Frankie Victorious

When Frank Sinatra publicly insulted Washington Post Columnist Maxine Cheshire with a mouthful of four-letter words and two dollar bills on the eve of President Nixon's Inauguration (TIME, Feb. 5), many proper people in the capital were appalled. Nixon himself, according to one source, was livid, feeling that the incident had "besmirched his Inauguration."

There were two immediate predictions as to the consequences: 1) that the uproar would jeopardize Frankie's friendship with his chief political patron, Vice President Spiro Agnew; 2) that the friendship might jeopardize Agnew's ties with his own patron, Richard Nixon.

Not so. Last week it was learned that Sinatra had received an invitation to a White House party in his honor planned for sometime this spring. The invitation was issued before the row with Mrs. Cheshire, who is suing Sinatra for slander, but according to White House spokesmen, the party is still on.

This has nothing to do with the fact that Sinatra donated at least $14,000 to Nixon's reelection. It is just that, in the words of one White House staffer, "he did so much during the Inauguration, and in the campaign too." On the West Coast, Sinatra's publicity man said that the entertainer was "excited, delighted, flattered and honored."

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