The Secret Plot to Make Ted Kennedy President: Inside the Real Watergate Conspiracy

I have been meditating on the Vietnam War, and Watergate, for a long, long time. As a very young man, I was opposed to the war, and I did my share of "wallowing in Watergate" as the Erwin trial proceeded. I actively disliked Nixon (although he had shaken my hand), just as I later actively disliked Ronald Reagan. (I saw him once, at U.C. Santa Barbara, emerging from an elevator, and noted that he had dyed hair. Reagan even signed my diploma!) It was only later that I began to understand the horror of Stalin. I can date this precisely to an article in "The New Republic" which undermined all of my assumptions. The late author of "The Gulag Archipelago" played an important role as well. In short, I began to grow up. Are the "starry-eyed illusions of youth" a good thing? I don't think so. And then the real implications of Watergate began to hit home. Nixon, for all his faults, had left Vietnam with the clear diplomatic understanding that invasion of South Vietnam would bring disaster for Hanoi. You can laugh and chuckle, but Nixon brought "peace with honor," having obtained nothing more than the "status quo ante." And then Watergate struck. Nixon was forced to resign, Ford became President, and a wave of McGovernites were elected to office. They actually cut off ALL funding to South Vietnam, and so invited Hanoi to invade. Which happened. Note that they didn't just cut off military funding to Saigon. They cut it ALL off. Imagine what would happen if we did that to Egypt right now, in 2008! The result was a bloodbath in SE Asia. Why? And this brings me to the point of this review. Anyone who thinks that Watergate was some sort of non-partisan political action needs to have their head examined. It was obviously an effort to get rid of Nixon and bring in a Democratic majority. It worked. Kind of. Because, after Ford had been disposed of, the next presidential candidate was NOT Teddy Kennedy -- which was the idea -- but some peanut-chomping nincompoop named Carter. And we abandoned SE Asia for this? We surrendered to the enemy (some really vicious thugs) just because the Democrats wanted the White House? Well, thank goodness, that was A Long Time Ago. Other good points of this book: John F. Kennedy (for a long time,a liberal icon) was in fact the son of Joseph Kennedy, one of the richest men in America, and he bought his way into the White House with amounts of money which had never been seen before. I guess everyone knows that Kennedy was much "worse" than Clinton in the marital fidelity sweepstakes, but somehow nobody in the press thought that this was worth mentioning.

As a present-day "liberal" (Witness the "Goldwater in '64" bumper sticker I've got framed and hanging on my office wall), I suppose I should be all upset about the premise of this book, but now, as I near the end of a great read, the book has me wondering. Did John Dean come to his senses and realize what he had to do when he sojourned to Camp David at Nixon's request for a long weekend in late March 1973, or was he plotting to come out unscathed from the moment he heard about the botched break-in on June 19, 1972? The author portrays Teddy Kennedy as "plotting" Watergate as a vehicle to the Oval Office (I like Teddy Kennedy, by the way--warts and all). I think it was more--back then--of Teddy being drawn to the White House like a kid to a playground: he really couldn't do otherwise. The author has tons of interesting and sometimes humorous stuff, such as Nixon's reaction upon learning of the break-in as one of "dismay" rather than "disapproval"--dismay that CREEP would choose the DNC's Larry O'Brien's phone to bug, when anyone with any knowledge of politics would realize that the phone to bug would be the Democratic candidate's campaign manager's phone! The book has me re-thinking what exactly went on back then, really, although I can't say I thought the author "demonized" Hillary Rodham. Back in 1973 I thought it would be impossible to perpetrate an injustice such as Mr. Shepard describes; today, 35 years later, I'm not so sure. Anyway, it was a great read, even if you don't share the author's point of view.

Shepard connects the dots and provides a compelling paper trail illustrating the Harvard/Kennedy clan cabal. Fast paced and well written, it's a good read for anyone and a must read for the political junky. Side bars provide a nice bridge for those whose memories are fading and those who were not around to remember. A convincing indictment with the occasional rascally aside.

Secret Plot should be a must read for everyone interested in government, politics and history. This is an excellent resource for those who want to get the real story on Richard Nixon and Watergate. It is such a fascinating read, so different from the other books on Watergate. The author, Geoff Shepard, obviously, had a front row seat to history, and appreciate his look from the inside. Shepard is to be commended for his research and attention to detail. The flow of the book reads like a novel, but, unfortunately, is non-fiction. The author shows how Dean, who was supposed to be the President's lawyer, planned and perpetuated the cover-up and was more interested in protecting himself than giving wise counsel to his client. No wonder Dean is called the villain and Judas of Watergate. It is good to see the true colors of John Dean.

This book should be required reading for all political science classes. Rarely do outsiders get a look into the inner workings of Washington's politcal machinations that this book makes possible. Here, the author explores new lines of thought regarding Watergate that he has uncovered, and then structures them in context with other parallel activities such that the reader has a real time sense of the day by day influences surrounding Watergate and those caught up in it. The book opens the window on an important time in our history, and challenges the reader to consider new possibilities brought by the author after exhausting research and discovery of new material.