Mel Gibson Loses Half of His $850 Million Fortune to Ex-Wife in Divorce

I almost feel bad for him

(abcnews.go.com Lionel Cironneau, file/AP Photo) Mel Gibson is not only single, but $425 million poorer, thanks to a divorce settlement finalized Friday between the actor and his wife of 31 years, Robyn Denise Moore.

The judgment, finalized by a judge in Los Angeles, keeps virtually all details of the settlement secret.People magazine reports that the couple did not have a prenuptial agreement, meaning his ex-wife would be entitled to half of everything Gibson earned during their marriage.

The Oscar-winner’s fortune has been estimated to be as high as $850 million, the magazine said, citing a 2006 report in the Los Angeles Business Journal. Throughout the 31-year marriage, which produced seven children, Gibson directed, invested and starred in movies such as “The Passion of the Christ,” which grossed more than $600 million alone.  He also invested heavily in real estate, including an island in Fiji he bought for $15 million in 2005.
People also reports that Moore, a former dental nurse, is entitled to half of any film residuals Gibson receives for the rest of his life.
Moore, 55, filed for divorce from Gibson, also 55, in 2009.  The two met in the late 1970s, when they were both tenants in a house in Adelaide, Australia.   Of their seven children only one, a 12-year-old son, is a minor and therefore subject to a custody agreement.
The divorce, which will take effect Jan. 9, is believed to be the biggest celebrity divorce payout in Hollywood history.  Director Steven Spielberg paid an estimated $100 million to Amy Irving in their 1989 divorce.
Gibson’s divorce payout and the potential custody battle that lies ahead comes on the heels of the $750,000 he agreed to pay to Oksana Grigorieva, his former girlfriend and mother of his toddler daughter, Lucia, in August.
The two, who split last April, were engaged in a bitter custody dispute that included leaked recordings that sounded like Gibson engaged in a racist and sexist tirade, and Grigorieva accusing Gibson of domestic violence.
The “Braveheart” star pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor battery charge involving Grigorieva in March.  The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department also investigated allegations of  attempted extortion by Grigorieva, but she was never charged.
Robyn Moore came to her now ex-husband’s defense in the battery case, filing a brief declaration that Gibson had never physically abused her or their children.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Allen West: Obama intentionally killing the economy

(EYE) First, a short history lesson.
Karl Marx believed that capitalism must be destroyed and replaced by socialism which will pave the way to communism:

Marx's theories about society, economics and politics, which are collectively known as Marxism, hold that all societies progress through the dialectic of class struggle. He was heavily critical of the current socio-economic form of society, capitalism, which he called the "dictatorship of the bourgeoisie", believing it to be run by the wealthy middle and upper classes purely for their own benefit, and predicted that, like previous socioeconomic systems, it would inevitably produce internal tensions which would lead to its self-destruction and replacement by a new system, socialism. Under socialism, he argued that society would be governed by the working class in what he called the "dictatorship of the proletariat", the "workers state" or "workers' democracy". [Exactly what the Occupy Wall Street parasites are advocating for. -ed.] He believed that socialism would, in its turn, eventually be replaced by a stateless, classless society called pure communism. Along with believing in the inevitability of socialism and communism, Marx actively fought for the former's implementation, arguing that both social theorists and underprivileged people should carry out organised revolutionary action to topple capitalism and bring about socio-economic change. [Again, exactly what Occupy Wall Street parasites and Obama are fighting for. -ed.]

Fast forward to 2011. Avowed Marxists radical leftist professors Cloward and Piven, heavily influenced by Saul Alinsky, took it even further, advocating that "government agencies with a flood of demands beyond the capacity of those agencies to meet", which would collapse the economic system, resulting in violent takedown of the power by the "downtrodden":

Their article called for "cadres of aggressive organizers" to use "demonstrations to create a climate of militancy." Intimidated by threats of black violence, politicians would appeal to the federal government for help. Carefully orchestrated media campaigns, carried out by friendly, leftwing journalists, would float the idea of "a federal program of income redistribution," in the form of a guaranteed living income for all -- working and non-working people alike. Local officials would clutch at this idea like drowning men to a lifeline. They would apply pressure on Washington to implement it. With every major city erupting into chaos, Washington would have to act. This was an example of what are commonly called Trojan Horse movements -- mass movements whose outward purpose seems to be providing material help to the downtrodden, but whose real objective is to draft poor people into service as revolutionary foot soldiers; to mobilize poor people en masse to overwhelm government agencies with a flood of demands beyond the capacity of those agencies to meet. The flood of demands was calculated to break the budget, jam the bureaucratic gears into gridlock, and bring the system crashing down. Fear, turmoil, violence and economic collapse would accompany such a breakdown -- providing perfect conditions for fostering radical change. That was the theory.

