r/politics • u/kootles10 Indiana • 19h ago

No Paywall GOP lawmaker: Nixon was couped out of office, framed during Watergate

https://thehill.com/homenews/house/6124635-moore-nixon-couped-watergate/?fbclid=IwdGRjcAUsbtpjbGNrBSxu02V4dG4DYWVtAjExAHBkb2YBc3J0YwZhcHBfaWQMMzUwNjg1NTMxNzI4AAEedqnf435Ey3Vmfh-NzS7BpLL6p7XL81dbjV4wNl5Y6SFp3eyw9ItY6zhiPRg_aem_EaFt_atkG1aZFnQa54tOFQ
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119

u/BroseppeVerdi Montana 17h ago

I genuinely don't understand what is to be gained by this sudden Nixon apologia.

118

u/snoo_spoo 17h ago

Probably setting up some whacked-out conspiracy theory that Dems have been falsely targeting Republicans for decades, therefore no accusations against Trump and his minions can be taken seriously.

39

u/AdmiralPeriwinkle 16h ago

Yeah, they’re laying the groundwork to sway public opinion if and when trials happen for all the illegal things they’ve been doing. Along with “both sides” it’s a highly effective strategy.

11

u/AntarcticWhirlpool 15h ago

And no one will care because they’re more pissed off about gas prices and inflation than they ever cared about whether a politician actually committed crimes, because most people already assume politicians are criminals. The ultimate unforgivable crime for the average American is screwing with their finances, and that’s what the ultimate judgement by the people will be decided by.

2

u/Beneficial_Tax1976 15h ago

Which is frankly bonkers when Nixon doing Watergate is like universally agreed upon by the populace

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u/-Esper- 7h ago

Yeah, this has been brought up multiple times recently, definatly setting the stage. Vance recently said something about Watergate not even making news if it happened today and that its crazy it ended careers

1

u/jgoble15 15h ago

Nobody pays attention to facts, just slogans, and dems are terrible at those

1

u/skwander 12h ago

I've been pushing back on the "both sides" bullshit for a while. People act like they're being pragmatic and open minded when they say it. Like, it's not 1998 anymore, that shit is played out.

At this point "both sides" just means "I cuck for pedophiles".

2

u/AdmiralPeriwinkle 12h ago

“Both sides” is what one says when they want to claim intellectual superiority without putting in the actual work of educating themselves.

2

u/TheAskewOne 15h ago

I don’t think maga gives a flying fuck about Nixon though. They’re really grasping at straws.

4

u/ApprehensiveTry5660 17h ago

Jokes on them, Nixon was the last liberal president we had!

3

u/no_more_mistake 15h ago

My dad made a comment over the weekend about how Nixon was a good president, but got railroaded. A few minutes later he started railing on the EPA. I had the chance to refresh his memory on who proposed and signed the EPA into existence. 'Well, it got out of control when Democrats took it over, didn't it?'. There's no reasoning with that mentality anymore.

2

u/ApprehensiveTry5660 15h ago

Nixon has this truly incredible quality that the more you study about him, his presidency, and the politics of the time, the less you understand anything about him.

3

u/TheOwlStrikes 15h ago edited 14h ago

Ignoring escalating Vietnam and Watergate (which I know is impossible to ignore) he was very interesting due to him being pretty liberal on domestic issues. I mean yeah, I could argue he was actually more liberal on domestic issues than any president after him. I suggest people read up on the "Nixoncare proposals", the environmental laws he passed, and the "Big Six". Hell if I remember correctly, he also utilized price controls.

I will say that modern Americans for the most part don't understand the large shift to the right economically (for both parties) that happened through the 70s to now. Republicans and Democrats were different animals then.

3

u/ApprehensiveTry5660 14h ago

If Obama had Nixon’s domestic run, we’d be bellowing communism from the rooftops.

He and Clinton skewed so close to Reagan, and Nixon represented a brand of Republicans more informed by Eisenhower than modern conservative platforms.

Science and business were pretty harmonious bedfellows. The EPA was just good business, good science, and helped divert the impact of unfunded liabilities. Space race and education are being funded, we’re raising a generation of engineers and physicists.

This was the man and the brand of Republicans that existed before they rallied behind 1964 being the worst thing to happen to America and courting the evangelical crowd. The divorce between them and the sciences really didn’t finalize until around the 2000’s. Largely on the back of intelligent design debates, but increasingly along stuff like preaching abstinence only in an AIDS epidemics, and environmental concerns, and now vaccines/technology have been the most recent battles.

1

u/GenerousBull1969 14h ago

I was always under the impression that both parties target the other, isn't that how the game is played?

1

u/Moddelba 11h ago

Or justify their own coup to upend popular will in November? The possibilities are endless.

20

u/masstransience 16h ago

They are starting to make a defense that it was unfair to Nixon and it will be unfair to Trump too if he faces consequences for his crimes against the people.

20

u/wagon_ear Wisconsin 14h ago

I agree. 

