When Nixon resigned and Ford pardoned him...

[kentuck]

it was not the best of times for America.

The Vietnam War was about to end.

Spiro Agnew had to resign as Nixon's VP and Gerald Ford was appointed to replace him.

Gerald Ford then had to get a VP to serve out the term, even as our troops were helicoptered off the roof of the Embassy in Saigon.

Nixon had resigned in disgrace over the Watergate scandal.

The American people were looking for some honesty and decency in the White House.

They elected Jimmy Carter, one of the most decent and honest people to ever serve as President of the United States.

For some reason, these times remind me of those times.

[unblock]

1. watergate on steroids with no jimmy carter in sight.

[In_The_Wind]

2. Maybe I should run for president in 2020.

[unblock]

5. jimmy? is that you?

[In_The_Wind]

8. Well ... I was born in Georgia.

As y'all know ... Southern Women are somethin' else.

I know I could do a better job of running this country than the guy being inaugurated on Friday.

[unblock]

11. i have no doubt.

low bar you've set for yourself but still, no doubt

[Aristus]

14. I'd vote for you!

Any day of the week, and twice on Sunday!

Or would that be called voter fraud?

[In_The_Wind]

15. One vote from everyone is all I want.

[Aristus]

16. Not too much to ask, I think.

[In_The_Wind]

17. Back when I was ask to run for a local office I declined the request.

[Aristus]

18. Even local politics can be nasty stuff.

Candidates often use campaign rhetoric to settle old personal scores with people in the community whom they know.

Lots of things get tossed around; higher class standing, the one who intercepted the otherwise game-wimming touchdown, whose daughter made cheerleader and whose didn't.

You were right to decline.

[kentuck]

21. I ran for US Congress in '98...

during the height of the Clinton "blue dress" scandal.

I ran against incumbent Joel Hefley, the Chair of the House Ethics Committee , and did similar to every other Democrat that had run up to that time, except for a professor at Colorado College that had once worked for JFK. (His name escapes me at the moment)

[In_The_Wind]

22. Thanks for all the hard work you did while you were campaigning.

And, thanks for everything you do here at DU.

[LeftInTX]

3. Watergate on steroids with no Dem majorities in sight

[gordianot]

4. We were invaded, seized, and are about to be occupied in the first great cyber war.

Much like the perfect crime one you do do not know was committed, this was the perfect bloodless war one many still do not know was committed by a hostile foreign power.

In comparison Nixon and the 70's were nothing.

[Baitball Blogger]

6. Oh, it's much, much worse.

America did not have a president that was colluding with a foreign country.

BTW, Watergate was much more than just a break in. Can someone recall the full story about what Nixon was after?

[kentuck]

7. I know.

And there is no Jimmy Carter campaigning in Iowa.

It reminds me of those times but it is much worse. You are correct.

[Dave Starsky]

12. Intelligence to use against Dems in the upcoming election

In the DNC's office at the Watergate.

Nixon had a group working for him called CREEP (Committee to Reelect the President--I shit you not) whose purpose was to get him reelected by any means.

So it was basically a lower-tech, microscale version of what Russia just did in this recent election.

[rickford66]

9. Carter got swiftboated before it was a thing.

[MoonRiver]

10. I love Jimmy Carter as a person, but he wasn't an effective politician.

We need somebody with more pizzazz and clout.

[kentuck]

13. Do you remember those times, MoonRiver?

When he came into office, it was the worst recession we had seen in a long time. The doubling of gas prices was a hard hit on everyone.

[VOX]

19. Yes. And it was an era is shortages: gas rationing, energy crisis...

Meat shortages, water (in California, first-time water rationing), etc.

The fallout from the Nixon years was long and dreary. Who knows what misery a Trump administration can create.

[MoonRiver]

23. Yes, I remember.

He also was conned out of his second term by Raygun.

[H2O Man]

20. Recommended.

The connections between Watergate, Iran-Contra, WMD/yellow cake, et al, are links in a chain spanning the last half-century. The cancer has grown, and spread throughout the body of "politics." To fully understand exactly where we are today -- and why -- one needs to have a full understanding of that chain's growth. Otherwise, one can not fully fight back.

I had been working on an essay on this exact topic two weeks ago, until my computer shit the bed ......