How often the name Watergate has been used since 1973, would be impossible to estimate. It would be difficult to find people who are unaware of something that the name represents. It has been widely treated as the epitome of evil. The catalog of writings on the subject would he enormous.
Now, however, there has appeared a book which is unlike any other written on the subject, a book that is eminently worth reading. It may open the reader’s eyes to a new appreciation of the declaration of Scripture that evil resides in the heart of man.
As the drama of Watergate unfolded, there were those, myself included, for whom the real and whole story waited to he told. We were confident that whatever this crime might be. Richard Nixon was being cut down by men of the press. The former president was classed among the lowest criminals. He has been compared with a drop of rotten blood which is extracted from the patient to assist in diagnosing his health, the patient in this case being society.
History, however, has a way of revealing its own perspective. A new viewpoint is taken in the newly published book, It Didn’t Begin With Watergate, by Victor Lasky. Mr. Lasky, while not exonerating Nixon, puts Watergate in a new perspective. He demonstrates that the “crimes” which brought about the resignation of the President were practiced in equal measure, and in most cases more voraciously, by his predecessors. In fact, Lasky’s documentation reveals that Nixon was least culpable of those who have held office, going back to and including Franklin D. Roosevelt (with Harry Truman being a possible exception). The reader will be forced to evaluate his own standard of judgment when reading It Didn’t Begin With Watergate. To read this documented novel and condemn the ex-president makes as milch sense as “asking the Chicago gangsters to investigate the Chicago Police.”
Many illustrious names of the past and present are paraded before the reader in the 448 pages of this book. FDR‘s and all subsequent presidents’ records are opened up. Besides them you will meet Bobby F. Kennedy, Martin L. King, J. Edgar Hoover, Katzenbach, John Dean, Doar, Califano. Ervin, Weicker, Cox, Sirica, Rebozo, Colson, Humphrey, Baker, Hays, Mills, Mitchell, Reynolds and a host of others who are revealed as less than paragons of virtue. Although the men surrounding Nixon are also portrayed as men of low caliber, they do not come off worse than those who worked with their chief executives. All of which leads William Safire, author of Full Disclosure to comment:
The first carefully researched blast of criticism at the fus ion of the hysteria that gripped this nation in 1973 and 1974 . . . Mr. Lasky may have intended to write a rock-’em, sock:em everybody–did-it defense of Mr. Nixon, but the import of this book is more profound . . . . Lasky’s blockbuster . . . is not like any book on the Watergate shelf.
and the New York Daily News to say:
“No defense of the idiocies or misdeed of Watergate, or even Nixon himself . . . . Lasky’s book is about the primary export of this capital city—Hypocrisy . . . eminently readable .”
I personally doubt that this novel will get the attention it deserves. Nor do I expect a re-examination and re-evaluation of the sordid history of 1973–74. I do assume, however, that the fair-minded church editors and others will make some sort of evaluation of the Watergate events and their total perspective for the benefit of the reader and for the record of history. Surely, we may expect that the episode of the nation‘s history of 1973–74 will now be seen in a larger perspective.
To have said all the above about this recent publication will be of little use if we only intend to say “See, I told you so,” or “Look at the abiding corruption in the very highest echelon of our government, including the misdeed of Nixon.” If the author is right, Nixon was no worse and perhaps of higher moral character than some of his predecessors and investigators.
There are, however, three things to be seriously considered and which make this book worthwhile. The Watergate story and its climax has weakened the office of the presidence, as we clearly see today. No president can now forget that he governs in the shadow of the fourth estate, and what the men of the powerful press are able to do and demand. The second lesson which makes this book valuable is its exposure of the degree to which we are brainwashed, influenced and ruled by many unprincipled men from whom we receive our information and who hold office. And finally. the same unprincipled men continue to direct the affairs of government on the pathway of surrender which we witness at present. To summarize, in its broadest terms, the book exposes the rotten fruit of the relativism we have been taught.
I would encourage and urge all those who would like to get a fair look at the facts and story behind the scenes to read this book. History cannot be changed, but perhaps if we made ourselves aware of something of the total perspective we would be better able to assess and evaluate, and, perhaps, influence the course of events. For the small sum of $2.25 you can have this information.