Watergate | 4. Lie Detectors

Summary

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Slow Burn – Watergate | Episode 4: Lie Detectors

Date: December 19, 2017
Host: Leon Neyfakh
Guests/Voices: Mark Lakritz, Mary DiIorio, Senator Lowell Weicker, (archival audio: John Dean, James McCord, others)

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Episode Overview

Theme:
This episode of Slow Burn peels back the curtain on the behind-the-scenes drama and meticulous planning that fueled the televised Senate Watergate hearings in 1973. Through first-person accounts from two young Senate Committee staffers (Mark Lakritz and Mary DiIorio), listeners get an inside look at how the hearings became a national obsession, the narrative-building involved, and the human element within America’s greatest political soap opera—long before twenty-four-hour news cycles or social media.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Unexpected Beginnings and Personal Stakes

• Mark Lakritz and Mary DiIorio, both early-career professionals and dating, inadvertently had their first date on the night of the Watergate break-in (06/17/1972).
• Mark is offered a job on the Senate Watergate Committee in April 1973—a turning point both personally and professionally.
• Mary, initially resistant to leaving her promising life in San Francisco, ultimately decides to join Mark in D.C., working first as a researcher before becoming an investigator on the committee.
  • Quote:

    “This really was going to be important to him and I was in love. And so therefore it was important to me.”
    —Mary DiIorio [04:09]

2. How the Senate Hearings Came to Be

• The Senate voted unanimously (77-0) to investigate after the Watergate burglary, surprising even Nixon’s allies.
• Nixon’s team didn’t pressure Republican senators to block the investigation—a historical curiosity explored by the host, Leon Neyfakh.
• The turning point: Burglar James McCord’s letter to Judge John Sirica.
  • Quote:

    “When Sirica read the letter in court at the end of March 1973, Watergate instantly entered a new phase.”
    —Leon Neyfakh [03:03]

3. Behind the Scenes: Staff as ‘Script Writers’

• The public saw dramatic hearings, but much of the research, question-writing, and investigative work was carried out by young staffers like Mark and Mary.
  • Quote:

    “There was an enormous gap between what the public saw and what was going on behind the scenes. We were like the scriptwriters of the soap opera.”
    —Mark Lakritz [07:29]

• The committee asked questions about a wide range of topics: illegal fundraising, dirty tricks campaigns, and attempts to undermine Nixon’s rivals—many surfaced thanks to meticulous preparation by staff.

4. Televised Spectacle and Cultural Impact

• The Watergate hearings became “the greatest show on earth”—a national obsession watched live on TV.
• High drama: Senators questioning powerful officials on alleged criminal activity, creating pre-Internet “memes,” and introducing the public to a cast of unforgettable characters.
  • Memorable example: Senator Lowell Weicker grilling John Mitchell (Nixon’s Attorney General) over wild plans by G. Gordon Liddy, including kidnapping leftist leaders.
  • Quote:

    “That plan, complete with visual aids, included elaborate charts of electronic surveillance and breaking and entering, and prostitution, and kidnapping.”
    —Senator Lowell Weicker [06:29]

  • Mitchell’s dry response:

    “That is exactly what happened, Senator. It was a grievous error.”
    —John Mitchell (archival audio) [07:10]

5. The Soap Opera’s Emotional and Political Stakes

• The episode details how the hearings captivated the nation, with viewers “getting sucked into the scandal.”
• The Senate staff orchestrated the production, ensuring key questions exposed the inner workings of the conspiracy—raising the tension and drama at every turn.
• The hearings were not just about the break-in, but about exposing an entire system of corruption and political sabotage.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “We were clueless. We didn't know how big it was going to be... But we had no idea that it was going to blow into what it blew into.”
  —Mark Lakritz [04:44]

• “We are not for sale.”
  —John Dean (archival testimony) [05:17]

• "John Dean implicated perhaps a dozen people in his sworn testimony today, and the President himself."
  —Archival news report [08:19]

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Key Timestamps

• [00:33 – 04:31]: Mark and Mary’s personal and professional backgrounds, decision to join the Committee.
• [02:20 – 03:26]: James McCord’s bombshell letter and its impact.
• [04:44 – 05:01]: Lakritz and DiIorio recall their naiveté at the scope of the scandal.
• [06:29 – 07:17]: Senator Weicker’s infamous questioning of John Mitchell about Liddy’s wild plots.
• [07:29]: Mark reflects on being the unseen “scriptwriters” for the national drama.
• [08:19 – 08:29]: Archival audio highlights the scale of the scandal and high-level involvement.

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Tone and Style

The episode masterfully blends personal anecdotes, archival sound, and narrative flair to humanize the Watergate saga. It alternates between the confessional and the dramatic—as much about young people stumbling into world history as it is about the unraveling of a presidency. The tone is accessible, suspenseful, and tinged with irony, as Leon Nayfakh asks how something so serious also became compulsively watchable television.

