The Week

Has anyone stopped to ask whether there is a free market solution to Nixon? If the President is worth impeaching, he’s worth impeaching at a profit, right? We have a couple of modest suggestions along these lines. First, the President should sell the damn tapes to the highest bidder—Ervin, Rodino, Jaworski, the New York Times, or whomever—and use the proceeds, after taxes of course, a) to buy 34 senators for acquittal, or b), failing a), to retire comfortably, perhaps sharing digs with Robert Vesco. If more funds are needed, Mr. Nixon has among his personal belongings an even more valuable piece of property to sell, namely, his resignation. He could say, “All right you deleteds, you want me to resign, make it worth my while. What will you pay me to go quietly?” Taxpayers could chip in the combined budgets of the Senate Watergate Committee and the House Judiciary Committee to buy Nixon out, and still save a bundle. The country’s problem is solved, and as for Mr. Nixon, a man can struggle along all right on the combined budgets of two congressional committees. Anyway, we’ve been giving this whole mess a lot of serious thought.

Ever since it became clear that Watergate was not going to turn into a hoop and roll away, Republicans have been watching Barry Goldwater. If Goldwater—Mr. Republican, and the man without whose support Richard Nixon would not have been nominated or elected in 1968 —asked Nixon to resign, Nixon’s position would be untenable. Although Senator Goldwater had long been critical of Mr. Nixon’s handling of Watergate, he was cool to Senator Buckley’s call for resignation in March. Now, in Newsweek, he has elaborated his position: “Q. Should a delegation go to the White House and urge him to resign, for the good of the party and of the country? A. I know of no reason now, in the middle of May, for me or anyone else to go and ask him. If I became convinced that this should be done, I would have no qualms about doing it.” When might that be? “After the Memorial Day recess I think you’re going to be able to sense around here a definite feeling favoring impeachment or nonimpeachment. Let’s wait and see what another two weeks will do to the temper of the people; let’s see what a more thorough reading of the tapes will do . . .” What about the notion that the only way to clear up Watergate is for the House to vote impeachment, and the Senate to consider the evidence? If President Nixon were impeached but not convicted by the Senate, could he govern effectively? “I would have serious questions about it.”

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Has anyone stopped to ask whether there is a free market solution to Nixon? If the President is worth impeaching, he’s worth impeaching at a profit, right? We have a couple of modest suggestions along these lines. First, the President should sell the damn tapes to the highest bidder—Ervin, Rodino, Jaworski, the New York Times, or whomever—and use the proceeds, after taxes of course, a) to buy 34 senators for acquittal, or b), failing a), to retire comfortably, perhaps sharing digs with Robert Vesco. If more funds are needed, Mr. Nixon has among his personal belongings an even more valuable piece of property to sell, namely, his resignation. He could say, “All right you deleteds, you want me to resign, make it worth my while. What will you pay me to go quietly?” Taxpayers could chip in the combined budgets of the Senate Watergate Committee and the House Judiciary Committee to buy Nixon out, and still save a bundle. The country’s problem is solved, and as for Mr. Nixon, a man can struggle along all right on the combined budgets of two congressional committees. Anyway, we’ve been giving this whole mess a lot of serious thought.

Ever since it became clear that Watergate was not going to turn into a hoop and roll away, Republicans have been watching Barry Goldwater. If Goldwater—Mr. Republican, and the man without whose support Richard Nixon would not have been nominated or elected in 1968 —asked Nixon to resign, Nixon’s position would be untenable. Although Senator Goldwater had long been critical of Mr. Nixon’s handling of Watergate, he was cool to Senator Buckley’s call for resignation in March. Now, in Newsweek, he has elaborated his position: “Q. Should a delegation go to the White House and urge him to resign, for the good of the party and of the country? A. I know of no reason now, in the middle of May, for me or anyone else to go and ask him. If I became convinced that this should be done, I would have no qualms about doing it.” When might that be? “After the Memorial Day recess I think you’re going to be able to sense around here a definite feeling favoring impeachment or nonimpeachment. Let’s wait and see what another two weeks will do to the temper of the people; let’s see what a more thorough reading of the tapes will do . . .” What about the notion that the only way to clear up Watergate is for the House to vote impeachment, and the Senate to consider the evidence? If President Nixon were impeached but not convicted by the Senate, could he govern effectively? “I would have serious questions about it.”