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Perhaps this would be better for the history forum, but I still don't understand what exactly Nixon hoped to accomplish with the whole watergate thing.
To cover up, what someone else had done, not knowing it was all a set up to remove him from office. Had he not got involved in the cover up, he would have skated free of accusation.
The Deep State.
Trump had Roger Stone and educated Trump what really sunk Nixon. It wasn't the crime, it was the cover up.
There is plenty of evidence. Maybe you didn't study modern history. However I don't think this is the reason that Nixon lost that election.
Nixon looked bad during the Presidential TV Debate. It was the first one in US History an hugely watched. They underestimated the significance of it and got burned enough to lose it to the first Catholic running for President. (A huge negative for Kennedy at that time.) Nixon came off dishonest looking and tired, while Kennedy was young, energetic and most importantly looked good on a camera.
...It was a long, sordid affair. Mr. Nixon had nothing to gain from the break-in (done without his knowledge) or the cover-up, but, as I said, he was very loyal to those that served him.
When O'Brien's office was entered the second time to replace the bugs, Magruder had given special instructions to get a file which contained all of the dirt that the Dems had on the Republican candidate and others. Nixon was heading for an easy victory, and this information - and the break-in itself - was unnecessary. Nixon and those around him were paranoid, though, so no stone was left unturned.
While Nixon had nothing to gain from the break-in, the cover-up was a different story. Once the investigation led to the WH, Nixon's presidency would have been damaged, so he elected to go with the cover-up. The Cubans - and Hunt - would have talked, so the payoffs and promises began. Liddy, OTOH, had told Dean that he would rather go to prison than talk, and he did for just over four years.
Perhaps this would be better for the history forum, but I still don't understand what exactly Nixon hoped to accomplish with the whole watergate thing.
Nixon did many similar things - he even lied about ending the war and took actions some decried as treasonous (when found out decades later) regarding that.
Watergate was just one where he got caught. Then - it was really the cover-up that brought him down. He fired the very people who were charged with investigating his crimes.
Amazingly enough, Trump has done the same types of things (or spoke about them) - that is, firing or threatening to rid himself of anyone in his admin who would investigate the crimes of his family, friends or he himself.
Today people just yawn....it seems.
Anyway, many of Nixon's crimes were about him getting elected or re-elected:
"President Richard Nixon believed that years of aerial bombing in Southeast Asia to pressure North Vietnam achieved “zilch” even as he publicly declared it was effective and ordered more bombing while running for reelection in 1972, according to a handwritten note from Nixon disclosed in a new book by Bob Woodward.
Nixon’s note to Henry Kissinger, then his national security adviser, on Jan. 3, 1972, was written sideways across a top-secret memo updating the president on war developments. Nixon wrote: “K. We have had 10 years of total control of the air in Laos and V.Nam. The result = Zilch. There is something wrong with the strategy or the Air Force.”"
We have this note now....but tricky dick fooled the public who wanted the war to end...
The movie "Nixon" is quite good - maybe it was based on a book (?). He is, no doubt, an interesting person to read about. I'd say he was 60% crook, 20% great POTUS and 20% madman. Of course, the POTUS office being somewhat of a multiple choice test, my 20% isn't saying much......he falls into the bottom rung of POTUSes according to historians....just about tied with GW.
The same rankings currently show Trump at dead last....but he still has time to climb up and just be in the bottom 15% or so.
There is plenty of evidence. Maybe you didn't study modern history. However I don't think this is the reason that Nixon lost that election.
Nixon looked bad during the Presidential TV Debate. It was the first one in US History an hugely watched. They underestimated the significance of it and got burned enough to lose it to the first Catholic running for President. (A huge negative for Kennedy at that time.) Nixon came off dishonest looking and tired, while Kennedy was young, energetic and most importantly looked good on a camera.
According to some accounts, JFK was a regular at the particular doctor who was giving EVERYONE (completely legal, it seems, at the time) so-called "vitamin boosters" which were found to be a mixture of meth, steroids and a bunch of other stuff. He reported had "shots" located at just about everywhere he had to be (sometimes the doc toured along with him, other times he has full needles located at each stop)...
And people say drugs are bad.....well, it sure made JFK and MANY others function day to day.
