Word: haldeman
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...Just be damned sure you say, 'I don't remember, I can't recall.' " Ben-Veniste then cited numerous "I don't recall" answers in Haldeman's subsequent grand-jury testimony. Inadvertently dramatizing the prosecutor's point, Haldeman in just one hour responded with "I don't recollect" no fewer than 18 times to Ben-Veniste's questions. Despite his forgetfulness, Haldeman conceded that he did have a reputation as a detail man in the White House, and had even approved a $25-a-month raise for a Nixon gardener...
...Haldeman's bad memory gave Ben-Veniste a choice opportunity to try to refresh it by reading portions of previously undisclosed transcripts of White House tapes. They included revelations that shortly before Nixon sought the resignations of Haldeman and Ehrlichman in April 1973, he had offered them help for future legal costs and family support from one of two secret White House funds. One was a fund of $200,000 to $300,000 controlled by Nixon...
...HALDEMAN: That compounds the problem. That really does...
Under Ben-Veniste's questioning, Haldeman insisted that neither he nor Ehrlichman had ever accepted the offered cash from Nixon. He said he knew nothing about those funds and did not know what he had meant in telling Nixon that to have taken the money would have "compounded the problem." Asked Ben-Veniste: "It compounded the problem of all the money paid to the [original Watergate] defendants?" Insisted Haldeman: "No, sir. That is totally incorrect." When defense attorneys raised objections that Nixon's offers were irrelevant because "we're not trying the former President...
Apart from these new revelations, Haldeman had great difficulty trying to explain away other prosecution testimony. He admitted following Nixon's instructions to ask top CIA officials to intercede in the FBI's investigation of money found on the arrested Watergate burglars. But he claimed that his interest was not to keep the funds from being traced to Nixon's re-election committee; he wanted to protect the anonymity of the political donors whose checks had been converted to this use. He also claimed that there were valid national-security reasons for calling...