Marina del Rey, where Segretti lived, was on the water and, if you believed the ads, represented the ultimate in swinging-singles living. Lots of sai… - Carl Bernstein

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 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.

The failures of the press have contributed immensely to the emergence of a talk-show nation, in which public discourse is reduced to ranting and raving and posturing. We now have a mainstream press whose news agenda is increasingly influenced by this netherworld.

Basic strategy that goes all the way to the top. The phrase unnerved Bernstein. For the first time, he considered the possibility that the President of the United States was the head ratfucker.