"Doctor Max Jacobson, whom the Secret Service under President John F. Kennedy code-named “Dr. Feelgood,” developed a unique “energy formula” that altered the paths of some of the twentieth century’s most iconic figures, including President and Jackie Kennedy, Marilyn Monroe, Frank Sinatra, and Elvis. JFK received his first injection (a special mix of “vitamins and hormones,” according to Jacobson) just before his first debate with Vice President Richard Nixon. The shot into JFK’s throat not only cured his laryngitis, but also diminished the pain in his back, allowed him to stand up straighter, and invigorated the tired candidate. Kennedy demolished Nixon in that first debate and turned a tide of skepticism about Kennedy into an audience that appreciated his energy and crispness. What JFK didn’t know then was that the injections were actually powerful doses of a combination of highly addictive liquid methamphetamine and steroids."
There is plenty of evidence. Maybe you didn't study modern history. However I don't think this is the reason that Nixon lost that election.
Nixon looked bad during the Presidential TV Debate. It was the first one in US History an hugely watched. They underestimated the significance of it and got burned enough to lose it to the first Catholic running for President. (A huge negative for Kennedy at that time.) Nixon came off dishonest looking and tired, while Kennedy was young, energetic and most importantly looked good on a camera.
I will note that JFK made use of the 'primary' system for the 1960 race (or, at least, for those states that had a primary), in order to prove to the Democratic Big Wigs that his being Catholic* would not be an impediment to being the Democratic candidate for the Presidency. Indeed, in one primary, dominated by Protestants, Mr. Kennedy handily defeated Hubert Humphrey (who appeared about as Protestant as you may desire).
In other words, Kennedy knew he had to take part in primaries, and win against others, in order to convince those at the convention to nominate him. At the convention he faced LBJ, whom had declined to run in any primary, and so won (with LBJ, of course, being picked as VP to balance the ticket).
Indeed, in 1952, Senator Estes Kefauver of Tennessee (D) ran in 14 primaries, and won 12, to try to convince the National Convention delegates to pick him. It did not work. The Party Bosses picked Mr. Stevenson.
*Looking it up, I see that they were worried about a repeat of the experience of a prior Catholic nominee of 1928, Al Smith.
^I don't remember the details now, but I do believe that Kennedy made some deal with one of the Southern Democrat Bosses that delayed civil rights legislation my several years in order to get their vote.
^I don't remember the details now, but I do believe that Kennedy made some deal with one of the Southern Democrat Bosses that delayed civil rights legislation my several years in order to get their vote.
Kennedy was a strong ally in the Senate of the Southern Dems. When Sammy Davis Jr., who was married to a white woman, offered to help w/ Kennedy's campaign, he was turned down. Probably because Kennedy did not want to risk offending his southern allies. Davis went to the Nixon campaign and offered his help, where he was accepted and embraced.
^I don't remember the details now, but I do believe that Kennedy made some deal with one of the Southern Democrat Bosses that delayed civil rights legislation my several years in order to get their vote.
This may have been...."delay by omission"...
We were in the middle of a bad time in the cold war and many other worldwide problems and every POTUS knew that tackling Civil Rights was going to be the single biggest issue of our time (and maybe of our entire history!).
From what I read, he was obviously "for" civil rights, but was only reluctantly drawn into the fray because he had to send Federal Troops to stop the Confederates from killing black folks. Then he became full involved and actually wrote much of the legislation that became the Civil Rights Bill(s) passed by LBJ.
"From the onset of his term, President John F. Kennedy was relatively silent on the issue of African-American civil rights in the United States, preferring executive action to legislative solutions. He was cautious not to distance the South, marked by substantial segregation and racial discrimination, by infringing upon states' rights.[1] He also wanted to avoid upsetting members of Congress, as he was already struggling to secure its support for most of his New Frontier domestic programs.[2] However, Kennedy's position on civil rights had begun to evolve during the Freedom Rides of 1961, when African-Americans traveled along segregated bus routes in the South. Though he dispatched federal marshals to guard against the racial violence of the events, he publicly stressed that his actions were rooted in legality and not morality. "
We should make no mistake about it. Civil Rights bills and Voting Rights bills were signed by Dem POTUSes. Congress was somewhat Dem leaning during a lot of those years, but became GOP leaning (or 50/50) once LBJ signed Civil Rights legislation. He famously remarked "We just lost the South for a generation".
Little did he know that the hate for human rights and equality was so strong in some places that it is taking 2-3+ generations...maybe more...and is solidly GOP due to this. Under the GOP, both states and Congress have (in general) tried to curtail voting rights.
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