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Conclusion

“Lie Detectors” demystifies the spectacle of the Watergate hearings—not just as a pivotal moment in American history, but as a carefully choreographed performance shaped by determined young staffers. Through their eyes and voices, listeners see how a national scandal becomes personal, and how the work of “scriptwriters” behind the scenes changed the national conversation forever.

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Transcript

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

Wasn't that delicious?

[Senator Lowell Weicker]

So good.

[Wells Fargo Commercial Voice]

Your bill, ladies.

[Person arguing to pay the bill (generic)]

I got it. No, I got it. Seriously, I insisted first. Oh, don't be silly. You don't be silly.

[Wells Fargo Commercial Voice]

People with the Wells Fargo Active Cash credit card prefer to pay because they earn unlimited 2% cash rewards on purchases.

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

Okay.

[Person arguing to pay the bill (generic)]

Rock, paper, scissors for it.

[Mary DiIorio]

Rock, paper, scissors.

[Elise Hu (Podcast Host)]

Shoot.

[Wells Fargo Commercial Voice]

No. The Wells Fargo ActiveCash credit card. Visit Wells Fargo.comActiveCash terms apply.

[Mark Lakritz]

My name is Mark Lakritz. I was an assistant Chief Counsel on the Senate Watergate Committee staff.

[Mary DiIorio]

I'm Mary DiIorio. I was hired initially as a researcher and then graduated to become an investigator on the Senate Watergate staff.

[Mark Lakritz]

We've only been married for 45 years. We think we're off to a good start.

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

Mark Lackritz and Mary Diorio went on their first date on June 17, 1972. It was only later that they realized it was the same night as the Watergate break in. They had been going out for less than a year when Mark, who was in his final semester at Harvard Law School, got a call from someone high up on the staff of the Senate Watergate Committee. He was calling to offer Mark a job. This was In April of 1973, about a month before public televised hearings on Watergate were scheduled to begin. The Senate had voted 77. 0 to form the committee and hold the hearings. The committee's mission would be to figure out whether illegal, improper or unethical activities had taken place during the 1972 election. Strangely, the Nixon people didn't even try to pressure Republicans in the Senate into voting against the investigation. You would think they would have, given how hard they worked to interfere with Wright Patman's inquiry in the House. Maybe the vote took them by surprise. Maybe it was because the election was over and there was a sense that Nixon was out of the woods. Or maybe no one thought these hearings would lead to anything. You know, let them dig, Fine. Who cares? It's not like Nixon was going to get impeached. The truth is, I haven't been able to figure out definitively why the resolution to form the committee passed so easily. What I can say with confidence is that if these Senate hearings were ever going to be a low key affair, that possibility went out the window as soon as James McCord sent his letter to Judge John J. Sirica.

[Various historical figures giving testimony (e.g., John Dean, James McCord)]

Good evening. There was a sensational development in the Watergate trial today. One of the key defendants says there was political pressure and perjury involved in the trial.

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

James McCord was one of the burglars who broke into the Watergate. He had pleaded not guilty, got convicted, and was facing decades in prison. And then he wrote this letter. In it, McCord informed Judge Sirica that that the Watergate conspiracy went way beyond the seven low level operatives who had appeared in Sirica's courtroom up to that point.

[Various historical figures giving testimony (e.g., John Dean, James McCord)]

Then came the bombshells. There was political pressure on the defendants to plead guilty and to remain silent, wrote McCord. Perjury occurred during the trial in matters highly material to the very structure, orientation and impact of the government's case.

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

Why McCord wrote the letter is a matter of some debate. A lot of people say it was because he was facing such a stiff prison sentence and he wanted leniency from the judge. McCord himself insists that he just wanted to set the record straight. Regardless, when Sirica read the letter in court at the end of March 1973, Watergate instantly entered a new phase. And just like that, all eyes were on the Senate committee.

[Various historical figures giving testimony (e.g., John Dean, James McCord)]

The full story of Watergate now will come out.

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

Mark Lackretz got that fateful phone call from the Senate committee higher up about a month later. Did he want to come work on the Watergate investigation? Yes, he did. But there was one small problem. Mark's girlfriend Mary was happily living in California and working at a law firm. And she'd been expecting Mark to move out west to live with her once he was done with law school. She didn't want to move to Washington.

[Mary DiIorio]

D.C. i'm looking at him thinking, I've got the apartment, I've got the view, I've got me. I've got this life in San Francisco. I'm skiing every weekend. What is sailing? What is your problem? No, no, no, he says, we're going to do this.

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

In the end, Mary agreed to go along with Mark's plan.

[Mary DiIorio]

This really was going to be important to him and I was in love. And so therefore it was important to me.

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

When Mark and Mary arrived in D.C. mary landed a job working for the committee as well as a researcher. At first, she mostly read and summarized the reams of documents and interviews and credit card records that the investigators were collecting from witnesses. Later, she was promoted to investigator and she started working alongside Mark.

[Mary DiIorio]

I was not political. My family was Republican. My parents were not delighted with what I was doing. One living with this guy too, working on this committee.

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

Neither Mary nor Mark had any idea what was coming when they got to Washington.

