Does he deserve all the shit modern academia gives him? Was he really that bad other than Watergate?

...

Watergate was an unmitigated disaster. An abject embarrassment for Nixon and the country. It utterly changed the relationship between the White House and the Press from then on.

Kissinger was brilliant though.

Most modern teachers and professors I meet try to highlight the good sides of Nixon before getting down to the big scandal. I'm pretty sure most kids before highschool have a perception of Nixon as a huge asshole through word of mouth, and from what I remember talking to students and my own experiences in history classes after going through education they learn about his diplomatic feats and such.

One particular point of view I remember fondly is how I had a discussion with a highschool economics teacher that told her class the ramifications of a reality in which Nixon would refuse to resign as President and be taken to court over impeachment. In a way, he kinda did America a favor by stepping down, handling the situation in a totally different light than say Clinton.

Is it true that Nixon had one of his campaign aids sabotage the 1968 Paris Peace talks conference in order to win the election on the basis of ending the Vietnam war or is that just an Alex Jones-tier conspiracy theory pile of horseshit?

>Was he really that bad other than Watergate?
Nah. In fact, Nixon is probably the second best President of the 20th century barring Watergate. Kissinger's policy regarding Latin America was kind of a disaster and there's still ill will from LATAM toward us because of it, but it's completely understandable given the circumstances.

Conspiracy. There's no actual evidence for this, only conjecture which doesn't make sense considering Nixon was far harder on Vietnam than Humphrey would have been.

He screwed everything up with his policy on drugs and guns.

Kissinger is a war criminal zionist.

Watergate was a creation of the Jewish media.

Kissinger was a Zionist Jew who caused the death of tens of thousands of American young men and millions of Vietnamese.

That was LBJ. Who decided to go full retard in Vietnam for some unknown reason.

Kissinger was a shit. A devil. Still is.

For his dick.

>Kissinger was a Zionist Jew
kek

Not that I agree with him on many issues, but objectively, if Nixon were a politician today and he only stooped as low as he did back tin the day, he'd be seen only slightly below a saint.
Corruption and scandals used to be a big deal back then. Today it's expected. People don't even bat an eye at shit twice as bad as Watergate anymore.

>Corruption and scandals used to be a big deal back then
Not really. Kennedy got away with voter fraud because his brother stuffed the FBI investigation. Nixon is closer to the exception than the rule when it came to Presidential scandals.

I know this sounds silly desu, but I liked how Nixon was portrayed in Mad Men. Especially in comparison to Don Draper.

It's depressing that Nixon's accomplishments are overshadowed by Watergate. I almost find it suspicious that in most cirriculum, Nixon is demonized but LBJ gets a free pass.

If anything, LBJ is glorified for the CRA. I didn't know how corrupt that motherfucker was until I went back and did some research. I honestly believe he had something to do with the JFK assassination.

>I know this sounds silly desu, but I liked how Nixon was portrayed in Mad Men
I don't remember him being portrayed at all outside of the first season when he loses the election to Kennedy.

He was a paranoid dude that did petty shit to his political opponents.

Only reason we even have Nixon tapes is because he himself ordered bugs and microphones installed in the white house.

>being so insecure that you go after TV talkshow hosts
>It's on your own fucking tape recordings

Watergate happened because his staff was preparing some fall guys who decided they weren't gonna bite the bullet

Civil Rights Act was a basically a Get Out of Jail Free card for LBJ.

Try and criticize him, you'd probably be labeled a racist and ostracized by a lot of people.

I was taught that he's one of the 3 most important presidents of the last century.

FDR b/c Keynesianism

LBJ b/c of the great society

Nixon b/c he opened up China

Redpill on LBJ corruption? What makes you say he may have had a hand in the JFK assassination?

That's just plain bullshit though. There were the same amount, if not more political scandals back then due to how limited media coverage was. There was no "investigative journalism" when it came to the White House before Nixon

Before JFK was assassinated, there was a newspaper (the Washington Post if I remember right) that was going to come out with this huge exposé on corruption and bribery leading back to the Vice President's office. The scandal would have ruined LBJ, and there was already rumors that he would have been dropped from the ticket in '64. That would have been huge.

Nixon, on the other hand, made the mistake of recording everything in the White House and being caught in a criminal conspiracy to obstruct justice. But the only reason he was, and the "Smoking Gun" tape was released so quickly, was because of H. Mark Felt (aka Deepthroat), the associate director of the FBI.

Felt was the guy behind Hoover and Tolson, and was something of like a golden boy. He ran point on most of Hoover's intelligence gathering schemes. When Hoover died, Tolson stepped aside, and Felt believed he should be made Director. He wasn't. Every president since FDR had tried to get rid of Hoover, and Nixon was lucky to have the man drop dead during his term. Nixon wanted what every single president before him wanted - break the power of the FBI and bring in an outsider.

Felt didn't pass along personal knowledge of the Nixon White House. He passed along systemic spying, information that he should NEVER have had in the first place. Or, in another way: the associate director of the FBI purposefully leaked information that had been collected through unauthorized surveillance to a press more than willing to bring down the country's president. All because he didn't get the job he felt he deserved.

The only reason the investigation got anywhere was because Felt told them where to look, what to ask, exactly what to do.

Nixon, while a bastard in some regards, didn't deserve the shit that he got in the history books

Probably one of the greatest Presidents of the 20th century. Paranoid and driven by personal agendas, true, but he was not the only president to have such traits. He was an incredible statesman, a master political manager, and very good at reading people. He got a lot of shit done. There's a reason that Deng Xiaoping told Jimmy Carter that if Nixon was not invited to the White House that he would leave Washington and go see Nixon in California.

Honestly I don't think Watergate should be a particularly dark mark on his record. Not a flattering one, for certain, but I think his greatest failing was presiding over the withdrawal from Vietnam and leaving the South Vietnamese to their fates after the US had committed to an alliance with their government. Not that that can really even be blamed on Nixon though; the public was against the war at that point, and not unjustifiably so.

Nixon apologists are terrible. The China episode doesn't really land, does it? Kinda feels like anyone in lapels could have done the same?

And Reagan beat the Russia.

No he didn't, the Soviet Union was on its last legs when Reagan came to power. Massive internal dissent in the European bloc states, split between political and military command, collapse of the command economy model, and disastrous conflict in Afghanistan sealed the Union's fate, not because Reagan adopted the Jew Friedman's retarded neoliberal economic policies, which have put our economy in the shitter today.

He prolonged a war so he could get re elected, and he fucked America with the war on drugs.

user from the first quoted post. Good point, I forgot the War on Drugs. That was definitely one of his shittier calls.

>Kissinger
>Zionist
good one

So let me get this straight. The Jewish media lies about Nixon to get his administration (including Kissinger) out of the White House even though Kissinger was a Zionist Jew?

Are there any particularly compelling books on any of the post-WWII American presidents/candidates? I'm quite interested in Nixon and Goldwater (don't ask me why, I don't really know) -- are they interesting? are there any good books on them?

He accepted shit-loads of money to pass legislation when he was in the Senate.

Bobby Kennedy as AG was about to launch an investigation into those allegations when JFK was assassinated.