The Watergate scandal, a major political controversy in the United States during the presidency of Richard Nixon from 1972 to 1974, led to the rise of conspiracy theories. The scandal involved the arrest of five burglars at Democratic National Committee headquarters, which led to an investigation that revealed multiple abuses of power by the Nixon administration and a growing body of evidence pointing to serious White House plots. In the twentieth century, conspiracy theories continued to evolve, with many Americans suspecting the U.S. government itself of plotting against them.
The Nixon Conspiracy is a detailed and definitive account of the Watergate prosecutors’ internal documents uncovered after years of research. The obsession with finding and casting out “un-Americans” has been a constant in American conspiracy theories. The earliest conspiracy theory in British history dates back to the publication of the Pentagon Papers.
Despite the negative portrayal of conspiracy theories in popular culture, research has shown that most Americans believe in some sort of conspiracy theories. The absence of a trial of Richard Nixon gave Nixon himself the opportunity to weave a conspiracy theory, as explained by Ken Miller Center’s Ken.
In conclusion, the Watergate scandal led to the rise of conspiracy theories and the question of whether Richard Nixon was the architect of his downfall or part of a Deep State plot. The Watergate scandal has influenced the evolution of conspiracy theories and the belief in the existence of a conspiracy.
📹 Watergate in Two Minutes
A super fast overview of the basics of understanding the Watergate scandal. Grow your brain with a longer video here!
📹 The Real Watergate Scandal: Collusion, Conspiracy and the Plot that Brought Nixon Down
Forty years after Nixon’s resignation, Geoff Shepard, the youngest lawyer on Nixon’s Watergate defense team, is back with newly …
The 1968 presidential election was NOT a squeaker! Nixon/Agnew won with 301 electoral votes, Humphrey/Muskie got 190 electoral votes, and Wallace/LeMay got 46 votes. The third party — Alabama governor George Wallace and retired USAF SAC general Curtis LeMay of the American Independent Party arguably had an effect on the election. Per Wikipedia: Democratic governor of Alabama, George Wallace, to mount a third-party challenge against his own party to defend racial segregation on the basis of “state’s rights”. Wallace led a far-right American Independent Party attracting socially conservative voters throughout the South, and encroaching further support from white working-class voters in the Industrial North and Midwest who were attracted to Wallace’s economic populism and anti-establishment rhetoric. In doing so, Wallace split the New Deal Coalition, winning over Southern Democrats, as well as former Goldwater supporters who preferred Wallace to Nixon. Nixon chose to take advantage of Democratic infighting by running a more centrist platform aimed at attracting moderate voters as part of his “silent majority” who were alienated by both the liberal agenda that was advocated by Hubert Humphrey, and by the ultra-conservative viewpoints shared by George Wallace on race and civil rights, yet used coded language to combat Wallace in the Upper South, where these states were less extreme on the segregation issue. Nixon sought to restore law and order to the nation’s cities and provide new leadership in the Vietnam War.