TO RICHARD NIXON - A BELATED APOLOGY
TO RICHARD NIXON - A BELATED APOLOGY
by
Ken Eliasberg
For six weeks in May and June I had the good fortune to attend a seminar on America’s role in the world. It was sponsored by the Richard Nixon Library, facilitated by Bruce Herschensohn, and populated by an exceptional group of bright, involved, and interesting people. Thanks to the aforementioned, I learned a great deal—Bruce Herschensohn is a man of uncommon decency and great erudition who makes both commodities available in great abundance; the group, a bunch of warm and concerned people were liberal in their participation; and the Library was most hospitable. For 6 Saturdays this combination filled my mind with information and my psyche with nourishment. I learned a great deal about what’s happening in the world, but, most of all, I learned 2 other very important things: (1) That Richard Nixon was much more than the sum of his failings, and (2) that I, like history, had never given him his due. As a consequence, I feel compelled to share this bit of enlightenment with my readers—not so much as a mea culpa (which I do not hesitate to provide; I was not fair in my assessment of Nixon—even after I became a conservative), but more as an effort to in some way share my newly acquired sentiments with those whose biases may reflect those that I previously held.
In taking a second look at Nixon it is not my intention to sweep Watergate under the carpet or minimize its seriousness; rather it is an effort to suggest that a more historically balanced view of the man might be appropriate. Watergate was stupid and incredibly damaging. It was stupid for any number of reasons. First, it was unnecessary to the point of being ridiculous. McGovern challenging Nixon was like a flea crawling up an elephant’s leg with rape on his mind. The country would not then, nor would it now, tolerate someone as far left as George McGovern. Ergo, why assume such a dangerous risk? Second, even if McGovern were a serious challenger, how could you justify a criminal undertaking of this nature? Finally, once the fat was in the fire, why not make a clean breast of it instead of engaging in the cover-up, which, like most cover-ups, did him in.? That is, come out and say that it happened on my watch, I’m responsible, and I shall take every step to uncover those responsible and see that they are dealt with appropriately. He would have taken a hit for a week, maybe a month, and then the whole thing would have blown over. And, even if he did not authorize the “third-rate burglary,” and I don’t believe that he did (he was much too smart to authorize such an undertaking), he was responsible. Something in his management style must have given those in charge of the burglary the impression that Nixon would not condemn that sort of behavior. So, no matter how you look at it, Nixon would have to take some heat. However, that heat would have been far less incinerating had he just come out and copped to it. (Clinton, on the other hand, could not have gotten off so easily, i.e. he could not very well argue that he was not responsible—that it was someone else’s semen on that young lady’s dress). Moreover, Dick Morris, who polled the country on his conduct—Clinton didn’t go to the bathroom without first conducting a poll—advised him that the country would not be particularly tolerant of a president being fellated in the Oval office by a 21-year old intern, to which he responded that I guess “we’ll just have to win” ).
It was incredibly damaging - to Nixon, to the office of the Presidency, and to the country at large. To Nixon, for obvious reasons, i.e he became the first—indeed, the only - president to resign from office. To the office of the presidency which was considerably diminished in stature by virtue of both the conduct and the cover-up. And to the country at large whose people lost a great deal of confidence in the executive branch of government (which was restored by Reagan and then degraded by Clinton).
That said, Watergate notwithstanding, Richard Nixon deserves much better treatment than he is presently being accorded by historians (admittedly, a group that, by their nature, is not favorably inclined to Republican presidents). Why? Because he did some significant things—particularly in the foreign policy arena. What did he do? He opened up China, he dealt appropriately with Taiwan (unlike his Democratic successor—Carter), and he saved the State of Isreal, whose prime minister—Golda Meir—openly acknowledged that without Nixon’s support Isreal might never have survived the 1973 Yom Kippur war. In addition, he demonstrated a commanding understanding of foreign policy, in general and the appropriate course to follow in the Cold War in particular. Had Nixon not been pressured by the vicissitudes of Watergate to resign, I believe that the Vietnam war might have been resolved in a manner that would have been much less costly to the U.S., to Vietnam, to Cambodia, and to the region, in general. Domestically, he had to deal with a recession and several other problems, but, on the whole, Nixon was much more liberal than his liberal critics give him credit for (although, as a conservative, I am inclined to a different approach).
My mea culpa, if you will, is based on 2 considerations—(1) I really never knew the man on a personal level, and my views were heavily influenced by a press that was violently opposed to Nixon, and (2) the input I received from people whom I respect that did know Nixon up close and personal—and they speak of him not just with admiration and respect, but with incredible affection for a very caring human being. On that basis, I was convinced that I needed to take another look at Richard Nixon (and share the re-examination process with you).
In this regard, I found Ben Stein’s online column in the American Spectator, shortly after the “deep throat” revelation, to be quite illuminating. In commenting on the Mark Felt revelation, Stein had this to say (on 6/1/2005) about Nixon:
Can anyone even remember now what Nixon did that was so terrible? He ended the war in Vietnam,
brought home the POW’s, ended the war in the Mideast, opened relations with China, started the first nuclear weapons reduction treaty, saved Eretz Isreal’s life, started the Environmental Protection Agency. Does anyone remember what he did that was bad?
Oh, now I remember. He lied. He was a politician who lied. How remarkable. He lied to protect his
subordinates who were covering up a ridiculous burglary that no one to this date has any clue about
its purpose. He lied so he could stay in office and keep his agenda of peace going. That was his
crime. He was a peacemaker and wanted to make a world where there was a generation of peace. And
he succeeded.
This is his legacy. He was a peacemaker. He was a lying, conniving, covering up peacemaker.
He was not a lying drug addict like JFK, a lying conniving war starter like LBJ, a lying conniving
seducer like Clinton—a lying conniving peacemaker. That is Nixon’s kharma.
While Stein’s statement sounds more like a eulogy or an excuse, rather than an explanation, there is much truth in what he says—enough to justify a more historically balanced approach to an assessment of Richard Nixon. And that is the point of this column—it is not to praise Nixon; rather it is to bury him on terms much more appropriate to a decent man who “made” a mistake rather than one who “was” himself a mistake. I believe that Americans deserve a much more balanced and fair view of any president. And, in my judgment, there was much more to Richard Nixon than just Watergate. Or, viewed in another light, Richard Nixon may be the entirety of Watergate, but Watergate is not the entirety of Richard Nixon.