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Lucianne Goldberg

Lucianne's the book agent/publicist/gossip queen who convinced Linda Tripp to tape her phone conversations with Monica Lewinsky. Linda thought the plan sounded sleazy, but Lucianne told her to do it anyway.

The lady loves notoriety. Folks have called her mischievous, amoral, an opportunist, a pit viper -- and that's what her friends said. Even Lucianne herself has admitted she's an old meanie.

She enjoys creating a fuss and telling shocking stories. It was Lucianne who gave the tabloids so many salacious details on Clinton's affairs. And she was the one who leaked the semen-stained dress story.

But some of the information was inaccurate. She has a tendency to embellish her stories. She has also been known to tell a story, change it, and then deny she changed it. Many reputable journalists don't treat her as a reliable source. There's no telling what may come out of her mouth. One acquaintance said she told him she had been in a Nazi concentration camp. Uh-uh. Not even close.

Lucianne insists she and Linda were so morally outraged by the President's philandering that they just couldn't take it anymore. But don't think for a minute that Lucianne's a prude. Check out the novels she's written. One features a tabloid columnist who can unzip a fly with her toes. Another has a feature writer who will sleep with any man for her next day's lead story.

Lucianne has quite a history and is no stranger to controversy. And she hasn't always worked with Republicans, either. In 1960, she worked for the Democratic National Committee and the JFK inaugural committee. Well, it didn't work out. She got in hot water after charging items to a department store account belonging to one of Lyndon Johnson's advisers -- and then the guy's wife found out about it.

Lucianne said Clinton's people dredged this up to smear her. She denied having an affair with the guy. But one reporter has her on tape admitting that she did.

Then more trouble came in 1965 when she tried to auction off a handwritten note Jackie Kennedy had written to Lady Bird Johnson. Lucianne had swiped the note from campaign headquarters back in 1960. Lady Bird wasn't pleased and demanded that it be returned to her. The story made the front page of The New York Times.

By the 1970s, Lucianne had gone to work for the Republicans. A Nixon adviser hired her in 1972 to spy on George McGovern's presidential campaign. She was planted in McGovern's press corps, for $1,000 a week, to look for dirt -- to find out who was sleeping with who, who smoked pot, stuff like that. She said her dirty tricks operation was approved by Nixon himself.

In 1999, Michael Moore, director of Roger and Me and host of Bravo's The Awful Truth, tried to give Lucianne a taste of her own medicine. Citing her lack of respect for the privacy rights of others, he set up http://www.iseelucy.com -- a 24-hour Web cam outside her Manhattan apartment window. She responded by turning her blinds into advertising space for The National Enquirer.

Classy dame, huh?