Dear kabar,
"I am always leery of using the WP as a source for anything especially anything to do with Watergate."
I don't blame you, but I've seen much of this reported elsewhere.
"I read the article and nowhere does it state that CREEP influenced the selection of the Dem nominee nor does it mention McGovern."
It certainly points to an attempt to influence the selection of the Democrat nominee:
"Law enforcement sources said that probably the best example of the sabotage was the fabrication by a White House aide -- of a celebrated letter to the editor alleging that Sen. Edmund S. Muskie (D-Maine) condoned a racial slur on Americans of French-Canadian descent as 'Canucks.'"
At the time, Mr. Muskie was the front-runner, and this clearly was an attempt to damage Mr. Muskie's candidacy. Did it have much of an effect? I don't know. Was it clearly an attempt to do so? Sure looks like it to me.
"All this article proves is that the GOP engaged in operations research against possible Dem opponents, the same way they do against Rep candidates."
Well, not quite. Even the part you cut and pasted, and then highlighted, belies that assertion:
"But federal investigators said what they uncovered being done by the Nixon forces is unprecedented in scope and intensity."
However, the assertion of the article is that it went beyond intelligence gathering:
"One federal investigative official said that Segretti played the role of 'just a small fish in a big pond.' According to FBI reports, at least 50 undercover Nixon operatives traveled throughout the country trying to disrupt and spy on Democratic campaigns.
"Both at the White House and within the President's re-election committee, the intelligence-sabotage operation was commonly called the 'offensive security' program of the Nixon forces, according to investigators."
Note, "DISRUPT and spy..." Disruption goes beyond intelligence-gathering.
And of course, we actually know that the CREEP resorted to illegal bugging for "intelligence-gathering" as well. If one wishes to say that others before did it, I won't disagree. Nonetheless, it is illegal, and it was part of a coordinated effort by the CREEP.
"You decide to use these three elections for analysis, but why not add 1976 to the mix to establish a longer term trend."
I chose 1964 and 1972 first because they were the closest to 1968, and thus would be most relevant to discussing trends. But also, 1964 showed great erosion in the "Solid South" for the Democrats, a trend that has continued to the present day, only interrupted by the Southern Democrat candidates - Mr. Carter and Mr. Clinton. That's why I didn't use 1976, as I'd stated elsewhere that southern states tend to return to the Democrat ticket when a Southerner heads the ticket, although Mr. Carter's first term was so disastrous that he oculdn't do even that.
Regarding some of the election results, by state, that you cite, I'll generally say just a few things. First, it's quite possible that without the influence of Mr. Wallace, states may have tipped differently. However, in some of the states that you cite, Mr. Wallace's voters would have had to have come at a very high cost to Mr. Humphrey. Let's look at Illinois. To say that Mr. Humphrey would have won if Mr. Wallace hadn't run, one must assume that Mr. Humphrey would have received about 70% of the votes that Mr. Wallace actually received.
In California, Mr. Humphrey would have needed more than 70% of Mr. Wallace's votes. Although I wouldn't entirely discount the possibility of that, these weren't Southern states where Mr. Wallace was stealing traditional Southern Democrat votes, but rather Northern and Western states that had often gone Republican.
"The 1964 civil rights act had an impact. It is problematic to extrapolate that impact to 1968."
Yes, it did. But it isn't at all difficult to extrapolate the impact to 1968 and beyond. Even though Republicans voted for the civil rights bills in higher proportions than Democrats, at a national level, a lot of folks who opposed these bills in the South punished the national Democrats, not the Republicans.
The dominance by the Republican Party in the South (except when Southerners lead the Democrat ticket) is in part a legacy of the reaction against the civil rights legislation of the 1960s.
"Informed of the general contents of this article, The White House referred all comment to The Committee for the Re-election of the President. A spokesman there said, 'The Post story is not only fiction but a collection of absurdities.'"
Well, unfortunately, in light of all that eventually came to light, this has even less credibility than articles from the Washington Post.
"'Their vote for Mr. Wallace may be seen as an aberration of that trend (accentuated since then, except when a Southern Democrat runs).'
"Not really. ALA, Miss, GA, AK and LA went for Stevenson in 1952 and again for Stevenson in 1956..."
