Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward collaborate once again in the Post -- in an article that pulls together all that we now know about President Nixon. As their headline points out, Richard Nixon was "far worse than we thought."
In the course of his five-and-a-half-year presidency, beginning in 1969, Nixon launched and managed five successive and overlapping wars — against the anti-Vietnam War movement, the news media, the Democrats, the justice system and, finally, against history itself. All reflected a mind-set and a pattern of behavior that were uniquely and pervasively Nixon’s: a willingness to disregard the law for political advantage, and a quest for dirt and secrets about his opponents as an organizing principle of his presidency.
Long before the Watergate break-in, gumshoeing, burglary, wiretapping and political sabotage had become a way of life in the Nixon White House. ...Woodward and Bernstein, WaPo
Nixon may have started it. But each subsequent Republican president and the Republican party as a whole have emulated Nixon's behaviors, making things even worse. I don't think even the most cynical among us thought, in 1975, that Nixon was and would continue to be very representative of his entire party.
America is paying a heavy price for their politics.
