[STARWISE]

George Smathers - power politician ... and he done good.

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George Smathers never lost an election, but his legacy remains attached to a campaign quote he never said.

MIAMI - To entertain a visitor, George Smathers imitates his old political nemesis, Claude Pepper.

He narrows his eyes into a beady squint, arches a clenched fist toward the ceiling and transports himself back to 1950, when the two of them duked it out in an infamous U.S. Senate primary.

Pepper always would remind crowds that Smathers wasn't born in Florida but had moved here as a boy. Now Smathers replays Pepper's stump speech, right down to its raspy twang and drawn-out cadence:

"How . . . can . . . you . . . vote . . . for . . . someone . . . from . . . NEW JERSEY?"

Smathers drops his arm and chuckles. "You know, I always liked old Claude."

Somewhere, Florida's liberals of yore are spinning in their graves.

They never forgave Smathers for thrashing Pepper. They called Smathers an opportunist and a scurrilous red-baiter. History books credited him - incorrectly - with one of the cleverest smears in American politics.

But Smathers is beyond that now. He turned 90 this month; 35 years have passed since he hobnobbed with presidents and helped shape a nation's destiny. Forty years have passed since Dallas and his old friend's assassination.

Political opponents dubbed him Gorgeous George, a smirking reference to his tailored suits and bedroom eyes. Though his mind sometimes wanders, passing years have been kind. His voice remains clear, his handshake vigorous.

He has money to burn, grandchildren to enjoy and daily tete-a-tetes with lunchtime cronies.

"I have no major regrets," he said. "Don't look at the downside of everything that comes along. It helps life move along so much smoother and nicer."

Easy win into House and an introduction to JFK

George Armistead Smathers never lost an election.

He starred on the playing fields of Miami High and the Blue Key corridors of the University of Florida, where he ran the student body. They called him "Smooch" for his easy ways with visiting Florida State coeds.

His roommate was Phil Graham, who would marry his way into running the Washington Post.

Smathers was wired into both U.S. senators from Florida. One had a son at UF. The other was Claude Pepper, and Smathers had honchoed his Gainesville campaign in 1938.

So at 25 and fresh out of law school, Smathers had no trouble wrangling an appointment as a federal prosecutor from Dade County. He made a quick splash by jailing "white slavers," people who brought young women across state lines for "immoral purposes."

He was articulate, hard working and ambitious. World War II solidified his political bona fides by taking him to the South Pacific and aerial combat as a Marine. In the 1946 Democratic primary, he swamped a four-term congressman named Pat Cannon, who had an unfortunate habit of skipping votes on the House floor. Back then, the primary was all that mattered in Florida. Lovebugs enjoyed better status than Republicans.

Smathers, 33, shows up in a 1947 photograph of freshmen members of the House of Representatives. To his left are an introspective Californian named Nixon and a skinny Bostonian named Kennedy.

"Of the fellows least likely to be president, you'd have to vote Jack No. 1," Smathers later told a Senate historian. "He only weighed about 125 pounds, and he had this bad back and he had another illness that we didn't know about at the time, but he didn't look well."

Smathers and John F. Kennedy had adjoining offices and became fast friends. They both had hard-driving fathers who pushed them into politics. They both loved golf and after-hours carousing. Only Smathers and a few others knew of JFK's near-constant pain. On roll-call votes, Kennedy would lean on Smathers' shoulder as they walked to the House chamber. Other times, Smathers would help Kennedy put on shoes and socks.

Kennedy "was the most delightful gentleman . . . I was ever with," Smathers said this month. "He had a sense of humor. Smart as he could be."

But he never carried money.

"We'd go to dinner somewhere and the waiter would put the check in front of him. He'd look around and look around and drop it on the floor. Then he'd hand it to me under the table and say, "George take care of this for me.' "

The Cold War and a wrongly attributed quote

A New Deal war horse, Sen. Claude Pepper could stir the masses during the Depression with his silver-tongued populism. By 1950, however, the economy was rebounding and a crusty guy from Missouri had replaced Franklin Roosevelt in the White House.

Pepper had lobbied to keep Harry Truman off the presidential ticket in 1944 and 1948. Truman, a machine pol from Kansas City, didn't lack for memory.

As Smathers tells it, Truman called him to the White House and said, "George, I want you to do me a favor . . . I want you to beat that (expletive) Claude Pepper."

Smathers had a South Florida base and UF connections throughout the state. He also had an issue: the Red Menace.

As much as any politician, Pepper had reacted slowly to geopolitical shifts that followed World War II. The Soviet Union, once an ally, had taken over Eastern Europe and stolen the United States' atomic bomb secrets. While Truman expanded the military and created NATO, Pepper urged cooperation. He praised Joseph Stalin and appeared at peace rallies with American Communists.