Sounds familiar? This is what Obama is trying to achieve, with ballooning national debt and an overwhelmed welfare system. "We are on their side", he said of the Occupy Wall Street "revolutionary foot soldiers" spoken of by Cloward and Piven.
And now, Allen West, calling a spade a spade:

...yeah... but my guess is that Obama has no intention of holding power when the system implodes. The thing about inflation is the long term effects of the abuse from printing money that is not reflective of a countries wealth could take years to collapse from within. When leftists say the economy has reached a point where it is no longer in free fall they fail to mention the long term effect of the problem created. This is going to be Obama's argument. He is going to point out that he revived the economy... and that is the problem. What he is doing is juicing the economy full of sugar... and eventually our system will self destruct... but Obama will say... hey... it wasn't me. This is very similar to what FDR did (though he didn't live long enough to see the long term effects of his New Deal, but many of us remember the urban decay). Think of the inner city riots of the 70's and the African American migration from rural America... because the government bailed out the white farmer (who no longer needed the black share cropper). The level of irresponsibility is exponential.

Breaking: 'Palestinians' claim US suggests releasing convicted terrorist to compete in elections

You kind of knew this was coming. There is no moral lines left for the left not to breach.

(Carl) Palestinian media are reporting based on Israeli sources (not reported yet in any Israeli media that I have seen) that the United States has 'suggested' to Israel that it release convicted terrorist Marwan Barghouti (one of the 'heavy' terrorists that Israel refused to release in the 'terrorists for Gilad' deal) from jail so that Barghouti can compete in the 'Palestinian elections' against Hamas (link in Arabic). Barghouti is serving multiple life sentences for murder.
The following is an untouched Google translation of the link.

Palestine Today - Gaza
Israeli sources said that the U.S. administration is concerned about the prospects for the victory of Hamas in Palestinian elections in the event of future conduct in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
The radio said, the occupation army from those sources that concern the U.S. is increasing in light of certain information received from Arab countries on the determination of the Palestinian president to leave office and not to run for president, opening the door to the Hamas victory, even in the presidential election and full control over the Palestinian situation.
Meanwhile, Israeli sources said that the American delegation discussed the important role during the last few months and down with officials in Tel Aviv, the idea of releasing a member of the Central Committee of Fatah, Marwan Barghouti from prison so that the occupation of the movement's leadership in the face of Hamas in the upcoming elections.
The sources pointed out that Netanyahu rejects the idea of releasing Barghouti, considering it an extension of the late Palestinian leader 'Yasser Arafat' where he helped the two together in planning to kill dozens of Israelis during the second intifada, according to those sources.
The sources pointed out that many mediums, including an Israeli Knesset member Binyamin Ben-Eliezer and former Defense Minister Amir Peretz and some leaders of security agencies and Mossad, the former does not oppose the release of Barghouti, considering him one more Palestinian commitment to peace with Israel.

(Carl) If he ever had one, Barghouti no longer has any commitment to peace with Israel. Ben Eliezer and Peretz are both Labor party MK's who were both failures as Defense Minister (Peretz should never have gotten the job in the first place). And if Obama is willing to make an outrageous demand like this one during an election campaign, imagine what he will demand if God forbid he is reelected.
What could go wrong?

there is little difference between Barghouti and any other Palestinian leader. When the bar is moved to the point beyond comprehension one can no longer defend children because the line between right and wrong is not so much arbitrary, but rather completely biased against a Jew's existence. Israel should make a note of this and have a death penalty for those who cross the moral line and attacks Jews in Israel. Because of political pressure there is no way to keep a terrorist captive for long enough for him to pay for his misdeeds. One can literally see the direct line between the Left in Israel and the death of innocent civilians.

No wonder the official Reform Judaism position is so far Left

(Carl)In case you were wondering why Reform Judaism in the US is politically so far Left when it comes to Israel - and for that matter every other issue.

