Exposing The Watergate Scandal

Many people, myself included look up to individuals in an authoritative role such as; senators, governors, and presidents. We view them as being honest and sincere. They have to be right? They do want to run the country after all. Often our thoughts are “they would never lie to us or hide things from us”, but unfortunately that’s not always the case. One of the biggest political scandals to hit the United States of America was the Watergate scandal involving our very own President Richard Nixon. This scandal caused a lot of American’s to lose trust and hope in the presidency. The scandal received its name from the Watergate apartment and office complex that was located in Washington D.C., where a burglary took place on June 17, 1972 and five men were arrested. It then came to surface that the men’s intentions were to sabotage the opposite political party, when president Nixon was notified of this he order the Central Intelligence Agency to call the FBI to stop with any further investigation, that national security was at stake. President Nixon knew that it would come back to the White House and didn’t want to risk anything, even though he was never involved with the

Watergate Scandal has been considered as one of the darkest chapters in American history. The event not only refers to unethical use of power by the public representatives but also levied great deal of attention on the mechanism of surveillance over the activities of public servants. Watergate scandal provides ethical directions not only to public servants but also provides ethical guidelines to the lawyers and media representatives as well. This incident reveals how ethical lines were crossed time and again by the politicians, legal attorneys and media for their own purposes. Ignoring the righteousness of the outcomes, events like these cause severe damage to the public's trust vested in these authorities which takes a long time to restore.

As time progressed and the investigation began to uncover the truth about what transpired at the Watergate apartment complex several things became evident: most of the burglars were ex-CIA and ex-FBI personnel, the burglars were paid with money directly from the re-election campaign and President Nixon not only knew about and sanctioned the break-in but deliberately attempted to cover it up. When called before Congress to testify about his knowledge, White House staffer John Dean testified that Nixon and his aides attempted to “stonewall” the investigation. As Congress continued its inquiry, it became clear

On June 17, 1972, Woodward was asked to cover a story for his job at the "Washington Post." There had been a burglary at the Watergate hotel. When he arrived at the newsroom, he discovered that this wasn 't an ordinary burglary, and he wasn 't the only one reporting on it. The burglars had broken into the headquarters of the Democratic national committee in the Watergate office-apartment-hotel-complex. Bernstein had the same assignment. The two men had no appreciation for each other.

The Watergate Scandal was the downfall of Richard Nixon. It made Americans put less trust in the government and built trust in the media. It all takes place at the Watergate Hotel. He led an extremely corrupt administration to get him re elected. He also was the first President to resign. The unethical organization that was formed was called the CRP (later creep). They helped Nixon get re elected in 1972. They used illegal tactics to get him re elected. They paid lawyers for the burglars who broke into the Watergate Hotel. These people were known as the Plumbers. That was directed by John Ehrlichman. They were the White House investigation unit. They prevented information leak and burglarize any of Nixon reveals. Watergate seven was Richard Nixon closest comrades. They were in charge of the Creep and the plumbers that carried out many illegal activities. Christ the Transformer of Business culture is a good trait to obtain. “These people are intimately involved with those in the business, but their distinctive Christian standards are not lost” (Ruddell, 2004, p. 40). The people that were involved in the Watergate scandal should have had this trait.

There was allegations of the diversion of funds from Whitewater through the Madison Saving and Loan to cover some of the campaign debts of the Clinton's. There were also allegations of whether the Clinton's gained income-tax benefits from the failure of Whitewater that they were not entitled to. To date no charges have been filed against President Clinton or his wife Hillary (Whitewater 1). The whole Watergate scandal, brought about charges of political bribery, burglary, extortion, wiretapping, conspiracy, obstruction of justice, destruction of evidence, tax fraud, and illegal use of the CIA and the FBI, campaign contributions and taxpayers money for private matters. In all, more than 30 administration officials and other people in the Nixon administration pleaded guilty or were found guilty of illegal acts (Time and Again 2).

