Final_Judgment

476 ”Deep Throat” [379]
Agnew admitted that he had often received campaign contributions
from corporations that did business with the state—a common practice in
Maryland and elsewhere—but insisted that he never accepted any money
for personal use. However, the federal prosecutors were eager to build a
case against Agnew in order to force him out of the vice presidency." 980
AGNEW AND ISRAEL
M. Hirsh Goldberg, wrote in the Times of Israel about Agnew's career.
In an article entitled "Jews at the Opening . . . Jews at the Close" Goldberg
said: "It was a political life curiously intertwined with Jews. The swift rise
like a Fourth of July rocket, the sudden fall from political grace—both
involved Jews. It was an ironic, almost unnoticed aspect of a political career
so much addressed to Middle America . . . and yet so heavily dependent on
Jewish brains, Jewish talent, Jewish money and—at the end—so heavily
damaged by the testimony of Jews." 981
Ultimately, facing a possible jail sentence if he went to trial and was
convicted, Agnew resigned the vice presidency and pleaded no contest to
bribery and tax evasion charges stemming from his purported acceptance of
the bribes (which Agnew continued to deny until the day he died). Neither
of Agnew's accusers ever spent time in jail.
The Republican attorney general who promoted the campaign by U.S.
Attorney Sachs against Agnew was Elliot Richardson, who ultimately
resigned from the Nixon administration "in disgust" and was heralded as a
"hero of Watergate." In his memoirs Agnew (not insignificantly) points out
that Richardson wanted someone in the line of presidential succession who
"would defend Israel, whatever the risk to the United States." 982
Agnew was already suspected of "anti-Semitism" because of his attacks
on the media and, as Agnew noted, two years after leaving office he came
under heavy fire "for saying that our attitude toward Israel was affected by
the preponderance of Israel's sympathizers in the big news media." 983
After leaving office, Agnew wrote The Canfield Decision, a controversial,
though little-read novel about high-level political intrigue which some critics
called "anti-Semitic," bringing the former vice president back into the headlines
once again. Agnew's novel was described by one pro-Israel columnist as
suggesting that "Jews in the media make up a 'Zionist lobby' leading us to
disaster in the Mideast." 984
Later, privately, in an April 20, 1988 letter to his friend, former Rep. Paul
Findley (R-Ill.), himself a sharp critic of the Israeli lobby, Agnew commented
that "I trace the advent of my difficulties to a confrontation with this same
lobby." 985 But Agnew will be remembered as a "crook" who served as Vice
President. Not as the victim of Israeli intrigue, as he most certainly was, the
naysayers notwithstanding.