Today is the 50th anniversary of Watergate, the scandal that led to the resignation of President Richard Nixon.
And I can't help drawing comparisons between that crisis and the one in which our most recent former president finds himself knee deep.
- Richard Nixon had a CREEP - the Committee for the Re-Election of the President; Donald Trump is a creep.
- Nixon had criminals acting on his behalf; Trump had hundreds of criminals acting on his behalf.
- Nixon's scandal came to light with a break-in at the Watergate Hotel, a building in DC; Trump's came to light with the break-in at the US Capitol, a building in DC.
- The Watergate scandal had Deep Throat, the long-anonymous source who fed reporters information they published in real time; the Trump scandal has deep voices: the dozens of reporters and former staffers who have written about his administration.
- Nixon had the Saturday Night Massacre, in which DOJ folks quit so they wouldn't have to fire the special prosecutor investigating the scandal; Trump conspired to fire DOJ staff, and had a legion of people threaten to quit.
- Nixon's secretary, Rosemary Woods, destroyed White House documents; Donald Trump has allegedly destroyed White House documents.
- Nixon had the 'plumbers'; Trump was full of crap with his ideas of a stolen election.
- Nixon was overwhelmingly re-elected after the scandal; Trump continues to maintain that he overwhelmingly won an election he overwhelmingly lost.
- Gerald Ford declared "our long national nightmare" to be over when Nixon resigned; Mike Pence prevented a constitutional crisis when he refused to follow Trump's directive that he not certify the election.
- Nixon dealt with shady characters in support of his winning re-election effort; Trump had Rudy Giuliani, Steven Bannon, and countless others helping him try to steal back an election he lost.
- It took a long time for Republicans to turn against Nixon; it's taking Republicans a long time to turn against Trump.
- Richard Nixon famously said he was not a crook; Donald Trump said "No way we lost this election!"
Let's all raise a glass to the Republican who had the good sense to quit, shall we?
No comments:
Post a Comment
Thanks for sharing your thoughts!