Smathers hammered him.

"The people of our state will no longer tolerate advocates of treason," Smathers said in a campaign speech. "The outcome can truly determine whether our homes will be destroyed, whether our children will be torn from their mothers, trained as conspirators and turned against their parents, their home and their church."

Such were the beginnings of Cold War politics. Out in California, Richard Nixon won a Senate seat by labeling his opponent "pink down to her underwear."

Pepper had naively made himself vulnerable, and Smathers exploited it. What he didn't do was author that delicious little smear.

According to political legend, Smathers would address North Florida Crackers so uneducated they couldn't understand big words. Though no on-site journalist ever reported these legendary remarks, Time magazine published them as a political "yarn":

"Are you aware that Claude Pepper is known all over Washington as a shameless extrovert? Not only that, but this man is reliably reported to practice nepotism with his sister-in-law, and he has a sister who was once a thespian in wicked New York. Worst of all, it is an established fact that Mr. Pepper before his marriage habitually practiced celibacy."

Over the years, biographies and historical texts accepted the Time quote as gospel, sometimes adding more lines like "Pepper matriculated with coeds."

Smathers offered $10,000 to anyone who could prove he said it, with no takers. Now he shakes his head and acknowledges the falsehood as part of his legacy.

Unfortunately, Nixon wasn't much of a partier As a representative, Smathers introduced the bill that created Everglades National Park. He moved federal holidays to Monday, so tourists could take three-day trips to Florida. He harped on economic aid to Latin America so often colleagues called him "the Senator from Latin America."

But he made his mark with personality, not legislation. In the clubby Senate, he made friends with almost everyone - diehard segregationists, crusading liberals, even Republicans.

Smathers once arranged a fishing trip off Miami for Nixon with an old childhood buddy, Bebe Rebozo. Nixon wore a suit and never seemed to unwind.

"I liked Nixon fine, but Nixon was not a partier" Smathers recalled this month. "He didn't drink, he didn't play cards and he didn't chase women. Kennedy was a lot of fun, always. He had something going on. But not Nixon."

The fishing trip did yield fruit. After Nixon became president, he asked to buy Smathers' Key Biscayne retirement home, next-door to Rebozo. It became the Florida White House and Rebozo's financial dealings later played a minor role in the Watergate scandal.

Smathers lacked seniority for a powerful committee chairmanship. But he quickly rose to the No. 3 party leadership post under Lyndon Johnson, the Senate's Democratic mastermind. Smathers' congeniality provided an effective counterpoint to Johnson's blunt arm-twisting, particularly on civil rights.

Smathers was "a bridge between the South and North," said Tarpon Springs resident Jerald Blizen, who covered Smathers as the St. Petersburg Times' Washington correspondent before becoming Smathers' press secretary. "Johnson used him to convince the Southerners to come around."

Back in the '50s and early '60s, successful statewide politicians never looked too progressive on race. When the Orlando Sentinel published a 1950 photograph of Claude Pepper shaking hands with a black voter, the venerable liberal responded, "I don't believe in social equality, and they know it."

Smathers was no exception. When Martin Luther King was jailed in St. Augustine, Smathers offered to pay King's bail if he would leave the state. He opposed Thurgood Marshall for the U.S. Supreme Court and the landmark civil rights act of 1964.

But behind the scenes, he quietly supported federal voting rights bills, giving political cover to other Southerners to inch forward.

An assassination and coming to terms with foes

For any American over 50, November is a month for remembering. Smathers, too. He was on a plane from Washington to Florida when the news hit.

"The pilot came back and said he had just heard that Kennedy was shot," Smathers said. "It was doubtful whether or not he would live. The pilot said, "Would you like to sit up front with the co-pilot and me and listen as to what's happening?' "

Smathers and Kennedy traveled Europe together. When Kennedy visited the family compound at Palm Beach, Smathers usually showed up, golf club in hand.

Suddenly, he was squeezed into a cockpit, absorbing his friend's death.

When his term expired in 1968, Smathers quit the Senate and set up a lucrative Washington lobbying practice. Perks of his former office gave him access to the Senate floor, parking garage and dining room. Clients "would go back and say, "That Smathers is really something. He knows everybody over there.' " Smathers said. "I could send them a big bill, and hell, they'd be happy to pay it."

Real estate deals, orange groves, banks and a car dealership stoked his wealth. He has donated more than $30-million to the University of Florida and University of Miami, with plenty left over for a home on a private Miami island and another in the cool mountains of North Carolina.

Son John works for the Department of the Interior. Son Bruce, once Florida's secretary of state, tends to investments in Jacksonville. Second wife, Carolyn, stays mostly in North Carolina. Beloved Scottish terrier Chip has died, but Drive and Putt wag on.

