Alicia and I changed position and embarked on good old plain, old-fashioned ordinary sexual intercourse.
“I am not a crook! . . . I am not a crook! . . . I am not a crook! . . .”
It was music to be screwed by!
Notes
[←1 ]
Pun on president Richard Milhous Nixon, involved in the Watergate affair (telephone bugs placed in the offices of the Democratic party). By late 1973, the Watergate scandal escalated, costing Nixon much of his political support. On August 9, 1974, he resigned in the face of almost certain impeachment and removal from office. -- This novel was probably written, just before the resignation, while impeachment and deposition were very much actual possibilities.
[←2 ]
The 1970s energy crisis was a period when the major industrial countries of the world, particularly the United States, Canada, Western Europe, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand, faced substantial petroleum shortages, real and perceived, as well as elevated prices. The two worst crises of this period were the 1973 oil crisis and the 1979 energy crisis, when the Yom Kippur War and the Iranian Revolution triggered interruptions in Middle Eastern oil exports. Mark refers to the 1973 crisis.
[←3 ]
Nixon entered the race for the US Senate in November 1949. He engaged in a contentious campaign in which the ongoing Korean War was a major issue. During this campaign, Nixon was first called "Tricky Dick" by his opponents for his campaign tactics.
[←4 ]
As narrated in Here’s your O.R.G.Y.
[←5 ]
Gloria Marie Steinem (born March 25, 1934) is an American feminist, journalist, and social political activist who became nationally recognized as a leader and a spokeswoman for the American feminist movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
[←6 ]
Pun on Charles Gregory "Bebe" Rebozo (November 17, 1912 – May 8, 1998) was a Florida banker and businessman who became infamous for being a friend and confidant of President Richard Nixon.
[←7 ]
The Katzenjammer Kids is an American comic strip created and drawn by Rudolph Dirks and also drawn by Harold H. Knerr for 35 years (1914 to 1949). The two artists worked for competing journals, and were involved in huge legal suits. After settlement, the Dirks version was called The Captain and the Kids.
[←8 ]
Pun on Henry Kissinger.
[←9 ]
This does not match the Kissinger curriculum. Kissinger served as National Security Advisor and Secretary of State under President Richard Nixon, and continued as Secretary of State under Nixon's successor Gerald Ford. On Nixon's last full day in office, in the meeting where he informed Ford of his intention to resign the next day, he advised Ford that he felt it was very important that he keep Kissinger in his new administration, to which Ford agreed.
[←10 ]
Pun on president Gerald Ford.
[←11 ]
Pun on Martha Beall Mitchell, John Mitchell’s wife (see a further footnote).
[←12 ]
Pun on John Newton Mitchell (September 15, 1913 – November 9, 1988) who was the Attorney General of the United States (1969–72) under President Richard Nixon.
[←13 ]
Pun an Dita Beard – See following note.
[←14 ]
This refers, pun-wise, to the situation where the International Telephone and Telegraph Corporation, a.k.a. I.T.T. needed to settle anti-trust suits by the DOJ and it needed DOJ approval of its merger with Hartford Fire Insurance. The settlement of I.T.T.’s legal troubles happened in 1971. At nearly the same time, I.T.T. pledged $400,000 for the 1972 Republican National Convention to be held in San Diego. President Nixon’s White House tapes showed that Nixon personally intervened in the I.T.T. settlement with the DOJ. On February 29, 1972, syndicated columnist Jack Anderson reported on an inter-office memo from an I.T.T. lobbyist, Dita Beard, which indicated that the $400,000 pledge for the RNC convention was in exchange for the DOJ’s anti-trust settlement.
[←15 ]
Pun on Rose Mary Woods (December 26, 1917 – January 22, 2005), Richard Nixon's secretary from his days in Congress in 1951, through the end of his political career.
[←16 ]
(Probable) pun on Robert Henry "Bob" Abplanalp (April 4, 1922 – August 30, 2003), an American inventor and engineer who invented the modern form of the aerosol valve. Abplanalp was a close friend and supporter of former US President Richard M. Nixon, Nixon's immediate family, and Nixon's long-time confidant, Charles "Bebe" Rebozo.
[←17 ]
Pun on Ron Ziegler.
[←18 ]
"In like Flynn" is a slang phrase meaning "having quickly or easily achieved a goal or gained access as desired". In addition to its general use, the phrase is sometimes used to describe success in sexual seduction. The title of the film In Like Flint (1967) is a play on the phrase.
[←19 ]
Reference to Nixon’s frequent use to coarse language. Also, the transcripts of the Watergate tapes had all expletives redacted in this fashion.
[←20 ]
The Katzenjammer Kids comic featured Hans and Fritz
[←21 ]
Long reach pun on Spiro Agnew. Spiro Agnew's father was born Theophrastos Anagnostopoulos, in Greece.
[←22 ]
Jack Benny (February 14, 1894 – December 26, 1974) was an American comedian, vaudevillian, radio, television and film actor, and violinist. Recognized as a leading 20th-century American entertainer, Benny often portrayed his character as a miser, playing his violin badly, and claiming to be 39 years of age, regardless of his actual age. Benny was known for his comic timing and the ability to cause laughter with a pregnant pause or a single expression, such as his signature exasperated "Well!"
[←23 ]
Reference to Howard Hughes, an American business magnate, investor, record-setting pilot, film director, and philanthropist, known during his lifetime as one of the most financially successful individuals in the world. He first made a name for himself as a film producer, and then became an influential figure in the aviation industry. Later in life, he became known for his eccentric behavior and reclusive lifestyle—oddities that were caused in part by a worsening obsessive–compulsive disorder.
[←24 ]
To prevent Dita Beard from testifying before the 1972 -1973 Watergate Grand Jury investigation of high crimes at the highest level of government, she was kidnapped by the White House Plumbers and secreted out of Washington DC, and forcible hospitalized in Denver, CO. The White House Plumbers, sometimes simply called the Plumbers, was a covert White House Special Investigations Unit, established July 24, 1971, during the presidency of Richard Nixon. Its task was to stop the leaking of classified information, such as the Pentagon Papers, to the news media. Their membership is the subject of speculation.
[←25 ]
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, often referred to as just Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, is an absurdist, existential tragicomedy by Tom Stoppard, first staged at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1966. The play expands upon the exploits of two minor characters from Shakespeare's Hamlet, the courtiers Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.