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A review by abdiel47
Nixonland: The Rise of a President and the Fracturing of America by Rick Perlstein
5.0
I want to like Richard Nixon. He started out poor and worked his way to the top. And he was a political genius. But he seems to have had a seething absence of self worth. There is a story that Perlstein tells of Nixon in college in Southern California where Nixon tried to join a social organization called the Franklins and was rejected because his impoverished upbringing means he lacked the proper social connections. Rather than take rejection, he started his own social club called the Orthogonians.
The first thought is to get excited for Nixon taking things into his own hands, building his own bridge when he’s not allowed to use the one others are using. But Nixon didn’t want to be an Orthogonian and the Franklin rejection burned inside him. Perlstein describes Nixon as seeing the world as full of Orthogonians and Franklins. And he spends his entire career prostrating himself before the wealthy and well connected in the hopes they will give him some of what they have. Which means he’s always doing the dirty work, humiliating himself, playing bad cop to get ahead. And still there’s always a Franklin like Kennedy to put him in his place.
Nixon sees the world as divided, and sees himself as not really belonging anywhere. And in the mid 60s the US was truly divided: race riots, Vietnam, etc. Nixon charges into this divide trying to burn it all down, divide America, do anything it takes to become president because he, and he alone, is suited to lead the US through those trying times. The ends justify the means.
Rick Perstein once again writes a breathtaking but dense narrative of American politics. These 800 pages cover four election cycles: 1965-66, 1967-68, 1969-70, and 1971-72. They include some of the most explosive events in US political history. There are a number of common themes: the increasingly chaotic Democratic party, the increasingly immoral and opportunistic Republican party, and a free press that consistently fails to comprehend what’s happening while it’s happening.
The first thought is to get excited for Nixon taking things into his own hands, building his own bridge when he’s not allowed to use the one others are using. But Nixon didn’t want to be an Orthogonian and the Franklin rejection burned inside him. Perlstein describes Nixon as seeing the world as full of Orthogonians and Franklins. And he spends his entire career prostrating himself before the wealthy and well connected in the hopes they will give him some of what they have. Which means he’s always doing the dirty work, humiliating himself, playing bad cop to get ahead. And still there’s always a Franklin like Kennedy to put him in his place.
Nixon sees the world as divided, and sees himself as not really belonging anywhere. And in the mid 60s the US was truly divided: race riots, Vietnam, etc. Nixon charges into this divide trying to burn it all down, divide America, do anything it takes to become president because he, and he alone, is suited to lead the US through those trying times. The ends justify the means.
Rick Perstein once again writes a breathtaking but dense narrative of American politics. These 800 pages cover four election cycles: 1965-66, 1967-68, 1969-70, and 1971-72. They include some of the most explosive events in US political history. There are a number of common themes: the increasingly chaotic Democratic party, the increasingly immoral and opportunistic Republican party, and a free press that consistently fails to comprehend what’s happening while it’s happening.