Since the book was released just yesterday, I doubt that many of us have read it yet. I did see an interview with John Dean that was chilling.
Just for the record, John Dean is neither a liberal nor a Democrat. He was Nixon’s man, but testified against the President in the Watergate hearings.
I was in my early 30’s when Nixon resigned. It has been my opinion for the last year that the Bush Administration is more dangerous to the country and to the Constitution than Nixon.
Nixon was corrupt, abused his power and conspired to obstruct justice. He could have been prosecuted criminally if President Gerald Ford had not pardoned him. He was also mentally unbalanced toward the end and generally disliked for his sullenness.
I don’t know how he is perceived now in Europe, but by the early 1970’s he he was enormously disliked in Northern Europe because of the war.
I think Bush is more dangerous because he is ignorant, vindictive, shallow and stubborn. He is also much more likeable than Nixon in a frat-bro sort of way. That makes him easier to accept by the naive. He is too easily influenced by willful men with devious agendas and a love of war games. I think he is in way over his head and that the Administration is in chaos. Lies (not just from Bush, but from the Administration as a whole) have become more and more obvious. There seems to be no shame – perhaps because there is no grasp on reality. He is the most truly unpatriotic President in my lifetime. (I began with FDR.)
speaking of patriotic and it is KILLING me to write this, but wheares dub cheerfully stole the presidency, Nixon knew that jfk had stolen chicago and hence Illinois and hence the presidency, but he rejected calling for a recount because (supposedly, and I have to take it at face value) he thought it would be bad for the country…
gagmewithaspoon…
Well, I am only about half of the way through, but his primary focus is on secrecy within the administration, and the extra-constitutional powers the current administration has used to keep things hidden under the rubrik of national security and executive privilege. Given that this administration is making drastic changes to long standing foreign and domestic policy, I think it is reasonable to be concerned. I will try to add some of his arguments more clearly when I can get the book in front of me this evening.
First, responding to alaric’s issue, I think Nixon would still have lost in 1960 even with Illinois, but I’m relying on memory here and won’t be a bit hurt if that is wrong, but I think it’s right.
Anyway, back to John Dean. His sources on the present administration are mostly published works, augumented by correspondence with some insiders, most of whom desire to remain anonymous (yes, that old problem); though the public sources are probably sufficient for his purposes.
His thesis is that the Bush administration is far more secretive than the Nixon administration (but acknowledges that no scandal comparable to Watergate has [yet] attached itself to Bush). Such secretiveness, says Dean, is destructive of democratic government.
I’m about a third of the way thorugh the book. So far, the case for secretiveness is pretty good; whether it’s bad enough to topple the American Way of Life is, of course, eternally debatable.
Altho, “the dead can dance (all the way to the polls)” made a catchy tune.
That said, I’m gonna come down on the nixon bad bush worse side, because altho both presidents were mentally unbalanced, only dub thinks he’s crusader rabbit.
Where are you getting this? Clinton is very popular with my European friends, and I have run across many places in foreign countries named after JFK, and Carter won the Nobel Prize, so I would guess those are our most popular presidents abroad. Never heard anything good about Truman; I can’t imagine he’s very popular in Japan, for one.
