You Did What__ Mad Plans and Great Historical Disasters - Bill Fawcett [92]
What they got was a vast resource of potentially incriminating evidence that they did not previously know existed.
If all of the president’s conversations were taped, all they needed to do was to review the tapes to see who said what to whom on what day for an accurate record of what really happened. The later revelation that the system was automatically voice-activated further enhanced their value as an accurate record of the conversations since there was no excuse of human error interfering with the record.
The subsequent battle over the release of the tapes by the White House went all the way to the Supreme Court.
The White House lost.
When the first tapes (less than forty hours’ worth) were released in April 1974, the pattern of White House action and conversation revealed was enough to provide a framework for the proof of the allegations of abuse of power and obstruction of justice.
The outcome was from that point inevitable.
The president resigned, not over the charge of masterminding a second-rate burglary or violation of civil rights or even lying to the American people, but for failing to sufficiently cover up a cover-up that was unnecessary in the first place.
It was not enough that Butterfield admitted that Dean’s conversations were taped. By exposing the existence of the entire taping system, information he inadvertently volunteered, he had laid the groundwork for the impeachment case to come, providing a road map that even a congressional committee would be able to follow.
You Vaccinated Whom Against What?
The best of intentions, the worst of science. Who says science and politics don’t mix? Well, this does.
THE CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL
UNITED STATES, 1976
E. J. Neiburger
The great flu epidemic of 1917–1918 was one of the world’s greatest plagues and depopulators of the world. An estimated 20 million to 50 million people died in this great epidemic, though undoubtedly many more folk silently died in uncounted rural settings where public health officials would not visit. Hundreds of millions of people were made ill and never fully recovered. Many, weakened by the flu, became infected with TB, contributing to the future TB epidemics of the 1920S and early ’30s, where in many cities one out of every four inhabitants died from “consumption.” This influenza epidemic was unique. It came in two waves and killed primarily healthy adults rather than the old, young and feeble, as is usually seen in the commonly experienced annual influenza outbreaks. The 1918 flu was very rapid in its effects, often striking a healthy man in the morning and leaving him dead in the evening. Besides killing humans, this flu subtype also infected and killed pigs.
Over 600,000 Americans died of this rapidly transmitted, airborne form of Influenza A. Most families affected were isolated by neighbors. Everyone kept to themselves, wore masks and avoided crowds. All economic activity, not to mention World War I, slowed due to disruptions in trade and loss of key personnel. Production of goods and services faltered. The world economy, plagued by end-of-war disruptions, began to fail. In 1976, it looked to some Public Health officials like the 1918 Flu was back. It was a false alarm, but thousands would die in the series of errors that tried to deal with the epidemic that wasn’t.
In January 1976, an army private at Fort Dix, New Jersey, reported for sick call. The base physician, Colonel J. Bartley, diagnosed the soldier’s illness as an upper respiratory infection and ordered him to rest. Ignoring doctor’s orders, the private participated in a late-night march, collapsed and later died at the base hospital. A few hours later, dozens of soldiers reported sick with symptoms of upper respiratory infections.
The base doctors suspected the annual, and normally rather mild, flu, which often affects the population in the winter. They found it in throat swabs of the sick soldiers, but there was also evidence of another unknown virus. The samples were sent to the U.S. Centers for Disease