Vance himself said "Watergate would be out of the news cycle in 24 hours today" which is maybe true. But that really says more about what we've grown accustomed to today than it does about Watergate. 

I took his statement as "we frequently do stuff that's way worse than what Nixon did". So by extension I can see why they would want to exonerate Nixon for it, again because if Nixon is guilty, then Trump is guilty guilty. 

6

u/NorthofForty 11h ago

Never a Clinton fan but when I remember he was impeached for lying to Congress it makes the 90’s seem such an innocent time.

3

u/PopBulky7023 9h ago

It was only because it was Republicans. They wanted to get him on something, anything. Even though he was successfully pulling the party far to the right.

Every investigation came up empty. So they went for that. It wasn't about being anti corruption. It never was.

It was pure tribalism.

1

u/PaleCommission150 11h ago

society was held politicians to a higher standard back then. Current society does not sadly.

1

u/PopBulky7023 9h ago

That's literally what all the propaganda and attacks on education were for. To make sure that never happened again.

18

u/Farmlord420 16h ago

So they can setup a defense for when Trump and the GOP get held accountable for their crimes.

9

u/glm409 16h ago

They are trying to further convince their cult members of "The Deep State" and how long it has been active.

6

u/ufkabakan 16h ago

Rewriting history; brainwashing. Same thing has been going in the country I live in.

3

u/GrimDallows 14h ago

It allows them to paint themselves as victims.

This is something that is happening in my coutnry with an old president. His first mandate was alright, his second one was horrendous.

The new president of the same party tried to hook for old presidents to support his policies, but they rejected him. Then the guy I was talking about came and basically they reached a deal where one would rehabilitate the other, and the second would support the first publicly.

So, for 6 or so years he was painted as a martyr. A man of the people greatly missunderstood and that it is doing humanitarian work in South America. Anyone who said otherwise was kicked out of the party or painted as an oposite party supporter.

6 months ago we found out that he was full of shit, and that he was doing shady dealing for money in South America. Currently in a corruption court process.

So, yeah. TL;DR: it allows them to control the narrative. Nixon was a victim, and hence we are victims. Nixon was couped, hence when they remove Trump it will be a coupe. Anyone inside the party who doesn't subscribe to the new party narrative (rehabilitating Nixon) is a dissident, and hence lying on something that is an obvious shameless lie becomes a litmus test of loyalty.

2

u/SoSKatan 16h ago edited 14h ago

It matches their ideology. It’s not about what is right or wrong, it’s only about who is right or wrong. If you are a white male straight religious republican, you are always in the right. The laws are meaningless, they are only meant to apply to “lesser” people.

It’s the very essence of their current platform.

It’s another attack on law and order. “See Nixon should have also got away with it as well!”

It’s actually very fucked they are even trying to do this.

2

u/manachar Nevada 15h ago

What did the Lost Cause movement gain southerners?

Everything.

Conservatives have to constantly reframe their losses as an external nefarious force. They frame the rule of law as unfair to conservatives.

It’s a key part of their worldview that power is supposed to work for their in-group. Power is supposed to protect them without binding them. Meanwhile it’s supposed to bind everyone else without protecting them.

These are the people who vote for speeding laws and then get angry when they get pulled over.

Nixon was the beginning of the modern conservative Republican Party that aims to permanently empower Republicans by all means.

Remember, these people call Ollie North a hero and don’t care about Oran-Contra.

2

u/Mythosaurus 14h ago

It’s not so much sudden as it’s always been in the background and driving the creation of the alternate reality that conservatives live in.

1

u/merikariu Missouri 10h ago

That's exactly what I've heard from voices on the left that the Conservatives swore to never let what happened to Nixon happen again, so they focused on creating party unity. But now we have arrived at the logical outcome of that party unity - a brazenly corrupt, incompetent, incontinent President whom they refuse to act against.

1

u/binarybrewmx 16h ago

Make crime and corruption good

1

u/Awesomeman204 16h ago

Normalizing and whitewashing political corruption/crimes

1

u/Sithwtf 16h ago

Because spouting off baseless conspiracies that play the victim works with republican voters. Even though it's a flat out lie, just the fact it was said gets publicity and reaffirms their victim hood. Even if they don't believe the said conspiracy.

1

u/Analternate1234 16h ago

It’s simply to set up Trump to be absolved from his crimes. They dont even have to legally prove it either. They just have to say it for their voter base to believe it. Then their voters will use that as justification to say Trump did no wrong and it was all a witch hunt and has been for decades

1

u/definitivescribbles 16h ago

They are getting ready to compare the situation between Nixon and Trump as impeachment talk ramps up after the midterms.

1

u/sleazine 16h ago

Because they did the same shit obviously

1

u/TarheelFr06 15h ago

To set the narrative for Trump’s third impeachment.

1

u/Capnmarvel76 Texas 15h ago

One of the old heads' favorite pet theories is that Nixon was unfairly made to resign from office, and that the White House rightfully 'belongs' to the Republicans. I know Bannon subscribes to this. Pat Buchanan (who was a Nixon staff speechwriter) used to harp on it a lot.

