In the Shadow of the White House by Jo Haldeman

Author:Jo Haldeman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Rare Bird Books
Published: 2017-04-05T21:25:21+00:00

We’ll be Eaten Alive

I spend a restless night and awaken early Tuesday morning, April 24, to find Bob already on the phone in his office. Before leaving for the White House, he steps outside on the patio where I’m feeding the dogs.

“Ron called again,” he says.

“What’d he say this time?” I’m still upset at the way things were handled last night.

“The president hasn’t made up his mind after all.”

“I can’t believe it,” I exclaim. “So what happens now?”

“Everybody has a different idea. Ehrlichman thinks that the president should fire Dean and that I should take a leave of absence. He would stay on the job but be prepared to take a leave if it becomes necessary. I’m just waiting to see how it all falls out.”

As if to confirm John’s opinion, the cover of Time features cartoon figures of Nixon and six men in the administration tangled up in wiretap equipment. Bob and John Dean are two of the six, but John Ehrlichman is not. In the upper right corner, a yellow banner proclaims, “Watergate Breaks Wide Open.”

The seven-page article hardly mentions Bob, except to say that he’s being hopelessly compromised

…if only because many of the men in the deepest trouble at one time or another reported to him… It is Haldeman’s duty as chief of staff to protect the president from such disasters; instead his shop played a big hand in creating the debacle… One man moving most frantically to clear himself was John Ehrlichman, who has long worked intimately with Haldeman and thus could be tainted… It would be tragic if Richard Nixon’s considerable achievements as president were coupled in history with the sordid business of Watergate…

Over the next couple of days, Bob says that all their time is consumed with Watergate discussions and that the president continues to vacillate on whether he and John need to take leaves or resign. I don’t see how they can continue on like this much longer. Bob and John are scheduled to meet with the US attorneys and the chief counsel for the Senate Watergate Committee next week. They will also be meeting with the grand jury, as well as other congressional committees looking into Watergate.

On April 26, a new disclosure at the Pentagon Papers trial keeps Watergate on the front page. Testimony reveals that, in 1971, two of the Watergate defendants, Hunt and Liddy, broke into Daniel Ellsberg’s psychiatrist’s office in an attempt to get information on Ellsberg’s mental state. The judge in the trial orders the prosecutor to find out who hired them.

The next morning, Acting FBI Director L. Patrick Gray resigns, stating that he destroyed documents at the direction of Ehrlichman and Dean. Bob tells me that the president is going to Camp David tomorrow to work on a major Watergate speech, which he will give Monday night.

“At this point, the president expects John and me to request voluntary leaves,” Bob says.

“Really, Bob?” I don’t see how my husband can take this. At what point will it end?

On Saturday, April 28, a large group of noisy reporters gathers on the sidewalk outside our townhouse.

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