Where is the direct link to your quote?
"Where is the direct link to your quote?"
http://tinyurl.com/9fzug
The project was so secret at People that I dealt directly with the top editor, Martha Nelson, and one of her high-ranking lieutenants. Even my editors at the D.C. Bureau knew nothing of the story, which was code-named "Project Green Door." (Perhaps from another porn movie title.)
Ultimately the story died because of money. The Felt family and their attorney wanted a lot of money, and People magazine - with my blessing - backed away in what would have been a case of "checkbook journalism." Reputable news organizations don't pay a penny for news. This also was during the Jayson Blair plagiarism scandal at The New York Times. The ethical meters at news organizations were tuned to full alert, or should have been.
I was still convinced that Felt was Deep Throat, so I took the story to an author friend of mine who had written several books for HarperCollins, which would not be bound by the monetary precepts of journalism. The book publisher would have no prohibitions against buying Felt's story.
HarperCollins subsidiary Regan Books agreed to the project. By then, I was immersed in my job here. I asked my author-friend, Jess Walter of Spokane, Wash., to take over and do most of the legwork. I happily agreed to give him most of the book advance.
"He wrote that Felt's daughter Joan, who persuaded her 91-year-old father to go public as "Deep Throat," lamented that the Post's Bob Woodward would get all the credit - and profit - if Felt went to the grave with his secret."
"We could make at least enough money to pay some bills like the debt I've run up for the kids' education," she told Felt, according to the article. "Let's do it for the family."
Instead of Follow the Money, we now have follow the Felt's Money.
According to today's NYT, Judith Regan turned down a book deal because of serious concerns about whether or not Mr. Felt is now suffering from dementia.