When someone dubbed "Deep Throat" gave information to Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein about impropriety in the Nixon Administration, it became a national scandal forcing Nixon to resign. The identity of Deep Throat is to this day unknown.

Some 30 years later, again someone comes forward to talk about problems and trangressions inside a Republican administration, but it's handled a little differently: he writes a book with a journalist and appears on 60 Minutes. Though Democrats are grabbing a hold of the Paul O'Neill story, Paul O'Neill has opened himself up to right-wing attack.

It's also a different world than it was in the early 1970s. The Republican party manages the media better. Hell, they own most media outlets. Thus, Paul O'Neill -- and the Democrats' chances of using his name in debates -- is screwed.

Don't get me wrong: I think Paul O'Neill is telling the truth. I can't be sure, but at least his truth seems more plausible than the fair-and-balanced truth. However, if Paul O'Neill wanted to take down his old boss, he would have remained anonymous instead of opening up an opportunity for the neocons to cast stones at his character and turn him into a disgruntled ex-employee out for vengence and a payday. Sure, Fox News, Newsmax, and National Review would still poke holes in the story, but then it's just a story, not a face. Perhaps that's easy for me to say now that it's all out there; perhaps I'm being a Monday-morning quarterback about the whole thing. History, however, is always full of good lessons, and the lesson today is if you want to take down a president, do it secretly.