He was seventy years old in 1950, a towering figure who had worked long and hard to perpetuate his own legend. As Truman suspected, he hungered for the White House, but in the political arena he was surprisingly clumsy. He was the darling of the far right, corresponding regularly and indiscreetly with all sorts of figures on that side, encouraging them to believe he shared their views that the New Deal signaled the end of Western civilization. As early as 1944, a writer named John McCarten wrote in The American Mercury, “It may not be his fault but it is surely his misfortune that the worst
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