Cirque Du Salahi: Be Careful Who You Trust (2 page)

Introduction

As a veteran of the news business I’ve lived in many locations across America. For a decade, Washington, DC was my home. I covered much of official Washington, including the U.S. Congress and the White House.

I was never part of the upper-crust social scene in DC, nor did I ever aspire to be. But you can’t live in a place as compact as the District of Columbia and escape becoming acutely aware of the social milieu, the attitudes, and unspoken rules that guide the glittering set through their enchanted evenings of parties, charity events and black tie affairs. The social system is firmly in place and offers no genuine welcome or comfort to outsiders.

When the world awoke on the morning of November 25, 2009 to the news that a couple had come t-h-i-s close to the President of the United States, and could have done him harm if they’d wanted to, I was riveted. My curiosity at who would dare do such a thing was quickly supplanted with the feeling that we were only getting part of the story.

I have passed through the high security gates at the White House to work as a reporter, and even with a bona fide press pass and knowing those standing guard by name, it is never easy to get into the place.

How did Michaele and Tareq Salahi actually enter the White House compound? Why, even their name sounded suspect. Salahi—isn’t that a Middle Eastern name? And Palestinian at that! Maybe they were terrorists in formal clothing. He could have been carrying a non-detectable plastic explosive; she could have been carrying some deadly powder with which to douse the President or his honored guest, the Prime Minister of India. Fueled by media speculation our imaginations went wild. Our collective outrage festered.

I posed to some of my law enforcement sources, including friends with the Secret Service, the question that continued to rattle in my brain: How can someone—two people in fact—crash the gate at the nation’s most heavily fortified residence
and not
be arrested immediately?

The answer kept coming back the same: They couldn’t have. Someone had to have let them in to the compound at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

No matter, the Salahis had the scarlet letter “C” for “Crashers” branded on their forehead and that was that. In the few days following the state dinner—when the story was still developing and
nothing had
been proven
—trusted media outlets had already convicted them.

CNN’s Senior Political Contributor Ed Rollins declared, “This despicable, desperate, duplicitous couple disgraced the Secret Service and embarrassed the President in his home … The Salahis deserve to be charged with criminal trespassing and lying to federal officers for starters.”

Respected
CBS News
Correspondent Bob Orr began his evening news piece the night after the state dinner proclaiming the event was, “The most notorious break - in since Watergate,” and branded the Salahis “the party crashers.”

Fox News
Anchorman Neil Cavuto proclaimed in his
Common Sense
column, “Throw them in jail then throw away the key! Tareq and Michaele Salahi are fence-jumpers, only they didn’t use a fence. They just walked in. But they’re just as crazy. And just as dangerous.”

People Magazine
,
U.S.A. Today
and syndicated TV programs like
Access Hollywood
picked up the label “Gate Crashers” or “Party Crashers” and so it went. The monikers stuck and were repeated countless times not only nationwide but worldwide in the days, weeks and months following the incident.

A freight train in full motion is hard to stop.

What was life like for the Salahis? How would they ever live it down? What had brought them to this place and time in their lives? I ultimately asked them these questions and many, many more. And over time they told me.

This is the story you haven’t heard.

Diane Dimond

September, 2010

Full Disclosure

I first met Michaele and Tareq Salahi April 10, 2010 as part of my job as Special Correspondent for the syndicated television show,
Entertainment Tonight.
I traveled to Washington, DC to cover an event they were hosting at a club in the Adams Morgan neighborhood.

The moment we met, Michaele grabbed me up in a hug, and a broadly smiling Tareq pumped my hand enthusiastically as if we were long time friends. The couple, I soon realized, was ultimately likeable. As I often do with interview subjects, we traded e-mails and over the next few weeks we corresponded back and forth, getting to know each other better.

