# Richard Nixon's presidency **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 3, 2009, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188 "2009-05-03T16:16:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/21 "2009-05-03T19:24:33Z")
My Dad was serving in Vietnam in 1968. He’s very liberal, but he voted for Nixon and, by mail, persuaded my Mom to do the same because only Nixon would end the war. She held a bit of a grudge about that . . . ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/22 "2009-05-03T19:29:38Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > LW outlets are limited to expressly political magazines like _The Nation_ and radio networks such as Democracy Now! What more do you want?! Well, at least we know that non-commercial media aren’t simply trying to boost commercial income by sensationalizing things, because it doesn’t matter that much. Rush Limbaugh, however, would suddenly become a far-leftist if he thought it would get him more money. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/23 "2009-05-03T19:33:29Z")
> [@guizot](#): > > He was at least highly resentful of opposing politicians who’d graduated from Ivy League schools, and at worst, paranoid of them–to the point that he felt justified in using “dirty tricks” against them to get what he wanted. Even as an undergrad at Whittier College, Nixon was resentful of the shiny, happy in-crowd, who had an actual club called the Franklins. Nixon organized his own counterclub, the Orthogonians. Perlstein sees Nixon as playing out that rivalry throughout his career. JFK was a classic Franklin. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/24 "2009-05-03T19:43:46Z")
> [@ShibbOleth](#): > > I also heard recently that Nixon’s much ballyhooed opening of China actually didn’t amount to much. Not sure what’s the truth on that. No, that was a real accomplishment. By the time Nixon became president his youthful Manichean Commie-fighting views on foreign policy had evolved into a commitment to _Realpolitik,_ a sense that more or less peaceful coexistence with the Communist world was possible provided the balance of power was maintained – that was why he got on so well with Kissinger, who held the same views. And making nice with China would provide a balance to the USSR. But much of the American public in the 1960s (and especially the John Birchers, who were an actual political force then) saw the Communist Bloc as essentially monolithic and in particular saw Red China as an impossibly alien and evil and incomprehensible dystopia. Only an old Commie-hunter like Nixon had the credibility to open relations. And it did amount to something in the long run – China is, for better or for worse, a major trade partner of the U.S. ---
**Author:** ![Dissonance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@Dissonance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dissonance)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/25 "2009-05-03T20:24:35Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > The mainstream media hated Nixon for decades. Probably because of his anti-communist stance and Alger Hiss. Once they felt they found a chink in his armor (Watergate), they pounded on it day after day after day for two years until finally they succeeded in driving him from office. Wait - the media drove him from office? Not his actual involvement in Watergate? I guess it was the media’s job to help cover it up. > [@](#): > > It should be noted that there is no evidence that Nixon did anything more than try to cover up for the people who were working on his behalf. That was wrong and a mistake He didn’t do anything more than aid in and conspire to cover up felonies committed in his name to illegally influence elections is just wrong and a mistake? Amazing that you can say that with a straight face and blame the media for Nixon being driven from office. Nixon did get the US out of Vietnam, but not exactly honorably. Promises were made to South Vietnam that couldn’t be kept to get them to agree to the Paris Accords; namely that the US would send masses of airpower to crush any future massive conventional invasion as it had in the 1972 Easter Offensive. > [@Marley23](#): > > Because Nixon spread the war to Cambodia I have to disagree with the phrasing of this - Nixon greatly expanded the war in Cambodia, but he didn’t spread the war **to** Cambodia, it was already there. The NLF had been using Cambodia to infiltrate troops and supplies to the south and had set up sanctuaries since even before the US intervention in the Vietnam War, and the US had been conducting operation in Cambodia since 1965. See for instance [here](http://74.125.47.132/search?q=cache:gjXkh23iicoJ:www.yale.edu/cgp/Walrus_CambodiaBombing_OCT06.pdf+cambodia+vietnam+war&cd=9&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us): > [@](#): > > Thanks to the database, we now know that the US bombardment started three-and-a-half years earlier, in 1965, under the Johnson administration. What happened in 1969 was not the start of bombings in Cambodia but the escalation into carpet bombing. From 1965 to 1968, 2,565 sorties took place over Cambodia, with 214 tons of bombs dropped. These early strikes were likely tactical, designed to support the nearly two thousand secret ground incursions conducted by the cia and US Special Forces during that period. B-52s—long-range bombers capable of carrying very heavy loads—were not deployed, whether out of concern for Cambodian lives or the country’s neutrality, or because carpet bombing was believed to be of limited strategic value. ---
**Author:** ![BMax](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bmax/32/4267_2.png) [@BMax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BMax)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/26 "2009-05-03T20:42:41Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > No, that was a real accomplishment. By the time Nixon became president his youthful Manichean Commie-fighting views on foreign policy had evolved into a commitment to _Realpolitik,_ a sense that more or less peaceful coexistence with the Communist world was possible provided the balance of power was maintained – that was why he got on so well with Kissinger, who held the same views. And making nice with China would provide a balance to the USSR. But much of the American public in the 1960s (and especially the John Birchers, who were an actual political force then) saw the Communist Bloc as essentially monolithic and in particular saw Red China as an impossibly alien and evil and incomprehensible dystopia. Only an old Commie-hunter like Nixon had the credibility to open relations. And it did amount to something in the long run – China is, for better or for worse, a major trade partner of the U.S. I agree with that, Nixon’s visit to China was only a first step to trade relations with China. I never saw “MADE IN CHINA” stickers on products in stores until probably 1990, after Brent Scowcroft’s (former Nixon staffer) fact-finding visit to China, supposedly to investigate the Tienanmen square massacre. That was when China received [most favored trading nation](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Most_favoured_nation#Specific_countries.27_policies) status. I think the fact that Brent came back with was “we can make a hell of a lot of money together”. