Watergate
If you ask most people to explain what Watergate was all about, they might say that it was about a bungled break-in that brought down a president. That’s true, but the break-in is the least significant part of the scandal. What else should you know? Radio host and columnist Hugh Hewitt has the real story.
FOLLOW PragerU!
Facebook: 👉https://www.facebook.com/prageru
Twitter: 👉https://twitter.com/prageru
Instagram: 👉https://instagram.com/prageru/
SUBSCRIBE 👉 https://www.prageru.com/join/
To view the FACTS & SOURCES, Transcript, and Quiz, visit: https://www.prageru.com/video/watergate
Join PragerU’s text list! https://optin.mobiniti.com/prageru
Do you shop on Amazon? Click https://smile.amazon.com and a percentage of every Amazon purchase will be donated to PragerU.
SHOP!
Love PragerU? Visit our store today! https://shop.prageru.com/
Script:
The most famous political scandal in American history is, of course, Watergate. It’s so famous that even now, 50 years after it happened, almost every scandal of any kind comes with an obligatory “gate” after it.
If you ask most people to explain what Watergate was all about, they draw a blank. If they know a bit of history, or perhaps they lived through it, they might say something like this: “It was about a bungled break-in that brought down a president.” That’s true. But the break-in is the least significant part of the story.
Watergate was, first and foremost, a political war between the president, Richard Nixon, and the media, which in those pre-cable days meant ABC, CBS, NBC, the New York Times, and the Washington Post. The media’s aim, in the words of British historian Paul Johnson, “was to use publicity to reverse the electoral verdict of 1972.”
Why? What did the media have against Nixon? That’s a complex question, but we can essentially boil it down to three things: 1. He was despised by the East Coast liberal elite, of which the Washington press corps was a key component. 2. He was a staunch anti-communist. The media considered the communist threat to be overblown. 3. He refused to abandon South Vietnam. Nixon insisted on “a peace with honor.” The media was entirely “anti-war.”
Even though Nixon spent most of his adult life in New York and Washington, he never fit in. Born in a small town in California, there were no Ivy League degrees on his resume. To make matters worse, while not being part of McCarthyism, he made his reputation aggressively exposing Alger Hiss, a communist in the U.S. State Department in the late 1940s. After serving as vice president under Dwight Eisenhower for eight years, he ran against and nearly defeated John F. Kennedy, the paragon of East Coast elitism in 1960.
Then, eight years later, and much to the media’s dismay, Nixon mounted an improbable political comeback to win that year’s presidential election. And then, as if rubbing the media’s nose in it, he won again in a 49-state landslide in 1972.
Something had to be done. Ironically, Nixon’s own people provided the opportunity the media had been waiting for. On June 17, 1972, five men associated with the Nixon re-election campaign broke into the offices of the Democratic National Committee headquarters in the Watergate office building in Washington, D.C. Presumably, they intended to gather information about the Democrats’ campaign strategy. Whatever their purpose, it was a painfully dumb plan that turned catastrophic when the burglars were caught in the act and arrested by D.C. police.
Nixon found out about it—like everyone else—in the morning papers. Initially, he didn’t think it was a big deal. “I had been in politics too long,” he later wrote, “and had seen everything from dirty tricks to vote fraud. I could not muster much moral outrage over a political bugging.”
Today, most would conclude that if he had simply acknowledged his campaign’s responsibility—“owned it,” as we say, fired those responsible, and apologized, the whole sorry mess would have been rendered the minor incident it was. But, as historian Evan Thomas noted, Nixon “wasn’t paying attention and when he was confronted with the problems below deck, he didn’t really engage… by the time he did, it was too late.”
So the scandal grew beyond his control. Three men made sure of that: a publicity-seeking judge, a revenge-seeking FBI official, and a partisan special prosecutor.
The judge was John Sirica. Suspecting a vast conspiracy, Sirica threatened the burglars with lifetime prison sentences if they didn’t rat out the people who authorized the crime. The media loved Sirica. For a time, he was the most famous jurist in the country.
For the complete script as well as FACTS & SOURCES, visit https://www.prageru.com/video/watergate
source
You guys are good propagandists. If you only watch this video you might actually think Nixon was the hero in this story
It his same vein, PragerU please make a 5-minute video on Russiagate (include the Mueller Report, Durham Report, and Legacy Media response).
The journalists who were mouthpiece of democrats, helped Biden get elected. Little did they know they were helping themselves to their own firing. The same type of people who are doing the bit for socialism and communism, are helping to bring socialism and communism to the US. And then they will be the first to be killed when socialism/communism is here, for they have already done their job
Wow! This explains the very beginning of the mess that we are experiencing in 2023.
Wiretapping was more more extensively by both JFK and LBJ. But the tapes doomed Nixon. If it weren't for them, Nixon would be remembered as a pretty great president.
The media tried a similar strategy with Trump, so far it's failing thankfully.
Thank you! Could it have been different? We have been on our way to Armageddon for almost 2,000 years with the deeds of Evil People, foreign and domestic, being exposed and expanded into crisis from time to time. I do not mean President Nixon.