Along the way, Smathers even made peace of sorts with Claude Pepper.

In 1964, Pepper won a seat in Congress from Dade County and became an icon of programs for seniors. Smathers donated to Pepper's campaigns. Asked about the contributions 20 years ago, when he was 70, Smathers said, "I guess I'm getting old enough to where I kind of feel like he may speak for me."

A born winner, if not a native Floridian

[STARWISE]

Not connected to DT, but spins another web of stunning political intrigue:

Huge UK historical site with section on US Politicians since the beginning -- not sure if it's not a bit of spin as well .. will let the historians judge if it's totally factual:

Spartacus Educational

Excerpt:

George Smathers: Biography

(1) William Torbitt, Nonmenclature of an Assassination Cabal (1970)

From 1960 to 1963, the ruling hierarchy of Lionel Corporation was General John B. Medaris, Roy Cohn and Joe Bonanno (Joe Bananas), a top Mafia man from New York, Las Vegas, Tucson and Montreal, Canada. Lionel Corporation during this period did over ninety percent of their business with the space agency and army ordnance furnishing such items as electronic equipment, rocket parts, chemical warfare agents and flame throwers. Also, during this period, General Medaris, though having retired in 1960, remained on active duty as special advisor to Army Intelligence in the Pentagon.

The Lionel Corporation management was in direct contact with Louis Mortimer Bloomfield who, among other things, was a lawyer with offices in Tangiers, Morocco and Paris, France. Bloomfield was also the president of Heineken's Brewers, Ltd., Canada. General Medaris was a director of one of the land speculation companies of Bobby Baker and Senator George Smathers in Florida. Joe Bonanno (Joe Bananas) in his capacity as a Mafia leader, was associated in the Havana and Las Vegas gambling with L.J. McWillie, Clifford Jones and others.

In addition to J. Edgar Hoover's close association with Roy Cohn, he was also a long time friend of General Medaris. Joe Bonanno (Joe Bananas) had been a personal informer for J. Edgar Hoover for over a decade during 1963. Grant Stockdale, ex-United States Ambassador to Ireland and former George Smathers Administrative Assistant and a stock holder and officer in Bobby Baker's vending machine and Florida land transactions, knew and was closely associated with almost all of the top figures in the cabal.

Shortly after President Kennedy's assassination on November 22, 1963, Grant Stockdale was pushed, shoved or fell from the fourteenth story of a Miami building and was killed immediately in the fall. As an officer in the Bobby Baker enterprises, Grant Stockdale had particular knowledge of a good part of the workings of the cabal and his death was one of a series made necessary to protect the group from public exposure...

Fred Black of Washington, D.C. was a lobbyist for North American Aircraft and business associate with Bobby Baker and Clifford Jones. Black has confirmed the connection between Jones, McWillie, Baker, Ruby and ex-Cuban President, Prio.

After November 22, l963, Black publicly told many people in Washington, D.C. he had informed J. Edgar Hoover that an income tax conviction against him must be reversed or he would blow the lid off Washington with revelations of the assassination conspirators.

Lobbyist Black prevailed upon J. Edgar Hoover to admit error before the Supreme Court where his case was reversed in 1966. Hoover did well to rescue Black from the conviction. Fred Black, while socially drinking with acquaintances in Washington has, on numerous occasions, been reported to have told of J. Edgar Hoover's and Bobby Baker's involvement in the assassination through Las Vegas, Miami and Havana gamblers.

He named some of these as the Fox Brothers of Miami, McLaney of Las Vegas, New Orleans, Havana and Bahamas, Cliff Jones of Las Vegas, Carlos Prio Socarras of Havana, Bobby Baker and others. He stated there was also a connection in that some of the gamblers were Russian emigres.

Don Reynolds, Washington, D.C. businessman and associate of Bobby Baker and who had a number of questionable business transactions with Walter Jenkins on behalf of Lyndon Johnson, also gave testimony concerning Bobby Baker's involvement with the principals and he has stated on numerous public occasions that this group was behind the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Black was a stockholder with Baker in the Waikiki Savings & Loan Association in Honolulu. The other members were Clifford Jones and his law partner, Louis Weiner. There was the Farmers and Merchants State Bank in Tulsa where Jones joined Baker and Black in a stock deal and brought in a Miami pal by the name of Benny Sigelbaum, a courier of funds and documents to the Swiss banks for Permindex and the Syndicate.

