"Blame Gerald Ford"

"Over the past few weeks, Donald Trump has exposed the flimsiness of American institutions. Pressure-tested by his audacious assault on the civil services, those institutions instantly folded. But when a bridge tumbles into a river, the rivets and bolts don’t suddenly fail. They erode over generations. This is what happened in Washington: The unfettered power of the president kept expanding, Congress entered a state of sclerosis, the parties became apologists for their leaders, and courts fell into the hands of ideologues."

Franklin Foer at The Atlantic writes that the "road to Trump begins, in some moral sense, with the absolution of Nixon."

"The Earliest Neoconservative"

"Banfield did not abandon altogether the possibility of policy interventions, although it’s true he thought policymakers' room to maneuver was severely constrained. Likewise, Kristol remarked in his 1985 retrospective that 'the failure (or at least non-success) of so much of social policy in the past twenty years can be exaggerated. Not every program failed and there are a few important ones that represent positive achievements.' Indeed, 'The Public Interest has always emphasized the modestly positive along with the skeptical.' Yet on the right writ large there has been a clear decline from skepticism toward nihilism—toward a belief that policy interventions fail so often and character is so intractable that it is almost never worth it to attempt to solve social problems through policy."

Joshua Tait at The Bulwark recalls political scientist Edward C. Banfield.

And David Klion at The Nation looks at varying definitions of "neoconservatism."

"A Better Ex-President Than President"

"Businessman, Navy officer, evangelist, politician, negotiator, author, woodworker, citizen of the world--Carter forged a path that still challenges political assumptions and stands out among the 45 men who reached the nation's highest office. The 39th president leveraged his ambition with a keen intellect, deep religious faith and prodigious work ethic, conducting diplomatic missions into his 80s and building houses for the poor well into his 90s."

Bill Barrow of the Associated Press reports the death of former U.S. president Jimmy Carter.

Jos Joseph at The Hill writes that "Jimmy Carter was the Christian most politicians pretend to be."

Lindsay M. Chervinsky at The Bulwark adds that "Jimmy Carter redefined his legacy after his presidency."

But Jonathan Schlefer at The Nation contends that by "[t]urning sharply toward neoliberalism (before that term was commonplace) and weaponizing markets, [Carter] set the US economy on its path toward lousy working-class wages and steeper financial crises."

"How Did Trump Get Away With It When Nixon Didn't?"

"Trump also bent administration rules to obtain a top security clearance for his son-in-law, who served as his unofficial secretary of state and went on to negotiate for himself a highly unusual $2 billion investment deal with Saudi state funds just months after the administration ended. Any one of these incidents would have been an administration-shaking event in the 1970s or '80s, even in the '90s or early 2000s. The old rules were sloughed off in the 2010s, and by the 2020s were barely remembered."

David Frum at The Atlantic marks the 50th anniversary of Richard Nixon's resignation.

"If the Turmoil Continues, History Suggests That It Will Be Another Significant Burden on Biden's Fight for a Second Term"

"Most media retrospectives of the 1960s celebrate the marchers, the protests, the peace signs along with the compulsory Buffalo Springfield lyrics ('There's something happening here/ But what it is ain't exactly clear'). The reality is those upheavals were an enormous in-kind contribution to the political fortunes of the right. And if history comes even close to repeating itself, then the latest episode will redound to Donald Trump's benefit."

Jeff Greenfield at Politico warns that the current student protests may lead to voter backlash.

Jill Filipovic at Slate writes that "the actual violence that has now played out at some protests makes clear that there is indeed a difference between emotional harms and physical ones."

And Frank Furedi at Spiked argues that the protests have been products of "safetyism" and "therapy culture."

"So It Goes"

"At the very least, we can learn from Kissinger, who unhesitatingly supported Gulf War One and Gulf War Two, and every war between and since, that the two defining concepts of United States foreign policy—realism and idealism—aren't necessarily opposing values; rather, they reinforce each other. Idealism gets us into the quagmire of the moment; realism keeps us there while promising to get us out; and then idealism returns anew both to justify the realism and to overcome it in the next round."

Greg Grandin at The Nation provides "A People's Obituary of Henry Kissinger."

"The Week That Changed the World"?

"That opening paved the way for President J[immy] C[arter] to strip Taiwan (as the Republic of China) of U.S. diplomatic recognition in January 1979 and switch ties to the PRC. That allowed U.S. investors and manufacturers to take advantage of the economic liberalization within Chinese paramount leader D[eng] X[iaoping]'s 'reform and opening' policy that helped transform China from impoverished backwater to the economic powerhouse—and increasingly, the U.S. military rival—that it is today."

Phelim Kine at Politico tries to "parse the lessons of the 50th anniversary of President R[ichard] N[ixon]'s historic trip to China."