“While I loved my time there and deeply respected my professors, I found that HUC was not comfortable exploring or discussing anything politically that wasn’t left,” said Rabbi Samantha Kahn, who received her ordination from Hebrew Union College in Los Angeles in 2011 and is now the assistant rabbi at Congregation Emanu El in Houston, Texas. “I definitely struggled with it, and I was hurt by the lack of openness and the anger toward positions of center and right when it came to Israel and foreign affairs.”
To be sure, most observers point out that the political atmosphere at HUC does not comprehensively reflect the reality of the wider Reform movement. But the differences can sometimes be unusually stark. Kahn, who worked at the Hillel at the University of Miami before entering HUC, recently recalled the “strange transition” she experienced: “As a Hillel professional, it seemed that I was [politically] very left. All of a sudden, at HUC I wasn’t left anymore, but very right. The truth is, being in Houston, I feel more left again. I pay attention to the New Israel Fund and read Haaretz. But I’m also still involved with and appreciative of AIPAC and Hadassah and am glad to see them still thriving in Houston. At HUC, AIPAC and Hadassah were four-letter words. They were the devil.”
HUC—like all educational institutions—is a bubble of sorts, and it is often difficult to find genuine ideological pluralism inside any such closed environment, especially on a subject as complicated as Israel. Nevertheless, some have grown concerned about the ways the political culture of HUC could influence the future texture of Reform Judaism and the broader American Jewish community.
“You could probably do the same story at Yeshiva University and you might get the exact opposite political trend,” David Wolpe, the rabbi of Sinai Temple in Los Angeles, said in an interview this week. “Having said that, the difference between right-wing support of Israel and left-wing support of Israel is that left-wing support much more easily morphs into indifference to and abandonment of Israel. That’s what the left wing has to guard against.”
***
Founded in 1875, Hebrew Union College has always been a proudly liberal institution. It has brought religious leaders through its ranks that have played integral roles in nearly every major social movement of the past century—from its social-action mandate in the 1885 Pittsburgh Platform to the March on Washington in 1963. Rabbi Jerome Davidson, a longtime pulpit rabbi from Great Neck, N.Y., who teaches a required course on social action at the seminary, seems to exemplify a certain model of rabbi-as-political-leader popular at the institution. “As far as I’m concerned, a rabbi should be able to get up on his pulpit and speak about why it’s necessary to have stronger gun-control laws or why the death penalty should be abolished or curtailed or strengthened or whatever she or he thinks Judaism teaches us,” Davidson said in an interview this week. And to his mind, the politics that should be transmitted from the pulpit are very specific.
“Judaism is very clear about the nature of government, that government is a social contract and that it exists, in significant part, to benefit the vulnerable,” he explained. “The Torah, the book of Deuteronomy, and the book of Exodus are filled with materials that reflect that. It’s about how the structure of government has to somehow take care of the vulnerable, the needy, the poor, the orphan, and so on. There’s a real mandate. Looking through Jewish values onto the political scene certainly mandates Reform Judaism and Jews, laypeople, or clergy to act on behalf of those Jewish values, and it is certainly reflected in the politics.”
But if Davidson believes firmly in supporting left-wing causes, some students in a younger generation argue that the very definition of “liberal politics” is in flux—particularly when it comes to Israel.

Sounds to me like they're being brainwashed.
Read the whole thing.

ain't that the truth?

Haniyeh: Our goal remains the destruction of Israel

It's just so frustrating. The idea that Fatah is for peace is a joke... but since we accepted that (even though Oslo has long since been voided)... now the opposition to the Jews is pushing the idea that Hamas is our peace partner too.

(CARL)'Moderate' 'Palestinian' President Mahmoud Abbas Abu Mazen is running around telling anyone who will listen that Hamas 'Prime Minister' Ismail Haniyeh is willing to make peace with Israel. But at a rally earlier this month marking the 24th anniversary of the founding of Hamas, Haniyeh told a much different story.

At a ceremony marking the 24th anniversary of the founding of Hamas, Hamas leader in the Gaza Strip Ismail Haniyeh said that Hamas may work for the "interim objective of liberation of Gaza, the West Bank, or Jerusalem," but that this "interim objective" and "reconciliation" with Fatah will not change Hamas' long-term "strategic" goal of eliminating all of Israel:
...
In his speech, Haniyeh also promised that Hamas will "lead Intifada after Intifada until we liberate Palestine - all of Palestine, Allah willing. Allah Akbar and praise Allah."

Let's go to the videotape.

They're just so flexible, aren't they?
But even Fatah has not yet given up on its 'phased plan' to get rid of Israel. And it probably never will.
Let's go to the videotape.

Read the whole thing.

the Hitlery Clinton sharks are swimming in the water

8-year-old Israeli girl becomes face of clash between moderates, ultra-Orthodox Jews

(nydailynews.com h/t Jane Smith of the Republican Jewish Coalition) oh...noes... I'm shocked! bad Jews? come now... this shouldn't of made the news... someone was looking for some feminist spin. walk around the block and you will find someone doing something nasty, but when it is a Jew then it makes the news. This is pathetic. In Egypt the police are kicking the shit out of women in the streets, but a few oddball naughty Jews that don't even support the state of Israel are the focus of the media. It's all about cultural equivalences.

