nhboy
Ubi bene ibi patria
" Eight weeks in, Trump displays all the petty paranoia that sank Nixon — but without his shrewd executive competence
Presidents almost always hate the press or at least find them a necessary evil. Some handle the relationship better than others. John F. Kennedy’s press conferences were celebrated for their erudition and Ronald Reagan’s were often upbeat laugh fests. But part of the reason that presidents hate the press is because people inside the government leak information to reporters and they publish it for all to see.
One can only imagine how stressful this is, even if a president isn’t hiding illegal or unethical behavior. Bill Clinton was fighting scandal throughout his presidency and seemed to become inured to the din after a while. But he had to have been distressed by leaks from the Justice Department and the independent counsel’s office throughout the Monica Lewinsky affair. Reagan was notably calm about the Iran-contra scandal but he also professed to not recall any involvement, which no doubt spared him a lot of anxiety.
The president who most passionately loathed the press, in the modern era anyway, was good old Richard Nixon. In 2008 some previously unheard Nixon tapes were released that reminded the world just how overwrought Tricky Dick was about his perceived enemies. In one conversation in December 1974 he uttered these now-famous words to his national security advisers, Henry Kissinger and Alexander Haig:
All this comes to mind as we read the latest stories of chaos and ineptitude leaking out of the Trump administration.
Frankly, they make Nixon look good by comparison. I’m not the first to note the similarities, but when you think about the fact that Donald Trump has declared the press to be the “the enemy of the people” and accused his predecessor of illegally wiretapping him. it’s clear that the new president is in a different league altogether — and he has been in office less than eight weeks. The sheer scope of grievance, pettiness, petulance and vindictiveness he shows daily in his tweets and interviews is staggering. As the historian Rick Perlstein has
As the historian Rick Perlstein has said, on a Nixonian scale of 1 to 10, “Trump is an 11.”
http://www.salon.com/2017/03/16/nixon-nostalgia-trip-trumps-administration-already-recalls-the-worst-of-tricky-dick/
Presidents almost always hate the press or at least find them a necessary evil. Some handle the relationship better than others. John F. Kennedy’s press conferences were celebrated for their erudition and Ronald Reagan’s were often upbeat laugh fests. But part of the reason that presidents hate the press is because people inside the government leak information to reporters and they publish it for all to see.
One can only imagine how stressful this is, even if a president isn’t hiding illegal or unethical behavior. Bill Clinton was fighting scandal throughout his presidency and seemed to become inured to the din after a while. But he had to have been distressed by leaks from the Justice Department and the independent counsel’s office throughout the Monica Lewinsky affair. Reagan was notably calm about the Iran-contra scandal but he also professed to not recall any involvement, which no doubt spared him a lot of anxiety.
The president who most passionately loathed the press, in the modern era anyway, was good old Richard Nixon. In 2008 some previously unheard Nixon tapes were released that reminded the world just how overwrought Tricky Dick was about his perceived enemies. In one conversation in December 1974 he uttered these now-famous words to his national security advisers, Henry Kissinger and Alexander Haig:
Never forget, the press is the enemy, the press is the enemy. The establishment is the enemy, the professors are the enemy, the professors are the enemy. Write that on a blackboard 100 times.
Nixon was also preoccupied by his predecessors, particularly Kennedy, who had beaten him by an agonizingly narrow margin in 1960 and someone with the casual, stylish confidence he didn’t have. Nixon was desperate to discredit JFK and even ordered his chief of staff, Bob Haldeman, to have someone raid the Brookings Institution to uncover information about Kennedy.
All this comes to mind as we read the latest stories of chaos and ineptitude leaking out of the Trump administration.
Frankly, they make Nixon look good by comparison. I’m not the first to note the similarities, but when you think about the fact that Donald Trump has declared the press to be the “the enemy of the people” and accused his predecessor of illegally wiretapping him. it’s clear that the new president is in a different league altogether — and he has been in office less than eight weeks. The sheer scope of grievance, pettiness, petulance and vindictiveness he shows daily in his tweets and interviews is staggering. As the historian Rick Perlstein has
As the historian Rick Perlstein has said, on a Nixonian scale of 1 to 10, “Trump is an 11.”
http://www.salon.com/2017/03/16/nixon-nostalgia-trip-trumps-administration-already-recalls-the-worst-of-tricky-dick/
