I hope you will respond to the crisis of confidence that Watergate has created by opening up your administration and reaching out to people in a more magnanimous spirit.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
This story, I predict, will grow to be worse than Watergate. The American people need to have the answers.
This is a generation weaned on Watergate, and there is no presumption of innocence and no presumption of good intentions. Instead, there is a presumption that, without relentless scrutiny, the government will misbehave.
I can see clearly now... that I was wrong in not acting more decisively and more forthrightly in dealing with Watergate.
There may yet be another Watergate book. I have thought a book about the aftermath of Watergate and its impact could be done, perhaps by me or someone else.
It would seem that the Watergate story from beginning to end could be used as a primer on the American political system.
Watergate had become the center of the media's universe, and during the remaining year of my presidency the media tried to force everything else to revolve around it.
Watergate just happened to come along at the same time as the demand for honesty in relations between the sexes, in advertising, in ecology, in almost everything. It just stumbled into that great big elephant trap that had already been built for it.
I suspect there have been a number of conspiracies that never were described or leaked out. But I suspect none of the magnitude and sweep of Watergate.
You must pursue this investigation of Watergate even if it leads to the president. I'm innocent. You've got to believe I'm innocent. If you don't, take my job.
The great thing about Watergate is, is that the system worked. The American system worked. The press did its job. We did what we were supposed to do.