The Richard Nixon Experience

Send us Fan Mail

In this episode we listen as the House Judiciary Committee sets up shop to start their look into the impeachment of Richard Nixon.  You will hear from Bernard Nussbaum as he talks about the decision by John Doar not to aggressively investigate the facts of the case instead deciding they would collate the evidence already gathered by the Senate Watergate Committee and the Special Prosecutor's office. A decision that Nussbaum violently opposed at the time but in these interviews tries to put the best face on for the oral history he is providing. He even goes so far as to say it was  most likely the biggest factor in getting to the result that eventually happened. 

You will hear Hillary Rodham Clinton discuss the system for organizing material they came up with based on how Doar ran his law practice. The three areas that they all worked on included just trying to figure out how an impeachment would work, what were the grounds for determining a high crime and misdemeanor, and just what exactly were the facts as they knew them. It is a fascinating look at how the committee was run and you will hear how the congressmen were babysat through the process, with little black books, kept under lock and key, that staffers would go through the evidence with the congressmen, given to them by the WSPF, let them ask questions and go through books only under the direct supervision of staff with all the materials going safely back into custody after they were done researching it all for the current session. 

It was all a very controlled environment, for secrecy's sake, or at least that is what we have been led to believe.

Then we go through the scenario that led to the request by the Special Prosecutor's office for 64 more taped conversations. The President refused to hand them over, deciding instead to give edited transcripts, to be released simultaneously, to the Prosecutors, the House Committee and the public, all at the same time. That decision would eventually lead to the legal fight in the Supreme Court known as the United States vs Richard Nixon.  

Then the President addressed the nation.

If ever a case of being caught telling the truth has existed then this speech by President Nixon is it.  We just did not have any way of knowing it then, but we do now. If you go back to our first four tape series episodes and listen to the "Cancer on the Presidency" conversation with 
John Dean, the White House Counsel, ( episode 137 -  Tape series part 1) or the conversations with Assistant Attorney General Henry Petersen ( episode 139  -  Tape series part 3) every single assertion in his defense made by President Nixon in this April 1974 speech turned out to be true. 

Go listen to it all for yourself. 

Send us Fan Mail

In this episode we are going to introduce you to a new set of players in the saga of the fall of Richard Nixon. These are the members of the House Judiciary Committee and its staff. We chose five of them. 

Representatives Elizabeth Holtzman D-New York and Trent Lott R-Mississippi, two people at the very start of their long and illustrious careers. We also chose three members of the staff, Hillary Rodham Clinton and William Weld, who were young staffers and the number two man on the staff Bernard Nussbaum. 

It is Bernard Nussbaum whose oral history is of the most interest throughout the rest of our series. He is blunt in his assessment of the office of Special Prosecutor even as he attempts to defend the job that they all did in 1974. He calls it a dangerous office. He also points out often that Doar overruled him in his view that a thorough investigation needed to be conducted by their office rather than just relying on the information and evidence gathered by the Senate Watergate Committee and the Watergate Special Prosecutor's office. 

However, in this episode, we will just introduce them all to you and how they got in the places they were when the scandal landed on their doorstep in March of 1974.

  I will tell you that of all the various entities involved in the horrible travesty of justice known as Watergate (Here I am editorializing again) my opinion of these people, with the exception of William Weld, changed the most dramatically for the better of any of the research I conducted. 

This is their story with a few funny side stories too. Like how sliming  salmon prepared Hillary Rodham Clinton for her long career in politics. 

Send us Fan Mail

In this , the season premier or our final season on "Richard Nixon and Watergate 1974 - 1994 The Fall and Re-Rise of Richard Nixon" we take a thorough examination of the actual crime that our President had been accused of by the Watergate Special Prosecution Force. It was that he authorized the payment of $75,000 in hush money to Howard Hunt. They laid out a convincing case. They met in secret with John Doar, the House Judiciary Committee's lead legal staffer. They met in ex parte meetings with Judge John Sirica, to insure that all the accumulated evidence they had was going to be moved over to the Judiciary Committee, Grand Jury secrecy rules be damned.  It all went down  flawlessly when the indictments were handed down on March 1, 1974. 

There was just one problem. They had a gargantuan hole in the story. 

There was even more than a small possibility that the money had been paid outside of a window of time when President Nixon could have even known about the blackmail threat made by Hunt.

 Now that's a problem. 