I came to learn that my literary manager, Sharlene Martin, was talking with them about representing them for a lifestyle book on entertaining. Through Sharlene, the Salahis and I began to discuss the possibility of this book. I let them know I would only be interested on two conditions: They had to agree to answer every question they were legally able to respond to and they had to agree to give me full editorial control.

They have had full knowledge from the beginning of this project that I might include information that was embarrassing to them. Nonetheless, they boldly agreed to go forward.

I hold the full copyright to this material. They have had no editorial approval whatsoever.

Michaele Ann Holt

To the eye of a camera, there really are only two kinds of people in this world: (1) blondes; and (2) everybody else. Cameras record blonde hair as bright flashes against the always-darker background. A platinum blonde head reflects far more light than a slightly darker mantle, no matter how much shiny product gets massaged into those brunette locks. To stand next to a platinum blonde in a crowd shot is to taste invisibility.

On top of that, everybody knows that for adults, only the rarest of blonde hair is produced by nature. The rest is an artificial phenomenon. That fact alone is enough to cause resentment to bubble over with many people. Ask a woman who isn’t one.

Now combine that light-catching blonde mane with a physique that is naturally slim. Throw in a beautiful face, dazzling smile, and vivacious personality. If those attributes describe you, then the only people who don’t resent you with a boiling rage strong enough to deep-fry road kill
at a glance
are a few extremely secure females—plus that half of the human population composed of heterosexual males, along with whatever number of blonde-loving lesbians may be single and looking. And if those blonde and beautiful attributes really do describe you, then even the lusty males and blonde-loving lesbians who drool every time you grin are going to begrudge you as much as anyone else—they’re just willing to set that aside for the moment in the interest of a little shared recreation.

So why would any woman choose to be so blonde and expose herself to that level of resentment from people who are just waiting for her to slip up and do something that they can revile and ridicule? And why, when that woman is already beautiful and will attract attention whether she is blonde or not, would anything be worth incurring irrational anger?

Most likely, every platinum blonde could give her own unique answer to that. But this story focuses on just one beautiful, thin blonde in particular. The world already knows how easy it was for society to turn its rage and scorn onto her. A few inaccurate reports in the major press combined with her arresting photographic image, and that was all it took to start the ball rolling.

She quickly found herself beyond society’s tolerance level, beginning with the earliest reports about that evening and continuing throughout the following days, weeks, and months. Much of it came from the image she presented at the White House. Her flashing hair and eye-catching appearance projected full confidence in photographs that for many people became a piece of visual torment, taunting them with how much fun Michaele appeared to be having while she earned her infamy.

Once the photos appeared in the media, every new shot of her at the White House confirmed the same blunt truth. It left many women with the feeling of dragging their fingernails on a chalkboard. The bright red, size two, custom made sari that looked so spectacular on her in this ultimate public setting, was—most unforgivably—something few others would dare to try on in private.

There is no “political correctness” protecting beautiful blondes. We feel they haven’t suffered enough. Many people perceive them as getting things they don’t deserve in return for nothing more than their appearance. It doesn’t matter whether blondes really do have more fun, because so many people assume they do. We as a society tend to resent the hell out of people who get things for nothing: lottery winners, bad actors who nonetheless strike it rich, and beautiful slim blondes.

This time, glamorous photos and a false news report were all that it took to tap nerves already primed to fire. Each new article fed off the one before. The wave began to roll. Haters showed up like carnivores trailing the scent of fresh meat.

Michaele (pronounced “Mah-kell”) Ann Holt was nicknamed “Missy” shortly after arriving in the world October 1st, 1965, at Holy Cross Hospital in Silver Springs, Maryland. She was the last of the four children born to Rosemary and Howard Holt. Michaele’s oldest sister Debbie was then ten years old, her brother Howard Jr. was seven, and baby Glenn was just seventeen months.

To hear Michaele tell it, she had a wonderful upbringing with lots of attention, and firm but compassionate parental discipline. There were rules that needed to be followed in the Holt household, but there was never a question that love was the overriding force in their family.