Talk:Watergate burglaries
NPOV
I have to say that this, to me, is indeed a very suspicious-looking article that does no so much try to present a plausible narrative of a specific (and, given the consequences, ultimately important) historical event, based on the agreed-upon findings of countless judicial and legislative investigations of Watergate and on the overwhelming majority of journalistic or scholarly books and articles written about these findings. Rather, it seems that the underlying attempt of the whole article is to cast universal doubt on exactly this “conventional wisdom on Watergate”. Indirectly, the aim of this pinpointing of the supposed or real holes in the traditional narrative seems to be the promotion of an esoteric reading of the Watergate events as presented in books containing conspiracy theories that have been dismissed by most historians and other writers. In this regard, the article might not so much be the outgrowth of “six years of research” on the part of the original author as one would think after reading the first editing summary and the impressive list of original documents cited as references. Rather, it seems that the author has simply rehashed conspiracy theories as presented in the highly controversial Watergate books by Jim Hougan (Secret Agenda: Watergate, Deep Throat and the CIA, New York: Random, 1984) and Len Colodny and Robert Gettlin (Silent Coup: The Removal of a President, New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1991). Let me make this clear: Using these books for the preparation of a Wikipedia article on Watergate is not in itself problematic but it is every author’s obligation to both highlight the fact that he’s using these books as his source as well as to put them into the perspective of Watergate literature as a whole which would underline the fact that we are dealing here with minority or even outsider positions. Moreover, in this case it would be necessary to direct the attention of Wikipedia readers to the fact that essential parts of Silent Coup have effectively been acknowledged to be unreliable when the publishers agreed to settle in a lawsuit filed by former White House counsel John Dean against the authors, Gordon Liddy and the publisher St. Martin’s Press. Under the terms of the settlement of this lawsuit, large parts of the book are even prohibited from being republished. I get the impression that the original author went to great pains in order to cover up (irony intended) the fact that he was relying to a great degree or even exclusively on this rather seedy and dubious source (however, Silent Coup is mentioned in passing in the article, although not in the list of references). But if I am unfair in my speculations here and this article indeed represents the outgrowth of “six years of research” totally independent from Secret Agenda and Silent Coup (as the original author implicitly claims), the immediate erasure of the whole article from this site would be expedient. This is because, according to one of the three strict content policies of Wikipedia, this is not the place to present “original research,” that is “unpublished theories, data, statements, concepts, arguments, and ideas; or any new interpretation, analysis, or synthesis of published data, statements, concepts, or arguments that appears to advance a position or, in the words of Wikipedia's co-founder Jimbo Wales, would amount to a ‘novel narrative or historical interpretation’” (see: [1]) In this context, I refer anyone’s attention to the fact that the article is relying heavily on the deposition which G. Gordon Liddy gave in 1996 in the course of the mentioned libel lawsuit which John Dean filed against the authors of Silent Coup. Although a transcript of this deposition has been published online ([2]), I am not aware of any published interpretations of this specific source. Once again: If such an interpretation does not exist and therefore the article cannot be based upon it, the author’s reliance of this source must be considered to be original research which is uncalled for at Wikipedia, not in the least because in any imaginable circumstance the presentation of such research is self-serving and cannot conform to the neutrality principle. Moreover, what has to be nipped in the bud is any attempt by individuals to highjack this encyclopaedia in order to get a forum for one’s own esoteric ideas about important events in history.
