Nixon Dug Deep for Dirt on Ted Kennedy

Source: Huffington Post

WASHINGTON — President Richard Nixon considered Ted Kennedy such a threat that he tried to catch Kennedy cheating on his wife, even ordering aides to recruit Secret Service agents to spill secrets on the senator's behavior.

"Do you have anybody in the Secret Service that you can get to?" Nixon asked his aide John Ehrlichman in a stark series of Oval Office conversations about Kennedy before the 1972 election. "Yeah, yeah," Ehrlichman replied.

"Plant one," Nixon said. "Plant two guys on him. This could be very useful." Nixon made clear that the Secret Service protection afforded Kennedy before the 1972 election would be rescinded after. Then, said the president, "If he gets shot, it's too damn bad." His aides disdainfully referred to Kennedy supporters as "super swinger jet set types."

Tape recordings from the Nixon White House betray a preoccupation with the Kennedy mystique and how that might be used against the Republican president by the last surviving brother, who died Tuesday at age 77. Nixon wanted a sharp and private eye kept on Ted Kennedy's movements after the Chappaquiddick scandal, hoping to expose another misstep with a woman other than his wife, Joan.



Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/08/28/nixon-dug-deep-for-dirt-o_n_271012.html

---

Dick was aptly-named.

I have thought for years that it would not surprise me if the nixon people dirty tricksters had a hand in chapaquidick. Let me explain how easy it would have been to character assassinate Ted... all they would have had to do was place something on that bridge to make him swerve. Just an accident that provided a bonus of a dead woman. A fishing expedition .
tib

That's sort of like "catching a bird by putting salt on its tail." If dirty tricksters could create a Ted Kennedy scandal by setting up Chappaquiddick, why not just go the extra inch and kill him, making it look like an accident?

Unless...that was the idea all along, and Ted managed to survive it. :scared:

I used to drive over that bridge in a 4WD to get out to the Chappy beach for striper fishing, and it was a difficult bridge to cross. The sand road approach was at an angle to the bridge, and the bridge had no railings or marker to show the edge of the bridge. One had to creep up to the bridge and get the wheels turned somewhat sharply to get up on the bridge evenly and then across.

Since the Chappy dunes on the other side of the bridge were a favorite spot for beach lovers, I assume a tipsy Ted did not approach and try to cross the bridge slowly. He tried to go over too quickly and didn't turn his wheel enough and over they went.

Leekee here: http://www.crimemagazine.com/richard_nixon_kennedy.htm

They were there for the specific purpose of "contaminating the crime scene" (to put it in "cop-speak")

pnorman

If the CIA (or elements within) killed the first two brothers, to off the third would be just *too* suspicious, so they engaged in character assassination instead.

I've often wondered if Chappaquiddick might have been an actual, physical assassination attempt, that maybe Kopechne was used by the same people that used Oswald.

it was all for naught, nixion did it, nothing to do about it now!!

..........more of a "liberal" today than Obama. I am by no means a Nixon fan and a lot of the Reagan/Bush II fascist policies began in his presidency, but he was quite liberal (by todays standards) when it came to a lot of domestic policy. Look at the plan he was thinking about regarding healthcare, it makes the HHS committee's (Kennedy's committee) bill look like shit. It just goes to show how fascist this country has become since the 60's.

"Big deal - every president has dug up dirt on his political rivals / enemies." No exceptions. Their guys AND ours.

I can only imagine the shit Bush and Cheney pulled, though.

Considering that Nixon was right down there with George W. Bush as one of the most dishonorable men to ever inhabit the White House.

:spray:

Kennedy supporters are "Super Swinger Jet Set Types"!

:rofl:

My only concern in using it (as I'm also a 'bleeding heart liberal') is that one of my uninsured friends who knows me IRL will read it and hurt themselves laughing. :/

And why was it moved, anyway? :shrug:

There's another thread with basically the same title and content. It's a dupe.

We know he was terrified of Ted Kennedy running against him.I believe had he beat Carter In the primarys In 80 he would have done far better against reagan.Now he may have still lost to Reagan but
It would not have been a 44 state loss.ALso remember untill the debate Carter had a chance to win.Now just Imagne a Kennedy Reagan Debate.That would have been a classic TV moment.Plus John Anderson would not have been the factor he was.People forget Anderson probally helped Reagan just as back In 68 Wallace may have helped Nixon.

There have been those who think Chappaquiddick may have been another assassination plor or a Character
assassination plot.And this can not be totally dismissed.Maybe not a plot to assassnate him,although some think the plane crash he was earlier In Is suspecious too,but to damage his Public standing plot.

a failed assassination attempt - Chappaquiddick

just saying it's plausible

Take this guy, for instance, who was parked in a secluded spot by the side of the Kennedy compound on Rt. 123 in McLean, VA . While there's no apparent reason why a truck should have gone off the road at that place on January 23, 1974, but it did, at high-speed. Senator Ted Kennedy called the police to report hearing the crash.

The parked car was destroyed and the occupant, Murray Chotiner, Nixon's long-time hatchet man died of his injuries shortly thereafter. The truck driver walked away and was never charged by the Virginia State Police who took over the "accident" investigation.

Who said American politics was war without blood? Eleanor Clift never really understood. Few Americans do.

He's been scum for decades