Ah, the Good Old Days, when crime and corruption at the top were so much simpler and straight forward...just a garden variety illegal cover-up, and some actual cold, hard, ill-gotten cash. Kind of makes me a little misty...
And a general public that wasn't so easily conned into accepting this sort of thing. It's no surprise that the Nixon Administration was the genesis of Roger Ailes' long, depressingly successful odyssey to create the right-wing media ecosystem we have today.
I remember when Trump infamously noted that the difference between him and Nixon was that Nixon gave up, and Trump never would. It was revealing.
Because Nixon, for all his faults, was a normal person. An exceptional person, actually, forged from meager beginnings. He grew up a poor Quaker on a farm. Two of his four brothers died young - one at the age of seven and one at around 24. The latter's illness (from tuberculosis) kept him from moving away from his hometown to attend Harvard on scholarship. In high school he ran for student government. He enlisted in the Navy during WWII even though as a Quaker he could have gotten an easy deferment. He knew hardship and hard work, and had a clear sense of civic duty. Power corrupted him, because in the end he was still human.
Trump is, like many who are raised in wealth, something akin to a sociopath. His entire life has been lacking the normal boundaries, restraints, and challenges that sculpt most people's character. He never performed a drop of public service in life, and at times seems to literally lack comprehension of moral and ethical norms. He is completely without shame or any principle beyond his own self-preservation. This is what makes him so terrifyingly unique.
Yeah, unlike DFn'T, Tricky Dick wasn't completely rotten to the core. Whatever his motivation for doing so, he did do the right thing in the end. And though I recall hearing he had some issue about his taxes, I don't think he was exactly lining his pockets while in office.
Ah, the Good Old Days, when crime and corruption at the top were so much simpler and straight forward...just a garden variety illegal cover-up, and some actual cold, hard, ill-gotten cash. Kind of makes me a little misty...
And a general public that wasn't so easily conned into accepting this sort of thing. It's no surprise that the Nixon Administration was the genesis of Roger Ailes' long, depressingly successful odyssey to create the right-wing media ecosystem we have today.
I remember when Trump infamously noted that the difference between him and Nixon was that Nixon gave up, and Trump never would. It was revealing.
Because Nixon, for all his faults, was a normal person. An exceptional person, actually, forged from meager beginnings. He grew up a poor Quaker on a farm. Two of his four brothers died young - one at the age of seven and one at around 24. The latter's illness (from tuberculosis) kept him from moving away from his hometown to attend Harvard on scholarship. In high school he ran for student government. He enlisted in the Navy during WWII even though as a Quaker he could have gotten an easy deferment. He knew hardship and hard work, and had a clear sense of civic duty. Power corrupted him, because in the end he was still human.
Trump is, like many who are raised in wealth, something akin to a sociopath. His entire life has been lacking the normal boundaries, restraints, and challenges that sculpt most people's character. He never performed a drop of public service in life, and at times seems to literally lack comprehension of moral and ethical norms. He is completely without shame or any principle beyond his own self-preservation. This is what makes him so terrifyingly unique.
Yeah, unlike DFn'T, Tricky Dick wasn't completely rotten to the core. Whatever his motivation for doing so, he did do the right thing in the end. And though I recall hearing he had some issue about his taxes, I don't think he was exactly lining his pockets while in office.
Congrats on that review, btw.