- What I forgot to mention: The already dubiously looking name given by the original author is nothing but an unimaginative anagram of "Only the Truth". I leave it to others to check out how reliable Wikipedia contributions are whose authors claim that they possess the truth. -- Beek100 08:42, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
- That's quite a long rant. Do you have specific issues that concern you, or are you more generally just worried that because the sources are only cited at the end, that incorrect and biased data could easily be inserted? --Dhartung | Talk 04:15, 17 June 2006 (UTC)
- Well, both would be true. I took and take the liberty to write in detail because a claim that an article is biased should not be made carelessly. Some length is also necessary because the whole material is quite complicated. If you are familiar with the Watergate literature as a whole (I think I am), you can easily notice that the whole article adopts the perspective of a few authors as opposed to the majority perspective. It does so in quite an argumentative fashion (in itself problematic in light of the NPOV policy), most of the time sounding like a lawyer’s presentation (“there is no physical evidence”), giving you the facts, the circumstantial evidence and the sources fitting the argument, but essentially leaving out everything that contradicts it. Take the passage I rewrote as a case in point in the article. It concerns the so-called Gemstone III meeting of March 30, 1972. The version of “Huntley Troth” concluded: “The Key Biscayne memo does not survive. The earlier Liddy plans do not survive. There is no physical evidence to support any of the anecdotal accounts.” The dispute here is about whether John Mitchell, Nixon’s Attorney General and head of the Committee-to Re-elect the President, signed off on a downscaled plan for political espionage presented to him by his deputy Magruder but written by G. Gordon Liddy. Every reader not familiar with the bulk of Watergate literature and the findings of the courts and Congress in this regard must conclude that the claim of Mitchell’s involvement stands on very shaky, that is, above-all, self-contradictory ground and that there seems to be no evidence supporting that claim. You never even learn about the fact that both the Ervin Committee and the Rodino Committee in Congress and the jury in Mitchell’s trial, after weighing all this evidence, concluded that it suggested that Mitchell in fact had supported the Gemstone III plan (that’s one of the reasons Mitchell went to jail). The bulk of circumstantial evidence in this regard, the fact for example that the surviving copy of a “Talking Paper” prepared for a meeting of Nixon’s Chief of Staff Haldeman with Mitchell suggests that the consequences of an adoption of the Liddy plan were discussed between the two of them just 5 days later is not mentioned at all in the article, although it plays, for example, such a large role in the narrative of Fred Emery’s well-known Watergate book. And you would have to add this kind of detailed information in almost every passage of the article in order to get an unbiased perspective. This all-in-all is clearly the attempt to rewrite history, to question the findings of a whole generation of Watergate researchers. And this attempt is based on very questionable ground. I don’t know how many times the Liddy deposition of 1996 (that was given 24 years after the events in question!) is cited as “evidence”. But if you read that deposition in whole and pay attention to the passages where Liddy is pressed by oppositional lawyers on his memory, it becomes quite clear that concerning many details he has no first-hand memory at all but has to rely on “refreshing his memory” when re-reading passages from two books on Watergate (see f.e. p. 50-52), his own memoirs “Will” and the conspiracy book “Silent Coup” that was the issue of that 1996 trial and which Liddy calls quite revealingly “the new bible on Watergate” (p. 52). That must have created an almost surreal situation in the courtroom, but is that the kind of evidence that fits Wikipedia standards? I think not. And to make myself clear: I am not against an article on the first Watergate break-in which the caveats of some authors concerning the “conventional wisdom” in this regard is mentioned and the reasons therefore are given. But I am totally against an argumentative article which tries to CONVINCE you that the traditional narrative is false. -- Beek100 10:22, 17 June 2006 (UTC)
- I respectfully will avow that there are no theories whatsoever expressed in the article. If you are going to claim that a "conspiracy theory" is any part of the article, please cite it by quotation and not by unsupported allegation.
- I also will submit emphatically that the bulk of the article is nothing whatsoever but recitation of sworn testimony by the co-conspirators themselves in congressional hearings, as is entirely reflected in the list of references. The other sources that are relied upon to a substantial degree are mainly the autobiographies of co-conspirators Hunt and Liddy, are completely valid sources, and are relied upon mainly for issues not covered in the congressional testimony. That you make an issue out of one sole reference in the text to Colodny's book, which concerns an otherwise verifiable reference to a telephone company sweep of DNC headquarter--which has NOT been "discredited--I consider disingenuous indeed. And nothing in any of it constitutes either NPOV or "original research." You claiim these "offenses" at great length, but never quote anything from the article itself to support it. I submit that's because your position is unsupportable.
