Perfectly Clear: Nixon from Whittier to Watergate

by Frank Mankiewicz

Mankiewicz, Frank, Perfectly Nixon From Whittier To Watergate

239 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1973

About the author

Frank Mankiewicz (1924 – 2014) was an American journalist, political adviser, president of National Public Radio, and public relations executive.

He was the son of screenwriter Herman J. Mankiewicz and the nephew of director Joseph L. Mankiewicz.

Reviews

[Christopher Saunders · Rating 2 out of 5]

"Current affairs" books penned by angry partisan pundits rarely age well. This book (written by Frank Mankiewicz, journalist and sometime Democratic speechwriter) is typical of the form, though written 40 years ago. Written in early 1973, before the worst Watergate offenses came to light, it's an angry, accusatory book that, at the very least, traces Nixon's lifelong habit of deception and dirty politics and provides analyses of his culpability in his "third-rate burglary" that were reasonably vindicated. Still, Mankiewicz's anger overwhelms his skill as a writer: there's a whole chapter comparing Nixon to Adolf Hitler and his underlings to various Nazi officials, and more bizarrely an invented speech where Nixon confesses his guilt to the nation. That kind of hyperbole and rating digression wouldn't be out of place in a best-seller to bargain bin screed about how Bush or Obama embody the latest incarnation of fascism, and it's no more illuminating about a politician who was more genuinely corrupt than most.