Actors - Ben Stein

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	Actors - Ben Stein

Benjamin Jeremy Stein (born November 25, 1944, in Washington, D.C.) is a lawyer, economist, law professor, actor, and former White House speechwriter. He is the son of noted economist and writer Herbert Stein. His sister Rachel is a writer.

Personal life

Ben Stein was born to parents of Jewish descent and grew up in a Democratic neighborhood in Silver Spring, Maryland. He graduated from Montgomery Blair High School, where his classmates included journalist Carl Bernstein and actors Goldie Hawn and Sylvester Stallone. He went on to major in economics at Columbia University. He graduated with honors in 1966, and then enrolled in Yale University Law School, graduating as the valedictorian in 1970.

Today Stein is married to entertainment lawyer Alexandra Denman , whom he once divorced and later remarried. He resides with Denman and their son in Beverly Hills, California. He lives part-time in Malibu, California, in a house with a Pacific Ocean view, while teaching at Pepperdine University.

Legal and academic career

Ben Stein was first a poverty lawyer in New Haven, Connecticut, and Washington, D.C. before becoming a trial lawyer for the Federal Trade Commission.

Stein's first teaching stint was as an adjunct professor, teaching political and social content of mass culture at American University in Washington, D.C., and then at University of California, Santa Cruz. He also held classes on political and civil rights from the United States Constitution at UC Santa Cruz.

At Pepperdine University in Southern California, Stein taught libel law and United States securities law and its ethical aspects. He was a professor of law at Pepperdine University Law School, from about 1990 to 1997.

In addition, Stein is very interested in American Civil War history, and is a strong supporter of the Civil War Preservation Trust.

Political career

Ben Stein began his political career as a speechwriter and lawyer for United States President Richard Nixon, and later for President Gerald Ford. Stein was one of many public figures speculated to have been Deep Throat. As far back as May 3, 1976, Time magazine had speculated on the possibility of Stein being Deep Throat. See .

Stein responded over the years by not only denying he was Deep Throat but by going further and accusing journalist Bob Woodward of falsifying the famous secret source. In the May 14–21, 1998, edition of the Philadelphia City Paper Stein is quoted saying, "Oh, I don't think there was a Deep Throat. That was a fake. I think there were several different sources and some they just made up." On June 17, 2002, CNN aired a clip of Stein stating, "I'm sure there was no Deep Throat. I'm absolutely sure of it. I've got a million dollars there's no Deep Throat." On May 13, 2003 he told David and Tom Gardner of the Motley Fool, "There was no Deep Throat, I'm sure of it. I certainly wasn't. At the time Deep Throat was operating, I was a hippie in the woods of Santa Cruz, Calif. — so it wasn't me. And I don't think there was any Deep Throat. I think it was somebody Bob Woodward made up in one of his more imaginative moments."

When W. Mark Felt finally admitted to being the famous informant on May 31, 2005, Stein stopped denying the existence of Deep Throat and began expressing contempt toward Felt and his role in exposing the Watergate scandal. Stein said "If there is such a thing as justice in this life or the next, Mark Felt has bought himself the worst future of any man on this earth." in part because he felt Nixon would not have allowed the rise of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia.

Some have called Stein a "Nixon apologist" due to his fervent defense of Nixon's legacy. As recently as 2005, in the American Spectator, Stein said: "Nixon was a peacemaker. He was a lying, conniving, covering-up peacemaker. He was not a lying, conniving drug addict like JFK, a lying, conniving war-starter like LBJ, a lying, conniving seducer like Clinton — a lying, conniving peacemaker."

Stein is a vocal supporter of the Republican Party. He is a pro-life activist and was given a Pro-Life Award in 2003 by the National Right to Life Educational Trust Fund.

Writing career

A frequent writer, Ben Stein has authored books on several topics, including economics. He writes a regular column in the conservative magazine The American Spectator. He has also written for numerous publications including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, New York Magazine, Los Angeles Magazine and Barron's Magazine, where his discussion of the Michael Milken Drexel Burnham Lambert junk bond situation, as well as the ethical dimensions of management buyouts, attracted heavy US national attention in the 1980s and 1990s. He currently writes a regular column for the Sunday New York Times Business Section and for Yahoo! Finance online.

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Ben Stein ]

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