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Carl Bernstein QUOTES

Carl Bernstein QUOTES

1 " We are in the process of creating what deserves to be called the idiot culture. Not an idiot sub-culture, which every society has bubbling beneath the surface and which can provide harmless fun; but the culture itself. For the first time, the weird and the stupid and the coarse are becoming our cultural norm, even our cultural ideal. "

― Carl Bernstein

2 " They walked across 15th Street to the Madison Hotel's Montpelier Room, an opulent French restaurant. Bradlee asked for a corner table, and began the conversation. 'You'd better bring me up to date because...' He turned to order lunch in perfect French, and then turned back to Woodward. '...our cocks are on the chopping block now and I just want to know a little bit more about this. "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

3 " Simons, as restrained as Bradlee could be hard-charging and obstreperous, liked to tell of watching Bradlee grind his cigarrettes out in a demitasse cup during a formal dinner party. Bradlee was one of the few persons who could pull that kind of thing off and leave the hostess saying how charming he was.

-- Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

4 " A prize-winning science reporter, Simons had become the number-two editor at the Post a year before. An intent, sensitive man with a large nose, thin face and deep-set eyes, he looks like the kind of Harvard teaching assistant who carries a slide ruler strapped to his belt. But he is skillful with fragile egos, and also the perfect counterpoint to Bradlee. Bradlee is more like Woodward: he wants hard information first and is impatient with theories.

-- Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

5 " The managing editor shared Bernstein's fondness for doping things out on the basis of sketchy information. At the same time, he was cautious about what eventually went into print. On more than one occasion, he told Bernstein and Woodward to consider delaying a story or, if necessary, to pull it at the last minute if they had any doubts. 'I don't care if it's a word, a phrase, a sentence, a paragraph, a whole story or an entire series of stories,' he said. 'When in doubt, leave it out.'

-- Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

6 " Aware that much of the story was out of his hands, he tried to exercise what control he could: he hovered around the reporters' typewriters as they wrote, passed them questions as they talked on the phone to sources, demanded to be briefed after they hung up or returned from a meeting. Now, gulping down antacid tablets, Rosenfeld grilled Bernstein and Woodward to find out how solid this latest story was. "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

7 " Rosenfeld went to work for the Herald Tribune after his graduation from Syracuse University and has always been an editor, never a reporter. He was inclined to worry that too many reporters on the metropolitan staff were incompetent, and thought even the best reporters could be saved from self-destruction only by the skills of an editor. His natural distrust of reporters was particularly acute on the Watergate story, where the risks were very great, and he was in the uncomfortable position of having to trust Bernstein and Woodward more than he had ever trusted any reporters.

-- Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

8 " Rosenfeld runs the metropolitan staff, the Post's largest, like a football coach. He prods his players, letting them know that he has promised the front office results, pleading, yelling, cajoling, pacing, working his facial expressions for instant effects - anger, satisfaction, concern.

-- Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

9 " Woodward said that he had told no one the name of Deep Throat.
Mrs. Graham paused. 'Tell me,' she said.
Woodward froze. He said he would give her the name if she wanted. He was praying she wouldn't press it. Mrs. Graham laughed, touched his arm and said she was only kidding, she didn't really want to carry that burden around with her. Woodward took a bite of his eggs, which were cold.

-- Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

10 " Soon, challenges against the Post's ownership of two television stations in Florida were filed with the Federal Communications Commission. The price of Post stock on the American Exchange dropped by almost 50 percent. Among the challengers - forming the organizations of 'citizens' who proposed to become the new FCC licensees - were several persons long associated with the President.

-- Carl Bernsein, Bob Woodward "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

11 " Deep Throat stamped his foot. 'A conspiracy like this...a conspiracy investigation...the rope has to tighten slowly around everyone's neck. You build convincingly from the outer edges in, you get ten times the evidence you need against the Hunts and the Liddys. They feel hopelessly finished - they may not talk right away, but the grip is on them. Then you move up and do the same thing at the next level. If you shoot too high and miss, the everyone feels more secure. Lawyers work this way. I'm sure smart reporters must, too. You've put the investigation back months. It puts everyone on the defensive - editors, FBI agents, everybody has to go into a crouch after this.'
Woodward swallowed hard. He deserved the lecture.

-- Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

12 " June 17, 1972. Nine o'clock Saturday morning. Early for the telephone. Woodward fumbled for the receiver and snapped awake. The city editor of the Washington Post was on the line. Five men had been arrested earlier that morning in a burglary attempt at Democratic headquarters, carrying photographic equipment and electronic gear. Could he come in? "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

13 " Bernstein looked like one of those counterculture journalists that Woodward despised. Bernstein thought that Woodward's rapid rise at the Post had less to do with his ability than his Establishment credentials.

They had never worked on a story together. Woodward was 29, Bernstein 28.

-- Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

14 " It was 9:30 P.M., just an hour from deadline for the second edition. Woodward began typing:


A $25,000 cashier's check, apparently earmarked for the campaign chest of President Nixon, was deposited in April in the bank account of Bernard L. Barker, one of the five men arrested at the break-in and alleged bugging attempt at Democratic National Committee headquarters here June 17.


The last page of copy was passed to Sussman just at the deadline. Sussman set his pen and pipe down on his desk and turned to Woodward. 'We've never had a story like this,' he said. 'Just never.'

-- Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

15 " At heart, Sussman was a theoretician. In another age, he might have been a Talmudic scholar. He had cultivated a Socratic method, zinging question after question at the reporters: Who moved over from Commerce to CRP with Stans? What about Mitchell's secretary? Why won't anybody say when Liddy went to the White House or who worked with him there? Mitchell and Stans both ran the budget committee, right? What does that tell you? Then Sussman would puff on his pipe, a satisfied grin on his face. "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

16 " The August 1 story had carried their joint byline; the day afterward, Woodward asked Sussman if Bernstein's name could appear with his on the follow-up story - though Bernstein was still in Miami and had not worked on it. From the on, any Watergate story would carry both names. Their colleagues melded the two into one and gleefully named their byline Woodstein.

-- Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

17 " The invariable question, asked only half-mockingly of reporters by editors at the Post (and then up the hierarchical line of editors) was 'What have you done for me today?' Yesterday was for the history books, not newspapers.

-- Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

18 " Woodward, a registered Republican, did not vote. He couldn't decide whether he was more uneasy with the disorganization and naïve idealism of McGovern's campaign or with Richard Nixon's conduct. And he believed that not voting enabled him to be more objective in reporting on Watergate - a vier Bernstein regarded as silly. Bernstein voted for McGovern, unenthusiastically and unhesitatingly, then bet in the office pool that Nixon would win with 54 percent.

-- Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

19 " Sussman had the ability to seize facts and lock them in his memory, where they remained poised for instants recall. More than any other editor at the Post, or Bernstein and Woodward, Sussman became a walking compendium of Watergate knowledge, a reference source to be summoned when even the library failed. On a deadline, he would pump these facts into a story in a constant infusion, working up a body of significant information to support what otherwise seemed like the weakest of revelations. In Sussman's mind, everything fitted. Watergate was a puzzle and he was a collector of the pieces.

-- Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men

20 " Bradlee had been recruited with the idea that the New York Times need nod exercise absolute preeminence in American journalism.
That vision had suffered a setback in 1971 when the Times published the Pentagon Papers. Though the Post was the second news organization to obtain a copy of the secret study of the Vietnam war, Bradlee noted that 'there was blood on every word' of the Times' initial stories. Bradlee could convey his opinions with a single disgusted glance at an indolent reporter or editor.

-- Carl Bernstein, Bob Woodward "

― Carl Bernstein , All the President's Men