Tricky Dick and the Pink Lady : Richard Nixon vs Helen Gahagan Douglas-Sexual Politics and the Red Scare, 1950
America in the 1950s may seem like a halcyon time, butTricky Dick and the Pink Lady,  a lively account of the 1950 race for the Senate in California, shows just how raucous and divided the  nation was as it entered the decade.  Two prominent members of Congress, a former actress and ardent  liberal, Helen Gahagan Douglas, and future president Richard M. Nixon, waged a vicious and often dirty  fight in the election. The entire nation paid attention as Nixon smeared Douglas as a Communist, claiming  she was "pink right down to her underwear." Greg Mitchell provides a well-written account of  the race that would forever define Nixon in the minds of many.