Woodward told Bennett then he was "surprised the name had not come out yet" since some people at the paper had guessed who Deep Throat was.

Bennett responded that he'd assumed Deep Throat was somebody on the White House staff.

"Woodward corrected me," Bennett recalled, "and said, on the White House staff or close enough to the White House that he would know what was going on."

Although interest in the three-decade-old story has waned, Bennett said he's still asked occasionally about whether he was the secret source.

"It's very clear that the people who are asking me have a very romantic vision of who Deep Throat was," he said.

But they don't understand the source very well, Bennett said.

"He was very conflicted. He felt there were things going on that were not only improper, but were illegal. At the same time, he was a member of the administration who felt an obligation of loyalty," Bennett said.

"Deep Throat," the senator added, "was not leaking state secrets. This was not a great spy story where classified information was being leaked to the newspaper. It was just that there was something sleazy going on."

Bennett said he believed Deep Throat was a career government employee "who was worried about losing his job if it ever got out. I'm not sure Mark FeIt was worried because he was No. 2 (in the FBI)."

But, Bennett said, "It would have been tremendously embarrassing to Mark Felt if the Nixon administration found out."

Even though they were in Washington at the same time, Bennett said he'd never met Felt.

"I'm not a lawyer. I've never been involved in law enforcement. When I was in the Nixon administration, I was in the Department of Transportation," he said. "There would have never been the occasion for me to meet him."

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