Would Deep Throat Be a Hero in 2005?

"But the main reason, I think, was that Felt saw his leaks as a betrayal of the FBI. Six years ago, I asked Felt (who at that point was still denying he was Deep Throat) whether, if he were Deep Throat, that would be so terrible. His reply:

" 'It would be terrible. This would completely undermine the reputation that you might have as a loyal, logical employee of the FBI. It just wouldn't fit at all.'

"But wasn't Deep Throat a hero?

"'That's not my view at all. It would be contrary to my responsibility as a loyal employee of the FBI to leak information.' "

Power Line quotes a 1974 piece by Edward Jay Epstein:

"The conclusion of Epstein's essay is of continuing relevance to the mythical role imputed to the press in uncovering Watergate. The journalistic sense of self-importance that flowed from the myth has become a dynamo of destruction. Epstein wrote in his 1974 essay:

" 'Perhaps the most perplexing mystery in Bernstein and Woodward's book is why they fail to understand the role of the institutions and investigators who were supplying them and other reporters with leaks. This blind spot, endemic to journalists, proceeds from an unwillingness to see the complexity of bureaucratic in-fighting and of politics within the government itself. If the government is considered monolithic, journalists can report its activities, in simply comprehended and coherent terms, as an adversary out of touch with popular sentiments. On the other hand, if governmental activity is viewed as the product of diverse and competing agencies, all with different bases of power and interests, journalism becomes a much more difficult affair.' "

Keep in mind, though, that Epstein said Throat was a fictional character. And The Post and Throat didn't bring down Nixon; the judicial process did. But they kept the story alive for months when other news organizations weren't investigating and were just quoting Ron Ziegler's third-rate-burglary denials from the White House podium.

RightWing NutHouse questions Felt's motivation:

"Felt wouldn't be the first Washington bureaucrat to dish some dirt as the result of being passed over for promotion. Information is power. And Felt's talking out of school eventually made L. Patrick Gray's position untenable to the point where the Acting FBI Director declined to be in the running as a permanent replacement for Hoover.

"Now I'm sure that Felt sees in his own mind a nobility of purpose and purity of motive that blinds him to the more unsavory aspect of his deed. There's a reason FBI reports aren't made public; they alert the target of the investigation to the interest of the Bureau. And in Felt's case, he guided Wood/Stein in such a way as to throw suspicion on people who could have been squeezed by the Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox before their names were associated with the crime.

"Would this have made a difference in the final analysis? Probably not. But it certainly made the job of Cox and his successor, Leon Jaworski that much harder."

G. Gordon Liddy has been on TV blasting Felt for betraying the Nixon administration, and Editor & Publisher picks up comments by ex-Nixon speechwriter Pat Buchanan along the same lines:

"I always believed it was Felt, but kept that private because what he did was so dishonorable I didn't want to tie him to that if it was not true. If it was honorable, why did he keep it hidden so long? I think the man is ashamed of it."

Jon Friedman at MarketWatch.com focuses on how the news became public:

"The two most celebrated investigative reporters since Gutenberg just got scooped on their own source! And their journalistic mystique, as the keepers of the 'Most Famous Secret' of modern times, has been dramatically devalued. Imagine the shock of the dynamic duo."

Media Bistro links to a CNN interview with ex-LAT Washington bureau chief Jack Nelson, who quotes former Post editor Barry Sussman on Throat's importance or lack thereof:

"He said, 'That's the power of the myth. Over the years, an anonymous, bit player, a minor contributor, has become a giant.' And he said, 'The fact is that, whoever this was, whether it was Mark Felt or whoever it was,' he said just did not have that much of importance in covering the -- in uncovering the whole Watergate scandal."

Now, so you ask, how did this myth get perpetuated?

KYRA PHILLIPS: "Well, probably the movie 'All the President's Men,' right?"

NELSON: "That's what kept it going. 'All the President's Men.' That's exactly right. Until that -- until that movie, you didn't hear anything about a Deep Throat. And I think it was a dramatic device, and I think it played right into the whole thing of this big myth."

Well, it wasn't entirely a myth, since it was also in the best-selling Woodstein book about Watergate.

But even that book had Throat guiding and confirming information for Woodward, not providing hard facts.

Those came from knocking on other people's doors.