Thursday, June 02, 2005
The disillusionment of Deep Throat
Yes, I'm blogging about Deep Throat. Feel free to change the channel (Paul Wells appears to be insulting his former boss, if you're interested).
I don't know about the rest of you, but I was a little disappointed by the revelation that Deep Throat is former G-Man Mark Felt. How disappointed was I? Let me count the ways:
I'd Never Heard of the Guy - Realistically, that was to be expected. I mean, of all the people who knew what was going on, only a small fraction were familiar names, and most of those who were familiar were familiar only because they wound being implicated by the information Deep Throat provided, and you'd have to imagine that people who stood to do jail time for Watergate were statistically less likely to provide the media with information about Watergate.
Still, though, idle speculation for those of us who weren't intimately acquainted with Washington in the early seventies was kind of fun. One acquaintance of mine - Deep Jones, we'll call him - confided to me that he'd always sort of hoped that the informant would turn out to be Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who was Assistance Attorney General at the time of the break-ins. Me, I once dreamt (yes, I've had dreams about this - see why I'm disappointed?) that it was Spiro Agnew. Even at the time I realized that *that* was unlikely, but wouldn't it have been cool?
Everybody who Mattered Already Knew - Christ, Nixon knew, because Bob Haldeman told him. Or consider this quote by Bernstein's ex-wife:
Great quote, don't get me wrong. But there goes the image of Woodward and Bernstein keeping the conspirators in the dark to the very end. I mean, if Felt's identity was already known to pretty well everybody who mattered, just what was Woodward trying to accomplish by protecting his anonymity? I guess maybe Felt didn't want to be harassed by the media, but, as consequences for whistle-blowing go, that one's pretty tame. I'd have preferred to think that his life was in danger, myself.
He's not Much of a Hero - Deep Throat should have been some innocent young guy who came to Washington an idealist, only to become jaded upon viewing the activities of his superiors until his conscience would no longer allow him to keep quiet. Instead, we got a guy who was bitter about being passed over for promotion, and who wanted to help the FBI in its turf war with the Department of Justice. He did the right thing for all of the wrong reasons, and if you doubt that let's try this hypothetical question: if Felt had been made J. Edgar Hoover's successor, do you think he'd have met Woodward in that parking garage? I suspect not. More likely, he'd have overstepped the powers granted to law enforcement agents in order to keep the media in the dark. You know, like he did before Watergate, when he broke into the offices of Vietnam protesters without a warrant (he was pardoned for this by Ronald Reagan).
I mean, I guess on some level the guy could still be considered a hero - he risked his career to bring down the corrupt, and that's pretty noble regardless of motivation. But Deep Throat had already been idealized, and it's a little disappointing to see just how far short of the ideal the man behind the cigarette fell.
So yeah, that's why I'm disappointed. Why couldn't it have been Pat Nixon? Or Checkers?
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Yes, I'm blogging about Deep Throat. Feel free to change the channel (Paul Wells appears to be insulting his former boss, if you're interested).
I don't know about the rest of you, but I was a little disappointed by the revelation that Deep Throat is former G-Man Mark Felt. How disappointed was I? Let me count the ways:
I'd Never Heard of the Guy - Realistically, that was to be expected. I mean, of all the people who knew what was going on, only a small fraction were familiar names, and most of those who were familiar were familiar only because they wound being implicated by the information Deep Throat provided, and you'd have to imagine that people who stood to do jail time for Watergate were statistically less likely to provide the media with information about Watergate.
Still, though, idle speculation for those of us who weren't intimately acquainted with Washington in the early seventies was kind of fun. One acquaintance of mine - Deep Jones, we'll call him - confided to me that he'd always sort of hoped that the informant would turn out to be Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who was Assistance Attorney General at the time of the break-ins. Me, I once dreamt (yes, I've had dreams about this - see why I'm disappointed?) that it was Spiro Agnew. Even at the time I realized that *that* was unlikely, but wouldn't it have been cool?
Everybody who Mattered Already Knew - Christ, Nixon knew, because Bob Haldeman told him. Or consider this quote by Bernstein's ex-wife:
For many years, I have lived with the secret of Deep Throat's identity. It has been hell and I have dealt with the situation by telling pretty much anyone who asked me, including total strangers, who Deep Throat was.
Great quote, don't get me wrong. But there goes the image of Woodward and Bernstein keeping the conspirators in the dark to the very end. I mean, if Felt's identity was already known to pretty well everybody who mattered, just what was Woodward trying to accomplish by protecting his anonymity? I guess maybe Felt didn't want to be harassed by the media, but, as consequences for whistle-blowing go, that one's pretty tame. I'd have preferred to think that his life was in danger, myself.
He's not Much of a Hero - Deep Throat should have been some innocent young guy who came to Washington an idealist, only to become jaded upon viewing the activities of his superiors until his conscience would no longer allow him to keep quiet. Instead, we got a guy who was bitter about being passed over for promotion, and who wanted to help the FBI in its turf war with the Department of Justice. He did the right thing for all of the wrong reasons, and if you doubt that let's try this hypothetical question: if Felt had been made J. Edgar Hoover's successor, do you think he'd have met Woodward in that parking garage? I suspect not. More likely, he'd have overstepped the powers granted to law enforcement agents in order to keep the media in the dark. You know, like he did before Watergate, when he broke into the offices of Vietnam protesters without a warrant (he was pardoned for this by Ronald Reagan).
I mean, I guess on some level the guy could still be considered a hero - he risked his career to bring down the corrupt, and that's pretty noble regardless of motivation. But Deep Throat had already been idealized, and it's a little disappointing to see just how far short of the ideal the man behind the cigarette fell.
So yeah, that's why I'm disappointed. Why couldn't it have been Pat Nixon? Or Checkers?