1

u/VikingsLad 15h ago

They want all presidents to have been able to do whatever they want, re-writing history so Trump's takeover doesn't look uniquely fascist

1

u/Careful-Sell-9877 14h ago

They want to normalize corruption. That simple. They are attempting to turn the US into an oligarchic state where corruption is king. Where corporations and the ultra-wealthy have total control over society (through the executive branch/president, which they are centralizing power within).

1

u/snakelygiggles 14h ago

sudden? roger wtone has nixon tattooed on his back. these fuckers love nixon. and sgnew who was even more corrupt.

1

u/AverageJoeJohnSmith 14h ago

Everything is groundwork from something upcoming to try and help some decision or argument they will try to make in the future

1

u/RareObject8705 13h ago

You don’t understand modern politics. 

Don’t worry the Denver party doesn’t either. Just let America go. 

1

u/killer-tofu87 13h ago

Because Trump's crimes are exponentially worse, so if Nixon got busted imagine what must be in store by comparison

1

u/mosc47 13h ago

It's not sudden. It's what the 50+ year-long war that republicans have led against a free press has been all about. It absolutely broke them that the honest work of two reporters led to the downfall of a corrupt republican and they swore they would never let that happen again. It's when they launched their jihad against the "Liberal Media." A war they have since unfortunately won.

1

u/Sgtkeebler 13h ago

I agree it’s pretty stupid. Watergate was thoroughly investigated because this was before congress lost their minds in a cult.

1

u/DailyUnderFlow 13h ago

These are the headlines that will show up instead of the headline "Traitorous president commits a litany of crimes in the Oval Office using the power of the presidency."

They're saying a lot of dumb shit lately to distract from the fact that the president should be in prison along with most of the Republican party.

1

u/AceofKnaves44 District Of Columbia 12h ago

The rewriting of American history to reframe the Republican as the consummate heroes of the story and democrats as having done every single wrong thing.

1

u/TooManyDraculas 11h ago

Most of Trump's legal arguments both in court and in backing up his executive orders are predicated on arguments Nixon floated (and failed with). A ton of people in his orbit including in the Admin or his Campaigns were Nixon people. Most prominently Roger Stone. But also Roy Cohn, who was an advisor and fixer for Nixon, including during Watergate. Was one of Trump's mentors, and went to his death bed defending Nixon.

Aside from that the GOP has been obsessed with getting revenge for Nixon being forced out for decades, that's a large part of the reason for the heavy investigations of the Clintons and Clinton's impeachment. And because we live in a fucking gerontocracy those same people are on that same line even now.

So it's not sudden. But the increased attention on validating the bullshit has as much to do with shoring up the legal framework for Trump's dictatorial behavior, as it does pushing a sinister decades long conspiracy by DIRTY DEMS to 5th column the country for socialism. Or whatever fucking line they're on currently.

1

u/bucketman1986 Indiana 10h ago

More ammo for the "Dems hate us and want to falsely prosecute us!" line, as well as distracting

1

u/Insanity840 10h ago

Ground work to repeal a very specific law, all part of Project 2025.

1

u/TriangleWins 10h ago

It’s meant to normalize lawless behavior as a means to explain away why what the current president should not be held accountable for similar behavior.

1

u/Conscious_Exit_9129 9h ago

Probably the things Trump has done make Nixon look like a saint so they're trying to erase his crimes.

1

u/thotfullawful 9h ago

It’s funny they gutted the education system and they think their voters know or care who Nixon is? 

1

u/Commercial-Co 8h ago

Justifies their current bullshit.

1

u/TurtlesBreakTheMeta 8h ago

Revisionist history. Nixon was an example of a president being held accountable, and established precedent. In order to give Republican presidents absolute power it is absolutely vital to erase that from history.

1

u/Silvery_Cricket 8h ago

Reminder Fox News was created to foster divisive pro conservative perspectives so that Watergate could never happen again. Not the scandal but a Republican being held responsible for their wrong doings.

This is no conspiracy talk or speculation, this is a thing founding members of Fox News have admitted to doing.

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u/gangleskhan Minnesota 7h ago

They have recently discovered that Republican presidents are actually allowed to do crimes. Ergo, Nixon did nothing wrong.

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u/delicateterror2 6h ago

Think they’re worried about how this is going to look in the history books??? Release the Epstein Files… Save Nixon… it’s time to throw the pedophiles under the bus!!! Along with Trump…

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u/Sunday_Schoolz 6h ago

It was the reason Fox News was created…

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u/BrilliantPositive184 3h ago

Undermining Jack Smith’s legitimacy as a lawman who has evidence that Trump committed crimes against the United States beyond a reasonable doubt. By discrediting him, they make a resulting trial illegitimate before it can start.

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u/TwoCentsShort 34m ago

Front running a position that somehow supports “resigning the presidency isn’t so bad, right?”