J. Evetts Haley, Redux

Just when I thought that J. Evetts Haley's A Texan Looks At Lyndon couldn't be topped for wackiness, along comes Barr McClellan: Blood, Money and Power: How L.B.J. Killed JFK. Even Evetts Haley didn't accuse Lyndon of murder. That was about the sole violation of the Ten Commandments that Haley didn't lay at Lyndon's feet in his wacko polemic in 1964. On top of that, the elder McClellan is the father of the White House Press Secretary and the FDA Commissioner and the first husband of the oft-renamed Carol Keeton Strayhorn (at this time). Actually, I think that W killed JFK. If this be (fair & balanced) paranoia, so be it.

[x NYTimes]
A Spokesman Son, a Tell-All Dad, a Mum Mom
By ELISABETH BUMILLER

WASHINGTON

In the firmament of American political families, the McClellans of Austin, Tex., are not in the constellation of Kennedys and Bushes. But like both of those dynasties at points in their histories, the McClellans now have political power in multiple generations, a family member in the White House and a relative they would like to sweep under the carpet.

Scott McClellan, 35, is the new White House press secretary.

His oldest brother, Dr. Mark B. McClellan, 40, is the commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration.

Their mother, Carole Keeton Strayhorn, 63, is the bombastic (her word) comptroller of Texas and the former three-term mayor of Austin with an eye on the governor's seat.

Their late grandfather, W. Page Keeton, was dean of the University of Texas Law School for a quarter-century.

And their father, Barr McClellan, 63, Ms. Strayhorn's first husband, is the author of a forthcoming book asserting that Lyndon B. Johnson engineered the murder of John F. Kennedy.

The book, "Blood, Money and Power: How L.B.J. Killed J.F.K.," has put the McClellans in an uncomfortable spot.

"I think at this time it's best that I keep the relationship with my dad a private matter," Scott McClellan said in an interview over the weekend.

"I'm not going to have any comment," Mark McClellan said in a telephone interview last week.

"I have not read the book, I will not read the book," Ms. Strayhorn said, also in a telephone interview last week. "I've had no comment about him for decades for my family's sake."

The book is to be released on Sept. 30 by Hannover House, a tiny publisher based in Fayetteville, Ark. Eric Parkinson of Hannover House said that Barr McClellan's book would have a large first printing — 100,000 copies — and that he expected it to be one of the big sellers of the year.

The book claims that Johnson plotted the killing of Kennedy through Edward A. Clark, now dead, who was for a half-century one of the most powerful political figures in Texas as well as Johnson's personal lawyer. Barr McClellan, in an interview last week, said that he had worked in Mr. Clark's firm but had parted company with him in 1978 over business gone sour.

"It seemed like a story to be told," he said by phone from his home in Gulfport, Miss., where he lives with his second wife. "I had a grudge, anyway, that I was going to clear up."

Mr. McClellan added that his book would offer photographs, letters and fingerprints to back up his claim. Johnson had a clear motive, he said, in that he faced being dropped from the ticket.

"There was only one thing between him and the presidency," he said.

Barr McClellan said that he was proud of all four of his sons — Dudley and Bradley, 38-year-old twins, are lawyers in Austin — and that he understood why Scott, his most prominent son, had taken a vow of silence on the subject of his father.

"I don't see any relationship between him and the book," Barr McClellan said. "It's just sort of a no-comment situation."

The parent who does elicit comment from the sons is Ms. Strayhorn, who in January married for the third time. Her new husband, Ed Strayhorn, was a high school sweetheart she turned down 37 years earlier. But he kept the rejected ring, which she now wears on her hand.

"Let me tell you, that is my greatest accomplishment, those four sons," Ms. Strayhorn said.

For most of the time that she was mayor of Austin, from 1977 to 1983, she was a single parent in a world where motherhood was tightly interwoven with her public life. Her sons, who ranged in age from 9 to 14 when she was first elected, manned campaign phone banks, read the newspapers aloud to her as she made breakfast and hung out in the mayor's office after school.

"And Brad and Dudley were more accurate on their pocket calculator than the city clerk on voter turnout," she said.

To her sons, Ms. Strayhorn was the role model, the one who shaped their interest in politics and the law. Their father, who was divorced from Ms. Strayhorn shortly after she became mayor, had a more distant relationship.

"It gave me a tremendous amount of respect for single moms, working and raising a family," Scott McClellan said.

He grew up to manage three of his mother's campaigns — her election and re-election as a Texas railroad commissioner and her election as comptroller.

"I finally got to tell her what to do, and once in a while she would listen to me," he said.

For her part, Ms. Strayhorn gives the credit to her sons, or at least to their DNA.

"Mark came into the world driven," she said. "He was reading encyclopedias in the first grade."

In fact, she said: "They're all determined and driven. I wouldn't call any of them easygoing."

And that, she said, includes Scott, the new mild-mannered face of the White House, who in November will be the last of her sons to marry.

So never mind politics, conspiracy books or ex-husbands.

"That's the most important thing," she said. "That kid's getting to the altar this year."

Copyright © 2003 The New York Times Company