But you got to give it to Leon Jaworski, Henry Ruth, and the Special Prosecutor's for coming up with a creative way around the problem. 

They met with John Doar late at night and over dinner at Henry Ruth's house and made a case to him. Then somebody, be it Doar on his own, or from the advice of his friend Henry Ruth, decided to go against the advice of his top advisors, Bernard Nussbaum and Hillary Rodham, and not investigate anything on their own. He would collate the evidence given to him from the Watergate Special Prosecutors and follow their road map.  A road map with only one goal in mind;  take down the President of the United States of America. The President they could not defeat at the ballot box. 

It's all here and you will hear it in their own words, and in one case, when asked a direct question, you will even hear one prosecutor, Jill Wine Banks, attempt the artful dodge rather than answer the question "How did you know for sure Richard Nixon authorized the payment to  Howard Hunt?" 

Send us Fan Mail

I told you it was a barn burner of a debate didn't I, and it lived up to the billing!!

Now if you have not seen it here is the link:
 
https://www.c-span.org/video/?521064-5/washington-journal-jill-wine-banks-geoff-shepard-discuss-watergate-50th-anniversary

In this episode we go through many of the exchanges and provide you with the facts of the case.

We will go back through:

- Who hired G. Gordon Liddy to run the campaign intelligence plan

- The Bombshell phone call between President Nixon and Assistant Attorney General Henry Petersen = Big time exculpatory

- Were the Shepard Documents Debunked?

-  The Giant Credibility Gap of Richard Ben Veniste

- Whose idea was third party verification

- The real relevance of the Smoking Gun Tape  

-  Elizabeth Holtzman will talk about the road map provided by the WSPF

- Bernard Nussbaum, of the House Judiciary Committee staff, talks about not being allowed to actually investigate the case, and only collating the information to show the congressmen on the committee. 

- Henry Ruth talks about his secret meetings after hours with John Doar, head of the House Judiciary committee's investigation staff,  both at the office and over at his house for dinner to allegedly  plot Watergate strategy, even using babysitters to pass information

It is all here and it will shock you!! This is one great hour, and it sets the stage for the story to come and the fall of Richard Nixon.

But, also, as we shall see, you can't keep a good man down, and before we are through you will also witness the re-rise and enormous impact Richard Nixon was still to play in the history of our World. 

So tune in to Season 8 of "Randal Wallace Presents: Richard Nixon and Watergate 1974 - 1994 The Fall and Re-Rise of Richard Nixon" it starts back on October 16, 2022

** The crowd noise was added for dramatic effect, these shows were not taped in front of an audience nor at the C-Span event

Send us Fan Mail

WELCOME TO OUR FIRST EVER SPECIAL EVENT!!!!!

We are so excited to put this event together to kick off the final season of our look back at, not only Watergate, but at our five season look back at the most controversial period in American History, the Vietnam War Era .

This episode is an attempt to introduce you to the two historic figures, Jill Wine Banks and Geoff Shepard,  who will face off on the episode of The Washington Journal from C-Span. The link to the debate is here

 https://www.c-span.org/video/?521064-5/washington-journal-jill-wine-banks-geoff-shepard-discuss-watergate-50th-anniversary

So after this podcast episode is finished head on over to the link and watch this unbelievable debate. Then come on back for a post debate show where we go through the debate, fact check it all, provide some analysis,  and introduce some material that we will be showing you over this our final season looking back at Richard Nixon.

This show is a lot of fun, enjoy!!!

Thanks again for tuning into our show too, we are closing in on 10,000 Downloads and that is because of you and we appreciate it!!

Randal Wallace 

** The crowd noise was added for dramatic effect, these shows were not taped in front of an audience nor at the C-Span event

Send us Fan Mail

Here are the instructions to fully enjoy our Podcast Special Event tomorrow night.

Our first post of the pre debate show will post at 8 PM (Sorry for saying in the broadcast 8:30 but it won't let me post in the half hour)

Our second post for the post Debate show will post at 10 pm

Both shows will be shared on Facebook and Twitter at those times as well.

In the hour provided between the shows, we suggest going to the link below which will take you to the You Tube video of the entire episode of C-Span's Washington Journal. The debate between Jill Wine Banks and Geoff Shepard aired on June 17, 2022. We look forward to spending the evening with you tomorrow night!!!

https://www.c-span.org/video/?521064-5/washington-journal-jill-wine-banks-geoff-shepard-discuss-watergate-50th-anniversary

Send us Fan Mail

Get Ready for an event like no other in the past half century. Finally Richard Nixon will get his day. It is a podcast event that we guarantee you will change everything you thought you knew about Richard Nixon and the Watergate Scandal. 

