The Don

[Hawk]

Fixed the Nixon description.

Agree on Trump. Everyone wants the straight-talkin' type until it becomes apparent that one needs to build coalitions to get things done. Trump is the current representation of the id in the American politics. I think Rand Paul differs from his father enough that he could build a coalition. Probably not a coalition I would agree with, but a coalition nonetheless.

Nixon was certainly ruthless, but I personally treat that more as a political asset than a character flaw. I tend to discount soft leadership styles. Somebody's got to rule the roost, so to speak.

In that same vein, RE: coalitions, I'm inclined to draw (yet another, this time more loose) parallel to British politics -- specifically the Cameron/Clegg Tory/LibDem government of 2010. Unity looks great on paper until you've got conflict and then suddenly the weaker -- or less aggressive -- ends, and their ideas, are practically banished from a pivotal place in the process. Strictly from a theoretical standpoint I'd advocate for the building of an unassailable majority (Tony Blair's Labour) that allows for unilateral decision making. The ultimate balance is that if the initiatives of a strong majority government fail you are looking at a complete turnover.

Domestically, we saw the 'New Deal' coalition fall apart because the Republicans mounted a fairly streamlined, unified effort that proved too overwhelming for the fractious Democrats. Plus, the country was evolving at an insane pace -- I think we're in a similar state of 'rapid flux' now. Sometimes people gravitate to the staid. I don't know if that time is now, though.

[Hawk]

They don't have Google in your corner of Dumb****istan ?

Runner up:

[The Chosen One]

V for Vendetta is one of my favourite guilty pleasures. That's the sort of Obama government I was hoping for that I was told would come.

[jpx7]

I was hoping for an actual socialist, like the right-wingers like to (falsely) claim Obama's been.

[50PoundHead]

Nixon was certainly ruthless, but I personally treat that more as a political asset than a character flaw. I tend to discount soft leadership styles. Somebody's got to rule the roost, so to speak.

In that same vein, RE: coalitions, I'm inclined to draw (yet another, this time more loose) parallel to British politics -- specifically the Cameron/Clegg Tory/LibDem government of 2010. Unity looks great on paper until you've got conflict and then suddenly the weaker -- or less aggressive -- ends, and their ideas, are practically banished from a pivotal place in the process. Strictly from a theoretical standpoint I'd advocate for the building of an unassailable majority (Tony Blair's Labour) that allows for unilateral decision making. The ultimate balance is that if the initiatives of a strong majority government fail you are looking at a complete turnover.

Domestically, we saw the 'New Deal' coalition fall apart because the Republicans mounted fairly streamlined, unified effort that proved too overwhelming for the fractious Democrats. Plus, the country was evolving at an insane pace -- I think we're in a similar state of 'rapid flux' now. Sometimes people gravitate to the staid. I don't know if that time is now, though.

I've been reading Arthur Schlesinger's The Imperial Presidency again and if you want to see the Constitution flaunted, Nixon was the unapologetic master. Granted, Schlesinger was a liberal who thought the Kennedy's walked on water, but he hammered Truman pretty hard in the book as well.

Nixon was the last truly liberal domestic policy president prior to Obama (who is progressive, but according to Bernie Sanders not progressive enough). Nixon extended a lot of Johnson's Great Society and really ramped up the guns-and-butter approach to government. One of Nixon's big advantages in 1968 is that he had George Wallace running from a strident states' rights position and Nixon seemed reasonable to Middle America by comparison. Humphrey was Johnson's Vice-President and he couldn't get his fingerprints off the Vietnam War, so Nixon's unspecified Plan to End the War looked more promising than more of the same. And Nixon did play the law and order card a lot. I remember an old cartoon from one of the news weeklies back then. Two guys were talking at a party. The one said to the other: "Wallace says 'crack heads.' Nixon says 'crack heads but not too hard.' Humphrey says 'crack heads but not too hard and only if they are asking for it.'" That about summed it up. Nixon could play the middle ground and he did so deftly in 1968.

Carter inherited a mess (and managed to shoot both his legs off trying to make his way around his difficult circumstances) and his presidency did fracture the Democrats and somewhat paved the way for Reagan. Carter actually tried to go to a middle ground on domestic policy and bring a lot of scientific management approaches into the development and implementation of policy (I was grad school at the time and zero-based budgeting became all the rage), which p*ssed off the New Deal coalition without going far enough to gain the embrace of conservatives. Given where we were as a country in the late-1970s, if Reagan hadn't won, he would have to have been invented. I wasn't a fan of the Reagan presidency and there was a gap between his rhetoric and his record (as there is with most folks heroes)--big deficits, Keynesian stimulus with defense spending, overall growth in government spending--but he took the alphabet soup programs of the Great Society and the Nixon administration, reduced the amounts, and sent the money out to states in the form of block grants (really bad policy in the long run in my estimation, but folks were ready for just about anything).

[acesfull86]

They don't have Google in your corner of Dumb****istan ?

...says that guy who relies on memes to make "arguments" he apparently isn't able to make for himself.

[sturg33]

He's the king of making a ridiculous post... and when someone calls him on the validity - he says "you don't have google?"

[acesfull86]

Memes have their place - I like some of them - but like I said they're the bumper sticker of the internet. I'm not going to scour the web to confirm or disprove sources, logic, and arguments when the person posting it was too lazy to show his/her own work in the first place.

[57Brave]

Below is the "meme" I take it you are referring to??


In which case, the source of the information is provided

&

The numbers is the numbers

If you don't understand them or if they confuse you or if you dispute them ------ show numbers that make the opposite point.

I could see your point if I posted "the economy sucks because ABC..."

