate break-ins were a CIA-led operation funded by G. Gordon Liddy in CREEP. Liddy was an attorney who had nothing to with the CIA, but Howard Hunt, James McCord, and Frank Sturgis, who organized both break-ins, were all with the CIA. Hunt worked undercover in the White House and McCord worked undercover in CREEP. During his sentencing, McCord told the judge he was working for the CIA during the break-in. Also, two of the four Cuban Watergate burglars testified during their trials that they were working for the CIA.

I am convinced that is how the Deep State plays—up to this day.

The purpose of the first Watergate break-in in May 1972 was to bug the phone of Spencer Oliver, who was in charge of DNC "hospitality" operations. The purpose of the second break-in in June 1972 was to tap the phone of Oliver's secretary, but the burglars were caught in the DNC lobby on the sixth floor of the Watergate complex before they began their work.

The CIA did this to build dossiers on DC officials and politicians so that negative information could be used against them in a contingency. Although the wire tap on Spencer's phone was successful, the CIA failed to collect any damaging information for specific individuals. Spencer and his secretary were careful to use code names and client numbers, instead of real names, for all their phone conversations.

13 posted on 08/01/2024 5:05:08 PM PDT by Right_Wing_Madman
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To: Right_Wing_Madman

You gave a good summary of what is known today.

Imho that is the beginning of the story—the first 10%.


14 posted on 08/01/2024 5:15:39 PM PDT by cgbg ("Our democracy" = Their Kleptocracy)
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