The Nation: It’s Inoperative: They Misspoke Themselves

THE Nixon Administration has developed a new language—a kind of Nix-speak. Government officials are entitled to make flat statements one day, and the next day reverse field with the simple phrase, “I misspoke myself.” White House Press Secretary Ronald Ziegler enlarged the vocabulary last week, declaring that all of Nixon’s previous statements on Watergate were “inoperative.” Not incorrect, not misinformed, not untrue—simply inoperative, like batteries gone dead. Euphemisms notwithstanding, the Nixon Administration’s verbal record on Watergate is enough to turn ardent believers into skeptics. Some examples of “inoperative” statements from Administration officials who misspoke themselves:

> On June 19, 1972, only two days after the breakin, Ziegler refused to comment on the incident and called it a “third-rate burglary attempt,” adding, “This is something that should not fall into the political process.”

> On Aug. 28, Attorney General Richard Kleindienst pledged that the Justice Department’s investigation of the Watergate case would be “the most extensive, thorough and comprehensive investigation since the assassination of President Kennedy . . . No credible, fair-minded person is going to be able to say that we whitewashed or dragged our feet on it.” In fact, five months later only seven men had been brought to trial as a result of that investigation—the five directly involved in the break-in on June 17, plus a low-level White House consultant and a former White House staffer. Until recently, top officials in the Justice Department made little attempt to find out who had planned and approved the operation.

> On Aug. 29, President Nixon remarked of a Watergate investigation being conducted by his counsel, John W. Dean III: “I can say categorically that his investigation indicates that no one in the White House staff, no one in this Administration, presently employed, was involved in this very bizarre incident.”

> On Oct. 16, Clark MacGregor, then chief of the Committee for the Re-Election of the President, said: “Using innuendo, third-person hearsay, unsubstantiated charges, anonymous sources and huge scare headlines, the [Washington] Post has maliciously sought to give the appearance of a direct connection between the White House and the Watergate, a charge which the Post knows—and a half a dozen investigations have found—to be false.”

> On Oct. 19, Jeb Stuart Magruder, former deputy director of C.R.P., told TIME Correspondent Hays Gorey: “Listen, when this is all over, you’ll know that there were only seven people who knew about the Watergate, and they are the seven who were indicted by the grand jury.”

> On March 24, 1973, Senate Minority Leader Hugh Scott quoted Nixon as saying: “I have nothing to hide. The White House has nothing to hide. I repeat, we have nothing to hide, and you are authorized to make that statement in my name.”

> On March 26, Ziegler “flatly” denied “any prior knowledge on the part of Mr. Dean regarding Watergate.”

> On March 29, former Attorney General John Mitchell said: “I deeply resent the slanderous and false statements about me concerning the Watergate matter reported as being based on hearsay and leaked out. I have previously denied any prior knowledge of or involvement in the Watergate affair and again reaffirm such denials.”