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/27 "2009-05-03T20:42:59Z")
Quoth **Starving Artist** : > [@](#): > > With regard to the press, they did far more than expose it. They hammered on it day after day for two years until they were finally able to turn the electorate (and Nixon’s political base in Congress) against him. For which I salute them. It’s the press’s job to hammer on those in power. For the past eight years, they’ve been derelict in their duty, not hammering nearly as hard as they should. And despite the fact that I voted for Obama and expect I’ll probably vote for him again, I hope that the press hammer him as hard as they can, too. The media should not be unbiased; they should in fact be biased against the administration, and we can recognize the truly great leaders when they hold up even against that bias. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/28 "2009-05-03T20:49:55Z")
> [@ShibbOleth](#): > > Saigon only fell in April of 1975, though, which may be why the Ford reference. Nixon did start the push to end the war, but that was probably because of a lot of pressure. To be fair, Nixon inherited the situation in Southeast Asia, which was a result of Kennedy’s and later Johnson’s attempt to continue Western influence on the peninsula of the former French Indochina. FWIW, Robert McNamara opins that Kennedy would have extracted the United States from Vietnam before the massive escalation that occurred under the Johnson Administration, and Nixon was clearly looking for some kind of out that wasn’t the complete rout that the fall of Saigon ended up being. > [@ShibbOleth](#): > > I also heard recently that Nixon’s much ballyhooed opening of China actually didn’t amount to much. Not sure what’s the truth on that. “Only Nixon could go to China,” is perhaps the most overused and misapplied homily of the 20th Century. First of all, it was Henry Kissenger, not Nixon, who paved the way for open diplomatic relations with China, which he did by completely selling out Western allies in Taiwan. He actively campaigned to have the ROC replaced by the PRC in the UN and elsewhere, undermining the (by some measure) legitimate government of the ROC in favor of the utterly criminal “revolutionary” regime that led the Cultural Revolution (the so-called “Gang of Four”). Whatever you think of the KMT (and they were a corrupt bunch indeed) they were at least nominally ideologically compatible AND were a continuation of the same government, whereas Mao and his successors seized power and ruled by fear, intimidation, and a campaign of brutality and organized murder that exceeded that of the Fascist powers of Europe during WWII, and rivaled even the Red Terror and Stalin eras off the Soviet Union. The supposed great achievement of Nixon opening a dialogue with China, worthy of this compromise, was to create a split between the two largest Communist powers. Unbeknownst (or at least, poorly understood) by Western intelligence was that the Sino-Soviet conflicts had been ongoing for well over a decade and despite a supposed shared ideology both the cultures and leadership personalities of the two powers were always at odds with one another. Nixon might like to have claimed to drive a wedge between China and the Soviet Union, but this had long existed before Nixon was ever on stage. The result is that we now have an official stance of “One China”, i.e. the PRC, while the Republic of China (which has made significant moves toward an actual democracy) is recognized only as a special administrative region. This “realpolitik” has been the cause of much strife in the region and resentment against the United States for abandoning a position of principle for one of pragmatics without actually having pragmatically gained anything. Or as I prefer to call it, dipshit politics. Nixon the Man was by all accounts (even favorable ones) a bare-assed, foul-mouthed, vindictive bastard who would lie out both sides of his mouth while grafting in five different directions. He became utterly convinced in his own righteousness regardless of the circumstance, and was ultimately a loathsome, self-serving hack. He never accepted responsibility for the crimes he had committed (even if they were limited to the concealment of a conspiracy) and frankly his tenure as president was marked with failures foreign and domestic, many of which if not directly his fault were not addressed in a fashion which mitigated the impact. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![joebuck20](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/74df32/32.png) [@joebuck20](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/joebuck20)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/29 "2009-05-03T20:57:11Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > It’s sort of hilarious that you cite this as a show of popular support without mentioning Nixon’s efforts to rig the same election. You also have to remember that after LBJ, the Democratic Party was pretty much in the same state that the Republican Party is today: leaderless, directionless and with ideas that amounted to little more than talking points. It took them years to get their act back together. ---
**Author:** ![BMax](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bmax/32/4267_2.png) [@BMax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BMax)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/30 "2009-05-03T21:04:43Z")
Didn’t Nixon pioneer telephone push polling during his senate campaign in California? I recently watched a biography of Nixon on PBS stating that. ---
