TS: Richard Nixon vs George W. Bush

i'm not so sure i'd be quick to praise ike for 'executive resistance to military+political+popular belligerence' -- as i mentioned he basically turned the CIA loose to wreak havoc in a bunch of other countries and ramped up the arms race (the u.s. had fewer than a thousand warheads when he came into office and had more than 30,000 by the time he left). not that i remotely put ike in the same category as a warmonger like bush (or truman for that matter), but he's as deeply implicated in the growth of the national security state as anyone.

no yeah completely, but the cia and "massive retaliation" were his covert/passive alternatives to overt/active military involvement in korea/taiwan/dienbienphu/prob even egypt idk. he believed in the Need For Strength and nsc-68 and the indispensability of the defense sector and everything and that's why the last-minute "but be careful!" is so funny, but he used his triumphant-general cachet to set a precedent of relative moderation when he could have done differently (altho not necc for very long in a recognizable world).

i mean tell that to the guatemalans sure.

I mean, we had TWO crises over future Trivial Pursuit answers Quemoy and Matsu.

this article's a bit on the long side for what it actually tells you but it's pretty eye-opening: http://hnn.us/articles/47326.html

In all that I've read and seen about Nixon, never knew this (from Summer of '68, a baseball book that goes beyond baseball):

"In his biography about the Packers' coach, David Maraniss detailed how Richard Nixon first considered Lombardi as his running mate. That infatuation lasted until the Republican candidate learned that Lombardi had been a strong supporter of Bobby Kennedy."

I've always been fascinated by the way Nixon makes his way into every presidential election--often by way of specific connections to candidates (i.e., trailing Romney's father at one point for the '68 nomination), sometimes as a point of comparison.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2015/09/01/hillary-clinton-new-email-released-state-department-column/71504450/

W. was so much more lovable and endearing than Nixon. He was the bagman. Cheney, Rumsfeld, Ashcroft, Rice, and Rove were the real super villains.

W was a cockroach.

Nixon on Crossfire, including outtakes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MacmN1EtIPQ

Would love to see the whole episode.

i'm sort of fascinated by the number of books Nixon wrote post-presidency. some of them sound intriguingly weird but i'm sure they're all paranoid and dull slogs.
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/515nFIAwlEL._SX339_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg

This book is so weird just for the captions. Stuff like:

"Like most men, I too hated the Vietnam War."

* Nixon studying yellow legal pad, pencil eraser in mouth *

"Here am I working on a speech. Writing even one line can take hours of concentration."

http://i.imgur.com/oLfZ9xw.jpg

"Hmmm. 'I've never been a babysitter...' No, that's no good. 'I've never been a bullshitter...' Too many syllables. 'I've never abandoned ship...' God, this could take hours."

haha

that clip above did contain any actual expletives :(

"shit it makes him [unintelligible] like a goddam animal"

(at around 1:15)

ah I couldn't quite make out that part about the Caro bio

funny cuz i feel like these days, post vols 3 and 4, caro's reputation is for being a bit of a softie re lbj, but when that first volume came out i think it seemed like a hatchet job to some? he really does come off textbook psycho in it. nixon otm there: "it makes him out to be a goddam animal. of course he was." (then lol comes over all marlene: "he was a man.")

Nixon as avid reader of NYROB, even citing Clifton Fadiman! Was he the last prez to do until maybe Obama?

so after learning that mtv vj kennedy has a show on fox news (lol) and reading in her wiki that she chanted "nixon now!" at the clintons at his first inauguration, i had to look into it and found this http://redalertpolitics.com/2013/08/08/mtv-vj-kennedy-recalls-being-an-alt-rock-republican/

When the Clintons went onstage she chanted, “Nixon now! Nixon now!” (There was apparently a lot of Nixon nostalgia in the ’90s.)

“John McLaughlin was looking and I knew another headset was bound to intercept if I didn’t act fast, and I had to prove to him he was not the only Lover of Nixon (or LON for short) in the room.”

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/85/8f/36/858f36226e6cfc4e148618401bc24d8c.jpg

he'd become The Elder Statesman – the image he'd sold to credulous publishers and Beltway types – by holding salons in '80s Manhattan, serving homemade Chinese food and martinis he mixed himself. Apparently he cut quite the figure.

Now, of course, he has proven himself very deft on Twitter.

Richard M. Nixon ‏@dick_nixon 4h4 hours ago
'68 brought people in. Trump locked the door and threw away the key. If you can't see the difference, the hell with you.

My lord, it sounds just like him. HOW UNCANNY. PITCH PERFECT.

Gonna start a Reagan twitter. Post things like "Boy, this guy? Nothing like 1980."

]people who remember the 90s, was this a real thing? i can't find anything about it and am now obsessed with the concept of 90s youth describing themselves as Lovers of Nixon

now listen y'all. I don't share this video with just anyone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dvy8uFN31s

thank you.

Richard M. Nixon ‏@dick_nixon 11h11 hours ago
Bobby Kennedy was the coldest man I ever met.

Richard M. Nixon
‏@dick_nixon
I mean it. Bobby Kennedy should have burned witches.

no offense to alfred specifically, but i am seriously ready for an ILX plugin that filters out reposts of @dick_nixon tweets

but that's what the thread's for – the reposting of wisdom

Richard M. Nixon ‏@dick_nixon
These DNC wikileaks. This is why you employ plumbers.

Richard M. Nixon ‏@dick_nixon
Beyonce might sing about lemonade, but Arnold Palmer was the man with the real drink.

See? Anyone can do it!

I get the uneasy feeling that @dick_nixon might be a friend of ours, but I just hate to see anyone trying to sully up the good Nixon name.

All it took was G W Bush for Nixon's legacy to be reconsidered.

― the return of (burt_stanton), Saturday, September 13, 2008

I bet we all know how to update this, as fucked as it is.

https://twitter.com/DennisThePerrin/status/837659000581808128

I can't wait to see Trump's finger painting.

http://www.avclub.com/article/george-w-bush-takes-credit-snls-strategery-not-war-251447

@adamjohnsonNYC
39 of the 39 people indicted by the ICC for war crimes are African meanwhile Blair is writing NYT op-eds & Bush is taking selfies w/ Ellen.

Sometimes it's hard to believe Dubya was President. Is there a German word for knowing and remembering something but it not feeling real?

buschtraum