Watergate, Then and Now

Those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it.
― Edmund Burke

Edmund Burke lived from 1729 until 1797, but part of him still lives on today. This quote is been rephrased by others throughout history including George Santayana in 1905 and Winston Churchill in 1948.

It's not uncommon for political campaigns to spy on their opposition, it happens all the time. It may not be overt spying as much now as trying to dig up dirt on the competitor to use as a smear campaign. In 1972, leaders of the Nixon campaign decided to pay burglars to to break into the offices of the Democratic competitor to steal documents and bug the telephones. Because a security guard happened to notice tape keeping doors from locking the police were called and the burglars were arrested. It's unclear to me if Nixon actually knew about the break-in but then the cover-up started.

The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.
― Edmund Burke

Because of the determination of good men the cover-up was eventually unraveled leading to charges of abuse of power and obstruction of justice against the administration. The efforts of these men eventually forced Nixon to resign from the office of President.

Now lets flash forward a little over 40 years. Based on unverified information obtained from Russians at the request of Hillary Clinton and the Democratic National Committee, we've come to the end of an investigation into Trump colluding with Russia lasting over two years. So far, there's been nothing made public that would tie Trump to collusion with Russia. So, was the investigation really the cover-up?

Based on unverified information, and the with holding of the fact that the information was unverified, FISA warrants were issued against a member of the Trump team to spy on the campaign. Through abuse of power, the investigative resources of the Department of Justice and the FBI were turned against the Trump campaign and ultimately the Trump presidency. This was done for potentially no more than a diversion, a cover-up.

Barr is now looking at the source of the investigation into the Trump collusion with Russia. Devin Nunes has been looking into it and is ready to forward criminal referrals to the FBI. It seems the real cover-up in the case of Trump colluding with Russia may be starting to unravel. How high did it go in our government? To know this we may have needed the server and devices destroyed by Hillary Clinton in what could be obstruction of justice. Time will tell and I am hopeful the efforts of good men will again get to the bottom of what really happened.

This isn't an exact repeat of history, but I don't think it's that far off. In Watergate the major crime was not the break-in, but the cover-up of the break-in. Now, it seems the real crimes will not be in trying to obtain dirt on Trump but the cover-up that ensued. While things did change of the 40+ years since Watergate, some of it stayed very similar. After all,

History doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme.
― Mark Twain