Anderson,meanwhile, was the Rodney Dangerfield of journalists. Even worse, actually:While Dangerfield’s lack of respect was an act, Anderson really got no, or little, respectfrom his colleagues. Like Dangerfield, however, he was no slouch at deliveringthe goods to his audience.
Mark Feldstein details Nixon’s misdeeds in his superb Poisoning the Press: Richard Nixon, JackAnderson, and the Rise of Washington’sScandal Culture (Farrar, Straus and Giroux). All of the actions involvedNixon directly or indirectly and were first brought to light in the syndicatednewspaper column “Washington Merry-Go-Round,” created by Drew Pearson. Anderson worked for Pearson from 1947 until Pearson’sdeath in 1969, when Andersontook over the column. The following is a partial list of the many instances ofNixonian corruption:
In 1952, Nixon’s secret personal slush fund, whichresulted in the famous, maudlin “Checkers” speech that rescued his career.
- In 1956, contributions to the Nixon campaign fromMafia members.
- Also in 1956, but not revealed until 1960, HowardHughes’ $205,000 “loan” to Nixon’s brother Donald as a way of obtainingcontracts and favors from the administration. From it Nixon learned thecutthroat tactics that “would become not his salvation but his ruin.”
- In 1971, another secret payment from Hughes, thistime to Nixon for $100,000.
- Also in 1971, exposure of covert operations in Vietnam and thesham of peace talks. That the rest of the press did not follow up shows Anderson’s low status andthe White House’s ability to control events and the perception of them.
This exposé was considerably more damaging than thebetter-known “Pentagon Papers” case, for the latter was about historicalmatters while Anderson’swas about ongoing operations. But it was the “Pentagon Papers” that broughtabout the creation of the White House unitknown as “the Plumbers” for theirmission of plugging leaksthat led to the Watergate scandal and Nixon’sdownfall and resignation.
- In 1972, the largest financial scandal of all: ITT’spledge of $400,000 to the Republican National Convention in return for JusticeDepartment approval of ITT’s takeover of other companies.
- Around the same time, a conspiracy between the CIAand ITT to overthrow Salvador Allende, the Marxist president of Chile.
But Andersondid not cover the most egregious outrage: his own assassination plot. In March1972 Nixon aide Charles Colson orchestrated a meeting, which G. Gordon Liddyand E. Howard Hunt have admitted attending, to discuss plans to kill thecolumnist. The extent of Nixon’s involvement is unknown, but the author andothers claim that Colson never did anything without Nixon’s OK.
Although largely forgotten today, Andersononce was the most widely read newsman in the United States. At its peak hisdaily 750-word exposé was published in nearly 1,000 newspapers, and it becamethe longest-running and most popular syndicated column in the nation.
Feldstein, an award-winning journalist and member ofthe faculty of George Washington University,notes several parallels between the lives of Nixon and Anderson. Anderson was a journalistic pariah becausehis muckraking investigative technique, though highly effective, was lookeddown upon by establishment journalists. Nixon, likewise, felt himself scornedby the political establishment.
Both came out of the West and from severe religioustraditions, Nixon from California andQuakerism, Anderson from Utah and Mormonism. Both had disapprovingfathers and ne’er-do-well, embarrassing brothers. Both had longtime, extremelydevoted secretaries, Nixon’s Rose Mary Woods and Anderson’s Opal Ginn.
And Anderson’shands were not entirely clean, either. With nine children to feed and aparsimonious boss in Pearson, he took money from Washington news sources he covered andmoonlighted by writing speeches for a senator he also praised in the column.
Feldstein makes a strong case for his chiefcontention, that “Nixon and his staff pioneered the modern White Housepropaganda machine, using mass-market advertising techniques to manipulate itsmessage in ways that all subsequent administrations would be forced toemulate.” The struggle between Nixon and the press “reveals not only how one presidentsabotaged the press, but also how this rancorous relationship continues to thepresent day,” creating the “Scandal Culture” of the book’s subtitle.
For those of us who experienced those exhilarating,perilous times, Poisoning the Presslets us relive them. For those who did not, it is a reminder that theirgovernment lied then, it is lying today and it will lie in the future. And toJack Anderson it gives some respect.