And at The Bulwark, Mona Charen adds that "The Verdict Is In: Trump Wasn't Right About China."

"Can We Have Come Full Circle?"

"Nixon announced his Family Assistance Plan in August, 1969 and fought for over two years for it, with limp liberal interest since it was, after all, Richard Nixon. More crucially there was conservative resistance in the GOP. California Gov. Ronald Reagan used 'FAP' to peel away Republicans from Richard Nixon. Reagan led the GOP move away from Nixon’s cash for the poor approach and toward the 1990s welfare 'reform.'"

John Roy Price at The Hill wonders if a revival is possible for Richard Nixon's Family Assistance Plan.

"As Recent Events Have Borne Out, the Federal Government Often Underreacts to Perceived Security Threats From the Right and Overreacts to Those Coming From the Left"

"Fifty years on, it seems remarkable how fast the 1971 attack faded from collective memory, even as it exercised a profound effect on the end of an era of political activism that would be unrivaled until the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020. The bombing supercharged Nixon's paranoia, leading the president and his aides to ramp up their crackdown on the New Left. They ordered the biggest, and most unconstitutional, mass arrests in U.S. history during the Mayday protests, rounding up more than 12,000 people. And then weeks later, the White House launched illegal measures to discredit Daniel Ellsberg, leaker of the Pentagon Papers. On Labor Day weekend, Krogh dispatched operatives to break into the office of Ellsberg's former psychiatrist in Beverly Hills, searching for compromising material. Nixon's men were field-testing the tactics they'd soon be caught using against their political opponents in the 1972 election. Thus, you can draw a line, if a dotted one, from the bombing to the demise of Richard Nixon in 1974. Donald Trump, meanwhile, still awaits the consequences of the Jan. 6 attack."

Lawrence Roberts at Politico tells the story of the bombing of the U.S. Capitol by the Weather Underground.

"If Trump's Presidency Can Be Said to Have a Defining Quality, It Might Well Be Chaos Itself"

"But much more importantly, for many Americans—especially in Trump's base—this rule-breaking was the whole point. Trump famously said in 2016 that his admirers would stick with him if he shot someone on Fifth Avenue, and it's true that his patina of scandal-repellent Teflon would make even Ronald Reagan envious. Certainly, the polarized partisanship of Washington today explains the unwillingness of so many of his fellow Republicans to cross their own voters and break with Trump; had he come to power in 1974, he probably would have been sent packing as Nixon was. But beneath it all was, for many, a true loyalty to the man, an admiration of his style, and, ultimately, a good deal of contempt for civility and decency, transparency and expertise, constitutionality and democracy. Trump may now be headed for Mar-a-Lago—no small thing—but that contempt remains. Nearly two-thirds of Republican voters, even after January 6, say Trump acted responsibly after losing the election to Biden."

At Politico, David Greenberg asks, "What Will Trump's Presidency Mean to History?"

Zack Stanton asks David Blight if "Trumpism Is Becoming America's New 'Lost Cause.'"

And Hope Yen, Christopher Rugaber, and Calvin Woodward at the Associated Press fact check Trump's final speech as president.

"Neither Carrots nor Sticks Have Swayed China as Predicted"

"Nearly half a century since Nixon's first steps toward rapprochement, the record is increasingly clear that Washington once again put too much faith in its power to shape China's trajectory. All sides of the policy debate erred: free traders and financiers who foresaw inevitable and increasing openness in China, integrationists who argued that Beijing's ambitions would be tamed by greater interaction with the international community, and hawks who believed that China's power would be abated by perpetual American primacy."

In a 2018 Foreign Affairs article, Kurt M. Campbell and Ely Ratner write that since World War II "Chinese realities upset American expectations."

"What the Republican Party Has Done Over the Last Two Months Is Akin to Having Dropped Polonium Into America's Political Groundwater"

"Nothing can get better in American politics until this lie is repudiated by the main body of the Republican party in the public square, with enough force and repetition that the majority of Republican voters cease to believe it." 

At The Bulwark, Jonathan V. Last writes that "[t]he root of the entire conflict we are seeing is a single lie: That Donald Trump won the election."

Jeff Greenfield offers the Republican Party "the opportunity to becalm the troubled waters."

And Thomas J. Balcerski writes that "Trump, like Buchanan and to an extent Nixon before him, can and should be made persona non grata in Washington."

"The Time Nixon's Cronies Tried to Overturn a Presidential Election"

"Donald Trump is fanning fears that if he loses the presidential election in November, he'll try to discredit the vote totals as fraudulent and won’t concede the race. Doing so would amount to a dramatic break from historical precedent, as commentators are noting. But not all of them are getting their history right. Al Gore, we're reminded, accepted defeat in 2000, despite reason to believe he should have won Florida, and Richard Nixon, we're told, declined to challenge John F. Kennedy's razor-thin victory in 1960.                                                                "The part about Gore is true. But Nixon did no such thing." 

