Richard M. Nixon

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Another important election poster, from 1972
If the right people had been in charge of Nixon's funeral, his casket would have been launched into one of those open-sewage canals that empty into the ocean just south of Los Angeles. He was a swine of a man and a jabbering dupe of a president. Nixon was so crooked that he needed servants to help him screw his pants on every morning. Even his funeral was illegal. He was queer in the deepest way. His body should have been burned in a trash bin.
Hunter S. Thompson[1]

Richard Milhous "Tricky Dick" Nixon (January 9, 1913 – April 22, 1994) was an American criminal and President of the United States from 1969-1974. Nixon's vice-president was Spiro Agnew, until he resigned due to breakin' laws. Agnew was succeeded by Nixon's nominee, then-Representative Gerald Ford. Ford then succeeded Nixon as president when he resigned for breakin' laws. It's all very straightforward constitutional logic, really.

Several years prior to his tenure as president, he served as Dwight D. Eisenhower's vice-president for eight years.

Contents

[edit] Politics

Does he look trustworthy at all?
The President wants me to argue that he is as powerful a monarch as Louis XIV, only four years at a time, and is not subject to the processes of any court in the land except the court of impeachment.
—James D. St. Clair, Tricky Dick's own attorney, in United States v. Nixon. (Yes, this is how bad it was.)

Nixon was a typical mid-20th century American conservative, which is to say that he made appeals to conservative sentiments while using tools like enactment of wage and price controls to try to reduce inflation. He was also a rabid anti-communist. Oddly, given some of the achievements below, he would probably be considered a card-carrying pinko by the standards of the present-day Republican Party.

He formulated and perfected his so-called "Southern strategy," which used a barely coded racism as a wedge issue to persuade naturally Democratic blue-collar voters in the Bible Belt to vote for the GOP. This strategy has continued to be a major force in US presidential elections, with a heavy dose of religious fundamentalist issues gradually added to the racism. Thanks, asshole.

Nixon's secret plan to end the war was first outlined in a 1967 Foreign Affairs magazine piece entitled "Asia After Vietnam."[2] Nixon proposed welcoming "China back into the world community" by seeking to make changes through dialogue[3] and stated that U.S. involvement in Vietnam was "proof that communism is not necessarily the wave of Asia's future."

During the 1968 Paris Peace talks, Nixon and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger assumed the roles of good-cop-bad-cop. Kissinger played the "reasonable" front man in the negotiations, trying to restrain Nixon back in Washington.[4] One night in a drunken stupor when Kissinger called to report a lack of progress, Nixon is reported to say, "we gotta nuke 'em, Henry."[5]

Nixon is responsible for the massive aerial bombardment of Cambodia that drove its peasantry into the waiting arms of the Khmer Rouge, launched the War on Drugs, cancelled the last Apollo lunar missions and scaled back the American space program. In the Russian Wheat Deal of 1972 he traded wheat for Jewish immigrants held hostage in the Soviet Union.[6]

He is the only man to be twice elected to both the Vice Presidency and the Presidency, and the only President to resign the office.

[edit] Achievements

Under Nixon, many groundbreaking steps were taken in the US:

  • He signed OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) into law, and was the first to argue for what is now known as the Affordable Care Act.[7]
  • The EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) was also created.
  • He went to China — because only Nixon could go to China — where Mao Zedong was impressed by Kissinger's sexual exploits.
  • Eventually ended the Vietnam War, but only after prolonging it unnecessarily (see below).
  • Ended the last vestiges of the gold standard.
  • Called hippies "jobless bums."
  • Referred to the Peace Corps and State Dept. Foreign Service as "cookie pushers and faggots in striped pants."
  • Spent his spare time writing piano concertos.[8]
  • Developed a hilarious speaking style. Arooo!

Nixon also made a lasting impact on the study of international relations by creating and perfecting the "madman theory" of diplomacy. The basic idea was to make the rest of the world think you are absolutely bonkers, so that they will always let you get your way (the idea being that a madman would be liable to do anything if his anger is aroused).[9] This drew quite heavily on existing literature (particularly the deterrence literature produced by Thomas Schelling), and in his case, it seemed to work really well.

Ronald Reagan perfected this strategy in later years, but it didn't work quite so well when the shrub tried the same thing. On the other hand, North Korea uses this tactic effectively all the time.