Naama Margolese is a ponytailed, bespectacled second-grader who is afraid of walking to her religious Jewish girls school for fear of ultra-Orthodox extremists who have spat on her and called her a whore for dressing "immodestly."

you can expect Livni to get a word in... she lives for this:

Israeli opposition leader Tzipi Livni said, "It's not just Beit Shemesh and not just gender segregation, it's all the extremist elements that are rearing their heads and are trying to impose their world view on us."

suspiciously going on while Hitlery Clinton attacks Jewish men because Arabs are raping and beating women. How about the Duke Lacross... or Tawana Brawley... or how many other stories that turned sour on the media. this is fabricated. it stinks of B.S.. If this really happened as often as they claim then where is the video footage?? surely it would not of been hard  to get if this were a pattern. I've seen it before... I've experienced it before. the timing is of course suspect. it is obviously a fabricated political story meant to deny what is going on in Egypt. This is the way the leftist media complex works... and anyone who can't identify this at this point isn't worth arguing with. The facts don't matter... the facts are created. and people try to frame the story... there is nothing to talk about. It's vapor.

Mohammad's hadith calling to destroy the mosques that are at the Tomb of the Patriarchs, and other burial grounds

(EOZ) stumbled across this series of hadiths, from Kitab Al-Salat, book 4 chapter 47:

Book 004, Number 1079:'A'isha reported: The Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) said during his illness from which he never recovered: Allah cursed the Jews and the Christians that they took the graves of their prophets as mosques. She ('A'isha) reported: Had it not been so, his (Prophet's) grave would have been in an open place, but it could not be due to the fear that it may not be taken as a mosque.
Book 004, Number 1080:
Abu Huraira reported: The Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) said: Let Allah destroy the Jews for they have taken the graves of their apostles as places of worship.
Book 004, Number 1081:
Abu Huraira reported: The Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) said: Let there be curse of Allah upon the Jews and the Christians for they have taken the graves of their apostles as places of worship.
Book 004, Number 1082:
'A'isha and Abdullah reported: As the Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) was about to breathe his last, he drew his sheet upon his face and when he felt uneasy, he uncovered his face and said in that very state: Let there be curse upon the Jews and the Christians that they have taken the graves of their apostles as places of worship. He in fact warned (his men) against what they (the Jews and the Christians) did.

At least one modern Islamic scholar says that such a mosque, if built after the grave was already in place, must be destroyed. It appears to be the mainstream thinking in Wahhabism.
So how come no Muslims are publicly calling to destroy the mosques that are at the Tomb of the Patriarchs, Rachel's Tomb, the Tomb of Joseph and Samuel's' Tomb, among others?
Could it be because the Jews have built places of worship there, and it is more important to erase Jewish connections to the land than it is to observe a series of explicit hadiths?

'Palestinians' to seek to add Machpeila Cave to UNESCO heritage list in February

American tax dollars hard at work... does Ron Paul have anything to say about this? oh? yeah... this is why we shouldn't fund UNESCO... and we are breaking our own laws to do this.

(Carl) The 'Palestinian Authority' plans to apply to UNESCO in February to have the Machpeila Cave and the Old City of Hebron declared UNESCO heritage sites. It goes without saying that they would classify the cave - the burial place of the three founding fathers of the Jewish nation and their wives - as a mosque.

BTW... this is in complete contradiction to Islamic belief... talk about taqqiyya: Mohammad's hadith calling to destroy the mosques that are at the Tomb of the Patriarchs, and other burial grounds

