In 1972, the Nixon Administration was seeped in scandal over “Watergate” (the break-in of Democratic Headquarters for the purpose of stealing an election.) Nixon’s famous “I’m not a crook” speech the following year wasn’t about “Watergate”, it was about his taxes. And those whom have listened to Rachel Maddow’s excellent “podcast” (audio book) “Bagman” learned Nixon’s VP Spiro Agnew was forced to resign when it was discovered he had been taking bribes both before & after becoming Vice President. With all these scandals, one might wonder how Nixon could have possibly won reelection in the first place. Yet he did.
2004 saw the rise and fall of John Kerry… a “war hero” who earned two Purple Hearts & a Bronze Star in Vietnam… whom Democrats saw as “undefeatable” and their best hope of beating an unpopular disastrous “draft-dodging” (actually “AWOL” from a cushy stateside appointment for the sons of powerful politicians) president who had ignored warnings of an imminent attack upon the United States and failed to prevent 9/11, only to then use that tragedy to lie us into an unrelated war in the middle-East that we are STILL fighting TODAY because they went in with no exit strategy.
One thing about getting older is it gives you perspective. And though I was in kindergarten when Nixon was forced to resign in disgrace amid scandal in 1974, I remember the 2004 election like it was last year. I remember Democrats “falling in love” with the extremely Progressive platform of Gov. Howard Dean, only to become spooked at the last minute by concerns of “electability” and voting for perceived “sure thing” war hero John Kerry.
With Nixon in ‘72, a significant number of Americans had never even heard of “Watergate” prior to the election and had no idea Nixon himself had been implicated. Republican members of Congress accused “Democrats, the New York Times & The Washington Post” (in that order) of being on “a witch hunt” (Nixon accused the Post of “shoddy journalism”) and “trying to undermine a successful popular president.” Hearings into “Watergate” (revealing numerous crimes amid a scandal-plagued White House) that finally turned the tide against Nixon didn’t actually begin until AFTER Nixon was reelected. Democrats were seen as “in disarray” during the ‘72 race as they fought amongst themselves with no cohesive message as to why Nixon should go.
Bush supporters don “Purple Heart” bandaids at 2004 GOP Convention
With John Kerry in 2004, a panicked GOP went to war on Kerry’s service record… his greatest strength against George W. Bush. A concocted pro-Bush, anti-Kerry group calling themselves “Swift Boat Veterans for Truth” (led by, “Jerome Corsi”, a man who never actually served with Kerry yet claimed Kerry did not deserve his Bronze Star and had not actually earned one of his two Purple Hearts), was all over the airwaves trashing Kerry’s service record, putting Kerry back on his heels. At the 2004 Republican National Committee convention, “troop-loving” Republicans were all smiles as they laughingly applied “Purple Heart Band-Aids” to their faces mocking the injuries that earned Kerry his two medallions, while they rallied around a man who “disappeared” for 16 months from a cushy stateside National Guard appointment his powerful father managed to get him into during Vietnam.
When TV News Magazine “60 Minutes” uncovered documented evidence that the rumors of Bush going AWOL were in fact true, Republicans quickly set about to destroy CBS News, discredit the report and undermine the evidence (as seen in the movie “Truth”.) And while most of the evidence was incontrovertible, their success at calling into question the veracity of a single page of documentation among a hundred pages of evidence is all it took to “discredit” CBS, get Dan Rather fired, and force the network to “apologize” to their viewers in what Bush’s supporters hailed as both “vindication” & “proof” the Media had been on a “witch hunt” against the president using falsified evidence.
And I see both things happening again in the 2020 race against Donald Trump. Once again, a scandal-ridden incumbent president who has no business being reelected attacks the Press as “fake news” while claiming to be the victim of a “witch hunt” and is rabidly defended by members of his own party who simply dismiss all evidence out of hand, while Democrats play defense as they worry about being seen as “playing politics in an election year”, and fail to devise a cohesive message that sticks to a scandal-plagued incompetent president, more concerned about “electability” than rallying around a candidate whose platform excites voters enough to drive them to the polls.
Lessons of 1972 & 2004:
1. There’s no such thing as a “sure thing” candidate. Backed into a corner, there are no depths of criminality & deplorable behavior Republicans won’t sink to to win an election. Republican voters who claim to be “fighting to save the children” as they protest abortion, are perfectly fine with women once again dying in back-alley abortions and locking immigrant children in cages under inhumane conditions that would earn any other presidency a trip to the Hague.
Evangelicals rally around a mindbogglingly hypocritical foul-mouthed thrice-married racist sexist serial adulterer chronically lying billionaire con-man, declaring he was “sent by God” and the persecuted victim of “a failed witch hunt”. There’s no overcoming that degree of delusion/denial. Stop trying.
2. There’s no amount of scandal a Republican incumbent can’t overcome. In 1972, we already knew the Nixon White House was deep in scandal just with “Watergate” alone (Nixon’s tax scandal, Agnew taking bribes, and a secret war in Cambodia didn’t become public until AFTER Nixon was reelected). In 2004, Republicans trashed the service of a decorated veteran to defend a man whose influential daddy got him into a state-side “Champagne Unit” (and even THAT was too much to bother to show up for), only to rush to defend a man who instigated America’s first ever “first strike” war of aggression based on false pretenses while failing to capture the terrorist who actually attacked the United States on 9/11. They have no principles. No honor. They’re uninformed (call education “elitism”) and are proud of it:
Trump supporters proud of their ignorance.
So stop worrying about “electability” and concern yourself more with nominating a candidate who “excites” voters and will draw them to the polls on election day.
(I add one more lesson: The lesson of 1980 when voters elected another Republican president a mere four years after the criminal Nixon/Ford Administrations ended: Voters have extremely short memories.)