[edit] Underachievements

Nixon is also famous for getting things horribly wrong:

  • Escalating Johnson's disastrous war in Vietnam to the point of carpet-bombing neighboring countries. (What's this doing on the Underachievements? It would have worked if only the goshdurned libruhls had been willing to fund it and maybe let him use a few nukes.)
    • Let's just mention Vietnam one more time: in 2013, it was revealed that LBJ knew Nixon deliberately sabotaged the Paris Peace talks, but abstained from telling anyone because a) he thought Hubert Humphrey (the Democratic nominee and his own VP) would be too "soft" on the war, and b) it would suggest to the public that the FBI and NSA were bugging ambassadors' phones.[10] Thanks to both of their efforts, Southeast Asia has a headcount millions less than what it should be today, and is still not free of communist influence.
  • In cancelling the Apollo program, Nixon confined humans to the Earth and its orbital space. Aliens could not have imposed a quarantine on our species more effectively.
  • Creating his infamous "enemies list."[11]
  • Hiring and protecting too many not-too-bright thugs to work for his administration.

[edit] Bigotry and paranoia

At the very time that overt anti-Semitism was beginning to vanish from mainstream American culture, Richard Nixon was perhaps the most profoundly anti-Semitic president in U.S. history. In the Nixon tapes, he repeatedly accuses American Jews of placing "Jewish interests" before American ones,[12] an almost verbatim reuse of one of 19th-century Europe's most pernicious anti-Semitic canards. Despite this Nixon surrounded himself with Jews at high levels in the White House: Leonard Garment (chief economic advisor), Ben Stein (chief speechwriter), William Safire (campaign manager), Murray Chotiner (adviser and campaign manager), and of course Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. Nixon was also regarded by Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir and then-Ambassador Yitzchak Rabin as one of Israel's greatest supporters.[13]

Nixon's obsession with the Evil Jew was just part of a profoundly paranoid personality that saw vast, byzantine conspiracies lurking everywhere. It is ironic (but predictable) that such a committed conspiracy theorist was responsible for some of the most outrageous conspiracies ever perpetrated in American politics.

That such a subtle monster was elected to the world's highest office speaks volumes about the self-image of Americans.

[edit] Awesome quotes

A little sampling that tells you just how insane Nixon was. Ladies and gentlemen, the former steward of the world's second-largest nuclear arsenal!

  • "I still think we ought to take the North Vietnamese dikes out now. Will that drown people? ... No, no, no, I'd rather use the nuclear bomb. Have you got that, Henry? ... The nuclear bomb, does that bother you? I just want you to think big, Henry, for Christsakes."
  • "You won't have Dick Nixon to kick around any more."
  • "I am not a crook."
  • "[Expletive deleted]"
  • "When the President does it, it's not illegal."
  • "When the American people look at you they see what they want to be; when they look at me they see what they are."[14]
  • "Sock it to me?"[15]

[edit] Jews

  • "Fucking Jew-bastards everywhere!"
  • "The Jewish cabal is out to get me."
  • "You know, it's a funny thing, every one of the bastards that are out for legalizing marijuana are Jewish. What the Christ is the matter with the Jews, Bob? What is the matter with them? I suppose it is because most of them are psychiatrists."[16]
  • "Many Jews in the Communist conspiracy. Chambers and Hiss were the only non-Jews. Many thought that Hiss was. He could have been a half. Every other one was a Jew--and it raised hell for us. But in this case, I hope to God he's not a Jew."[17]
  • "The Jews are irreligious, atheistic, immoral bunch of bastards."
  • "But, Bob, generally speaking, you can't trust the bastards. They turn on you. Am I wrong or right?[18]
  • "As long as I'm sitting in the chair, there's not going to be any Jew appointed to that court."
  • "Goddamn his Jewish soul!"[19]
  • "[Jews want] peace at any price except where support for Israel is concerned. The best Jews are actually the Israeli Jews."