As Finally, The Special Prosecutors, Jill Wine Banks, have to face the Nixon Defense team, Geoff Shepard, on live television. 

We will go over all of it here on "Randal Wallace Presents: Nixon and Watergate"  October 12, 2022 at 8 pm Pre- Debate, and 10 pm Post Debate shows, with a link provided for the actual debate for you to plug in and watch it all for yourself. 

Send us Fan Mail

Finally, we have arrived at the end of the Richard Nixon and Watergate story. Here we prepare you for the final chapters of the story of Richard Nixon's fall. His futile fight to save his Presidency in these final  5 months of his tenure. 

But  we will fast forward a half Century for a special event of monumental proportions provided by the good folks at C-Span to kick off the season. 

When the prosecutors finally have to share the stage with Richard Nixon's last living Defense team member, Geoff Shepard.  Jill Wine Banks and Geoff Shepard talk Watergate and we will go back through the debate with highlights, analysis, and a lot of fact checking too. 

It should be an ending to our series that will change everything you ever thought you knew about Richard Nixon and the Watergate Scandal. 

Send us Fan Mail

In our Richard Nixon and Watergate, 1974 Through the Fire , season 7 finale, all the plotting and planning bares fruit as the Special Prosecutor's get both their indictments and they are able to assist their favorite Judge John J. Sirica into maneuvering himself in as the presiding Judge for most of the big cases on Watergate. 

He, in turn, helps the Special Prosecutors, in a series of ex parte meetings, maneuver sealed Grand Jury evidence over to the House Judiciary Committee in order to insure what the congressman see as they move forward with a look at impeaching the duly elected President of the United States.  It is all here in plain sight, you just had to wait nearly. a half century to have the documents in hand to know what you were looking for rather than flying blind. 

Here you will hear the plan executed flawlessly, structured in a way preventing the Presidents defense team from ever knowing exactly what crime was  he was actually accused of committing  and its all covered by a very compliant national press corp, in the form of CBS News. 

All of this is happening while off camera, as we have discussed and shown you,  Henry Ruth, the second in command at the WSPF, is busy with secret dinners at his home,  and also extending special invitations  to his old friend,  John Doar, to hop on over to the office after hours  to get a look at all their secret evidence for himself. While also allegedly coming up with a plan to get his hands on it all,  keep his staff, and the Congressmen on his committee from ever seeing anything other than what the Special Prosecutor's want them to see. 

 And that is what we will be sharing with you in our final season of Richard Nixon and Watergate. 

Send us Fan Mail

The House Judiciary Committee is about to take center stage. In February 1974, the House votes to start the inquiry on Impeachment in ernest. They assign the task to the House Judiciary Committee under its new Chairman Peter Rodino, a little known New Jersey Democrat from Jersey City. He had assumed the position out of seniority after Elizabeth Holtzman's upset victory had unseated Chairman Emanuel Celler, who had served 50 years in the House and was a friend and supporter of President Nixon.

Most of the committee was made up of lesser known political figures, some at the very start of their political careers like Holtzman and Mississippi Republican Congressman Trent Lott.  They would be assigned the enormous and volatile task of investigating the President of the United States for High Crimes and Misdemeanors. The spotlight would fall to them. Would they be fair? Would they be bi-partisan? Could they meet the test? 

Here we examine the committee and their efforts to staff up to look at the evidence. We will also look at a major decision made by the lead staff person they hired, John Doar. Mr. Doar was himself a former Justice Department lawyer who had been heavily involved in civil rights work. He had lived in New York City at an early point in his career and then worked in the South. At several points along the way he had become friends  and maintained a friendship with Henry Ruth, now serving as the number 2 man in the Special Prosecutor's Office.

In this episode you will hear from Henry Ruth himself at just how close that relationship was and how it played to the advantage of his staff and their efforts to get all the evidence they had over to the House Committee, all while circumventing all the due process procedures that normally protect a defendant in any criminal proceeding. In this case, against a President of the United States of America, you will see every effort made that could be, to render the leader of the free world defenseless before an unsuspecting committee of lesser known political figures.