The Left is the weak underbelly of the USA. Because of them we are in a worsening near crisis day by day!
The New House may forestall or even change the inevitable! The prayers of the Saints can accomplish much! Is Armageddon near, Probably, But, it will be here when it gets here! It will eliminate current World Governments and bring us peace and prosperity for the Godly under righteous authority! Much will change for the much better! The Earth will bud and then blossom!
Ron PTL USA
Hugh Hewitt is a good historical fiction author. Do one on an alternate reality Vietnam war next.
No, was about a war between Nixon and his "enemies" that were all around him. A war against the "deep state" were his supporters tried to dig up dirt against the leading Democrat candidate in the election. Sound familiar?
I can’t even believe mark felt was called “deep throat”. Don’t let him near your junk boys 🤣
Now, do Bidengate, Garagegate, and Corvettegate.
Media is a good tool for control
fools believe Democracy!!
A lot of this parallels with the Democrats of today parroting "January 6th" to have Donald Trump arrested. If he does go to jail, then that same precedent can be weaponized to put anyone behind bars as a mere political prisoner–which already happens in most Communist countries anyway. The Democrat Party is communist at its core. They just don't want to say it out loud.
Interesting how now Obama and Biden take responsibility for nothing, and the media are fine with this.
Amazing these dead-enders are still trying to minimize and defend a flat out lying crook.
"Radio host and columnist Hugh Hewitt has the real story."
Yes, a "real story" that leaves out Nixon ordering illegal pay-offs, all the lies he was caught in, using official resources to inhibit the FBI and congressional investigations, and smear campaign against witnesses later proven to be telling the truth. Hewitt spends more time in this video complaining about the media than actually describing what Nixon did. As usual, Prager "U" (not a real university) cherry-picks facts to support its ultraconservative narrative.
Nixon was a red bater.
( his opponent was pink right down to her underwear) he said
She called him " Tricky Dick" it fit and it stuck. IN 1950!!
Nixon was a street tuff who resented the ivy league schools. Nixon was a street tuff, and climbed out of the sewer!
Nixon was also related to my grandfather through his mother.
And the Cornells of New England.
And for those interested…Nixon is also related to Jimmy Carter.
Here we go! The media! 🖕 Hewlett!
This was about THE LIES TOLD THE PUBLIC ABOUT VIETNAM!
The waste of American soldiers on a war the Leaders of the USA KNEW Vietnam was unwinnable!
Watch BBC DOCUMENTARY Uncle Sam and uncle Ho! On YouTube!
Then learn how USA KILLED 2 MIL VIETNAMESE IN THE NAME OF EXTREME CAPITALISM. Uncle Ho read the Declaration of Independence in 1945 to a huge crowd! Vietnam were our allies against Japan in ww2.
Then we turned our back on them and let the French imperialists back in 😡
So here again pregeru is LYING AND FEEDING YOU HALF TRUTHS AND TOTAL BULL SHIT!!!
Hugh Hewitt is a lifelong apologist for Nixon, trying in vain to obscure the documented historical record on Nixon.
The “East Coast liberal elite” didn’t despise Nixon, HE despised THEM out of his OWN insecurity of not being an Ivy Leaguer. He CREATED them as a monolithic entity in his own paranoid mind. The East Coast Ivies in fact, had plenty of Republicans, too, like the Bush family, Nixon’s brilliant confidante Henry Kissinger, and one young WaPost reporter named Bob Woodward.
And the MEDIA didn’t hire and run the Plumbers Unit under the bumbling lunatic Gordon Liddy to carry out burglaries, Dirty Tricks, and wiretapping against Nixon’s many imagined enemies. They were run from INSIDE the Nixon White House for TWO YEARS before they got caught at the Watergate.
And Nixon’s own tapes record him ordering worse crimes than Watergate on a regular basis against all his personal “enemies list” in the press and the Democratic Party.
Nixon’s deep personal insecurity and paranoia brought about his own destruction thru reckless (and useless) acts of political vengeance and sabotage that HE urged upon his incompetent and dishonest White House staff, and his crooked cronies like John Mitchell.
Nice try, Hugh, some of us were alive and alert back in the 70s and watched all this being documented by the Watergate Senate Hearings and the airing of the Nixon tapes.
He was a good president i don't give a damn about what his enemies, the fake media and leftie colleges saying about him
I suppose the story of Nixon's political career beginning with the tampering of evidence that Prescott Bush and Allen Dulles financed the Nazis as a young Navy lawyer isn't important right?
Absolutely no talk about accountability. Just a skewed 5-minute video on how the media railroaded a president. There cant be any current political agenda to this video at all. (please note sarcasm)
What a shock that Hugh Hewitt, former president and ceo of the Richard Nixon foundation, is trying to white wash the watergate scandal. I’m sure he is making his arguments in good faith. Prager U really has no shame.
Thank you so much for this video.
