'Someone in a Position to Know Told Me'
J$P Instant Transcript! Eric Burns tells Shepard Smith that he knows the identity of Deep Throat.
From Studio-B with Shepard Smith, February 18 2005:
SHEPARD SMITH [FOX NEWS]: Well it's a mystery that's gripped the nation for large periods of time over the last three decades. Who was it that tipped off the reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein about the Watergate scandal, leading to the collapse of the Nixon White House? Fox's media analyst Eric Burns says he knows. How do you know? Who is it?
ERIC BURNS [FOX NEWS]: Because someone who is in a position to know, and who is fairly recently deceased, and I kept his secret until that point, told me.
SMITH: How sure are you that he was right?
BURNS: I'm not positive, but what he told me is the most sensible explanation I have ever heard. You want--
SMITH: And he's in the position--
BURNS: He was in a position--
SMITH: --to absolutely know, prior to his passing?
BURNS: He was Stephen Ambrose.
SMITH: All right, well that's interesting.
BURNS: The noted historian, who had at Simon & Schuster the same editor as Woodward and Bernstein. Stephen Ambrose told me this. There is in the safe at Simon & Schuster a copy of the first manuscript draft of All the President's Men. In it there is no Deep Throat. What does that mean? Deep Throat was a later insertion. Why? Because an editor at Simon & Schuster--and as I said they have the same editor, her name is Alice Mayhew, and she is a legend in the business--is supposed to have said two things to these cub reporters who were looking for their first big book advance. First, your book has so many sources in it that it's a little hard for the reader to keep up. Second, your book is lacking a little something in narrative drive. I mean, it's like a bunch of newspaper articles. It's good, it's important, but I have, Ambrose believes she said, one solution to both problems. Let's tie all your sources into one source, and let's make him a mystery man.
SMITH: Deep Throat, smoking in the car park.
BURNS: As the moviemakers decided to do it. But think about that. First of all, it's the same thing, Shep, as saying, as a lot of people have said, which is the most sensible explanation, that Deep Throat's a composite. What I'm saying here is not a suggestion that the information provided by or attributed to Deep Throat was false. Simply that the identity of this person was false. It is exactly the same as saying there are a lot of people who contributed to Deep Throat. And you know, people have done studies, people who know a lot more about this than I do, in which they've said it's very unlikely that the person who gave Woodward and Bernstein this information, was placed in such a way that he or she could [also] have known this.
SMITH: It was a lot of stuff.
BURNS: It was a lot of stuff. It's not just it was a lot of stuff; it was a lot of stuff that was widely varied in source. So the likelihood that it's more than one person is great. The likelihood that this is an artistic invention is even greater. Look at this, it's 30--when was that book published, '74?
SMITH: Yep, '73, '4, yeah.
BURNS: All right, so it's more than 30 years, we're still talking about it. And why? Because Deep Throat has exactly the same characteristics as the great villains or mystery men of fiction. Why does Deep Throat resemble fiction? I think Stephen Ambrose is right. Deep Throat is fiction.
SMITH: Deep Throat is a group of people who told accurate, probably, as far as we know--
BURNS: No one has ever suggested that the information isn't accurate. But this--
SMITH: So accurate information from a lot of people, and some editor decided let's make it Deep Throat, and it never existed.
BURNS: Let's make it--no, and you know another reason to believe in this, is that when the moviemakers decided to do this too. They were looking at the Woodward and Bernstein first draft, and they thought, and this is on various records, they thought exactly the same thing. Well, what happened to Nixon is pretty interesting, but this book isn't very interesting. The creation of Deep Throat solved all manner of problems. And if I'm--there's an ultimate way to know whether I'm right, and I think I am because what Ambrose said makes so much sense, and whether Ambrose is right. Supposedly Woodward at least, I don't know about Bernstein, but Woodward has said when Deep Throat dies, his identity will be revealed.
SMITH: Yeah. He said that repeatedly.
BURNS: Well, first of all, that's an out. If you're going to attribute something to someone who's dead, is that person going to come back and say it's not true? Maybe I'm susceptible to the same charge because I am saying that Stephen Ambrose told me this. Ambrose told some other people too. But if he's going to wait until the person can't say I'm not Deep Throat, doesn't that suggest there's some credibility problems? And I submit to you that even when Deep Throat--if there were a Deep Throat and were to die, we still wouldn't be told about it.
SMITH: Eric, is there a Loch Ness Monster?
BURNS: See, what you have to do before I come on is you have to tell me what the topics are.
SMITH: I'm concerned that Nessie's not real.
BURNS: I have to do some research.
SMITH: So there's no Deep Throat. I mean, get that, start your blogging. I mean, Eric--
BURNS: That's why I said this morning that with this information revealed, it will be not a big expose but a big disappointment.
SMITH: Newswatch this weekend. Do not miss it, not this weekend. Don't.
BURNS: Actually, there's more on Deep Throat that you might find intriguing that I'm not going to share with you.
SMITH: Kind of you. Bye.
BURNS: Bye.
homepage.mac.com |
