Tinfoil Hat

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The only thing I've seen this week is the inside of the bus, the datacenter bunker and the dog park as, like Murphy's wisdom demands, everything tends to happen all at once and in the most inconvenient manner possible. And that doesn't even include the blasting of bedrock or rising water. At least the lift hasn't decided to trap me this week.

Amidst all the rather usual and dull news these days I read that Deep Throat decloaked at the urging of what sounds like family trying to cash in before he kicks it, which is consistent with the three people who might confirm or deny the verity of his admission refusing to do so. I don't know why, but I feel violated somehow as I remember watching the 10 o'clock news' Watergate reports every night as a kid and imagining Deep Throat as a kind of folk hero, the kind you only see in comic books and movies. A mysterious everyman who did the right thing. A man who spawned more tinfoil hat conspiracy theories than Area 51. A man who gave us a modicum of hope that not everyone in DC was a crook.

Now, in a very undignified, very American manner the hero comes out to sell book and movie rights to his story so his family can profit after he's pushing up daisies. It's a pity that there aren't more people like him in Washington these days given that Watergate seems like a quaint misdemeanor by current standards, but why bother when you can be a dirtbag, make millions and still sell book and movie rights to your sordid tale without shame. Perhaps it was inevitable, but I'm disappointed that the mystery man didn't take it to his grave and leave his family to sully themselves alone. Who knew that journalists would have more scruples 30 years on? Three cheers for Woodward, Bernstein and the Fourth Estate.