The Palestinians say they will ask UNESCO to formally recognise their cultural attachment to the Ibrahimi Mosque in February -- a move only made possible by their admission to the UN body two months ago.
"Before we gained membership, we didn't have the right to add a Palestinian archaeological site to the World Heritage List because we are under occupation and the only way to do it was through friendly countries," said Palestinian culture minister Siham al-Barghuti.
"Now we can ask UNESCO to add our archaeological and religious sites to the World Heritage List," she said. "It's the main benefit we've won." And if granted, would be a second symbolic victory after UNESCO membership.
Before the diplomatic wrangling starts, the Palestinians want to send clear signs that their people cherish the Ibrahami Mosque -- as on November 26 when huge crowds gathered there to mark the Muslim New Year, many with their hair newly cut in line with tradition.
"I haven't seen such crowds for long time, it's five times more people than were here last year," said Palestinian Hijazi Abu Sneineh, who called it a "reaffirmation of the Arab and Islamic character of the mosque".
While both Muslims and Jews pray at the compound, the site has been divided into separate sections since 1994 when an Israeli settler opened fire on Palestinian worshippers, killing 29 of them.
Despite the mosque's bloody past, Salah Abu Turki, 44, proudly carried his baby son for his circumcision ceremony -- a rare event in recent years because of Israeli restrictions on Palestinian access to the site.
"It's a great honour for me that my son is being circumcised here," he said.
"The settlers also circumcise their children here, but we have more rights to do so than them because this place is a mosque and this is an ancient tradition for the people of Hebron," he said.
Heritage efforts are focussed on more than the mosque. The city's Mayor Khaled Essili recently returned from Paris where he took part in a conference at the Institut du Monde Arabe in support of adding Hebron's entire Old City, including its holy sites, to the World Heritage List.
"We started a campaign three years ago to add Hebron's Old City to the UNESCO list," he said.
"Now the request is ready and we will present it to UNESCO in February 2012."

I wonder if the Americans will even make noise about withholding aid to the 'Palestinian Authority' over this.
What could go wrong?

Ron Paul and Non-Intervention during SLAVERY and a NAZI Holocaust

The Paul Pot and the Paulestinians (Sultan Knish) For all his talk of the Founders, they were men who weren't rooted to a single way of doing things. Hamilton, Jefferson and Madison had their fundamental differences, but none of them were so rooted in their way of thinking that they were unable to deal with reality.... Centralization and spending aren't the problem, they're the symptoms of the problem which is a corrupt technocratic political culture that he is completely unequipped to address, not least because his own nose has been caught in the trough, but mostly because he isn't a leader.(MORE)

(Carl) In this 2009 video, Ron Paul accuses Israel of creating Hamas (Hat Tip: Yid with Lid).

At the beginning of this month, US Ambassador to Belgium Howard Gutman, an Obama bundler, accused Israel of creating anti-Semitism. George Soros said the same thing in 1999 and in 2003. And now Ron Paul.

(1) I don't remember Israel being keen on the Gaza elections with oversight by Jimmy Carter. (2) The claim that Israel created Hamas is false... and was originally published in a French Magazine.

(Carl)In a posting in Right Wing News, Eric Dondero, who served as a senior aid to the Texas Congressman for 12 years, confirms that Ron Paul wishes Israel did not exist (Hat Tip: Memeorandum).

Is Ron Paul a “racist.” In short, No. I worked for the man for 12 years, pretty consistently. I never heard a racist word expressed towards Blacks or Jews come out of his mouth. Not once. And understand, I was his close personal assistant. It’s safe to say that I was with him on the campaign trail more than any other individual, whether it be traveling to Fairbanks, Alaska or Boston, Massachusetts in the presidential race, or across the congressional district to San Antonio or Corpus Christi, Texas.
...
Is Ron Paul an Anti-Semite? Absolutely No. As a Jew, (half on my mother’s side), I can categorically say that I never heard anything out of his mouth, in hundreds of speeches I listened too over the years, or in my personal presence that could be called, “Anti-Semite.” No slurs. No derogatory remarks.
He is however, most certainly Anti-Israel, and Anti-Israeli in general. He wishes the Israeli state did not exist at all. He expressed this to me numerous times in our private conversations. His view is that Israel is more trouble than it is worth, specifically to the America taxpayer. He sides with the Palestinians, and supports their calls for the abolishment of the Jewish state, and the return of Israel, all of it, to the Arabs.
Again, American Jews, Ron Paul has no problem with. In fact, there were a few Jews in our congressional district, and Ron befriended them with the specific intent of winning their support for our campaign. (One synagogue in Victoria, and tiny one in Wharton headed by a well-known Jewish lawyer).
On the incident that’s being talked about in some blog media about the campaign manager directing me to a press conference of our opponent Lefty Morris in Victoria to push back on Anti-Jewish charges from the Morris campaign, yes, that did happen. The Victoria Advocate described the press conference very accurately. Yes, I was asked (not forced), to attend the conference dressed in a Jewish yarlmuke, and other Jewish adornments.
There was another incident when Ron finally agreed to a meeting with Houston Jewish Young Republicans at the Freeport office. He berated them, and even shouted at one point, over their un-flinching support for Israel. So, much so, that the 6 of them walked out of the office. I was left chasing them down the hallway apologizing for my boss.

