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Believe it or not, Senates Russia investigation is moving faster than its Watergate counterpart 44 years agoBy Paul Kane May 13
This week marks the 44th anniversary of the public debut of the Senate Watergate Committee. On May 17, 1973, the committee kicked off hearings that became must-see TV, broadcast live on the three networks in the afternoon and replayed at night on PBS.
What did the president know, and when did he know it? was the famous question posed by Sen. Howard Baker (R-Tenn.) early on in the Watergate hearings, a defining phrase still invoked today when a politician is caught in scandal.
Since those hearings, just about every congressional committee conducting a high-profile investigation has had to live up to the legacy of Baker and Sen. Sam Ervin (D-N.C.), the leaders of the Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities. Its an almost impossible standard to meet and also one that often gets lost in myth rather than facts.
Sens. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) and Mark R. Warner (D-Va.), the chairman and ranking minority party member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, are the latest to stand in the long shadows of the Watergate committee. They regularly face questions about why they arent moving faster to investigate Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential campaign.
In fact, theyre moving more quickly than Ervin and Baker did 44 years ago. If it doesnt seem that way, thats got more to do with the insatiable appetites of social media and cable news than with reality.
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/believe-it-or-not-senates-russia-investigation-is-moving-faster-than-its-watergate-counterpart-44-years-ago/2017/05/13/8e3f8bcc-3746-11e7-b4ee-434b6d506b37_story.html
FarPoint
(12,209 posts)We didn't suffer with Watergate.
Control-Z
(15,681 posts)I was watching All the President's Men the other night and just to find the names of people possibly involved they had to dig through stacks of telephone books. Once they found a name, if they found a name, the only thing the book gave them was an address and phone number. From there they had to physically go to the address and knock on the door - and then take it from there.
When having others listen in on a phone call they would unscrew the the mouth piece from the phones where they were listening and removed the microphones.
It was so much harder and time consuming back then just to get preliminary things accomplished. We damn well better be moving along faster.
Txbluedog
(1,128 posts)GBizzle
(209 posts)The Republicans were defending the Crooked Californian for quite some time until he became, simply, indefensible.
And they faced a bloodbath in the House and Senate races in 1974.
dalton99a
(81,065 posts)procon
(15,805 posts)Think of the level of technology that was available back in the Watergate era, and remember that everything had to be done manually. It was slow and time consuming work. Just think how long it would take to 'Xerox' a box of documents, or have a transcriptionist type out an analog recording, and just mailing a letter might take a week.
With everything being digital now, instead of waiting days or even weeks, the investigators have almost instant access to everything with just a mouse click. Software now does the same thing that an office full of skilled workers used to do. The investigators can review data from anyplace in the world from their desk without planning a long overseas trip, so it's going a lot faster than what I remember about the Watergate story.
Instead of years waiting for a final conclusion, I think we a looking at months, and don't forget that these investigations have already been churning along for quite some time now. With Comey's alert that he was now getting daily briefings and had requested more money, you know things really starting to ramp up.