Going out tonight to a favourite local eatery–the last night we can go there before our new 10-day circuit breaker lockdown begins in W. Quebec–to celebrate the death of G. Gordon Liddy, the most notorious of the many thugs involved in Watergate. It is hard to enumerate all the reasons to celebrate this man’s demise (at age 90). Starting off life as an FBI agent, Liddy once ordered an FBI background check on his fiancee–who went on to marry him anyway. Under Nixon he was the key strategist involved in Watergate and the subsequent aftermath. Sentenced initially to 20 years’ imprisonment, Liddy had his sentence reduced to eight years by President Jimmy Carter and was paroled after four and a half.
Of all the many charming stories one could tell about this unbelievably awful man, one, of a twistedly gastronomic nature, stands out. Liddy was known to eat rats in prison. Confronted once by a fellow inmate who asked if he didn’t find it gross to eat such things, Liddy calmly replied, “Chacun a son gout!” (to each his own)–and went on chewing.
Jon Peirce Editorial Services 