Zeifman, Jerry. Without Honor: Crimes of Camelot and the Impeachment of President Nixon. New York: Thunder's Mouth Press, 1995. 262 pages.

Jerry Zeifman was the chief counsel to the House Judiciary Committee during the Watergate episode. This is his insider's account of what really went on as the committee responded to the pressure to investigate Nixon and send articles of impeachment to the floor. (One of the staffers on the committee was Hillary Rodham.) This book shows that Congress merely reacted to Watergate as events unfolded in the headlines. Congress is a joke; they will hire dozens of investigators, but nothing ever gets investigated.

Zeifman confirms what others have suspected -- that insiders are afraid of knowing too much about the secret state. Nixon's smoking-gun tape, for example, suggested crimes during the Kennedy administration, which meant that Democrats became less enthusiastic. Another example is that staffers wondered whether Dorothy Hunt had been murdered. (This is still a mystery; years later, Zeifman adds casually, he learned that Dorothy Hunt was under psychiatric treatment, and "her psychiatrist had subsequently disappeared under mysterious circumstances.") There are also interesting tidbits not widely known surrounding the resignation of Spiro Agnew, and also about the disappearance of Hale Boggs in a presumed plane crash. It would seem, on balance, that simple fear drives a fair amount of the conspiracy denial that one finds in the major media these days. Now that's downright scary.
ISBN 1-56025-128-X

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