'I don't recall'

We are approaching the 20th anniversary of the day news of the Iran-Contra scandal broke--Nov. 4, 1986.

The whole story provided me with an excellent civics lesson, teaching me what the 5th Amendment was all about.

There's an interesting post on the Daily Nightly today about what it was like when the story broke. They've also included a video clip of the NBC Nightly News from that date.

There is also this observation from NBC News Senior Investigative Producer Robert Windrem...

The scandal also resonates now in ways that couldn’t be imagined back then. Today, the Lebanese magazine that broke the story would be online. Experts and journalists with responsibility for the region —- not to mention bloggers -- would have found it almost immediately and pushed it out a lot quicker. And what few recall is that the scandal unfolded in large measure because of the White House’s nascent e-mail system, a prototype electronic mail system from IBM called the Professional Office System (PROFs). As North and countless others have learned since, e-mail leaves a long digital tail that lives on even after being deleted.