I am a history teacher and have a few classes that deal with Europe in the early to mid 1900s
And propaganda was used to much (and so well) its hard for the students to understand it
This video is so "textbook propaganda" that I can use in class to show students how those with agendas (often quite sinister) can brainwash large segments of the population
Thank you so much PragerU
You are doing a tremendous service in preparing the next generation to be immune to evil organizations like yourself…
Exactly what they tried to do with President Trump pretty much.
This is so disingenuous is unbelievable. The break-in was incredibly important, first off it is a crime, it started the whole scandal, and they were trying to wiretap the opposition which is illegal. Your quote is from someone that is extremely biased, so does not have a lot of credibility. You go into the media more later, but it just makes no sense, he won by a landslide so they had a plan the entire time to try and get rid of him? Also that this is the House and Senate's job, not the media. Dems had the house so fair he would have been impeached, but in the Senate, Dems had 56 and needed 67 to convict. Now there never was a vote cause he resigned, but it is commonly agreed he would have. But let's continue. There was no "East coast liberal elites" That is a modern phrasing that makes no sense for that time. Also, Nixon was pretty moderate. He started the EPA, Expanded Social Security, started the SSI, Started OSHA, created the Office of Minority Business Enterprise, Help with the creation of Title XI, Dialysis health insurance, etc. In no way defending him, but this claim that the Liberal Elites hated him is bunk. Um yeah, the scare of communism was overblown, domino theory was just wrong, that Is just fact. He should have left South Vietnam, he ran on he would leave. Every president that was involved in that war was not liked, not just Nixon. This is a juicy quote from your Paul Johnson "The national media now referred to the Vietnam War as “Nixon’s war,” and opposed Nixon’s every effort to use force — bombing, mining, incursions into formerly privileged sanctuaries — to bring North Vietnam to the negotiating table and achieve an honorable peace." How do you have bombing FORMER sanctuaries and peace in the same sentence? Yeah the media was anti-war, we should not have been there, and again he ran. on a platform of getting out of Nam. He was not Ivy League? That makes no sense, he was no outsider. His upbringing was rich, he went to Law school at Duke (Nothing to laugh at, on top of that he got accepted to Harvard just did not go), and he also was in the military. He is no Rags to Riches like you are trying to insinuate. He exposes Alger Hiss which the Media did not like? He probably was a spy and good thing we got rid of him, but that was not why he was targeted. He was targeted because of his views, which is his right as an American. Will be honest don't know that much about this case and will own up to that, does not change the fact that Nixon was just continuing Macarthism/ Red Scare. Hilarious how you call Kennedy "Paragon of East Coast Elitism" with first is not even true, but you have a video where you claim that Kennedy was a conservative. "He found out about it" See this is the shit that I hate, just move right past the part where he tried to not have his presidential tapes realized, and now that we hear them it is clear he did know about it. "Minor incident" What is going on?!?! You all were up in arms when the FBI bugged Trumped legally, and now it's a Minor incident when it's done illegally! It's a Federal Crime! Who are these said scholars that said he would be fine if he owned up to it, which is funny since it seems you admit he did it! This event also exposed all other illegal stuff he did. The defense "Well other President did stuff" is not a defense. John Sirica did his job so he's wrong? That is what all judges do, they did commit a FEDERAL CRIME, you saying the burglars lied about who wanted this? Mark Felt, Is there evidence that he was vengeful? I mean leaking documents does not really help you become in charge, we do know who it is. And um yeah that's how journalism works, they need sources, saying the info they got was wrong? Archibald Cox was hired so that would be non-biased, his own attorney General investigating his boss, their conflict of interest. Also OMG they hired lawyers to see if a crime was committed, and any evidence that ALL of them were anti-Nixon, let alone Liberal. Also just gloss over the Saturday Night Massacre, where Nixon asked his AG to fire Cox for no reason, he resigned, the next AG refused, resigned, and finally, the third guy did and fired Cox. Then a new prosecutor was appointed. Not important at all, right? John Dean flipped on Nixon, again what's the point. That's how our judicial system works, you leverage and make deals. "He was caught in the Cover-up" Why cover-up if not involved? We get back to the wired taps, and again yeah that's how it works. Having a recording of you admitting the crime is pretty incriminating. This is incredible, literally can't even admit that Watergate was bad. Like WTF! You say that Dems now are Thick, this is revisionist history.
So it was true Nixon wasn't imagining it, there was an elite conspiracy against him. No right wing anti-communist conspiracy against Kennedy, though.
This is ridiculously bad, aiming to play Nixon as the victim of the media and Democrats while completely ignoring the content of the Nixon tapes, and the deep, deep corruption within his Office. Nixon called on the CIA to have the FBI stay out of the investigation. He said it would be no problem to find a million dollars in hush money. The media (other than Woodward and Bernstein) couldn't care less about Watergate until McCord pointed at a bigger conspiracy. I know I've been accused of bias in some of my content around Trump, but this video is just absurd and actively misleading to fuel the "Republicans can do no wrong and are just the victims of the liberal elite witch hunt" narrative. Grow up and stop poisoning your own country!