The Bootblack Stand
Plunkitt, George Washington
The Bootblack Stand - Dr. George Washington Plunkitt, our prize-winning political analyst, is celebrating the publication of his new book, which is now available...
...GWP downfall simply does not wipe all this off the slate...
...The fourth factor to be weighed is the degree of contrition displayed by the wrongdoer...
...Personally, I cannot fathom what such a punishmenf would be...
...Plunkitt: As a woman and as a stripper I have suffered a great deal of distress due to the press' exploitation of my misfortune at the hands of one Wilbur D. Mills...
...GWP Dear Dr...
...Tell them he always drinks when he drives so that if he has an accident he will be relaxed...
...And when in addition one considers (as Mr...
...Although Dr...
...I was never very impressed with the women libbers, but it is apparent from the coverage my misfortune has received in the press that there is a great deal of sexism shown toward women who have chosen stripping for a career...
...If you could come by my office I would be glad to show you my collection of campaign buttons...
...The press has totally neglected the fact that most strippers have great pride and dignity...
...Nixon qualifies...
...Nixon to his grave, it becomes almost impossible to argue that any additional (albeit more traditional) punitive measures are called for...
...The Bootblack Stand by George Washington Plunkitt Dr...
...Initially, this seems impressive: Dean and Colson, after all, are going to jail, and Mr...
...This man Mills misled me—he told me his name was Wilbert—into thinking he was a man of refinement...
...Nixon should not escape the criminal sanctions imposed on subordinates like John Dean or Charles Colson...
...Plunkitt: What the hell are we to do...
...Stringfellow: Frankly I do not understand the lurid pother that the philistines in the media have stirred up over this very unexceptionalaffair...
...Nixon is not...
...I personally would not be caught dead with a Congressman or any other sort of politician...
...But to make heavy weather of this issue, as so many are doing, is rather superficial...
...Your friend, Jay Stringfellow Campaign Director Dear Mr...
...Plunkitt expects to earn ten million dollars from sales of his new book, he has agreed to continue to advise public figures through this column...
...Finally, there is the whole question of "equal justice"—the argument being that Mr...
...Mills...
...Nixon has "suffered enough...
...Nixon's largely ignored statement issued as he accepted the pardon did indeed express both his genuine remorse for the grief he had caused the nation, and the personal guilt he bore as a result...
...Here, many would contend that Mr...
...And he still comes forward with the most extravagant boondoggles...
...When the gentlemen of the law informed me of his real identity I was so mortified I attempted to have done with myself by leaping into the Tidal Pool...
...How the hell can we explain this to the stuffy ignoramuses who have been reelecting the old boy since the McKinley Administration...
...Moreover, Mr...
...Tuesday morning old Wilbur is driving around the Jefferson Memorial with a car full of strippers and his lights out...
...He still orders Moon Pies at Sans Souci , does he not...
...they have not made the contributions to the nation that Mr...
...Address all correspondence to The Bootblack Stand, c/o The Alternative, P.O...
...Third, there is the issue of mercy, which should take into account the extent to which the individual in question has already been punished for his wrongdoing...
...The real point, it seems to me, is that the pardon is a perfectly defensible and in many ways appropriate act—and that the virulence of the reaction to it is both indefensible and inappropriate in the extreme...
...When the cops pull him out of the car his face is bleeding like a ruptured blood vessel, his breath is combustible, and one of the broads leaps into the Tidal Basin...
...There are factors to be weighed in the scales of equal justice in judging a former President that are simply not present elsewhere...
...Consider, for example, that even as all the keepers of the nation's conscience are in such a dither over the pardon, Mr...
...There is, I submit, no clearer illustration of how warped and hysterical our discussion of political events in general, and of the Presidency in particular, has become...
...Not since the days of Camelot has a Washington solon shown such a lively interest in high culture...
...Dear Dr...
...Daniel Ellsberg is flitting about from one campus and talk show to another, cashing in on his illegal revelation of classified material, and all the while being acclaimed as a moral hero for doing so...
...Perhaps more profound displays of mea culpa would be appropriate...
...Indeed, this author is himself somewhat ambivalent on the issue, both in terms of its timing and its possible impact on more mundane matters such as the 1974 elections...
...President Ford was much impressed by this factor, as evidenced by his oft-quoted (and occasionally derided) language to the effect that Mr...
...active promotion of the Silver Slipper, The Scene, and the career of "the Argentine Firecracker," it seems entirely possible that Washington will soon rival New York as a cultural center...
...and realistically, they have not been subjected to anywhere near the suffering that he has...
...I take it as an extremely auspicious sign when I hear that Congressmen are again patronizing the arts...
...What with the opening of Mr...
...So what if he now tries to give a boost to adult librairies, genuine art films, and /a danse...
...Plunkitt's book is about the importance of altruism in politics and it is titled What's in It for Me...
...Now all of this is not to say that the pardon of Richard Nixon is so clearly right that no reasonable person should disagree...
...I shall be glad ,to consult with you privately...
...He still wears white socks, does he not...
...Justice may be blind, but it is not undiscriminating...
...I cannot imagine how Mr...
...How about some evening next month...
...Box 877, Bloomington, Indiana 47401, Continental U.S.A...
...Hirshhorn's museum, and now with Mr...
...But on the other hand, neither have there been loud protestations of innocence, nor any attempt to encourage the development of the so-called "myth of the martyred President...
...He is faced with these sorts of difficulties all the time...
...If there are individuals who can conceive of a more profound, lasting, or fitting punishment than being forced to become the first man in history to resign the Presidency in disgrace, I congratulate them on their imaginatively punitive minds...
...George Washington Plunkitt, our prize-winning political analyst, is celebrating the publication of his new book, which is now available at avant-garde bookstores throughout New Jersey...
...but I hardly think that Mr...
...Ford clearly did) the physical and emotional difficulties that will accompany Mr...
...To the degree that anyone who receives a pardon can be said to have earned one, Mr...
...Nixon has...
...Nixon's possible deficiencies on this score constitute a decisive argument against a grant of clemency...
...I thought he was a salesman for the Living Bible...
...Mills' constituents could be displeased...
...Dean and Colson were not President of the United States...
...Heartbroken, Fanne Fox, the Argentine Firecracker Dear Miss Fox: My dear, you have been shamelessly deluded by a low rascal indeed...
...There has been no ex-plicit admission of criminal liability, and none is likely to be forthcoming...
...Or blame the whole thing on Nixon...
...These facts were easily available 'to the Washington Post, but their male chauvinists saw me as a stereotype or something...
...If you are dissatisfied with these suggestions give Ted Sorensen a call...
...Or consider the 50,000 young Americans who avoided service in the armed forces during the Vietnam unpleasantness, who are currently developing their more refined theory of civil The Alternative: An American Spectator December 1974 27...
...Nixon's case, as Ihave attempted to demonstrate, is unique...
...Then along comes some TV cameraman who gets a shot of old Wilbur with his arm around a cop...
...If your constituents continue to grouse tell them that the Congressman was drunk...
...We need not, I think, tarry too long over this point...
...Nixon's case is at its weakest, and to some degree this is true...
Vol. 8 • December 1974 • No. 3
