OUT: Lennon Was Closet 'Republican'?

Hippie icon John Lennon was a secret fan of Ronald Reagan, claims his final personal assistant. Fred Seaman, who worked for the Lennons in the year before the ex-Beatle's death in 1980, says Lennon was embarrassed by his radical past, the Toronto Sun reports. Lennon "made it very clear that if he were an American he would vote for Reagan because he was really sour on Jimmy Carter," Seaman says in the new documentary Beatles Stories. Lennon biographer Jon Weiner, however, isn't buying Seaman's claim that the star was a closet Republican just because he was disillusioned with Carter. Lennon never abandoned left-wing politics and spoke out in support of striking workers just weeks before his death, Weiner writes in the Nation, noting that Seaman was sentenced to probation after being convicted of stealing some of Lennon's belongings after his death!