Excuse me. I should have made clear that the trend was one that largely got going in 1964, and has continued to the present day.
"'As for Tennessee, Virginia, and Florida, Mr. Goldwater ran much stronger in these states than in the country as a whole. Had the national race not been as lopsided as it was, it is quite possible that Mr. Goldwater would have taken these states. In Florida, he took nearly 49% of the vote against President Johnson.'
"That is pure speculation."
Certainly it's speculation. LOL. What is any of this?? ;-)
But the point is that Florida did run far ahead of the country in 1964 for the Republican candidate. It may be speculation, but it is an entirely reasonable, plausible speculation that should Mr. Goldwater have lost, let's say, 55% - 45%, instead of 61% - 39%, that he may have eaked out an extra couple of percent in Florida (After all, the additional votes would have had to come from somewhere, and certainly some number would have come from Florida.).
"We will agree to disagree."
Okay.
"Nixon won a national election in 1968 by 500,000 votes."
Actually, I think he won by over 800,000 votes. Mr. Wallace received around 9.5 million votes, or a little under 13%:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:ElectoralCollege1968-Large.png
Who he helped more is of course a debatable point. Like I said, I used to think it was Mr. Nixon, by taking votes from Mr. Humphrey. But I don't think that the evidence clearly points toward that conclusion, especially as the years have gone by, those places from which Mr. Wallace drew most heavily have mostly trended Republican.
"I was just referring to your statement, 'I also don't think that Mr. Nixon's minions did anything different than previous presidents.'"
Then I ask to amend my previous comment to, "I also don't think that Mr. Nixon's minions did anything different than the minions of at least some previous presidents."
"What we saw in the case of Nixon was a witch hunt and lynching with a disproportionate reaction and punishment for a President's loyalty to his subordinates."
Well, my view is that it was certainly part witch-hunt, but it was also an adamant refusal by national Republicans to retain a felon as president.
"Clinton was not punished appropriately for his more serious crimes and has been rewarded and fawned over by the MSM ever since finishing his term of office."
I agree. But as I said, we Republicans evict our felons, the Dammocraps enshrine theirs.
"Nixon became a political pariah until he died."
I think that Mr. Nixon had achieved significant rehabilitation by the time he died, although he was certainly not without some stigma even to his dying day, or even since.
"There is no moral equivalency between these two men."
I agree. Mr. Nixon was, in the final analysis, a patriot who loved his country, however flawed he may have been. Mr. Clinton is a narcissist who loves only himself, in spite of whatever intellectual and political gifts he may have.
"And certainly, Nixon's performance in office dwarfs Clinton's pitiful achievements as President."
I don't know that I agree with that. Mr. Clinton took a lesson from the 1994 Republican takeover of Congress, and significantly trimmed his sails thereafter. By abdication, in many ways, he governed almost as a centrist Republican, especially on economic issues.
Mr. Nixon, however, was a vigorous president, and in retrospect, I take issue with any number of the things he did, including wage and price controls, controls on oil pricing in the aftermath of the 1973 Arab oil embargo, the EPA, affirmative action (started in the federal govt under Mr. Nixon), his handling of the Vietnam War, detente with the Soviet Union, the suggestion to provide every family with a guaranteed income (which some have pointed out eventually morphed into the Earned Income Tax Credit), and his cavalier treatment of the Fourth Amendment (which ultimately what all this bugging & stuff gets down to).
I don't think these were particularly conservative, or particularly good for the United States.
But I give him credit for being imaginative, creative, and trying hard to do right by his country.
sitetest
You persist in using the WP article as gospel and accept their characterization as being correct. Why? In the article, I quoted you something rather important, i.e., Informed of the general contents of this article, "The White House referred all comment to The Committee for the Re-election of the President. A spokesman there said, "The Post story is not only fiction but a collection of absurdities."
The WP was pushing a political agenda. They hated Nixon for a host of reasons. The article you cited was written by Woodward and Bernstein for God's sake. Do you consider them objective observers? It was written about a month before the 1972 election. Could it be possible they were trying to pull a Dan Rather? Your citing of the loaded words proves my point. This was a hit piece against the GOP and Nixon.
