Journalist and author Bob Woodward shared his thoughts and experiences on issues central to the American presidency in this semester’s Richard E. Snyder’s Presidential Lecture yesterday afternoon.
In front of a fully packed Cohen Auditorium that included Snyder (A ’55) and University President Lawrence Bacow, Woodward recounted his experiences investigating high−profile stories in Washington and interviewing American presidents and other top figures throughout his career.
The journalist kept his own remarks short in order to make room for an extended question−and−answer session with the audience, pairing sobering commentary on serious political issues with humorous anecdotes about famous Washington personalities.
Woodward rose to national prominence for his coverage, alongside fellow Washington Post reporter Carl Bernstein, of the Watergate scandal in the 1970s. Since then, he has gone on to author a multitude of books on the American presidency.
Woodward told the audience that his biggest concern today is “secret government,” the concentration of power in the hands of the executive branch and the military and intelligence communities that he called “breathtaking.”
“Democracies die in darkness, and … if there’s no accountability, then we’re finished,” Woodward said. The Nixon presidency and Watergate scandal were symptomatic of this mentality, as the president committed abuses of power and ordered a cover−up.
“The tragedy of that ultimate secret government … [was that] no one ever said, ‘What would be good for the country? What does the country need?” Woodward said.
“The nightmare of the Nixon presidency is its smallness — it became disconnected from the basic function of the job,” he added.
Woodward spoke about the challenges and responsibilities journalists face in getting around the powerful “message machine” that controls the public face of many political figures, including presidents. He estimated that the public knowledge of most presidential administrations is only a tiny fraction of the complete picture — “one percent,” by former Vice President Al Gore’s calculations, according to Woodward.
“This is the problem for journalists … to develop a method so you can get around the public relations face that is put on, particularly by the White House,” Woodward said.
There can be a separation between public conventional wisdom and the reality of a situation, Woodward told the audience. He offered then−President Gerald Ford’s pardon of Richard Nixon, which has long been considered suspect for its timing after the Watergate scandal, as an example.
Woodward said he had long considered the pardon to have less than noble motivations. But an extensive investigation into the matter, including an interview with Ford, brought him to the opposite conclusion: that Ford made his decision in the nation’s, not Nixon’s, best interest.
“As I thought about it, and sifted the data, talked to everyone else involved, I realized that I had it wrong,” he said. “What he did was gutsy.
“What a cold shower to think something is this way, and to subject it to neutral scrutiny … and discover that it’s exactly the opposite,” he added.
Woodward emphasized that this realization was the product of a slow and deliberate journalistic process that he contrasted with the “speed and impatience” of the contemporary news cycle.
Woodward discussed the extent to which journalists, like the political figures they cover, can never fully understand the full consequences of their actions and their legacies.
“You don’t know what a lot of this is going to mean,” Woodward said. “You’re taking a snapshot — you don’t know the outcome.”
Woodward added that former President George W. Bush had once commented to him, about his own legacy, “History — we don’t know, we’ll all be dead.”
“There’s something utterly true about that — you don’t know how it’s going to be viewed in history,” Woodward said.
After his remarks, Woodward took questions from the audience that ranged from President Barack Obama’s handling of the current situation in Libya to the media’s role as a watchdog and investigator.
Woodward also credited Snyder, who was executive vice president of publishing house Simon and Schuster when the company bought Woodward’s “All the President’s Men” in 1972, for allowing him the creative freedom to pursue investigative stories throughout his career. Simon and Schuster has since published all 16 of Woodward’s books, he said.
In his introductory remarks, Bacow said his successor, President−elect Anthony Monaco, will continue the Snyder Lecture series. The next lecture, to take place in the fall, will feature Niall Ferguson, a professor of history and business administration at Harvard University, Bacow said.