who is the most annoying WH press secretary

In 1974, a statement by Mr. Ziegler on the safeguarding of the White House tapes won an award from the Committee on Public Doublespeak of the National Council of Teachers of English.

He said: ''I would feel that most of the conversations that took place in those areas of the White House that did have the recording system would, in almost their entirety, be in existence, but the special prosecutor, the court, and, I think, the American people are sufficiently familiar with the recording system to know where the recording devices existed, and to know the situation in terms of the recording process, but I feel, although the process has not been undertaken yet in preparation of the material to abide by the court decision, really, what the answer to that question is.''

Asked in February 1971 if allied troops were preparing to invade Laos, Mr. Ziegler replied: ''The president is aware of what is going on in Southeast Asia. That is not to say anything is going on in Southeast Asia.''

Mr. Ziegler dismissed the 1972 break-in at Democratic national headquarters as a ''third-rate burglary'' and attacked The Washington Post's coverage of the case as ''shabby journalism'' and ''character assassination.''

But on April 17, 1973, Nixon stunned reporters by saying that he had conducted an investigation that raised the prospect of involvement by White House officials.

Mr. Ziegler told a puzzled press corps that this was now the ''operative statement,'' repeating the word operative six times. Finally, R. W. Apple Jr. of The New York Times asked, ''Would it be fair for us to infer, since what the president said today is now considered the operative statement, to quote you, that the other statement is no longer operative, that it is now inoperative?''

Eventually Mr. Ziegler replied: ''The president refers to the fact that there is new material; therefore, this is the operative statement. The others are inoperative.''