Getting Nixon

For those of us old enough to remember the slogan "Dick Nixon before he dicks you,"  Newsweek's Toiletgate story has a weary familiarity about it—right down to the anonymous "Deep Throat" source at its center.

So let me make one thing perfectly clear: This is a determined effort by a liberal mainstream press to relive its Finest Hour and bring down another second-term Republican President. Moreover, the MSM is determined to do so by any means necessary, even if that means, repeatedly and unabashedly, fabricating stories out of whole cloth.

As Ausin Bay notes:

"Vietnam-Watergate" is a tired and phony game, but for three decades it's been the spine of the New York-Washington-Los Angeles media axis. Its rules are simple and cynical. Presume the U.S. government is lying—particularly when the president is a Republican. Presume the worst about the U.S. military—even when the president is a Democrat. Add multicultural icing—allegations by "Third World victims" are given revered status, while U.S. statements are met with arrogant contempt.

The formula was created long ago; the only thing that ever changes is the casting. And, of course, the MSM has to fill in some "additional dialogue" for the villians of the piece. Consider this exchange between Scott McClellan and The New York Times' Elizabeth Bumiller on Tuesday:

Bumiller: Are you asking them [Newsweek] to write a story about how great the American military is; is that what you're saying here?

McClellan: Elisabeth, let me finish my sentence. Our military—

Bumiller: You've already said what you're—I know what—how it ends.

We all know how Bumiller & Co. would like to end it—the Big Story, that is.

They would end it in disgrace, with a helicopter lifting off the roof of an American embassy in some Third World country or from the South Lawn of the White House.

The basic William Goldman screenplay hasn't changed since the Seventies: Dustin Hoffman and Robert Redford, threatened at every turn by evil Republicans, tenaciously expose the sordid truth and wind up toppling the powerful.

CREEP P.R. Man: For twenty years, the Eastern liberal press has been trying to smear Dick Nixon. Fortunately, the American public is too smart to be fooled by …

White House Spokesman: I have been reliably informed by John Dean that no one connected with the White House …

Some of us recall how those sentences ended too.

Dick Nixon before he dicks you.