09 February 2007
Svengalis
My bet is that she winds up remembered like Jayne Mansfield, a lesser luminary to Marilyn, perhaps on par with Kim Novak, or perhaps Mamie Van Doren or the sadly neglected Sheree North. But I could be wrong. There is a Svenagali in the mix, and that is a wild card.
My assessment is predicated on the staying power of the Blonde of the Age, Pamela Anderson. I read in Playboy Magazine that Pam was the anti-Marilyn: empowered, strong and unafraid. Paving the way for Paris Hilton, the widely distributed tape of her intimacy with that weird ex-husband only increased her fame.
Her confidence makes her the defining bombshell of the nascent century, or so goes the reasoning.
Jayne did not have the tragic and vulnerable side that Marilyn did, though she did share something with Anna Nicole Smith. I don't remember precisely how I felt when I heard the new about Jayne, though it came with some titillating photos in Life Magazine.
I know that yesterday I was saddened by Anna's passing. The video clips ran on an endless loop, the blonde tresses and images of her, svelte and hefty, but always with that Marilyn smile.
The news beat down the down the reports of downed helicopters and combat losses, and the Libby trial, and the issuance of the report on the wrongdoings of former Pentagon Policy Chief, Doug Feith.
It may be that the arrogance of the last two has left me feeling like the Libby jury felt after the defense cross-examined “Meet the Press” host Tim Russert for five hours.
Tim walked into the courtroom on crutches, and he didn't get to ask the questions. Bored, and disinterested is how they said the jury felt and I have to agree.
If you look at the prosecution's time line for when the former Vice Presidential Chief of Staff was talking about former Directorate for Operations agent Valerie Plame, only an idiot could believe that his testimony was not knowingly false. The only question for Scooter Libby is which facility they are going to put him, and for how long.
It is traditional in these things to come on strong with the convicted in the sentencing phase, hoping to shake down the next rung in the ladder of conspiracy, the Svengali of the plot. I doubt if it will work, since Scooter seems to be nothing if not loyal. Oddly, I have a little sympathy for Scooter, a little man who is going to jail with the big boys.
The more curious thing is that the bigger lies are not going to result in the same scenario. The Pentagon Inspector General is out, finally, with the report on the conduct of Doug Feith while he was Secretary Rumsfeld's chief architect of policy.
I worked with his staff in those strange days between the fall of the Towers, and the invasion of Iraq, and it was very much like walking into the looking glass. I would drive down the GW Parkway from Langley to the Pentagon to go to meetings chaired by Doug's minions.
The desired end-state was never in doubt, though the process had to continue to avoid making trouble. The meetings were about some sort of transformation, which the Secretary was very big on, and not about the certainty that Saddam Hussein was in league with Al Qaida. That topic did not seem to be one open for discussion.
The report on Doug's private intelligence unit is on the Hill this morning. It describes how they got to “conclusions that were inconsistent with the consensus of the Intelligence Community, to senior decision-makers.”
The conclusion that Saddam had weapons of mass destructions, as I recall, were what we would have liked to believe, since he had certainly tried to acquire them before. But the Intelligence Community could not prove it, and would not lie.
Doug needed to connect the dots to make the policy fit with the pre-determined outcome, and that is how it went. The IG's report concludes that it happened, and that actions were taken, and that there was nothing illegal and nothing that violated Defense Department directives.
Congress may take umbrage with that, and this may not be the end of it. But I marvel at the consequences of dissembling. One bright man is going to go to jail over when he knew where someone worked. Another bright man defiantly defends his conduct that led to war.
It is a funny town that way, and I will be interested to see how it plays out in the popular history of Our Fair City.
Doug could tell you how hard it is to accurately forecast the future. But the events of the recent past may secure Anna Nichole Smith a place ahead of more confident celebrities. The litany of tragedy may vault her right into Marilyn's league.
Think of it: she is deceased at 39, hundreds of millions of dollars still in play over a marriage to an octogenarian. There is a five-month old daughter with all that money hanging over her tiny head. Another man-child is dead, mysteriously, overdosing in the same hospital even as the babe was being born.
Add an evil Svengali of a lawyer, this one named Ron Zale, and you have the recipe for enduring fame.
Anna Nicole was staying with her entourage at the Hard Rock Casino and Resort in Hollywood, the one in Florida, on the Atlantic side where the insects are not so fierce.
That may be the factor that ties all modern life together. You may recall that on the last morning of her life, shortly after midnight, Jayne Mansfield left the Gus Stevens Supper Club in lovely Biloxi, Mississippi in a 1966 Buick Electra.
The Club was the most famous attraction on the Gulf Coast at the time, an eight hundred seat dining and gambling spa open twenty-four seven. It was the upscale venue on the Redneck Riviera, and celebrities like Mamie Van Doren appeared regularly. It was a place to wring the last dollars out of a dimming bombshell career.
Speed was involved in the tragedy, which is a useful mythical component of immortality. The Buick plowed into the rear of a tractor-trailer that had slowed because of a County truck spraying the ubiquitous smelly petroleum mist that keeps down the fierce Gulf mosquitoes.
The Buick was returned to its owner, Gus Stevens, who eventually sold it. It was in a museum in Florida for several years but now is owned by a Mansfield fan in North Carolina.
The thing was, Jayne had recently become romantically involved with one of the other adults in the car. His name was Sam Brody, and he was a married divorce attorney.
You don't have to be Dough Feith to connect the dots on that one.
Copyright 2007 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com