Nixon’s impeachment goes to full House, and removal by two-thirds of Senate.

So, the better man theory. . .

Nixon sees the light at the end of the tunnel. For example, maybe he decides right-wingers need to observe the full impeachment process and that he probably is guilty of at least some stuff, so they won’t be so angry and pissed off all the time.

Just this might change the course of American politics.
 
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Nixon to White House Staff the morning of his resignation

http://watergate.info/1974/08/09/nixon-final-remarks-to-white-house-staff.html

‘ . . . Always give your best, never get discouraged, never be petty; always remember, others may hate you, but those who hate you don’t win unless you hate them, and then you destroy yourself. . . ’
Yes, absolutely, Nixon should have followed his own advice. But all the same, this is part of

. . . better man Nixon.
 
So, the better man theory. . .

Nixon sees the light at the end of the tunnel. For example, maybe he decides right-wingers need to observe the full impeachment process and that he probably is guilty of at least some stuff, so they won’t be so angry and phased off all the time.

Just this might change the course of American politics.

There is no way that a man so selfish, vain, and egotistical as Richard Nixon would subject himself to a public crucifixion just to make a political point. You're talking about an American Socrates, not the man who stole the 1968 election and prolonged a failed war for political gain.
 
. . . the man who stole the 1968 election and prolonged a failed war for political gain.
Yes, Richard M. Nixon sabotaged the Oct. '68 peace talks. No question about it. Once Haldeman's handwritten notes of instructions from Nixon were found and publicized in late 2016, there's no longer any reasonable doubt regarding this.

In a better world, Nixon would have served 20 years in prison and he would have served the whole time, being released in late '88 which was about five or six years before he died. And who knows, maybe we would have gotten something approaching an apology, maybe he would have even written some good shit while in prison. And I say only 20 years because I'm liberal in this sense and don't believe long prison terms are a good idea in practical, moral, or other terms! Obviously, there are some exceptions and this would be one of them.

The one saving grace was that South Vietnam President Thieu wasn't crazy about the peace talks anyway. So, it may not have made a difference, but it may have. Would love to have a re-roll.
 
All the same, sometimes when a person gets a diagnosis of cancer, for example, they do become a better person. Or to a lesser extent, when they get off the hook at a highly stressful job, in a way they think is honorable and high road. In other words . . .



I'm going full zen on this one! Fully embracing a bad past, and asking what if a better future?
 
In a better world, Nixon would have served 20 years in prison and he would have served the whole time, being released in late '88 which was about five or six years before he died.

To my knowledge, violating the 1799 Logan Act - which made sabotaging the Peace Talks Illegal - usually resulted in 2 to 3 years prison time.
 
I have a lot of interest in the question of how this might lead to a less angry American right. And I mean a Senate trial in which a number of factual points are clearly brought to light and one in which Nixon accepts with good grace.
 
I have a lot of interest in the question of how this might lead to a less angry American right. And I mean a Senate trial in which a number of factual points are clearly brought to light and one in which Nixon accepts with good grace.

The American right, at least the faction lead by Reagan, Buckley, and Helms, was more so angry at social liberalism and the New Deal consensus than Watergate. Sure, they were mad that their boy Nixon had been driven from office (and in their minds treated unfairly by the "liberal" media), but even if Nixon's dirty deeds hadn't been uncovered that anger would still be there. Ditto if he'd gone through a Senate trial. That said Ford would not only do better in the '76 primaries but he would beat Carter if he didn't need to pardon Nixon. That means a Democrat is elected in 1980 and the 1980s are a liberal decade.
 
. . . at least the faction lead by Reagan, Buckley, and Helms, was more so angry at social liberalism and the New Deal consensus . . .
In the mid-‘70s in America, I think right-wingers were most of all angry because we had “lost” the war in Vietnam.

And lines of reasoning such that we had gotten involved in a civil war in which both sides were very mixed bags, or we in the free world had lost a very big opportunity in not writing just as many books about anti-imperialism and shaking off European domination as the communists had written, just weren’t going to carry that much weight with them.
 
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