A L S O +T O D A Y Clinton's "Soviet connection" By Murray Waas GOP money man discussed digging up dirt on Clinton T A B L E+T A L K Peace in Northern Ireland: Is a resolution near? Join the discussion in the International Issues area of Table Talk D A I L Y+Q U O T E Yo quiero saliva R E C E N T L Y A diminished view of manhood By Earl Ofari Hutchinson Reggie White's remarks that homosexuality is a sin reflects a widespread fear of gays in the black community (04/06/98) Republicans to Ken Starr: Ugh! By David Corn Now that Paula Jones has gone, all the Republicans have left against President Clinton is a 20-year-old land deal (04/03/98) Turning the tables on Starr By Murray Waas and Jonathan Broder Attorney General Janet Reno considers investigating key Whitewater witness David Hale (04/03/98) Day of reckoning By Andrew Ross With Paula Jones' case thrown out, it's time to expose those responsible for four years of political and journalistic fraud (04/03/98) The men who kept Paula Jones' lawsuit going By Murray Waas How associates of billionaire Clinton-hater Richard Mellon Scaife propped up her legal battle (04/03/98) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Browse the Newsreal Archives - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
		The man behind the mask SHY, SECRETIVE AND OF REGAL BEARING, RICHARD MELLON SCAIFE HAS WORKED HARD AND SPENT MILLIONS TO DICTATE THE NATION'S POLITICAL AGENDA. BY KAREN ROTHMYER Richard Mellon Scaife's eyes are what you notice first: a startling sky blue, they look almost unreal, so intense is their color. For the rest, a handsome countenance, a large frame and a shock of once-blond hair, now white, make up a classic picture of good breeding. Scaife's father came from one of Pittsburgh's blue blood families, its ancestry traced back to medieval England; his mother was a fabulously wealthy Mellon descendant whom Fortune magazine identified in 1957 as one of the eight richest people in America. And yet, there is about Richard Mellon Scaife a seeming unease with his own person that even friends have commented on through the years. Almost pathologically shy -- he removed his name from Who's Who more than 15 years ago and has since sat for only a handful of interviews -- he is, at the same time, given to a pattern of unpredictable behavior that has continued despite his having stopped his formerly heavy drinking. "He has a love-hate relationship with a lot of people, including himself," said a former close acquaintance. "He is at once the most wonderful, generous guy and the most hateful and vindictive one." Added another person who has observed Scaife close-up in Pittsburgh, "Whenever he dislikes someone, it's not enough to fire them; they can never work in this town again." Either because they fear his power or his temper, or because they want something out of him, almost all those who know Scaife, 65, are unwilling to say anything critical about him publicly -- that is, if they agree to talk about him at all. That reluctance, combined with his own penchant for secrecy, has made him the most shadowy figure in the Clinton scandals, even as evidence of his role as a funder of investigations into the Clintons' activities has grown. The man whom Time magazine, in its latest issue, calls "the ultimate patron" of the Clinton haters has been identified by Salon and the New York Observer as a key funder of the $2.4 million Arkansas Project, a four-year effort organized through the American Spectator magazine to discredit the president. Scaife foundation money, as Salon has reported, has also allegedly been used to pay key Whitewater witness David Hale and to help bankroll Paula Jones' sexual harassment case against Clinton. In fact, Scaife's part in the Clinton chronicles represents the second time that he has been a secretive major player in efforts to profoundly alter the course of politics and public policy in America. In the 1970s, his money fueled the "New Right" movement that sought to replace the perceived "liberal establishment" in Washington and the media with a new, conservative order. "The victories we're celebrating today didn't begin last Tuesday," Heritage Foundation president Edwin Feulner Jr. told a meeting of supporters in 1994 just after the Republican sweep of the House of Representatives. "They started more than 20 years ago when Dick Scaife had the vision to see the need for a conservative intellectual movement in America. These organizations built the intellectual case that was necessary before political leaders like Newt Gingrich could translate their ideas into practical political alternatives." Gingrich, who was also at the meeting, hailed Scaife as "a good friend and ally for a very long time." Just where Scaife's political views come from is a mystery to many people, including his only sibling, Cordelia Scaife May, from whom he is estranged. Their mother, Sarah Scaife, was a cold and often sarcastic woman, according to May, but apart from knowing Barry Goldwater, she showed no particular interest in current affairs. "My father didn't like Roosevelt, but as head of Pittsburgh Coal he sat across from John L. Lewis in labor negotiations and had enormous respect and, I think, liking for him," said May. Dick Scaife didn't read much while they were growing up, she said, but he did have a great interest in newspapers, especially out-of-town papers, which he collected and displayed on specially made racks at the family's country estate. Reflecting on those years of governesses and formal family dinners, May commented, "I don't remember any laughter in that house." During World War II, while Richard and Cordelia's father, Alan Scaife, served in Europe in the OSS, the forerunner to the CIA, the Scaife family lived in Washington. Perhaps it was this once-removed brush with intrigue that led to Dick Scaife's growing fascination with conspiracies of all kinds. "He's the kind of person who looks under his bed every night before they go to sleep," said a longtime family acquaintance and prominent Pennsylvania Republican. In the early 1980s, Scaife told a Philadelphia Inquirer interviewer that the late FBI director J. Edgar Hoover was one of his heroes, and that the most influential book he had read was "The Spike," co-authored by former Newsweek correspondent and Washington Times editor Arnaud de Borchgrave, in which a young reporter finds himself cast as a pawn in the Soviet Union's master plot to take over the world. It was also in Washington, according to Mellon family biographer Burton Hersh, that young Dick began to pay attention to the workings of government. Scaife told Hersh that he had "made it a kind of hobby to meet as many senators and congressmen as I could." Later, there would be boarding school and then Yale, from which he was expelled after a drunken party. He ended up at the University of Pittsburgh, where his father was chairman of the board of trustees. After getting a bachelor's degree in English in 1957, he was put to work first in the Scaife family business and later in Mellon enterprises. Within a few years, both of his parents were dead and Scaife had inherited an enormous fortune whose value is currently estimated by Forbes as about $1 billion (a significant underestimate, according to one reliable source). - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - N E X T+P A G E+| Funding the New Right PHOTO BY AP/WIDE WORLD