(Carl) one of those infamous newsletters you've been reading so much about for the last few days suggested that the Mossad was responsible for the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993 (Hat Tip: Memeorandum).

Government beaming radio waves into your brain at the behest of the military industrial complex? Cynthia McKinney, the presidential candidate for the Green Party in 2008 ...was endorsed by Ron Paul.

(Daled Amos) Jeffrey Scott Shapiro writes that in 2009, in answer to a question, Ron Paul responded that he would not have sent troops in to prevent the murder of 6 million Jews in the Nazi Holocuast:

And so I asked Congressman Paul: if he were President of the United States during World War II, and as president he knew what we now know about the Holocaust, but the Third Reich presented no threat to the U.S., would he have sent American troops to Nazi Germany purely as a moral imperative to save the Jews?
And the Congressman answered:

“No, I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t risk American lives to do that. If someone wants to do that on their own because they want to do that, well, that’s fine, but I wouldn’t do that.”

Paul then looked at me, and I politely thanked him for his time. He smiled at me again and nodded his head, and many of his young followers were also smiling, and nodding their heads in agreement. Clearly, I was the only one in the room who was disturbed by his response.
When I first presented the story of Paul’s comments about the Holocaust to major news media outlets two years ago, they were so stunned they were afraid to publish my story, and as a result it has remained unpublished until now.
I went to great lengths afterwards to learn more about the basis for Paul’s comments. I spoke to Eric Dondero, a former senior aide for Paul, in February 2010. Dondero is quoted in a Weekly Standard article today about Paul’s isolationist beliefs.
When I called Dondero again this morning, and told him I was finally going forward with the story, he told me that Paul had made similar comments to him.
“He told me numerous times it was not worth it to intervene to save the Jews in World War II,” Dondero said. “I don’t think that’s because he’s an antisemite. It’s because he’s an extreme isolationist and he’s trying to be 100% principled–he doesn’t think there’s any reason to intervene for human rights or any other reason anywhere on the planet.”
Calls to Rep. Paul’s congressional office and campaign office last week and this morning were not returned."

Similarly, in the same context of describing Ron Paul's isolationaism, Shapiro notes a 2007 interview on Meet the Press where Paul said that Lincoln should never have gone to war to free the slaves:

Whatever else you may think of Ron Paul's argument about the ease with which the government could have bought all of the slaves and freed them, it is disconcerting to hear Ron Paul say there is no longer any slavery today.
According to E. Benjamin Skinner, writing last year in Time Magazine about South Africa's New Slave Trade and the Campaign to Stop It:

Despite more than a dozen international conventions banning slavery in the past 150 years, there are more slaves today than at any point in human history.

Someone should tell Ron Paul that ideology does not trump the facts.

Did Nixon have a gay affair with a Mafia fixer? Forget Watergate. A new book claims America's most corrupt President hid a far more personal scandal...

(dailymail.co.uk) More personal scandal than Watergate? Richard Nixon with Bebe Rebozo at Key Biscayne, Florida

He carpet-bombed Cambodia, spewed out anti-Semitic slurs and crude misogynistic jokes in the White House and smeared his political opponents with ruthless 'dirty tricks' campaigns.
And, of course, he lied to his country about his involvement in the Watergate scandal and went down in history as America's shiftiest, darkest President.
Given everything that Richard Nixon has been accused of, it's difficult to believe there could be any more skeletons left in his cupboard. But it seems there are.
A new biography by Don Fulsom, a veteran Washington reporter who covered the Nixon years, suggests the 37th U.S. President had a serious drink problem, beat his wife and — by the time he was inaugurated in 1969 — had links going back two decades to the Mafia, including with New Orleans godfather Carlos Marcello, then America's most powerful mobster.
Yet the most extraordinary claim is that the homophobic Nixon may have been gay himself. If true, it would provide a fascinating insight into the motivation and behaviour of a notoriously secretive politician.
Fulsom argues that Nixon may have had an affair with his best friend and confidant, a Mafia‑connected Florida wheeler-dealer named Charles 'Bebe' Rebozo who was even more crooked than Nixon.
The book, Nixon's Darkest Secrets, is out next month — by coincidence at the same time as the UK release of a new film directed by Clint Eastwood about another supposed closet gay among Washington's 20th-century hard men.
But while FBI boss J. Edgar Hoover, played in Eastwood's film by Leonardo DiCaprio, allegedly had an affair with his squeaky-clean deputy Clyde Tolson, Nixon's supposed secret paramour was a very different character.
Bebe Rebozo was a short, swarthy,  good-looking Cuban-American businessman with a history of failed relationships with women and close alliances with Miami's Mafia chiefs.

