I'm going to riff for a few days on bird and spy stories.
First up: Nixon and Alger Hiss
Back in 1948, Whittaker Chambers, a senior editor at Time magazine, and a former Communist spy turned government informer, accused Alger Hiss of being a spy for the communists in the mid-1930s.
Chambers was not exactly a credible witness; he had very little documentation to back up his charges and he admitted at the Hiss trial that he had repeatedly committed perjury on other occasions. Inititially it was not clear he had even met Hiss, much less knew him well.
Chambers claimed he did know Hiss, and backed it up by noting that Hiss was a bird-watcher who was very proud that he had seen a prothonotary warbler near Glenn Echo Park just outside of Washington, D.C.
In cross examination of Hiss before the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC), a young Congressman by the name of Richard Nixon asked a seemingly innocent question: "What hobbies, if any, do you have, Mr. Hiss?"
Hiss answered that his hobbies were "tennis and amateur ornithology." Congressman John McDowell then jumped in an asked Hiss whether he had ever seen a prothonotary warbler?
Hiss walked right into the trap, responding that he had -- "right here on the Potomac."
Slam -- the trap had been tripped. Committee members were now convinced it was Hiss who was lying, not Chambers. After a series of trials, Hiss was sentenced to prison for 5 years based on very sketchy (and still controversial) evidence.
As for Nixon, he managed to use the Hiss affair to propel himself from the U.S. House of Representatives into the Senate, and from the Senate into the Vice Presidency under President Dwight Eisenhower.
The rest, as they say, is history.
The saga was was not quite over, however. In 1952, not quite content to let his 15 minutes of fame pass him by, Whittaker Chambers published his autobiography, which was entitled Witness. Ronald Reagan later credited this book with transforming him from a New Deal Democrat into a conservative Republican.
While shilling for General Electric in the 1950s and early 60s, Reagan made frequent references to Whittaker Chambers in his speeches, and on March 26, 1984 -- 23 years after Chambers had died -- Reagan posthumously gave Whittaker Chambers the nation's highest honor, the Medal of Freedom.
Probably no one has ever deserved it less.
The rest, as they say, is history.
The saga was was not quite over, however. In 1952, not quite content to let his 15 minutes of fame pass him by, Whittaker Chambers published his autobiography, which was entitled Witness. Ronald Reagan later credited this book with transforming him from a New Deal Democrat into a conservative Republican.
While shilling for General Electric in the 1950s and early 60s, Reagan made frequent references to Whittaker Chambers in his speeches, and on March 26, 1984 -- 23 years after Chambers had died -- Reagan posthumously gave Whittaker Chambers the nation's highest honor, the Medal of Freedom.
Probably no one has ever deserved it less.
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