Although more than 50 years have passed, the Watergate affair remains a cautionary tale of the threat of untrammelled presidential power and the yardstick against which all other political scandals are judged.
Yet some historians believe its architect, former president Richard Nixon, risks being usurped as the norm-breaking exemplar of presidential corruption by Donald Trump and the firestorm over his role in the 2021 US Capitol assault.
Mr Nixon's underlying crime was covering up a break-in at the Democratic National Committee headquarters in Washington's Watergate complex that was aimed at stealing documents that might have helped him in an election he would ultimately win by a landslide anyway.
The accusations against Mr Trump — that he incited a deadly riot to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power as part of a conspiracy to overturn an election — appear “far more serious”, says history professor Michael Green.
“One of the ironies is that Nixon did not need to order a break-in to win that election,” he said. “And there is no evidence, even with all of the tapes, that there was ever a discussion or thought of overturning the result if it went against him.”
Five Watergate burglars were caught red-handed on the evening of June 16 in 1972 and it quickly became clear that some were linked to Mr Nixon and the White House.
The ensuing investigation opened a Pandora's box of abuses and dirty tricks that included political spying, the forgery of correspondence and even the theft of a pair of shoes to intimidate a rival to Mr Nixon.
But the cover-up was initially so successful that Mr Nixon won 49 of the 50 states in his landslide victory over Democrat George McGovern in that year's presidential election.
The whitewash might have succeeded were it not for the chance discovery in the summer of 1973 that the president had secretly recorded all of his White House meetings.
They included a “smoking gun” tape in which Mr Nixon could be heard ordering that the FBI, which was set to investigate the Watergate break-in, be told to “stay the hell out of this”.
Mr Nixon resigned after a delegation of Republican elders, led by ultraconservative Barry Goldwater, came to the White House in 1974 to tell him he was likely to be impeached and the jig was up.
Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward, the reporters who played a pivotal role in bringing down Mr Nixon, have written a new foreword for their major book All the President's Men drawing parallels to Mr Trump.
They suggest that Mr Trump's incitement of a mob to march on the Capitol constituted “a deception that exceeded even Nixon's imagination”.
“By legal definition this is clearly sedition … thus Trump became the first seditious president in our history,” they say.
While the Senate voted unanimously to set up a cross-party investigative committee on Watergate, the Republicans of the 2020s vetoed a bipartisan commission and punished two members who joined the Democratic-led House committee investigating January 6.
About 80 million Americans — considerably more than a third of the population — tuned in to White House counsel John Dean's televised evidence given against Mr Nixon at the Watergate hearings, while about 20 million — only 6 per cent of Americans — watched the blockbuster first hearing put on by the January 6 panel.
For David Greenberg, author of Nixon's Shadow: The History of an Image, the Watergate hearings were “instrumental” in bringing down a president attempting to subvert democracy.
“The difference, however, is that in 1973 and 1974, a great many Republican congressmen and senators loyal to Nixon ended up admitting that he was engaged in criminal activity,” he told AFP.
“Today, only a few … have been willing to acknowledge Trump's complicity. Our polarised, partisan environment may prevent the January 6 hearings from achieving all they should.”
AFP contributed to this report
UAE tour of the Netherlands
UAE squad: Rohan Mustafa (captain), Shaiman Anwar, Ghulam Shabber, Mohammed Qasim, Rameez Shahzad, Mohammed Usman, Adnan Mufti, Chirag Suri, Ahmed Raza, Imran Haider, Mohammed Naveed, Amjad Javed, Zahoor Khan, Qadeer Ahmed
Fixtures and results:
Monday, UAE won by three wickets
Wednesday, 2nd 50-over match
Thursday, 3rd 50-over match
How to donate
Send “thenational” to the following numbers or call the hotline on: 0502955999
2289 – Dh10
2252 – Dh 50
6025 – Dh20
6027 – Dh 100
6026 – Dh 200
Basquiat in Abu Dhabi
One of Basquiat’s paintings, the vibrant Cabra (1981–82), now hangs in Louvre Abu Dhabi temporarily, on loan from the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi.
The latter museum is not open physically, but has assembled a collection and puts together a series of events called Talking Art, such as this discussion, moderated by writer Chaedria LaBouvier.
It's something of a Basquiat season in Abu Dhabi at the moment. Last week, The Radiant Child, a documentary on Basquiat was shown at Manarat Al Saadiyat, and tonight (April 18) the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi is throwing the re-creation of a party tonight, of the legendary Canal Zone party thrown in 1979, which epitomised the collaborative scene of the time. It was at Canal Zone that Basquiat met prominent members of the art world and moved from unknown graffiti artist into someone in the spotlight.
“We’ve invited local resident arists, we’ll have spray cans at the ready,” says curator Maisa Al Qassemi of the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi.