[edit] Black people

  • "There are times when an abortion is necessary. I know that. When you have a black and a white. Or a rape.
  • "I have the greatest affection for Negroes but I know they're not going to make it for 500 years. They aren't. You know it, too. The Mexicans are a different cup of tea. They have a heritage. At the present time they steal, they're dishonest, but they do have some concept of family life. They don't live like a bunch of dogs, which the Negroes do live like."
  • "Screw [the Department of] State! State's always on the side of the blacks. The hell with them!"
  • "Blacks can’t run Jamaica. Nowhere, and they won’t be able to for a hundred years, and maybe not for a thousand.[20]

[edit] Gays

  • "The Bohemian Grove, which I attend from time to time — it is the most faggy goddamned thing you could ever imagine."
  • "I don't mind the homosexuality. I understand it. Nevertheless, goddamn, I don't think you glorify it on public television, homosexuality, even more than you glorify whores."
  • "You know what happened to the Greeks! Homosexuality destroyed them. Sure, Aristotle was a homo. We all know that. So was Socrates."[21]
  • "You know what happened to the Romans? The last six Roman emperors were fags. Neither in a public way. You know what happened to the popes? They were layin' the nuns; that's been goin' on for years, centuries. But the Catholic Church went to hell three or four centuries ago. It was homosexual, and it had to be cleaned out. That's what's happened to Britain. It happened earlier to France. Let's look at the strong societies. The Russians. Goddamn, they root 'em out. They don't let 'em around at all.
  • "Homosexuality, dope, immorality, are the enemies of strong societies."
  • "Let me say something before we get off the gay thing. I don’t want my views misunderstood. I am the most tolerant person on that of anybody in this shop. They have a problem. They’re born that way ... my point is that Boy Scout leaders, YMCA leaders, and others bring them in that direction, and teachers. And if you look over the history of societies, you will find, of course, that some of the highly intelligent people ... Oscar Wilde, Aristotle, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, were all homosexuals. Nero, of course, was, in a public way, in with a boy in Rome."[22]

[edit] Nixon's apology

[edit] See also

[edit] Nixon's merry band of shysters

  • The headless body of Agnew, Vice President, tax cheat
  • Chuck Colson, White House Counsel, Watergate operative
  • Henry Kissinger, National Security Advisor and Secretary of State, destroyer of Third World nations
  • G. Gordon Liddy, Watergate operative
  • E. Howard Hunt, failed author of pulp thrillers, once disguised himself in a nurse's gown and wig (but no clown makeup, that we know of)
  • John Ehrlichman Esq., Peter Lorre impressionist
  • H.R. Haldeman, bag man masquerading as the White House Chief of Staff

[edit] External links

[edit] Footnotes

  1. He Was a Crook, The Atlantic, 1 May 1994
  2. Asia After Viet Nam, Foreign Affairs, Richard M. Nixon, October 1967.
  3. Raymond L. Garthoff. Détente and Confrontation: American-Soviet Relations from Nixon to Reagan. Brookings Institution Press, January 1994, pp. 242-243. (Oddly, G. Gordon Liddy had once proposed blowing up the Brookings Institution.)
  4. Schwartz, William A., and Charles Derber, et al. The Nuclear Seduction: Why the Arms Race Doesn't Matter -- And What Does. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990. Pg. 107. Quoted from H. R. Haldeman.
  5. Kissinger and Nixon in the White House, The Atlantic
  6. "...Jackson-Vanik amendment to the 1972 International Grain Agreement (IGA), or 'Russian Wheat Deal' negotiated by Richard Nixon and the Soviet Union which made for the first time by law a trade agreement contingent upon the fundamental human right of Soviet Jews to emigrate." [1]
  7. This is not a joke.
  8. Nixon and the Fifteen Democrats, everyone!
  9. Richard Nixon, The Real War, subchapter The "Hole Card", 1980.
  10. The Lyndon Johnson tapes: Richard Nixon's 'treason', BBC
  11. List of White House 'Enemies', Washington University in St. Louis
  12. In Tapes, Nixon Rails About Jews and Blacks, The New York Times
  13. What the Newest Nixon-Kissinger Tape Reveals
  14. Nixon wandering the halls of the White House shitface drunk talking to the portraits of dead presidents the night before resignation. (Woodward and Bernstein, Final Days, p. 303)
  15. And so much more!
  16. Tapes Reveal Nixon's Prejudices Again, ABC News
  17. A Rough Guide to Richard Nixon’s Conspiracy Theories, University of Virginia
  18. New Tapes Reveal Depth of Nixon's Anti-Semitism, Washington Post
  19. What’s in These New Richard Nixon Tapes?, Gawker
  20. Some Newly Uncovered Nixon Comments on the Subjects of Jews and Black People, The Atlantic
  21. Did Richard Nixon Actually say that?, Washington Post
  22. Nixon Unbound, Vanity Fair
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