The veteran TV newsman Dan Rather recalled how Rebozo 'transmitted the sense of great sensuality', paying tribute to his 'magnetic' personality and 'beautiful eyes'.
Fulsom uses recently revealed documents and eyewitness interviews — including with FBI agents — to shed new light on long-standing suspicions among White House insiders that Nixon may have been more than just good buddies with Rebozo.
He claims Nixon's relationship with Pat, his wife of 53 years, was little more than a sham. A heavy drinker whom his own staff dubbed 'Our Drunk', Nixon used to call his First Lady a 'f***ing bitch' and beat her before, during and after his presidency, says Fulsom.

Richard Nixon hugs his wife, Pat, as they leave Republican headquarters in Los Angeles to return to their hotel following his election victory

The pair had separate bedrooms at the White House — and in Key Biscayne, the exclusive resort near Miami where Nixon holidayed, Mrs Nixon didn't even sleep in the same building. Rebozo, however, was in the house next door.
Fulsom claims one of Nixon's former military aides had a secret job 'to teach the President how to kiss his wife' so they would look like a convincing couple.
How much of this can we believe? Nixon died in 1994 and his reputation is pretty much irredeemable. As with Eastwood's Hoover film, there is no definitive proof, but plenty of 'supporting evidence'.
Fulsom quotes a former Time magazine reporter who, at a Washington dinner, bent down to pick up a fork and saw the two holding hands under the table. It was, the reporter judged, sufficiently intimate to suggest 'repressed homosexuality'.
Another journalist related how, loosened up by drink, Nixon once put his arm around Rebozo 'the way you'd cuddle your senior prom date. Something was fishy there'.

Henry Kissenger is believed to have resented the way Rebozo would fly on Air Force One, the Presidential plane, wearing a blue U.S. Navy flight jacket bearing the President's seal and with his name stitched on it

But who exactly was Bebe Rebozo, and how did a shady Florida businessman of unclear sexual leanings end up as the bosom friend of one of the most paranoid and buttoned-up political leaders of the 20th century?
Born two months before Nixon in 1912, Charles Gregory Rebozo was the son of a Cuban cigar-maker and, as the youngest of nine, was stuck with the nickname 'Bebe'.
He came from poverty but worked his way up through property speculation and then banking. According to the FBI, he had close links with Mob bosses such as Santo Trafficante, the Tampa Godfather, and Alfred 'Big Al' Polizzi, a stooge of Meyer Lansky, the Cosa Nostra's financial brains.
By the 1960s, an FBI agent was describing Rebozo as a 'non- member associate of organised crime figures'. He bought land in Florida with a business partner who was believed to be a front for some of the most powerful Mafiosi.
When Rebozo started his own bank in Florida in 1964, Nixon — then a lawyer — wielded a golden shovel at the ground-breaking ceremony and became its first depositor.
According to Mafioso Vincent  Teresa, the bank was used by the Mob to launder stolen cash. It hardly seems possible that Nixon, who pledged to make fighting organised crime a priority of his presidency, could not have known of his best friend's Mafia links.
Nixon had just won one of California's U.S. Senate seats when he first met Rebozo in 1950. Fearing Nixon was facing a nervous breakdown, fellow Senator George Smathers suggested a holiday in Florida and enlisted his old school friend Rebozo to show the socially awkward Nixon a good time.
Their first jaunt together — in Rebozo's 33ft fishing boat — did not go well. Rebozo later complained that Nixon just sat reading papers and, according to his host, barely said half a dozen words to him.
Smathers said Rebozo later told him: 'Don't ever send that son of a bitch Nixon down here again. He's a guy who doesn't know how to talk, doesn't drink, doesn't smoke, doesn't chase women... he can't even fish.'
But Rebozo persevered — and according to a cynical Smathers, Nixon's rising stardom in Washington and the potential influence it offered 'had a lot to do with it'.
In months, the pair were inseparable, holidaying with Nixon's wife Pat — and without her. Rebozo became an 'uncle figure' to the Nixons' two daughters, Tricia and Julie. The dapper Cuban-American chose Nixon's clothes and even selected the films he watched at the White House.

