Political scandal isn鈥檛 necessarily the end 鈥� it can be a beginning
Egil Krogh, a Watergate 鈥榩lumber鈥� who passed away this week, served time in prison for his role in the burglary and cover up before going on to teach and lecture on ethics.
Egil Krogh, a Watergate 鈥榩lumber鈥� who passed away this week, served time in prison for his role in the burglary and cover up before going on to teach and lecture on ethics.
Dear reader:
Reading about former Watergate 鈥減lumber鈥� Egil Krogh today, as the fury of President Donald Trump鈥檚 Senate trial reverberates in Washington, I was struck by several lessons the arc of Mr. Krogh鈥檚 life might offer about larger meanings of President Trump鈥檚 pressure campaign against Ukraine and subsequent impeachment.
Mr. Krogh passed away on January 18. As The Washington Post and New York Times obituaries noted on Wednesday, as a young aide in President Richard Nixon鈥檚 White House, he was one of the leaders of a group charged with plugging media leaks 鈥� hence the 鈥減lumber鈥� nickname 鈥� and other skullduggery.
In particular, Mr. Krogh approved a burglary into the office of Pentagon Papers leaker Daniel Ellsburg鈥檚 psychiatrist. Carried out with farcical ineptitude, the break-in produced little but a trail of evidence implicating the White House in the crime.
The possible takeaway for President Trump鈥檚 team? All administrations are tempted to work around the executive branch to get sensitive tasks done 鈥� illegal or not. Sometimes it's looking for a press leak. Sometimes it鈥檚 getting your personal lawyer to push a foreign country to announce an investigation into one of your political opponents.
It鈥檚 seldom effective. As political scientist Jonathan Bernstein notes, the bureaucracy is not just a 鈥渄eep state鈥� blockade; it鈥檚 a critical source of ability and expertise about what can 鈥� and can鈥檛 鈥� be done. Chief executives ignore it at their peril, as Presidents Nixon and now Trump have found out.
The other lesson offered by Mr. Krogh鈥檚 biography is that for those caught in the swirl of a historic political scandal, it is not the end of work and hope.
It can be the beginning.
Mr. Krogh eventually pled guilty to burglary and conspiracy charges and served 4 陆 months in prison. He later called the Ellsburg break-in 鈥渁 meltdown in personal integrity鈥� and through the rest of his life taught and lectured on ethics, so others could learn from his mistakes.
鈥淚ntegrity, like trust, is all too easy to lose, and too difficult to restore,鈥� he wrote in a 2007 memoir.
Let us know what you鈥檙e thinking at csmpolitics@csmonitor.com.