But there is
a) numbers
b) context
c) a logical conclusion drawn from

a) numbers
b) context
////

If you disagree with the conclusion -- point out why. I might learn something .

[57Brave]

[acesfull86]

Like I said, a bumper sticker. First how to I know those numbers were properly sourced? I can make a meme in 2 minutes, tack "US Dept of Labor" of the bottom, and pass it off as fact. To say "the numbers is the numbers" is to put a lot of faith in an outfit apparently called "occupy Democrats." Yeah, no. Then, what exactly is the point? That rising CEO pay has something to do with the 6 figures pasted above it? The author (much less you) does not offer any proof of causality.

[57Brave]

sure

[Hawk]

[Hawk]

Nixon was the last truly liberal domestic policy president prior to Obama (who is progressive, but according to Bernie Sanders not progressive enough). Nixon extended a lot of Johnson's Great Society and really ramped up the guns-and-butter approach to government. One of Nixon's big advantages in 1968 is that he had George Wallace running from a strident states' rights position and Nixon seemed reasonable to Middle America by comparison. Humphrey was Johnson's Vice-President and he couldn't get his fingerprints off the Vietnam War, so Nixon's unspecified Plan to End the War looked more promising than more of the same. And Nixon did play the law and order card a lot. I remember an old cartoon from one of the news weeklies back then. Two guys were talking at a party. The one said to the other: "Wallace says 'crack heads.' Nixon says 'crack heads but not too hard.' Humphrey says 'crack heads but not too hard and only if they are asking for it.'" That about summed it up. Nixon could play the middle ground and he did so deftly in 1968.

1968 was a tumultuous year. You had the deaths of MLK and Bobby Kennedy, the Tet Offensive, Draft Card burnings en masse, riots on college campuses (birth of the Weathermen Underground), the out of control scene at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago ("The whole world is watching" chant on the bloody streets of Chicago). I think the nation craved order and direction at such a tense time. If you look at various polls taken across the country in 68' an almost overwhelming majority of citizens supported law enforcement, even directly in the face of rising policy brutality and excess. So it's not much of a surprise that Nixon won with Professional/White Collar types, although it is surprising that it he handily took College students. That debunked the myth that the 'youth' were universally opposed to the War, and laid the groundwork for the "Silent Majority" rhetoric that Nixon later championed.

The problem the Democrats had was mostly Vietnam -- but the party also never coalesced around a leader or a central platform. First it was McGovern (who was anti-war by an opportunistic stroke of luck), then it was Robert Kennedy (who really sparked the anti-war movement politically), then Eugene McCarthy (much like McGovern). For some baffling reason the Democrats turned back to Hubert Humphrey who was a) a supportive Veep to the guy who took the country into Vietnam b) not clearly anti-war.

The results of the election were closer than many remember (and certainly in incredibly stark contrast to 1972) -- and I actually see Wallace as having acted as more of a roadblock to Nixon in terms of the polls than a boost as you suggested.

Carter inherited a mess (and managed to shoot both his legs off trying to make his way around his difficult circumstances) and his presidency did fracture the Democrats and somewhat paved the way for Reagan. Carter actually tried to go to a middle ground on domestic policy and bring a lot of scientific management approaches into the development and implementation of policy (I was grad school at the time and zero-based budgeting became all the rage), which p*ssed off the New Deal coalition without going far enough to gain the embrace of conservatives. Given where we were as a country in the late-1970s, if Reagan hadn't won, he would have to have been invented. I wasn't a fan of the Reagan presidency and there was a gap between his rhetoric and his record (as there is with most folks heroes)--big deficits, Keynesian stimulus with defense spending, overall growth in government spending--but he took the alphabet soup programs of the Great Society and the Nixon administration, reduced the amounts, and sent the money out to states in the form of block grants (really bad policy in the long run in my estimation, but folks were ready for just about anything).

I perceive the New Deal coalition as having died in 1968 -- literally on the floor of the DNC, but it's interesting that you still see the influences up through the Carter administration and beyond.

[jpx7]

Like I said, a bumper sticker. First how to I know those numbers were properly sourced? I can make a meme in 2 minutes, tack "US Dept of Labor" of the bottom, and pass it off as fact. To say "the numbers is the numbers" is to put a lot of faith in an outfit apparently called "occupy Democrats." Yeah, no. Then, what exactly is the point? That rising CEO pay has something to do with the 6 figures pasted above it? The author (much less you) does not offer any proof of causality.

I personally think executives are vastly over-compensated, and workers—generally and across industries—are under-compensated.

Nevertheless, I also agree with some of your epistemological concerns regarding infographics. Unfortunately, a lot of people—irrespective of their biases across political spectra—are going to swallow, largely un-ruminated, stats and data couched in spiffy visuals and punctuated with a footnote, however stretched or spurious the actual sourcing might be.

[57Brave]

No one is disputing the claim!! Only the means of raising the topic
Got it.

Now you can go back to discussing the relevancy of "The Donald"

[weso1]

Donald is playing an important piece in this election cycle. I really think this is a wake up call for the GOP. I don't think Trump is getting this support strictly because of his celebrity.

[bravesnumberone]

Quite a week after seeing Chris Christie, Trump and Ricardo Perry all in person. Take this fwiw, but compared to Trump, Christie looks like every Republican's best vision of Ronald Reagan and every Democrat's best vision of the Kennedys. Pretty sad.

[bravesnumberone]

The question I haven't seen answered is who would Trump's running mate be?

Bieber?

Snoop?

A big mound of money?

[The Chosen One]

The question I haven't seen answered is who would Trump's running mate be?

Bieber?

Snoop?

A big mound of money?

Hillary Clinton.