The Nation: Gold in Them Thar Hills

It may have been the most neatly buried nugget in all that John Dean said. In one brief paragraph of his 245-page testimony before the Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities last week, Dean dropped an obscure reference to a client of Super-lawyer F. Lee Bailey's who "had an enormous amount of gold" to dispose of. As Dean told the story, the gold had come up during a luncheon conversation he had on March 22 with John Mitchell. What was Bailey up to, and how was Mitchell involved? The story behind Dean's fleeting remark lies somewhere between the fantastic and...