June 18, 1972: Media Pays Little Attention to Watergate Burglary, Instead Ridicules McGovern Campaign

The US media initially pays little attention to the Watergate burglary (see 2:30 a.m.June 17, 1972). Most political reporting is focused on ridiculing Democrat George McGovern’s chances of becoming president. Time prints a five-page report on McGovern’s campaign proposals, and offers its sardonic vision of America under McGovern: “The neighborhood draft dodger has triumphantly returned home to take one of the new jobs at Freedom Fleet, a bus company shuttling ghetto children to racially balanced schools in the suburbs. After work, the ex-expatriate picks up his date at the corner abortion parlor, stops next door at Pot City for some Acapulco Gold, and then trips off to Timothy Leary’s Dizzyland, a new chain of rock-‘n’-roll-your-own nightclubs springing up in abandoned American Legion halls.” [Reeves, 2001, pp. 502-503]