Is anyone surprised that the current Trump mess has been compared to Watergate? Of course not.
Watergate is, probably the most widely known political scandal the modern world has ever witnessed.
The recent trials of Paul Manafort and Michael Cohen also offer inescapable echoes of the Nixon scandal and Trump’s current travails also throw up similar characters out of central casting (Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy anyone?) who had vague occupations (‘fixers’) and seriously dodgy job titles (‘er, ‘plumbers’).
They had their moments in the legal headlights and then they vanished into the shadows of minimum security prisons.
We are witnessing new versions complete with porn stars, secret tapes and, God help us, ostrich skin jackets.
My single-favourite quote from the Watergate scandal was from some unknown character who quipped at its height that it was ‘grab a lawyer and blame someone else time’.
That moment is fast approaching for Trump.
Manafort has gone down and Cohen is following.
But the latter’s lawyer has signalled his client will sing like a canary. He wants to talk to Robert Mueller.
What is his tune? Does he know something new about that June 9th 2016 meeting between Team Trump and the Russians? Has he tapes? Has he a stash of secret documents? Does he have material implicating criminal activities by Trump before he was president?
No one knows.
Some think a Watergate political impeachment moment is close.
But clearer heads might think otherwise.
The Democrats need both Houses of Congress to control impeachment like they did in the Watergate-era. That’s not guaranteed without a front-runner to helm their cause. And the GOP do have the appetite to cut Trump down as they did with Nixon.
And, even so, Trump himself could harness his feverish supporters into a mad dash-for-the-line Ross Perot-like Independent race with the tune ‘Anything Goes’ as his campaign song.
So what now?
- DAVID PRATT: Under-fire President starts to feel heat
I would vouch that Trump is in imperilled by the law, not just by the politics. In particular his past nefarious deeds – not just those whilst in office – could prove fatal.
He has many enemies and Mueller knows their email addresses. His Don Corleone-like influence is waning rapidly. His friends and protégés are turning on him.
His own lawyer is now shopping for a deal. Meanwhile, Mueller is collating secret evidence that we cannot hope to guess at.
And just imagine, for a moment, if his old friends in the East – the pals he thought he was going to do a deal with to construct a Trump Tower in Moscow – decide to cut him loose and, gasp, pass on some toxic material (or surveillance tapes from a certain Moscow hotel bedroom) to Mueller as well.
That would, as in Watergate when the Oval Office tapes revealed Nixon discussed using the CIA to block an FBI investigation, signal his final demise.
And if that’s not enough, then can I suggest highlighting the fateful date of September 11th in your Watergate/Trump Diary this year please?
Why?
Well that’s when the small matter of a new book about this president and his bonfire of an administration is about to be published globally.
It’ll be shocking. It will be damaging.
It will make Watergate look like a slow-moving black and white film from another era.
Its author?
Bob Woodward.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here