- The article does nothing at all except compare the testimony of the co-conspirators. And no, calling them "co-conspirators" does not constitute a "conspiracy theory": that's how the court labelled them. Any "conclusions" or "theories" that you have reached by reading the article are your own, they are not in the article itself. If they were, you could quote them. But there's nothing to quote except claims made by the participants themselves in completely valid sources.
- Given all the foregoing, I recommend that you remove your alert from the article and devote your energies to something that has some validity. Huntley Troth 23:07, 17 June 2006 (UTC)
- Well, both would be true. I took and take the liberty to write in detail because a claim that an article is biased should not be made carelessly. Some length is also necessary because the whole material is quite complicated. If you are familiar with the Watergate literature as a whole (I think I am), you can easily notice that the whole article adopts the perspective of a few authors as opposed to the majority perspective. It does so in quite an argumentative fashion (in itself problematic in light of the NPOV policy), most of the time sounding like a lawyer’s presentation (“there is no physical evidence”), giving you the facts, the circumstantial evidence and the sources fitting the argument, but essentially leaving out everything that contradicts it. Take the passage I rewrote as a case in point in the article. It concerns the so-called Gemstone III meeting of March 30, 1972. The version of “Huntley Troth” concluded: “The Key Biscayne memo does not survive. The earlier Liddy plans do not survive. There is no physical evidence to support any of the anecdotal accounts.” The dispute here is about whether John Mitchell, Nixon’s Attorney General and head of the Committee-to Re-elect the President, signed off on a downscaled plan for political espionage presented to him by his deputy Magruder but written by G. Gordon Liddy. Every reader not familiar with the bulk of Watergate literature and the findings of the courts and Congress in this regard must conclude that the claim of Mitchell’s involvement stands on very shaky, that is, above-all, self-contradictory ground and that there seems to be no evidence supporting that claim. You never even learn about the fact that both the Ervin Committee and the Rodino Committee in Congress and the jury in Mitchell’s trial, after weighing all this evidence, concluded that it suggested that Mitchell in fact had supported the Gemstone III plan (that’s one of the reasons Mitchell went to jail). The bulk of circumstantial evidence in this regard, the fact for example that the surviving copy of a “Talking Paper” prepared for a meeting of Nixon’s Chief of Staff Haldeman with Mitchell suggests that the consequences of an adoption of the Liddy plan were discussed between the two of them just 5 days later is not mentioned at all in the article, although it plays, for example, such a large role in the narrative of Fred Emery’s well-known Watergate book. And you would have to add this kind of detailed information in almost every passage of the article in order to get an unbiased perspective. This all-in-all is clearly the attempt to rewrite history, to question the findings of a whole generation of Watergate researchers. And this attempt is based on very questionable ground. I don’t know how many times the Liddy deposition of 1996 (that was given 24 years after the events in question!) is cited as “evidence”. But if you read that deposition in whole and pay attention to the passages where Liddy is pressed by oppositional lawyers on his memory, it becomes quite clear that concerning many details he has no first-hand memory at all but has to rely on “refreshing his memory” when re-reading passages from two books on Watergate (see f.e. p. 50-52), his own memoirs “Will” and the conspiracy book “Silent Coup” that was the issue of that 1996 trial and which Liddy calls quite revealingly “the new bible on Watergate” (p. 52). That must have created an almost surreal situation in the courtroom, but is that the kind of evidence that fits Wikipedia standards? I think not. And to make myself clear: I am not against an article on the first Watergate break-in which the caveats of some authors concerning the “conventional wisdom” in this regard is mentioned and the reasons therefore are given. But I am totally against an argumentative article which tries to CONVINCE you that the traditional narrative is false. -- Beek100 10:22, 17 June 2006 (UTC)
- That's quite a long rant. Do you have specific issues that concern you, or are you more generally just worried that because the sources are only cited at the end, that incorrect and biased data could easily be inserted? --Dhartung | Talk 04:15, 17 June 2006 (UTC)