Months after Nixon's resignation and pardon, he spent time in the hospital for phlebitis. (Though it has been suggested later that Nixon had actually suffered a mental breakdown, and his chronic phlebitis was a cover.) At the time, a comedian (I don't remember who) said that he was actually in the hospital for treatment of gonorrhea.
"Because when you screw over 200 million people, you're bound to catch something!"
At least Nixon never tried to run for president again. Of course the 22nd Amendment says he wasn't supposed to, but TFG got elected twice as he says himself and it isn't holding him back, so no imagination from Tricky Dick. Very low-energy.
So, imagine if you will, that Trump resigned at the time of his first impeachment, stepping down in order to, oh, save the nation from the division that would come from an impeachment battle. (yeah, I know, but just imagine...)
Where would the country be now? Pence would have become president.
Pence probably would have behaved like most world leaders through the early pandemic, making some mistakes but behaving more or less like an actual president. Mask deniers and so on would have of course still existed, but not been as strong, nor gone as crazy, without encouragement from the oval office. In general, the US would still be a deeply divided country, but I'd say the level of absolute lunacy would be half what it is now.
But instead Trump doubled down, showed his flabby ass to the world, and here we are.
Money and age does it to so many people. Get rich, get older and start spending all of your time with other rich people, and the corruption starts. Kinda like one rotten apple in the bunch puts big brown gooey spots on all the others.
I was 9 so my opinions were more a reflection of what the adults around me were saying, and that's not the general attitude I picked up. More along the lines of "the rich and powerful get away with everything."
A voice from far on the political right, Hamilton Fish Sr., of Operation. Freedom, Inc., warned darkly of trouble if Mr. Nixon is prosecuted.
Ham Fish! I remember him from Rachel's Ultra podcase. He was, like, a Nazi or something long before Nixon. Seems like someone else needed to be held accountable, if he was still "a voice".
(I don't usually remember names very will, but it's hard to forget someone named after 2 of my favorite foods.)
The Cold War was the best thing to happen for American Nazis. Once the government was focused on rooting out commies, everyone who had sympathized with the Nazis got a pass.
"Nixon didn't contest the 1960 election, although he thought he'd been cheated, because he thought it would tear the country apart." That is not true. He filed three lawsuits challenging the vote in Illinois, Texas, and New Jersey. He had to win two out of three. New Jersey found some problems with malfunctioning voting machines in certain precincts, but no intentional malfeasance, with the total number of votes that could possibly have been affected too small to change the outcome. The Texas suit contained no real allegations, just general assertions that Texas elections are always corrupt especially when Lyndon Johnson is on the ballot; Texas judges were, shall we say, unsympathetic to the argument. So the case of Illinois, where some genuine crookedness is indeed believed to have occurred, was dropped since it wouldn't affect the final result.The myth that Nixon graciously conceded in order to spare us the trauma was, of course, invented by Nixon in a late-life memoir.
Now if it was Harrison Ford who was President, he would have told Nixon to get off his plane, then kicked him off Sparta style.
Missed opportunity, also would have answered the question of another President who faced a difficult decision, President Leslie Nielsen who once was heard remarking "what would President Ford have done?" while standing in front of a life sized portrait of the former President.
Months after Nixon's resignation and pardon, he spent time in the hospital for phlebitis. (Though it has been suggested later that Nixon had actually suffered a mental breakdown, and his chronic phlebitis was a cover.) At the time, a comedian (I don't remember who) said that he was actually in the hospital for treatment of gonorrhea.
"Because when you screw over 200 million people, you're bound to catch something!"
At least Nixon never tried to run for president again. Of course the 22nd Amendment says he wasn't supposed to, but TFG got elected twice as he says himself and it isn't holding him back, so no imagination from Tricky Dick. Very low-energy.
Didn't love her enough to buy her a fur coat with the slush fund money he had back in the 1950s, but at least she had "a good Republican cloth coat."
So, imagine if you will, that Trump resigned at the time of his first impeachment, stepping down in order to, oh, save the nation from the division that would come from an impeachment battle. (yeah, I know, but just imagine...)
Where would the country be now? Pence would have become president.
Pence probably would have behaved like most world leaders through the early pandemic, making some mistakes but behaving more or less like an actual president. Mask deniers and so on would have of course still existed, but not been as strong, nor gone as crazy, without encouragement from the oval office. In general, the US would still be a deeply divided country, but I'd say the level of absolute lunacy would be half what it is now.
But instead Trump doubled down, showed his flabby ass to the world, and here we are.
Money and age does it to so many people. Get rich, get older and start spending all of your time with other rich people, and the corruption starts. Kinda like one rotten apple in the bunch puts big brown gooey spots on all the others.
Banana Seats Rule!
Aside from the law school part (I was backstage warming up for a musical when Nixon resigned), that pretty much perfectly describes my reaction.
I was 9 so my opinions were more a reflection of what the adults around me were saying, and that's not the general attitude I picked up. More along the lines of "the rich and powerful get away with everything."
Ford was on the JFK assassination investigation. And the one leaking stuff too.
Hamilton Fish Jr was a Nazi collaborator, so he has nothing to offer us here.
And Donald Rumsfeld was Witness to how much a person could get away with (Kissinger AND Nixon) and did just what he warned Ford of.
All his anti-communist rhetoric was merely hiding the nationalist fascist leanings. We dodged that bullet luckily.
A voice from far on the political right, Hamilton Fish Sr., of Operation. Freedom, Inc., warned darkly of trouble if Mr. Nixon is prosecuted.
Ham Fish! I remember him from Rachel's Ultra podcase. He was, like, a Nazi or something long before Nixon. Seems like someone else needed to be held accountable, if he was still "a voice".
(I don't usually remember names very will, but it's hard to forget someone named after 2 of my favorite foods.)
The Cold War was the best thing to happen for American Nazis. Once the government was focused on rooting out commies, everyone who had sympathized with the Nazis got a pass.
Ford killed his political career and ended any hope for being elected president in his own right by pardoning Nixon.
Something for Meatball and any other republican with presidential ambitions to think about.
"Nixon didn't contest the 1960 election, although he thought he'd been cheated, because he thought it would tear the country apart." That is not true. He filed three lawsuits challenging the vote in Illinois, Texas, and New Jersey. He had to win two out of three. New Jersey found some problems with malfunctioning voting machines in certain precincts, but no intentional malfeasance, with the total number of votes that could possibly have been affected too small to change the outcome. The Texas suit contained no real allegations, just general assertions that Texas elections are always corrupt especially when Lyndon Johnson is on the ballot; Texas judges were, shall we say, unsympathetic to the argument. So the case of Illinois, where some genuine crookedness is indeed believed to have occurred, was dropped since it wouldn't affect the final result.The myth that Nixon graciously conceded in order to spare us the trauma was, of course, invented by Nixon in a late-life memoir.
Now if it was Harrison Ford who was President, he would have told Nixon to get off his plane, then kicked him off Sparta style.
Missed opportunity, also would have answered the question of another President who faced a difficult decision, President Leslie Nielsen who once was heard remarking "what would President Ford have done?" while standing in front of a life sized portrait of the former President.