Challenging the Secret Government: The Post-Watergate Investigations of the CIA and FBI

By Kathryn S. Olmsted

Book Overview

Just four months after Richard Nixon's resignation, New York Times reporter Seymour Hersh unearthed a new case of government abuse of power: the CIA had launched a domestic spying program of Orwellian proportions against American dissidents during the Vietnam War. The country's best investigative journalists and members of Congress quickly mobilized to probe a scandal that seemed certain to rock the foundations of this secret government. Subsequent investigations disclosed that the CIA had plotted to kill foreign leaders and that the FBI had harassed civil rights and student groups. Some called the scandal 'son of Watergate.' Many observers predicted that the investigations would lead to far-reaching changes in the intelligence agencies. Yet, as Kathryn Olmsted shows, neither the media nor Congress pressed for reforms. For all of its post-Watergate zeal, the press hesitated to break its long tradition of deference in national security coverage. Congress, too, was unwilling to challenge the executive branch in national security matters. Reports of the demise of the executive branch were greatly exaggerated, and the result of the 'year of intelligence' was a return to the status quo. American History/Journalism

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0807845620
• ISBN13: 9780807845622
• Release Date: February 1996
• Publisher: University of North Carolina Press
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 1.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 6.1" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

Comprehensive Understanding of the Facts, Spin-free

There have been so many books on this subject which have attempted to present one or another political party's point of view in a convincing manner that it is truly refreshing to read an author who gets her facts straight and lets the reader come to his or her own conclusions. Olmsted looks carefully at these investigations, and presents them honestly and with understanding. Good job!

A Not-So-Distant Mirror

If anyone still believes the mainstream press protects the interests of the average citizen, this book will disabuse you of that notion very quickly. Olmstead delivers a fascinating and lively expose of how the Washington press corps -- faced with a real opportunity in the 1970s to bring light and accountability into one of the darkest corners of our government -- turned tail and ran. Her book goes a long way towards explaining why media coverage of the so-called "intelligence community" is so lame and subservient, even to this day. Well-written, thoroughly enjoyable, and damned infuriating.