Guggenheim Abu Dhabi's Canal Zone Remix is at Manarat Al Saadiyat, Thursday April 18, from 8pm. Free entry to all. Basquiat's Cabra is on view at Louvre Abu Dhabi until October
Retail gloom
Online grocer Ocado revealed retail sales fell 5.7 per cen in its first quarter as customers switched back to pre-pandemic shopping patterns.
It was a tough comparison from a year earlier, when the UK was in lockdown, but on a two-year basis its retail division, a joint venture with Marks&Spencer, rose 31.7 per cent over the quarter.
The group added that a 15 per cent drop in customer basket size offset an 11.6. per cent rise in the number of customer transactions.
Will the pound fall to parity with the dollar?
The idea of pound parity now seems less far-fetched as the risk grows that Britain may split away from the European Union without a deal.
Rupert Harrison, a fund manager at BlackRock, sees the risk of it falling to trade level with the dollar on a no-deal Brexit. The view echoes Morgan Stanley’s recent forecast that the currency can plunge toward $1 (Dh3.67) on such an outcome. That isn’t the majority view yet – a Bloomberg survey this month estimated the pound will slide to $1.10 should the UK exit the bloc without an agreement.
New Prime Minister Boris Johnson has repeatedly said that Britain will leave the EU on the October 31 deadline with or without an agreement, fuelling concern the nation is headed for a disorderly departure and fanning pessimism toward the pound. Sterling has fallen more than 7 per cent in the past three months, the worst performance among major developed-market currencies.
“The pound is at a much lower level now but I still think a no-deal exit would lead to significant volatility and we could be testing parity on a really bad outcome,” said Mr Harrison, who manages more than $10 billion in assets at BlackRock. “We will see this game of chicken continue through August and that’s likely negative for sterling,” he said about the deadlocked Brexit talks.
The pound fell 0.8 per cent to $1.2033 on Friday, its weakest closing level since the 1980s, after a report on the second quarter showed the UK economy shrank for the first time in six years. The data means it is likely the Bank of England will cut interest rates, according to Mizuho Bank.
The BOE said in November that the currency could fall even below $1 in an analysis on possible worst-case Brexit scenarios. Options-based calculations showed around a 6.4 per cent chance of pound-dollar parity in the next one year, markedly higher than 0.2 per cent in early March when prospects of a no-deal outcome were seemingly off the table.
Bloomberg
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Our legal consultant
Name: Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Profile of VoucherSkout
Date of launch: November 2016
Founder: David Tobias
Based: Jumeirah Lake Towers
Sector: Technology
Size: 18 employees
Stage: Embarking on a Series A round to raise $5 million in the first quarter of 2019 with a 20 per cent stake
Investors: Seed round was self-funded with “millions of dollars”
Overview
What: The Arab Women’s Sports Tournament is a biennial multisport event exclusively for Arab women athletes.
When: From Sunday, February 2, to Wednesday, February 12.
Where: At 13 different centres across Sharjah.
Disciplines: Athletics, archery, basketball, fencing, Karate, table tennis, shooting (rifle and pistol), show jumping and volleyball.
Participating countries: Algeria, Bahrain, Comoros, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, Qatar and UAE.
WITHIN%20SAND
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Sugary teas and iced coffees
The tax authority is yet to release a list of the taxed products, but it appears likely that sugary iced teas and cold coffees will be hit.
For instance, the non-fizzy drink AriZona Iced Tea contains 65 grams of sugar – about 16 teaspoons – per 680ml can. The average can costs about Dh6, which would rise to Dh9.
Cold coffee brands are likely to be hit too. Drinks such as Starbucks Bottled Mocha Frappuccino contain 31g of sugar in 270ml, while Nescafe Mocha in a can contains 15.6g of sugar in a 240ml can.
Mohammed bin Zayed Majlis
'The worst thing you can eat'
Trans fat is typically found in fried and baked goods, but you may be consuming more than you think.
Powdered coffee creamer, microwave popcorn and virtually anything processed with a crust is likely to contain it, as this guide from Mayo Clinic outlines:
Baked goods - Most cakes, cookies, pie crusts and crackers contain shortening, which is usually made from partially hydrogenated vegetable oil. Ready-made frosting is another source of trans fat.
Snacks - Potato, corn and tortilla chips often contain trans fat. And while popcorn can be a healthy snack, many types of packaged or microwave popcorn use trans fat to help cook or flavour the popcorn.
Fried food - Foods that require deep frying — french fries, doughnuts and fried chicken — can contain trans fat from the oil used in the cooking process.
Refrigerator dough - Products such as canned biscuits and cinnamon rolls often contain trans fat, as do frozen pizza crusts.
Creamer and margarine - Nondairy coffee creamer and stick margarines also may contain partially hydrogenated vegetable oils.