Of all the enterprises, none could compare with the controversial Serv-U Corp., a Baker-Black controlled vending- machine firm. Ed Levinson, president of the Fremont Hotel, Las Vegas, Nevada, was also a partner. Grant Stockdale, President of Serv-U and his money is covered later. Formed late in 1961, Serve-U Corporation provided vending machines for the automatic dispensing of food and drink in companies working on government contracts. In the next two years, Serv-U was awarded the lion-share of the vending business at three major aerospace firms - North American Aviation, Northrop Corporation and Thompson Ramo Wooldridge's Space Technology Laboratories. Baker and Black each bought stock in the company for $1 a share, while the others paid approximately $16 a share

(snip)

Why should Smathers do this? One possibility is that Smathers was trying to link JFK with Monroe’s death. According to Matthew Smith’s Victim: The Secret Tapes of Marilyn Monroe (2003) the CIA was involved in a plot to implicate the Kennedys in Monroe’s death as punishment for the Bay of Pigs disaster.

If Smathers was involved in any conspiracy to kill JFK one would expect those close to him like Grant Stockdale to find out about it. One person who might have discovered what was going on was his secretary, Mary Jo Kopechne, and her flat mate, Nancy Carole Tyler, who was Bobby Baker’s secretary. According to Penn Jones, it was Kopechne and Tyler who leaked the story about JFK replacing LBJ by Smathers as vice president.

Nancy Carole Tyler died in a plane crash, near Ocean City, Maryland, on 10th May, 1965.

Kopechne went on to become Robert Kennedy’s secretary. She was to die in Edward Kennedy’s car on 18th July, 1969.

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H. R. Haldeman

Harry Robbins Haldeman, the son of a successful businessman, was born in Los Angeles on 27th October, 1926. He attended the University of Redlands and the University of Southern California, before serving in the Naval Reserve during the Second World War.

In 1949 Haldeman joined the J. Walter Thompson advertising agency in New York. Ten years later he was promoted to the post of vice president and manager of the California office.

Haldeman's father was a financial backer of Richard Nixon. Haldeman got to know Nixon when he was serving as vice president under Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1952. Haldeman helped Nixon in his unsuccessful 1960 campaign against John F. Kennedy. He also managed Nixon's unsuccessful campaign for the governorship of California in 1962.

In 1968, he was chief of staff of Nixon's presidential campaign. After Nixon's election he was appointed the president's chief of staff.

On 17th June, 1972, Frank Sturgis, Virgilio Gonzalez, Eugenio Martinez, Bernard L. Barker and James W. McCord were arrested while removing electronic devices from the Democratic Party campaign offices in an apartment block called Watergate. It appeared that the men had been to wiretap the conversations of Larry O'Brien, chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

The phone number of E.Howard Hunt was found in address books of the burglars. Reporters were now able to link the break-in to the White House. Bob Woodward, a reporter working for the Washington Post was told by a friend who was employed by the government, that senior aides of President Richard Nixon, had paid the burglars to obtain information about its political opponents.

In 1972 Nixon was once again selected as the Republican presidential candidate. On 7th November, Nixon easily won the the election with 61 per cent of the popular vote. Soon after the election reports by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein of the Washington Post, began to claim that some of Nixon's top officials were involved in organizing the Watergate break-in.

Haldeman was involved in the cover-up from the beginning. In April 1973, Nixon forced Haldeman and John Ehrlichman, to resign. A third adviser, John Dean, refused to go and was sacked. On 20th April, Dean issued a statement making it clear that he was unwilling to be a "scapegoat in the Watergate case". When Dean testified on 25th June, 1973 before the Senate Committee investigating Watergate, he claimed that Richard Nixon participated in the cover-up. He also confirmed that Nixon had tape-recordings of meetings where these issues were discussed.

The Special Prosecutor now demanded access to these tape-recordings. At first Nixon refused but when the Supreme Court ruled against him and members of the Senate began calling for him to be impeached, he changed his mind. However, some tapes were missing while others contained important gaps.

Under extreme pressure, Nixon supplied tapescripts of the missing tapes. It was now clear that Nixon had been involved in the cover-up and members of the Senate began to call for his impeachment. On 9th August, 1974, Richard Nixon became the first President of the United States to resign from office.

Nixon was granted a pardon but Haldeman was convicted of conspiracy and obstruction of justice and served 18 months in prison for his role in the Watergate cover-up.

On his release from prison Haldeman became vice president of the David H. Murdoch real estate development company. In 1978, Haldeman published his autobiography The Ends of Power. In the book he disclosed information on the assassination of John F. Kennedy: "After Kennedy was killed, the CIA launched a fantastic cover-up. The CIA literally erased any connection between Kennedy's assassination and the CIA... in fact, Counter intelligence Chief James Angleton of the CIA called Bill Sullivan of the FBI and rehearsed the questions and answers they would give to the Warren Commission investigators."

Harry Robbins Haldeman died of cancer on 13th November, 1993; at his home in Santa Barbara, California.

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Starting to believe we live IN a Tom Clancy novel.