Word: mollenhoff
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...Mollenhoff's treatment of the Watergate saga is a unique interplay of "outsider" journalistic digging and "insider" knowledge and communication. This dual vision results in a broader perspective on the Nixon kingdom and its demise than either the analyses of outsiders or the recollections that those who sank with the Watergate wreckage have been able to provide. The book delineates Mollenhoff's participation in the Nixon regime and his subsequent disillusionment with it. Soon after Nixon began his first term of office, Mollenhoff left a distinguished reporting career, highlighted by a Pulitzer (1958) and the publication of five books...
...existence. The profusion of literature inspired by Watergate can be grouped into three general categories: first, the apologia of the accused; second, the narratives of media and congressional heroes who scaled the White House walls of secrecy; and third, the chastening "outsider" voices of post-Watergate analysis. Until Clark Mollenhoff's book, however, a chasm existed between the first perspective--that of government "insiders"--and the second and third points of view--those of media people, congressional investigators, judges, lawyers, and political scientists...
...staunch Republican and initially a Nixon supporter, Mollenhoff was persuaded to assume the newly-created post by the president's expressed desire to ferret out the vestiges of past scandals and the seeds of future mismanagement. "I knew he was no angel," Mollenhoff said in an interview with the Crimson this week, "but I did think he was a salvageable political figure...
Immediately, problems surfaced in the form of the "Berlin Wall," an insurmountable barrier to communication with the President guarded by the ferocious watchdog team of John Ehrlichmann and H.R. Haldeman, whom Mollenhoff characterized as "inexperienced meddlers pulling political levers." Mollenhoff's unsuccessful early attempts to gain access to the Oval Office foreshadowed his later inability to implement any real reforms within the executive branch. "I had an opportunity from the first to view the real problems: excessive secrecy and an extreme political motivation that dominated their thinking," Mollenhoff said. These obsessions and the Nixon team's unshakeable belief in executive...
...They didn't work there very long if they did. Oh, [Clark] Mollenhoff said no, and Pete Peterson did. Neither one could get near the Oval Office. Len Garment said no, in a mild way. Dick Kleindienst said no once. Arthur Burns. And John Connally had to leave because of his recommendations on how to handle Watergate. He just didn't have enough information...