The Most Dangerous Man in America

The Most Dangerous Man in America is a cracklingly good documentary from Judith Ehrlich and Rick Goldsmith about Daniel Ellsberg and his leaking of the Pentagon Papers, a bit of recent history that doesn't hurt for any of us to be reminded of. It's not a stretch to say that Ellsberg's actions fundamentally altered the course of United States history, both in the attitudes about the Vietnam War, and also because it set the Nixon administration on its path to self-destruction.

Ellsberg was a military analyst for the Rand Corporation, a former Marine who was fully on board with the war in Vietnam. After meeting anti-war activists, though, he changed his mind. He endeavored to Xerox the 47-volume, 7,000-page Pentagon Papers, a history of the conflict prepared under Kennedy and Johnson's Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara, which outlined wholesale lying to the American public about the nature of the war and its origins. He then leaked the papers to the New York Times, which published them in 1971.

By now Nixon was president, and the administration got an injunction to have the publishing stop. But soon other papers took up the banner, and a junior senator from Alaska, Mike Gravel (who had a brief but memorable run for President in 2008) read the papers into the Congressional record, which meant they were now available to anyone in the public. Ellsberg was charged under the Espionage Act, and faced several years in jail, but as he said to a reporter, "Wouldn't you go to jail to stop this war?"

The film points out that it wasn't really the contents of the papers that stirred Americans--in fact, Ellsberg was disappointed in the lack of response. But his leak had unforeseen consequences. The administration, with Nixon's approval, set up the "plumbers" unit, led by Egil "Bud" Krogh (who appears on camera, apologetically) to "get" Ellsberg. The result was a break-in at his psychiatrist's office. This bit of presidentially-sanctioned burglary was just the first step in the criminality of Nixon and his men. The film makes great use of Nixon's own words on his office tapes (my favorite: Nixon referring to Vietnam as a "shit-ass" country).

Be warned--the filmmakers clearly believe Ellsberg is a hero. He fully cooperates, even going so far as to narrate. His wife, Patricia, who was an activist as well (the couple broke up early in their relationship over their differences on the war) provides commentary that fully develops Ellsberg as a human being, and not just a historical footnote. I'm sure there are many who think that Ellsberg should have been locked in jail, and they no doubt would hate every frame of the film. It was one of the nominees for the Academy Award for Best Documentary last year--typically liberal Hollywood!