**Author:** ![BrightNShiny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@BrightNShiny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrightNShiny)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/31 "2009-05-03T21:06:15Z")
Here are the [articles of impeachment](http://watergate.info/impeachment/impeachment-articles.shtml) against Nixon. There’s more in there than just a simple “cover up.” The allegations include witness intimidation, unlawful spying on Americans, obstructing investigations and misuse of government resources. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/32 "2009-05-03T21:32:01Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > It should be noted that there is no evidence that Nixon did anything more than try to cover up for the people who were working on his behalf. That was wrong and a mistake, but it does not equate to his having tried to rig the election. I’d consider it enough to render him rather unworthy for the title of “good president”, though (the extent to which his getting caught implicates his brightness is more of a debateable subject). ---
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/33 "2009-05-03T21:43:35Z")
> [@BrightNShiny](#): > > Here are the [articles of impeachment](http://watergate.info/impeachment/impeachment-articles.shtmlhttp://watergate.info/impeachment/impeachment-articles.shtml) against Nixon. There’s more in there than just a simple “cover up.” The allegations include witness intimidation, unlawful spying on Americans, obstructing investigations and misuse of government resources. Your link is malformed. Try [this one](http://watergate.info/impeachment/impeachment-articles.shtml). ---
**Author:** ![BrightNShiny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@BrightNShiny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrightNShiny)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/34 "2009-05-03T21:45:44Z")
> [@squeegee](#): > > Your link is malformed. Try [this one](http://watergate.info/impeachment/impeachment-articles.shtml). Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/35 "2009-05-03T21:58:25Z")
Don’t forgot we almost got universal healthcare under Nixon. It was only shot down because… the UAW, I think, decided they could get a better deal if they kept lobbying against it. Thanks, jerks. He detatched the dollar from the gold standard, which _I_ think was important. OSHA is his, so is the Consumer Product Safety people. Add those to the EPA, and you get a Republican who really cared about protecting the health and well being of citizens. ---
**Author:** ![pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pseudotriton_ruber_ruber)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/36 "2009-05-03T21:58:57Z")
> [@joebuck20](#): > > You also have to remember that after LBJ, the Democratic Party was pretty much in the same state that the Republican Party is today: leaderless, directionless and with ideas that amounted to little more than talking points. It took them years to get their act back together. Not nearly, and to the extent that they had a lack of leadership, it was attributable, not to a lack of political philosophy or strength, but to the bad habit that their leaders had to stepping in front of assassins’ bullets. Despite that bad habit, the Dems very nearly won the 1968 election, were cheated out of any chance they might have had in 1972, and won the White House back in 1976. so far, the Pubbies got creamed in 2008, I don’t see them winning a fair election (or losing a crooked one) in 2012, and we’ll have to see how they do in 2016–the smart money’s still on big losses in all three fair elections. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/37 "2009-05-03T22:38:18Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > To the OP: Wiki has a pretty good article about Nixon’s presidency that will tell you much more about it than you will ever learn here. > > [Link](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_M_Nixon#Second_term). Something that was not mentioned but you should learn. In 1972 there were elections in El Salvador, the leader of the opposition was not a communist, but the united opposition he leaded had some communist or leftist groups. There was fraud in the election and a military thug claimed to be the winner. The Nixon administration failed to intervene, far from it, they supported the new military “president” There was also virtually no reaction from Nixon when the Salvadorean people supported a military rebellion and the Salvadoran air force bombed the crowds of supporters of the opposition leader that were protesting the electoral fraud. A couple of other fraudulent elections and then civil war broke up. Many right wingers in the US are still incapable of ever wondering if there was actually another good reason why there was a civil war in the 80’s in places like El Salvador and always wonder why the US is criticized for helping the military governments of that era. I blame mostly Nixon and Reagan for following the path of darkness. ---
**Author:** ![DSYoungEsq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c6cbf5/32.png) [@DSYoungEsq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSYoungEsq)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/38 "2009-05-03T23:05:46Z")
All this thread goes to show is that, even 35 years after Nixon left office, attitudes about him are as hard as ever, on both sides of the discussion. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2009, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/39 "2009-05-03T23:07:05Z")
That was the KGB’s doing, they had a genius for making Communist led takeovers appear to be “popular” uprisings. You know, hungry peasants, oppressed workers, the whole bit. Throw in a murdered Archbishop or two, some raped nuns, and you got the _WaPost_ running articles endlessly, two, three times a year… ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2009, 1:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188/40 "2009-05-04T01:32:51Z")
> [@BrightNShiny](#): > > Here are the [articles of impeachment](http://watergate.info/impeachment/impeachment-articles.shtml) against Nixon. There’s more in there than just a simple “cover up.” The allegations include witness intimidation, unlawful spying on Americans, obstructing investigations and misuse of government resources. Of course, Nixon was not the first POTUS to abuse the power of his office to stifle political rivals. LBJ and even FDR had ignoble records in that regard. Nixon merely took it to unprecedented lengths – he had a **lot** of enemies, as far as he was concerned; his persecution mania was a self-fulfilling prophecy. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/richard-nixons-presidency/495188.md?page=3)