President Richard Nixon (left) says goodbye to family and staff in the White House East Room on August 9, 1974

On Nixon's solo visits to Key Biscayne, they swam and sunbathed, indulging in their shared passions for discussing Broadway musicals and barbecuing steaks.
Both men were also extremely secretive, and their relationship — described as the 'most important unsolved mystery in Nixon's life' — was kept so discreet that the New York Times did not mention it for nearly 20 years.
Observers noticed their intimacy became most apparent when they were drunk. An aide recalled them playing a game called King of the Pool at Key Biscayne: 'It was late at night, the two men had been drinking. Nixon mounted a rubber raft in the pool while Rebozo tried to turn it over. Then, laughing and shouting, they'd change places.'
They were seen together at the same British-themed hostelries in the Key: the English Pub, where they drank beer from tankards engraved with their names, and the Jamaica Inn, where they ate at a discreet booth.
Both spots were owned by another businessman with Mob links and the secret service asked Nixon to find another place to eat.
Why the President's minders didn't raise alarms about Rebozo's Mafia connections has puzzled experts, but they probably didn't dare. When a New York newspaper investigated Rebozo's Mob links in the 1970s, its staff suddenly found themselves under secret service surveillance.
A White House aide once dismissed Rebozo's role as 'the guy who mixed the Martinis', but he was far more important than that.

Richard Nixon died on April 22, 1994, four days after suffering a major stroke in New York. He was 81

When Nixon became President, Rebozo got his own office and bedroom at the White House, and a security clearance that allowed him to go in and out without being logged by the secret service. Using a false name, says Fulsom, Rebozo even got into Nixon's hotel suite during a trip to Europe.
The President's closest colleagues complained at the way Rebozo monopolised Nixon's time. General Alexander Haig, his last chief of staff, is said to have imitated Rebozo's 'limp wrist' manner and joked that Rebozo and Nixon were lovers.
According to Fulsom, Henry Kissinger resented the way Rebozo would fly on Air Force One, the Presidential plane, wearing a blue U.S. Navy flight jacket bearing the President's seal and with his name stitched on it.
Away from Nixon's side, Rebozo surrounded himself with glamorous women and threw Miami parties that descended into orgies, but was it all a front?
Aged 18, Rebozo reportedly enjoyed an 'intense' affair with a young man, Donald Gunn. He later wed Gunn's teenage sister. The marriage lasted four years and, according to his wife, was never consummated.
Rebozo didn't marry again until middle age, when he entered what Newsweek magazine described as an 'antiseptic' alliance with his lawyer's secretary. 'Bebe's favourites are Richard Nixon, his cat — and then me,' the lady complained later. A fellow Miami resident told Nixon biographer Anthony Summers that Rebozo was definitely part of the city's gay community.
Summers and co-writer Robbyn Swan, however, question whether there is enough evidence to suggest Nixon was gay. 'They held hands on occasion, and both men had problems with consummating physical relationships with women, but we found no evidence that Nixon was actively homosexual,' Summers told me this week.
Physical or not, Nixon's attraction to Rebozo has struck many as politically reckless. Nixon expert Professor Fawn Brodie couldn't understand how he would be 'willing to risk the kind of gossip that frequently accompanies close friendship with a perennial bachelor'. After all, she added, Nixon was, in public, a virulent gay-hater.
When Walter Jenkins, a trusted aide to President Lyndon Johnson, was caught providing sexual favours to a retired sailor in a YMCA lavatory, Nixon denounced him as 'ill'. People who suffered this 'illness', he added, 'cannot be in places of high trust'.
Rebozo was certainly in a position of 'high trust', and not only because he was a key fundraiser. He was with Nixon when he announced his successful run for President and again in June 1972 when Nixon learned that five men hired by the White House to break into the Watergate building had been arrested.
'We were swimming at Key Biscayne in front of my house,' Rebozo recalled. 'They came out and told him. He said: "What in God's name were they doing there?" We laughed and forgot about it.'
Rebozo also ended up being investigated by the Watergate committee, which found that a £64,000 cash contribution from the industrialist Howard Hughes that was meant for the Republican Party was actually in Rebozo's safe deposit box.
It also emerged that both Nixon and Rebozo's personal wealth had soared during Nixon's first five years in the White House, Rebozo's rising nearly seven-fold from £432,000 to nearly £3million.
Rebozo escaped prosecution — allegedly because of a White House deal — and he stood by his disgraced friend. He was at Nixon's bedside during his final days.
When Rebozo died in 1998, he left more than £12million to the Nixon memorial library, whose executive director eulogised him as a 'consummate gentleman' on whose 'wise counsel, shrewd political insight and ready wit' Nixon relied.
Typically, Nixon had been rather less charitable — he always described Rebozo as just a 'golfing partner'.

• Nixon's Darkest Secrets: The Inside Story Of America's Most Troubled President by Don Fulsom (Thomas Dunne Books, £16.62) is published on January 31, 2012.