Watergate is the popular name for the political scandal and constitutional crisis that began with the arrest of five burglars who broke into the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate office in Washington D.C. on the night of June 17, 1972. It ended with the resignation of president Richard M. Nixon. The burglars and two co-potters-G. Gordon Liddy and E. Howard Hunt were indicated on charges of burglary, conspiracy, and wiretapping. Four monthes later, they were convicted and sentenced to prison terms by District Court Judge John J. Sirica, who was convicted that pertinent details had not been unveiled during the trial and proffered leniency in exchange for further information. As it

At this time, only one other impeachment inquiry existed, so Bernstein and Woodward’s work had to be as accurate as possible. They made sure of this through a few precautionary measures. First, they agreed never to let an article go to print unless they both fully agreed the article was worthy of printing should. When they were investigating the truth of a fact or statement, they always made sure that they checked it with at least two sources. When they made a large implication, such as that of H.R. Haldeman, Assistant to the President, they investigated with as many as four or five sources. To make sure that they were not overly ambitious or biased, they frequently ran their story ideas, topics, and facts, over with their editors, Sussman and Rosenfeld.

Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward were the investigative reporters to the Watergate scandal. Bernstein was a reporter at the Washington Post; he had

Richard M. Nixon was a former vice president who barely won the election in 1968 against Hubert Humphrey for the Republican party. Once in his presidency, President Nixon pleased and displeased citizens in the United States. He was not necessarily the most liked president, but he was not the most disliked either. By 1972, it was time for the

Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward were dedicated young reporters at the time Watergate occurred. There dogged pursuit for the truth kept the story from falling into obscurity. Woodward was a relatively new reporter at the time, a Yale graduate, and a Navy veteran. Bernstein dropped out of college and he started working in the newspaper industry at the age of sixteen. By age nineteen, he was a full-time reporter for the Washington Star. Although they were young, and Woodward had not even been a Post reporter for a year, they were dedicated and tenacious. Without Bernstein and Woodward 's efforts, the entire truth may have never been revealed. Their actions during the scandal and their subsequent book has helped Americans see the reality of the Nixon administration.

Nonetheless, due to the exposure of the Nixon administration’s corrupt activities in addition to the President’s graceless resignation, the public and the news media scrutinized the backgrounds of people who sought power more carefully. A positive outcome of Watergate was the successful national movement for government transparency: to make meetings and records more accessible to the public. In 1974, Congress overrode a presidential veto and revised the Freedom of Information act, providing the public and media with new tools to access information held by the executive branch. This act reduced secrecy in government and gave the public a way to check the governmental and political operations happening in Washington, D.C. In case of tampering, the Presidential Records Act of 1978 required preservation of all presidential records and documents. Following Congress’s lead, state legislatures also adopted their own resolutions regarding government transparency, improving the public’s relationship with state and federal governments. While all these acts made information public, the most prototypical piece of Watergate legislation that strengthened legislative oversight powers and gave more leverage to the public was the Government in Sunshine Act of 1976, which ordered government agencies to conduct all meetings open to the public with some exceptions. Thus, agencies are bound by law to make the time, place, subject matter, and minutes of a meeting available to the public. This

Everyday citizens often live unaware of their government’s inner workings. The knowing of political espionage is often too heavy of a subject to be inducted in conversation. True, prima facie, modest twists and turns of information may not be considered substantial, but this inconsideration leaves much to be uncontrolled. It is easy for political leaders to become power crazed, to not realize the massive implications that come of their actions. Only after all is said and done do the people actually realize their government is an opaque mask of deception. The Watergate Scandal substantially impacted Americans’ trust in their government.

Woodward and Bernstein discovered that there had been a direct threat of violence against their workplace to hinder the efforts of the President’s exposure. A plan had been set in motion to start a fire in their workplace. Woodward had said the allegation “was deadly serious and not a joke...He wanted the Washington Post destroyed.” Although most likely not meant to cause serious harm, many of Woodward and Bernstein’s coworkers could have been injured or killed because of their investigation. While endangering oneself remains a personal choice, putting other people in harm’s way drew the debatable position of the media in the Watergate

i.     Both journalists are relatively inexperienced, but both are extremely hungry to uncover the details of the story. Throughout the film they are portrayed as very ambitious, but new reporters. They are under constant pressure to double and triple check their sources. Most of the editors at the Post were opposed to Woodward and Bernstein covering such a great story and wanted to pass it off to more experienced reporters, but Editor Ben Bradlee gave them a chance. He had confidence in their perseverance and dedication to uncover the truth. In many scenes, Woodward and Bernstein are extremely frustrated and feel as though they are getting nowhere because no one will talk to them. They are aggravated and feel it is because these sources of information and witnesses have been threatened by a higher force. During a few of the interviews they appear to be quite inexperienced when asking questions that are either irrelevant or lead the witness away