The Strange Arc

Why do some still hate Nixon so much? For the life of me I can't fathom it! Hmmm. Guess they are jealous guardians of the fourth estate's most treasured myth. Ah yes. Brave ink stained Davids of liberty against the Goliath that was Darth Nixon. Well, a myth with that many factual errors would require vigilant guardians.

In domestic policy, Nixon should be revered by Liberals. EITC was a Nixon idea, and it's pure socialist income redistribution. He was a champion of COLA for Social Security, and OSHA too. EPA was a Nixon initiative. In legislation Nixon was second only to TR as the most Liberal Republican Pres of the 20th century. But ol' Dick's spot is still secure in the Liberal Boogeyman Hall of Fame.

Well, they hate him because of the Southern strategy. They blame Dick for taking the South off the Dem electoral college map.

Foreign policy though. Wow! Nixon for all his personal demons was the most brilliant modern President in that arena. Henry, then and now is free to cast his spell on the cheap seats, but I know better. For all his talents, Henry was mostly executing Nixon's sweeping vision. I've sat rapt for two hours at a time, listening to the aged Nixon opining on geopolitics. That man had a very frail ego (there's something you know nothing about Dave!) and Watergate was direct hit on his Achilles' heel. But he was an astounding intellect about geopolitics.

And didn't Dick work so diligently to rehab his reputation? Any person should admire the effort. But Watergate's the phrase that pays. Politics is a contact sport. No quarter asked and none given, except by morons. Politics is "Grosse Pointe minute" every waking hour at that level.

It's absurd a bunch of zealots would do espionage against the McGovern campaign.(DO NOT GET INTO WHY McGOVERN LOST DAVE! You're running long, and it's off topic.)A ham sandwich could've beat McGovern, simply by buying him all the air time he wanted. But the zealots did what they did, Nixon sought to protect their bosses, and so history happened.

Hey! That's damned funny! Never thought about it before? Nixon was taken down by the tape with a gap in it. I wonder if you played that tape backwards would it say something about Paul McCartney being dead...No not that Dave! The other thing?

Oh yeah! Look, "Fortunate Son" is a strong contender, as are some other tunes from that era. But "Alice's Restaurant" is the long rider among VietNam protest songs. This probably because it has a sense of humor. That song is exactly 18.5 minutes in length. The gap on the tape that lost Dick his job, also exactly 18.5 minutes.

So what Nixon should've done is replace the awkward silence with the dulcet ragtime stylings of Arlo Guthrie!

Transcript would've been something like....

Nixon: "And those Jew boys over at the Washington Post? They think they're so smart, well let's get the IRS on those bastards and see how they like that"...crackle, buzz..."You can get anything you want at Alice's Restaurant."

Bet Senator Ervin would've loved that! And it could've been easily explained in that Pat was going to an Arlo concert, and she needed a tape. Well, you know how girls are!

Sherman! Mr. Peabody! To the Wayback machine!