January 8, 2007
Watergate Revisited Posted by Joshua Zeitz at 06:15 PM EST Since everyone deserves a vigorous defense, someone should stand up for Charles Colson. Why not John Steele Gordon? Mr. Gordon accuses me of hypocrisy for arguing that states should restore the voting rights of ex-felons while also mocking Colson. On the contrary. Colson should absolutely be permitted to vote. But that doesn’t mean that we can’t recall the criminal operation he built and ran inside the Nixon White House—an operation that illegally sabotaged rival presidential campaigns (particularly, that of Sen. Ed Muskie), willfully violated the civil rights of numerous private citizens, and employed toughs to physically assault antiwar protesters. Colson served seven months in prison. It should have been seven years. In any event, I’m not suggesting that he shouldn’t be permitted to vote. I just don’t believe a word he says. Neither am I crying for Chuck Colson. He’s as powerful today as he was when he was coordinating criminal projects for Richard Nixon. His life turned out just fine. Conservatives should treat all ex-convicts with such open arms. (Note to Mr. Gordon: Have I defended Webster Hubbell in these pages, or in any other forum? I don’t recall having done so. Unless he can refresh my memory, he should not intimate what is not true.) On the topic of Charles Colson, it’s worth noting that Fred Fielding, the high-powered Beltway attorney who has just been named to replace Harriet Miers as White House chief counsel, was also a member of the Nixon White House. As an assistant to White House counsel John Dean, Fielding sat in on FBI interviews with White House personnel during the initial investigation into the Watergate burglary. He did so with the explicit permission of L. Patrick Gray, the acting FBI director. This is partly why Gray never got to serve as director in his own right. It was a completely inappropriate violation of Bureau procedure, just this side of obstruction of justice. Fred Fielding played only a bit role in the cover-up. But he was there. Interestingly, before it materialized that Mark Felt was Deep Throat, the confidential government source featured in Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein’s bestseller All the President’s Men, Fielding was rumored to be the mole. Then again, so were about 100 other people.
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