David Greenberg at Politico explains the aftermath of the 1960 presidential election.

"The Most Appealing Message From a Candidate Was Neither an Authoritarian Crackdown nor Universal Tolerance for Protesters"

"He took some heat for this. The New York Times editorial board chastised him for moving to the right. Ronald Reagan and Nixon each noted that he was sounding more like them (although their speeches somehow left out the part where RFK talked about endemic poverty and a massive jobs program). But reporters began to notice an odd phenomenon: The same audiences who spoke about cracking down on demonstrators and who expressed admiration for Wallace also said they were considering voting for Kennedy.
"Why? Because, the answer came back, 'He’s tough. He put crooks in jail.'"

Jeff Greenfield at Politico writes about "Robert Kennedy's Lesson on Political Violence That Joe Biden Needs to Learn."

"The Problem for Trump Is He Has Yet to Find His Willie Horton"

"'He spent eight years as vice president and the solid Reaganites were always suspicious of Bush 41 for not being conservative enough. And he endured a lot of lousy press coverage that was a caricature of him.'
"'The turning point was the convention,' Grissom said. 'That was our reintroduction of Bush and our first real opportunity to define him without filters. People saw him through the convention, the convention speech. "No new taxes." "Kinder, gentler."'"

Adam Nagourney at The New York Times writes that "Republicans are looking back at the 1988 race as a beacon of hope in a bleak political landscape."

German Lopez at Vox writes about Donald Trump's embrace of Richard Nixon's "Law & Order" politics.

And Jeff Greenfield at Politico calls the 1996 election "the least suspenseful, least intriguing, least consequential election of my lifetime, your lifetime, anybody’s lifetime."

"Many Secrets. No Mysteries"

"Although crucial details remain concealed, the core narrative has been visible from the start. An American private citizen worked with foreign spies to damage one presidential candidate and help the other. That president accepted the help. When caught, the private citizen lied. When the private citizen was punished, the president commuted his sentence."

David Frum at The Atlantic calls Donald Trump's commutation of Roger Stone's prison sentence "One of the Greatest Scandals in American History."

And William Kristol at The Bulwark writes that "Trump has gone further than Nixon ever did."

"A Shocking and Seminal Event"

"That division was made all too clear as hundreds of anti-war protesters marched through New York City four days after Kent State. A large group of construction workers taunted them as anti-American and then attacked with crowbars in what became known as 'The Hardhat Riot'. Dozens were injured but President Richard Nixon understood the political advantage of siding with blue collar workers against students he called 'bums'."

Fifty years later, Chris McGreal at The Guardian writes that "the Kent State massacre marked the start of America's polarization."

"One of the Best-Kept Secrets of Recent U.S. History"

"Lee Harvey Oswald killed Kennedy before the President's medical ailments could. But the evidence suggests that Kennedy's physical condition contributed to his demise. On November 22, 1963, Kennedy was, as always, wearing a corsetlike back brace as he rode through Dallas. Oswald's first bullet struck him in the back of the neck. Were it not for the back brace, which held him erect, the second, fatal shot to the head might not have found its mark."

In a 2002 Atlantic article, Robert Dallek writes about John Kennedy's health problems.

"More an End Than a Beginning"

"After les évènements in France in May came June's parliamentary elections, sweeping General De Gaulle's rightist party to power in a landslide victory. After the Prague Spring and the promise of 'socialism with a human face,' the tanks of the Soviet-run Warsaw Pact overran Czechoslovakia. In Latin America, the Guevarist guerrilla trend was everywhere repulsed, to the benefit of the right. In the US, the 'silent majority' roared. As the divided Democratic Party lay in ruins, Richard Nixon's Southern strategy turned the Party of Lincoln into the heir to the Confederacy. As the right consolidated around an alliance of Christian evangelicals, racial backlashers, and plutocrats, the left was unable, or unwilling, to fuse its disparate sectors. The left was maladroit at achieving political power; it wasn't even sure that was its goal."

At The New York Review of Books, Todd Gitlin remembers 1968.

"Those Old Rules and Expectations Simply Do Not Apply"

"What these Republicans care about is prevailing against their opponents, period. Accusing these GOP voters of double standards is beside the point. It's true that if any Democratic president had been accused of even one-tenth of the charges swirling around Trump, Republicans would be calling for blood. But what does it prove to point this out? That Republicans are hypocrites? Sure they are. Proudly. They hate it when their enemies break norms and laws, and they love it when their teammates do the same thing. That's the mindset of someone willing to fight dirty."

Damon Linker at The Week explains Republican support for Donald Trump.

And Andrew Levison at Washington Monthly gets into "What Democrats Still Don't Get About Winning Back the White Working Class."