[Mark Lakritz]

We were clueless. We didn't know how big it was going to be. We sort of suspected because of all the things we saw and read that something wasn't right in the state of Denmark. But we had no idea that it was going to blow into what it blew into.

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

That spring and summer, the Senate Watergate hearings became the greatest show on earth.

[Various historical figures giving testimony (e.g., John Dean, James McCord)]

Political pressure from the White House was conveyed to me. He told me to shred the documents and deep six the briefcase. He indicated he would kill me. There was no need to buy our silence. We are not for sale.

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

As one Nixon, higher up after another came before the seven senators on the committee and revealed unthinkable things. The senators fired pointed dramatic questions at them.

[Various historical figures giving testimony (e.g., John Dean, James McCord)]

If you were concerned because the action was known to you to be illegal, what on earth would it have taken to decide against that plan?

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

And those questions were informed by hours and hours of research and investigation by committee staffers like Mary and Mark. The senators didn't just ask about the break in at the Watergate office building. They asked about illegal fundraising, about the campaign to sabotage Ed Muskie, about a whole panoply of dirty tricks and possible felonies. About two months into the hearings, Republican Senator Lowell Weicker questioned John Mitchell, Nixon's first Attorney General and the chair of his reelection campaign. The Senator asked about a meeting in 1972 during which G. Gordon Liddy, one of the organizers of the Watergate break in, pitched a room full of top Nixon officials on some pretty extreme election year shenanigans. One of them was to drug and kidnap radical leftist leaders like Abbie Hoffman and keep them in a Mexican safe house to prevent them from causing trouble at that year's Republican convention. Here's Senator Weicker.

[Senator Lowell Weicker]

That plan, complete with visual aids, included elaborate charts of electronic surveillance and breaking and entering and prostitution and kidnapping. Now, you've indicated that in hindsight, they probably should have thrown him out of the office.

[Various historical figures giving testimony (e.g., John Dean, James McCord)]

Out of the window, I think maybe.

[Senator Lowell Weicker]

Even out of the window in hindsight. And do you mean to tell me that you sat there through that meeting and in fact actually had the same man come back into your office for a second meeting without in any way alerting appropriate authorities, in this particular case, the President of the United States.

[Various historical figures giving testimony (e.g., John Dean, James McCord)]

That is exactly what happened. Senator. It was a grievous error.

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

Moments like this didn't happen every day during the roughly four months that the Watergate hearings were on tv. But they happened a lot. And many of them had been choreographed by people like Mary Diorio and her boyfriend Mark Lackritz, who were not in front of the cameras.

[Mark Lakritz]

There was an enormous gap between what the public saw and what was going on behind the scenes. We were like the script writers of the soap opera.

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

In this episode, we're going to hear about that script writing process, but we're also going to hear some of the soap opera itself because it was such a good soap opera, one that introduced the country to a whole cast of strange characters, featured breathtaking twists and revelations, and generated a number of honest to goodness pre Internet memes. What was it like to watch the spectacle on TV and get utterly sucked into the scandal as it became a national obsession? And what was it like to orchestrate that obsession to expose a high level government conspiracy on live television before an audience of millions of this is Slow Burn, a podcast about Watergate. I'm your host Leon Nayfak.

[Various historical figures giving testimony (e.g., John Dean, James McCord)]

John Dean implicated perhaps a dozen people in his sworn testimony today, and the President himself there was maintained what was called an enemies list, which is rather extensive.

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

Why on earth should I believe anything that John Dean says? Episode 4 Lie detectors.

[Person arguing to pay the bill (generic)]

If you want to hear the rest of this season and support what we do, now's the perfect time to join Slate Plus. You can join directly within Apple Podcasts and Spotify, or visit slate.com slowburnplus to get access wherever you listen.

[Elise Hu (Podcast Host)]

Hey, I'm Elise Hu, host of the podcast TED Talks Daily. Did you know paylocity offers one platform for HR finance and it that means innovative solutions like on demand payment which offers employees access to wages prior to payday, flexible time tracking features which enables staff to clock in through their mobile device and numerous other cutting edge integrations are available to all your teams in one single place. Learn more about how Paylocity can help streamline work and bring teams together at paylocity.com learning1 Wasn't that delicious?

[Senator Lowell Weicker]

So good.

[Wells Fargo Commercial Voice]

Your bill, ladies.

[Senator Lowell Weicker]

I got it.

[Person arguing to pay the bill (generic)]

No, I got it. Seriously, I insist. I insisted first. Oh, don't be silly. You don't be silly.

[Wells Fargo Commercial Voice]

People with the Wells Fargo Active Cash credit card prefer to pay because they earn unlimited 2% cash rewards on purchases.

[Narrator / Host (Leon Nayfak)]

Okay.

[Person arguing to pay the bill (generic)]

Rock, paper, scissors for it.

[Mary DiIorio]

Rock, paper, scissors, shoot.

[Wells Fargo Commercial Voice]

No the Wells Fargo ActiveCash credit card. Visit Wells Fargo.com ActiveCash terms apply.