Centerfield

The federal Government would be held hostage by political appointees in the various Departments without civil servant employees holding the threat of whistle-blowing.

Damn. I had my money on John Dean. ;-)

It's interesting, but I remember a part in Nixon's book _In The Arena_, where he railed about senior bureaucratic officials who betray their superiors because they're gunning for a political position of their own. I didn't know who he was talking about, but it's starting to make sense now...

I'm interested in hearing what Monica Crowley has to say, since I'm guessing she was exposed to quite a few of the President's rants while he was in the "wilderness," so to speak. She may be able to speak with some clarity on this issue.

Damn! I had 4 to 1 on Rehnquist....

Ah well, Tully, at least we can console ourselves that Felt is a fellow Kansan (or for me, a fellow Missourian)--he was in charge of the KC FBI from 1958 to 1962 or there about. It's not as good as the money we would have won, but hey, it's worth a question at Trivial Pursuit.

Personally, I had always believed it was Al Haig. I guess I owe him an apology.

Very punny, by the way, Rick. I'm sure that's part of the reason why Felt stayed undercover so long; he didn't want to tell his kids his nickname came from the most famous porn film in history.

I see little downside to leaks about domestic policy, as opposed to leaking classified information, which I believe is wrong in almost all cases.

The abuses at Abu Ghraib were classified. Government workers with security clearances were warned that they would be violating their clearances if they read the leaked Government reports.

As Lord Acton said, "Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely." Nixon, of course, had his problems anyway, but even with more stable personalities in government, they want to hide their mistakes and, in some cases, break the law. There was an article in the New York Review of Books about the Pentagon Papers and the NYT's and Washington Post's decision to publish. I have always had mixed feelings about the Pentagon Papers, but the article makes a pretty good case that there was nothing in them that hurt national security but they did show how the government had misled the country in leading us into Viet Nam. I don't blame administration's for trying to prevent leaks and sometimes they can be harmful, but in a liberal democracy, leaks are a price we pay for freedom. Bush's insistence on managing the press cannot be helpful to democracy. He seems to think that he and his administration have a right to decide what's fit for the American public to hear.

By the way, I heard that Pat Buchanan called Felt a "traitor" for leaking. Good ole Pat--a real friend of democracy.

I was interested in Colson's reaction. He was shocked,.....SHOCKED! And he thought it was unprofessional and a poor way to handle things. This from a guy who spent time in prison, found religion, became a minister to other prisoners and for all appearances seems to have recognized his mistakes and attempted to atone for them.

While this situation is full of nuance, it strikes me as odd that Colson expressed such an opinion.

I can't believe there is eve a question as to whether this man's actions were right or wrong. Nixon apologist are condemning the man and your Pres is questioning what to say until he has more information. What more Information? Nixon was a crook!

I can imagine Colson's rage. How dare the FBI do its job? How dare they catch criminals, instead of well...catching criminals.

Of course, the right wingers are steamed. After all the speculation, all the second guessing and the doubt, it wasn't the media who did Niixon in, it wasn't the hippies or the yippies, or the Dems, or the peace movement, or the Black Panthers, or any of the thousand and one "enemies" of the paranoid faction. it was one of Hoover's boys, the FBI, the feds, the boys in blue, the one faction the "law and order" guys thought they had safely in their pocket.

"Have a little irony. It's good for your blood."

Whistle blowers are an important part of American accountability. In all occassions, it should go through the command chain; however, if there is no motivation in the command chain to change the way things are running, then let the people hear and decide.