Rating: 
Summary: Nixon revealed
Review: Kutler has done a masterful job of presenting these tapes.Nixon was terribly served by his advisors. Haldeman was a meanspirited drone. One surprise was how badly Haldeman's successor, General Aexander Haig,comes across. In his goal to consolidate his own power he spurs Nixon's paranoia and anger. In the end all the president's men ill served their flawed chief. Nixon comes across and a petty, vengeful and neurotic man. Imagine. having your day to day conversations publicly revealed. Posthumus humiliation! Any student of Watergate must read this book.
Rating:
Summary: New perspective
Review: Reading how the day-to-day crisis management in the Nixon White House happened gave me new perspective on his downfall. I grew up in DC and remember that time. Nixon was vilified and demonized. My lasting image of him is one of a discredited, corrupt, and dishonest opportunist. Reading the transcripts, though, caused me to adjust that view somewhat. I think RN was truly surprised at the attention given to a little burglary in Foggy Bottom.
In the same way that Clinton is being called to the carpet for doing things that Kennedy got away with, Nixon was a victim of poor timing. I think that, before 1974, "dirty tricks" were commonplace and pretty much accepted by the players as part of doing business. That changed after Watergate. Relevant to our own times, sexual infidelity was common knowlege but went unreported, until Gary Hart. Today, politicians must be clean, AND true.
Rating: 
Summary: Overrated rehash of the Nixon tapes; poorly edited
Review: Stanley Kutler's rehash suffers from poor editing. The number of errors contained in the text of the transcripts is truly astonishing. Kutler has made a minor profession of studying Nixon's downfall, but he can't even get right the name of the case that Richard Nixon personally argued in the U.S. Supreme Court, a case to which Nixon alludes in one of the recorded conversations contained in this book. That is only one example among many. The reason why these transcripts are so lacking, at least in part, is owing to the use by Kutler of commercial Court Reporters, not scholars. Kutler admits to the use of such novices in his introduction. A poor, poor job.
Rating:
Summary: Deja Vu
Review: The irony of Clinton claiming executive privilege the day after I finished this book brought a new perspective to what is now happening in the current Administration. One can only speculate as to what is actually being said and covered up as I write this. This book really enlightened me to what can and does go on as opposed to what we think should go on.
Rating: 
Summary: The Nixon Legacy.
Review: There is only one word to describe many of these conversations....chilling. Nixon's arrogance and ruthlessness were astounding! What a terrible shock it must have been for men like Haige and Kissinger to learn this was all on tape. That anyone could listen to these tapes and proclaim that Nixon was a good president is unbelievable! Clinton lied about his sex life. That was embarrassing, I agree. Nixon, however, lied about his plans for Vietnam, his tax returns, and that fifth-rate burglary known as Watergate, in other words, a felony! As for those of you complaining that these tapes don't contain a "smoking gun." He destroyed two of the tapes he made after he was ordered by the authorities to turn them over. We'll never know what those tapes contained. He did all this and Ronald Reagan made him a goodwill ambassador to China! It's terrifying. This book is a must for any student of American History or the Cold War. We should all be grateful to Nixon for leaving us this invaluable piece of history.
Rating:
Summary: A book with an agenda
Review: This book is put together by an author with credibility. However, he picked and chose excerpts of certain tapes to suit his purpose. I do believe, however, these tapes actually debunk many of the myths put forward by Nixon-haters.
Rating:
Summary: Like being a fly on the wall
Review: This is an incredible read, an essential addition to any Watergate buff's library. The bulk of the book consists of transcripts from conversations Nixon had with his advisors during the Watergate break-in and its aftermath. All of the material is recently released and there's no doubt why the Nixon daughters desperately want this stuff suppressed: it paints their father with a viscerally black brush. We all know Nixon was a paranoid loner, brilliant but erratic, and distrustful of everyone around him except Haldeman and Ehrlichman. These tapes show conclusively that Nixon also demanded total sycophancy from his inner circle, that he was a racist, an habitual liar and someone with a pathological need to deceive. Bob Haldeman and Alexander Haig come off as complete toadies; worthless "yes men." Ehrlichman comes across better, as does Magruder, but the worst abuse must be heaped on Henry Kissinger, who appears as a quasi-insane boot licker of the highest order. It's incredible to see these men constantly assure Nixon that he was always right, always clever and completely above the law. How wrong they all were. The most delicious parts are when Nixon speaks himself. He is unintentionally hilarious, as he plots to "get" various reporters, wiretap his enemies and harass anyone who gets in his way. His diatribes on Howard Baker and Sam Erwin are the stuff of classics, you'll be on the floor, laughing. "That senile old b------," Nixon growls about Erwin. "He's half in the bag every waking moment, the miserable a------." This is a grand book, highly entertaining!
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