I'll send a dollar to the first person who can remember who first used the phrase "nattering nabobs of nepotism."  Most people on this board probably weren't even born when that phrase was first uttered.  Not uddered.  Uttered.

Tricky Dick's first VEEP.

and I believe it wasn't "nepotism" but "negativism."

TMT

PS. Yes I was born back then... I got to see Led Zeppelin in concert when I was 10.  

Can you name  the ghost-writer of that phrase?

The phrase 'nattering nabobs of negativism' was made famous by Spiro Agnew, but was written by that stalwart defender of Nixon, William Safire (ex-op/ed writer for the NY Times).

if he visited black-american ghetos:"If you've seen one you've seen them all"!

I'd read a number of times that it was Patrick Buchanan who turned that phrase.

Safire or Buchanan, you can have 'em both.