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The Fall of a President
The Fall of a President
232 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1974
309 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
March 27, 2017
This is an excellent analysis of Richard Nixon (who he was, his legacy) by Washington Post reporters, written in August 1974 in the aftermath of the Watergate scandal that forced Nixon to resign or face impeachment. It is especially interesting to read through the lens of today's budding Trump presidency. There are many startling parallels between Trump and Nixon as outlined in some of the book's quotes below:
"To Mr. Nixon, the press was a cross to bear, an institution to be used and manipulated to serve his version of the national purpose. To the press, Mr. Nixon was also a cross to bear, a man committed more to image than to truth."
"(Nixon's) ambitions, his insecurities, his aloofness, his resentments, his humorlessness, his inability to inspire popular confidence, his misplaced trust in others, his taste for the second-rate, his penchant for secrecy, for manuever, for deviousness--these were the attributes that ultimately destroyed him."
"As (Nixon's) transcripts show, he continued to believe that people weren't that troubled by Watergate. It would all blow over and be forgotten in time. He and his aides approached it as another problem to be manipulated rather than solved. A public relations blitz, a PR counterattack, would do the job."
"A month later, Nixon made another drastic miscalculation of his own invincibility. By releasing his own income-tax returns, he thought that issue would be settled. But his tax returns only deepened the ugly portrait which events were drawing of him and propelled Congress one more step down the road it didn't want to take."
"'The thing that is completely misunderstood about Watergate,' said Charles Colson, 'is that everybody thinks the people surrounding the President were drunk with power . . . But it wasn't arrogance at all. It was insecurity. That insecurity began to breed a form of paranoia.'"
"Nixon's tragedy asks the most serious questions of democracy. If Nixon reflected authentic popular values, then perhaps he showed Americans a coarse picture of ourselves, one we would rather not face. Or, if he misled us and deceived us in his climb to power, then our democratic process failed at the most serious level."
"Listened to in retrospect, the drama unfolds swiftly, the miscalculations providing the finale to each stunning act: The decision . . . to make the conduct of the press the issue, not the actions of his men; to lie continually . . . to invoke the sanctity of 'national security' long after the President himself cast that legitimate concern into disrepute; to make the mandate of 1972 license to undermine the Constitution."
"Also in (Nixon's) partisanship and the atmosphere of political siege he saw all around him, he subverted the lofty image of the presidency by using the office as a command post for waging political war. He waged it not only against the opposition party, but also against Congress, the press, and any segment of the population, like war protesters and student dissenters, that dared be critical of him."
"(VP) Agnew characterized anti-war youth in 1969 as 'rotten apples' to be cast out; Mr. Nixon called them 'bums.' The objective in each case was the same: to isolate and destroy the opposition."
"Considering the track record of politicians of both parties through the years, a skepticism among the voters that politics will be cleaner post-Watergate is inevitable, and not necessarily bad. But when public skepticism is driven to cynicism and the voter drops out, the hand and the influence of the manipulative politician is immeasurably strengthened. . . Richard Nixon as a politician has been one of the foremost practitioners of the art of voter manipulation. It will be among the greatest of ironies if, as a result of his political excesses, voters turn their backs and the system is thus rendered even more vulnerable to manipulative politicians of the future."
"Both the man and his job said something about the Nixon approach to the domestic situation. (Domestic Council Executive Director Kenneth R. Cole Jr.) is a young advertising executive, one of many from that field recruited to the White House with what they all conceded to be a stunning lack of background in legislation, politics or the substance of social and economic issues."
"When he launched his second campaign for the presidency in the nomination hall at Miami Beach in 1968, President Nixon promised to heed the 'real voice of America' -- that of 'the forgotten Americans - the non-shouters, the non-demonstrators.'"
"To Mr. Nixon, the press was a cross to bear, an institution to be used and manipulated to serve his version of the national purpose. To the press, Mr. Nixon was also a cross to bear, a man committed more to image than to truth."
"(Nixon's) ambitions, his insecurities, his aloofness, his resentments, his humorlessness, his inability to inspire popular confidence, his misplaced trust in others, his taste for the second-rate, his penchant for secrecy, for manuever, for deviousness--these were the attributes that ultimately destroyed him."
"As (Nixon's) transcripts show, he continued to believe that people weren't that troubled by Watergate. It would all blow over and be forgotten in time. He and his aides approached it as another problem to be manipulated rather than solved. A public relations blitz, a PR counterattack, would do the job."
"A month later, Nixon made another drastic miscalculation of his own invincibility. By releasing his own income-tax returns, he thought that issue would be settled. But his tax returns only deepened the ugly portrait which events were drawing of him and propelled Congress one more step down the road it didn't want to take."
"'The thing that is completely misunderstood about Watergate,' said Charles Colson, 'is that everybody thinks the people surrounding the President were drunk with power . . . But it wasn't arrogance at all. It was insecurity. That insecurity began to breed a form of paranoia.'"
"Nixon's tragedy asks the most serious questions of democracy. If Nixon reflected authentic popular values, then perhaps he showed Americans a coarse picture of ourselves, one we would rather not face. Or, if he misled us and deceived us in his climb to power, then our democratic process failed at the most serious level."
"Listened to in retrospect, the drama unfolds swiftly, the miscalculations providing the finale to each stunning act: The decision . . . to make the conduct of the press the issue, not the actions of his men; to lie continually . . . to invoke the sanctity of 'national security' long after the President himself cast that legitimate concern into disrepute; to make the mandate of 1972 license to undermine the Constitution."
"Also in (Nixon's) partisanship and the atmosphere of political siege he saw all around him, he subverted the lofty image of the presidency by using the office as a command post for waging political war. He waged it not only against the opposition party, but also against Congress, the press, and any segment of the population, like war protesters and student dissenters, that dared be critical of him."
"(VP) Agnew characterized anti-war youth in 1969 as 'rotten apples' to be cast out; Mr. Nixon called them 'bums.' The objective in each case was the same: to isolate and destroy the opposition."
"Considering the track record of politicians of both parties through the years, a skepticism among the voters that politics will be cleaner post-Watergate is inevitable, and not necessarily bad. But when public skepticism is driven to cynicism and the voter drops out, the hand and the influence of the manipulative politician is immeasurably strengthened. . . Richard Nixon as a politician has been one of the foremost practitioners of the art of voter manipulation. It will be among the greatest of ironies if, as a result of his political excesses, voters turn their backs and the system is thus rendered even more vulnerable to manipulative politicians of the future."
"Both the man and his job said something about the Nixon approach to the domestic situation. (Domestic Council Executive Director Kenneth R. Cole Jr.) is a young advertising executive, one of many from that field recruited to the White House with what they all conceded to be a stunning lack of background in legislation, politics or the substance of social and economic issues."
"When he launched his second campaign for the presidency in the nomination hall at Miami Beach in 1968, President Nixon promised to heed the 'real voice of America' -- that of 'the forgotten Americans - the non-shouters, the non-demonstrators.'"
June 17, 2017
Must read book, If we don't learn from the scandals of the past they will be repeated in the present and future.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews