Memoirs are one of my favorite genres of books. Recently, I read Carl Bernstein’s Chasing History: A Kid in the Newsroom (Henry Holt and Co., 2022) and William Barr’s One Damn Thing After Another: Memoirs of an Attorney General (William Morrow, 2022). I read these books back-to-back. Dueling memoirs. What could these stories have in … More Bernstein v. Barr
Carl Bernstein is a throwback to newspaper men and woman of a different and lost time in America. If you’ve ever seen The Front Page, Lou Grant or Teacher’s Pet; this was a time of hard-boiled newsroom editors who drank, smoked cigars and were married to chasing stories, or at least that’s the romanticized image. … More Carl Bernstein: Chasing History
Richard Nixon told David Frost, “If it hadn’t been for Martha, there would have been no Watergate.” Let that sink in. What Nixon meant was the time her husband John Mitchell spent on wife Martha, he was not tracking and making sure the various nefarious deeds of the Nixon re-election campaign and keeping them from … More Martha Mitchell: Washington Personality, Wife of Attorney General John Mitchell, and American Folk Hero
“The President must always comes first. ‘He was born to do this job – and he’s perfect!’” – H.R. Haldeman Watergate was 50 years ago, great time to publish a book. What I expected was a word or two of remorse or regret, but you won’t find it in this book. Dwight Chapin was a … More Dwight Chapin book: The President’s Man
I had been kicking around the notion of writing about actor Martin Balsam for awhile, then fellow blogger Pete’s desert island film list mentioned him in several films. Balsam was a face everyone will recognize; his work lives on in his hundreds of appearances on the big and small screen. He was an actor’s actor. … More Martin Balsam: A Very Busy Character Actor
Gordon Liddy has left the building. He died this week at age 90. Liddy was one of the central figures of the Watergate break-in. A former FBI agent and lawyer, sworn to uphold the law, he helped plan and execute the break-in at the Democratic headquarters in addition to other dirty tricks. Liddy would be … More G. Gordon Liddy and Watergate
On a rainy day or when you’re not feeling yourself, curling up with a movie is good company. Is it Love Story or The Dirty Dozen? In Sleepless in Seattle, there is actually a scene about guy movies, as a response to An Affair to Remember, which is pivotal to the plot of Sleepless in … More Comfort Movies
The subtitle is: A Reporter Remembers Watergate. A subtitle to the subtitle might be: Who is Richard Nixon, a question Brokaw tries to answer. Retired news anchor Brokaw has written several books including The Greatest Generation, a huge bestseller. Brokaw returns with a subject quite familiar to him, Richard Nixon. Brokaw traces events of 1973 … More Tom Brokaw: The Fall of Richard Nixon
All the President’s Men (1976) It’s a political film. It’s a newspaper film. It’s a mystery film. It’s a gripping drama, even though everyone knew how the story ends. Great films don’t have to be in your face, obvious, or beat you over the head. Great films start with a story that begs to be … More All the President’s Men
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