The Washington Post suggests that the revelation of Mark Felt's secret role in the Watergate scandal may have been a self-serving decision by his family:
Watching W. Mark Felt appear alongside his daughter and grandson on Tuesday to affirm that he was Deep Throat, one could be forgiven for suspecting that he was not the driving force behind this very public admission. Smiling like an eager-to-please child, his pajama top tucked poorly into mismatched bottoms, the 91-year-old looked like a man who no longer made many decisions for himself. Any evidence that he was once among the nation's most powerful lawmen was long gone. The two faces framing his, however, seemed to be very much in charge. His attractive, determined daughter Joan and his clean-cut, law student grandson, Nick Jones, positively glowed with purposefulness. It was hard not to think that they were the ones behind the revelation, not the shaky figure clutching the walker.
It is a very poignant picture.