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Reflecting on Nixon
by ricknight | August 8, 2007 at 09:46 am | 656 views | 9 comments
It was on this day in 1974 that Richard M. Nixon resigned the office of the presidency, the first American president in history to do so. His policies as president had been rather liberal. He began arms control agreements with the Soviet Union. He eased relations with China. He established the Environmental Protection Agency, expanded Social Security and state welfare programs and tried to create a national health insurance system.He won re-election in 1972 in a landslide, but in that same year a group of men broke into the Democratic Party headquarters at the Watergate Hotel, and in that break-in were the seeds of his downfall.
From the Writer's Almanac by Garrison Keillor. Available by e-mail daily.
I was twelve at the time of Watergate, and my social studies teacher of the day gave us an appreciation of the genius of the American political system - the ability to remove a sitting leader for violation of the law, without the use of force. Now granted, Nixon resigned before conviction, and was hastily pardoned by Ford, but the lesson is there. The president is not above the law, and at least during this episode, partisan politics in Congress took a back seat to duty to the country and the constitution as both Democrat and Republican supported the pending articles of impeachment. Back then wrong was just wrong.
What about today?
[See Bill Moyers Video on Impeachment attached]
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August 8, 2007 at 09:46 am by ricknight, 656 views, 9 comments
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Comments (9)
at 16:47 on November 24th, 2007
How interesting that when Republicans find they have a bad apple, they cast him out (i.e. Nixon, Foley, Craig); when Democrats find they have a bad apple, they close ranks and lie and spin (i.e. Clinton, Studds, Frank).
at 22:35 on November 24th, 2007
Bush, Cheny, Rove and scooter.... smells of a little fermentation too.... things that make you say hmmmm.
at 22:49 on November 24th, 2007
Only if you are caught up in BDS and can't think for yourself.
at 11:19 on November 25th, 2007
and what brand of kool-aid do you drink? Ideology of any stripe has its own brand of blinders....
at 11:31 on November 25th, 2007
The charges hurled at the President and the Vice President will play out in the same fashion as the Duke rape case, because there is no credible evidence, and in January, 2009, the dictator, Bush, will peacefully turn over the reins of government to the next elected president no matter who he or she might be. It's not Kool-Aid drinking to point out the juvenile nonsense we hear every day.
at 11:39 on November 25th, 2007
Suspension of habeus corpus? the vice president not part of the executive branch? Hardly juvenile, but nontheless nonsense originating from the west wing....
at 11:58 on November 25th, 2007
There's a war on.
at 12:05 on November 25th, 2007
I noticed... it was in all the papers... doesn't excuse the slavish adhearance to he party line argument though... "Leaders know best", "It's for our own good", sounds oddly un-American somehow.
at 12:31 on November 25th, 2007
If you went to my weblog and read some of my posts on immigration, education, McCain-Feingold, Terry Schiavo and many other subjects, you would see that you have no basis for sayng "slavish adherence to the party line". When President Bush is right, I will support him; when he is wrong, I will offer civilized opposition.