2007-01-06

Reliving the Nixon Years


I have to confess that in a purely abstract way it’s kind of exciting to be reliving the Nixon years. Oh, to be sure, I was too young the first time around to properly appreciate them, so the notion of “reliving” is not quite accurate. But it’s close enough, and the sense is helped all the more by the exhaustive correlations provided by the newsmedia, between Iraq and Vietnam and between Bush’s imperial presidency (or his pretensions to it) and Nixon’s.

But in another way, it’s such a depressing correspondence. The consequences of Nixon’s misrule were also hardly enjoyable: a wrecked economy, a destroyed belief in government as a public thing, or res publica. I can only guess that Bush’s effects will actually be worse. The scary thing is that it is not as if Bush et al. were ignorant of the tired history they are foisting upon us. On the contrary: they want to rewrite that history, only this time come up right. So, this time, the cycle is not farcical--it’s anything but--its rather kind of tragic.

(One plus: this time around, the descent is being not only televised but reported and blogged; never before have we had the opportunity to be such witnesses to such a catastrophe and never before have so many been able to see clearly what is occurring. Organizations and outlets like Think Progress, which is sustained by the Center American Progress Action Fund, merit more than our kudos.)

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