Reply #24: Yes. [View All]

[H2O Man]

Mr. Woodward was an officer in Naval Intelligence in the late 1960s; this is pretty well-documented, including in his own books. Part of his responsibilities included running reports to the White House. There, he met an older gentleman who had previously been associated with the Navy. The older gentleman, Mark Felt, was then a ranking official in Hoover's FBI. Hoover is known for sharing staff with military intelligence, which solidified his power in a number of ways. Anyhow, Felt suggested to Woodward that he consider a career in journalism. This is curious, because Felt held most journalists in utter contempt, and Woodward had no background in journalism. Even when he was working with Carl Bernstein at the WP, it was evident that one of the two was a talented writer, and the other was the channel for a type of information that few journalists have access to.

If we were to take the names away, and not think of the journalism and case history, the relationship between the two looks a little different than the myth that has been created. An older, high-ranking intelligence officer is meeting with a younger man, and providing guidelines to accomplish a pretty specific goal.

We've recently seen a lot of military and intelligence officers expressing serious concerns about the direction this administration is taking the country. I think it is very likely that Mr. Woodward's book has more than a coincidental or casual relationship to these concerns.