"Deep Throat" Mark Felt: Lawman's Unwavering Compass Led Him to White House Showdown

[DeepModem Mom]

Washington Post, Page One: Lawman's Unwavering Compass Led Him to White House Showdown
By Patricia Sullivan
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, December 20, 2008; A01

On Tuesday, Oct. 10, 1972, Washington awoke to this startling news:

"FBI agents have established that the Watergate bugging incident stemmed from a massive campaign of political spying and sabotage conducted on behalf of President Nixon's reelection and directed by officials of the White House and the Committee for the Re-election of the President," The Washington Post reported.

Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein wrote that story, but it would not have been possible, they would later tell the world, without the clandestine help of the most famous unnamed source in history, W. Mark Felt -- the man they called "Deep Throat."

He was the associate director of the FBI, and he guided the reporters, all along insisting that Watergate was not an isolated incident but part of a wider conspiracy designed to destroy Democratic presidential candidates who might run against Nixon.

Instead, the Watergate scandal subsequently destroyed the Nixon presidency. Facing impeachment, Nixon resigned the presidency in disgrace less than two years after that day in October when, one of his key lawyers would later say, it was apparent that "in a general way and with the help of Deep Throat, (Woodward and Bernstein) figured out Watergate." Felt died Thursday at his home in Santa Rosa, Calif. He was 95....

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/19/AR2008121900228_pf.html