Talk:White House Plumbers

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This article lacks one big basic element. Where the Plumbers on the government payroll or not. Can anyone cite evidence to that. Thank you. Nobs01 1 July 2005 17:43 (UTC)

I believe they were paid out of a secret fund, kept in the form of cash in a safe. Only a few people, among them Haldeman, had access to the money. I forget exactly where the money came from, but I think it may have been some off the record campaign funds. I'll try to look into it some more. -R. fiend 1 July 2005 18:17 (UTC)

I beleive that is correct; they were never employees of the government. This may have to be clarified in a series of articles that speak of CREEP and the White House as one entity. I believe there should be separation between the two, seeing there apparently was no misappropriation of funds to carry these people on the government payroll to commit criminal acts. thx. Nobs01 1 July 2005 18:42 (UTC)

Well, Howard Hunt had an office in the White House at one time, if I recall. And others were government employees (CIA or FBI, for instance). -R. fiend 1 July 2005 20:58 (UTC)

Yes, several were at one time in the employ of the federal government; likewise, those who approved payments from the Re-election Committee had dual roles, both as White House employees and being in authority to authorized expenditures from the private, independent re-election committee. But language like this, [1] for example, from the Richard_Nixon#Watergate bio page

"a series of scandals involving the Committee to Re-Elect the President (known as CRP but referred to by outsiders as CREEP), which also included the enemies list and assorted "dirty tricks."

makes it sound like CREEP held the enemies list and the White House was responsible (i.e. the government paid money) for dirty tricks. I'd like to clarify this. Thank you. Nobs01 1 July 2005 21:36 (UTC)

Good point about the enemies list. Go ahead and fix it (if you haven't already). It is easy to sort of lump everyone into one category, paying no mind to the sometimes subtle differences between the groups and roles. An encyclopedia, however, should be able to differentiate. As for the White House being responsible for dirty tricks, well, that's tricky (no pun intended). Usually the "White House" refers to the Preisdent and his staff (obviously the building isn't incriminated here), and I think they can be linked to "dirty tricks", depending on what you want to count as a dirty trick. -R. fiend 1 July 2005 21:45 (UTC)

Yes, that's all true, the employees of the White House did authorize private money for payment to dirty tricksters. That's what I wanna clarify, but it may be in several articles (CREEP, Plumbers, Watergate, Nixon, etc.) No sense piling on b.s charges like using gubmint money for private purposes, that only discredits the validity of the story as its told. Thanks again. Nobs01 1 July 2005 21:53 (UTC)