I chose 1964 and 1972 first because they were the closest to 1968, and thus would be most relevant to discussing trends. But also, 1964 showed great erosion in the "Solid South" for the Democrats, ...although Mr. Carter's first term was so disastrous that he oculdn't do even that.
My point is that three election cycles is not sufficient to see a trend. Clinton and Carter may or may not be blips in the long run. There are a number of variables that affect an election including the candidates, issues, events, and demographics. Things change.
1964 was a critical year for the Dems and the South. As I mentioned, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was a watershed event for the South. Upon signing the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Lyndon Johnson is said to have told aide Bill Moyers, "I think we have just delivered the South to the Republican Party for a long time to come." In 1968 Richard Nixon pursued the famous "Southern strategy," and the region split its votes between him and segregationist Democrat George Wallace, running on the populist American Independent ticket. Hubert Humphrey carried only one Southern state, LBJ's Texas.
The narrative breaks down, however, in 1976. That year Jimmy Carter, a pro-civil rights former governor of Georgia, carried every Southern state but Virginia. Mr. Carter would have lost without the South; the rest of the country gave Gerald Ford 228 electoral votes, to just 170 for Mr. Carter.
By 1976 there was a strong national consensus in favor of the Civil Rights Act. Not only was there never a serious movement to repeal it, but President Nixon had signed an executive order in 1971 expanding the use of racial preferences to provide opportunities for minorities in federal contracting.
Regarding some of the election results, by state, that you cite, I'll generally say just a few things. First, it's quite possible that without the influence of Mr. Wallace, states may have tipped differently. However, in some of the states that you cite, Mr. Wallace's voters would have had to have come at a very high cost to Mr. Humphrey.
I haven't gone through a detailed state by state analysis of the vote and how Wallace influenced it. Obviously, those states, which were won by Nixon in a close race would be the ones worthy of review along with those states won by Wallace or where he came in second in the voting. Wallace was a Democrat, so I have to assume that he received a higher proportion of Dem and Independent voters rather than GOP voters.
Actually, I think he won by over 800,000 votes. Mr. Wallace received around 9.5 million votes, or a little under 13%:
My reference shows about 500,000
Well, my view is that it was certainly part witch-hunt, but it was also an adamant refusal by national Republicans to retain a felon as president.
Should Ford have given him a pardon? He was not a felon until a court proves it.
The dominance by the Republican Party in the South (except when Southerners lead the Democrat ticket) is in part a legacy of the reaction against the civil rights legislation of the 1960s.
Does that hold true for Al Gore, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter (the second time)? Virginia hasn't voted Democrat since 1964. It depends on what you call dominance and what constitutes the South. I find your exceptions meaningless.
I don't know that I agree with that. Mr. Clinton took a lesson from the 1994 Republican takeover of Congress, and significantly trimmed his sails thereafter. By abdication, in many ways, he governed almost as a centrist Republican, especially on economic issues.
Clinton's few accomplishments: welfare reform (he vetoed it three times), and deficit reduction were really the product of a GOP controlled Congress. While Clinton was preoccupied with satisfying his sexual urges in the Oval Office, al-Qaeda was attacking US targets repeatedly without any real response from us (including the East Africa embassy bombings, which killed or wounded 5,000 people), the North Koreans were developing nuclear weapons, and our military and intelligence capabilities were going to hell in a handbasket. Clinton was a disaster as far as foreign policy was concerned and we are still reaping the results. His pardons at the end of his administration were a disgrace.
Mr. Nixon, however, was a vigorous president, and in retrospect, I take issue with any number of the things he did, including wage and price controls, controls on oil pricing in the aftermath of the 1973 Arab oil embargo, the EPA, affirmative action (started in the federal govt under Mr. Nixon), his handling of the Vietnam War, detente with the Soviet Union, the suggestion to provide every family with a guaranteed income (which some have pointed out eventually morphed into the Earned Income Tax Credit), and his cavalier treatment of the Fourth Amendment (which ultimately what all this bugging & stuff gets down to).
I don't think these were particularly conservative, or particularly good for the United States.
I find it interesting that you can run down a litany of things you don't like about Nixon and say very little negatively about Clinton's performance. I think I understand where you are coming from. FWIW, I think Nixon was a far better President than Clinton, especially in foreign policy.
