Populists – All About the Presidents

Republican Polarities: ‘The Bush Years’ and ‘Tricky Dick’

Paul Clinton — Wed, 01 May 2019 05:06:12 +0000

CNN seems like an unlikely venue for a gauzy tribute to two recent Republican presidents, but that was exactly what “The Bush Years: Family, Duty, Power” delivered.

The six-part documentary, which aired in March, provided a very different view of its presidential subjects than “Tricky Dick,” a four-part exploration of Richard Nixon’s destruction that aired on many of the same Sundays and bled into April.

In the first CNN Original Series, George H.W. Bush is an easy figure to like. He’s a doting family man, war hero, and diligent politician whose work brings him into a position of prominence despite his privileged upbringing as the son of a U.S. senator and Wall Street banker.

The “Fathers and Sons” episode tracks Bush’s early years. Bush’s rise is interspersed with plenty of archival photos and videos that color in the portrait of this Greatest Generation hero, especially the episode’s archival footage that shows him being rescued at sea from his downed U.S. Navy aircraft.

In “The Price of Loyalty,” the subjects intersect with Nixon’s appointment of Bush as ambassador to the United Nations in 1971. About two years later, Bush took the somewhat thankless job of chairman of the Republican National Committee. This episode could have been called “Bush: The Functionary Years.”

The series hits its stride in “A Family Triumph,” which recounts his ascension to vice president after Ronald Reagan outmaneuvered him at a 1980 New Hampshire debate. Episode Four, “First Family,” fills the time until “Sibling Rivalry,” which explores the early lives and political rise of Jeb and George W. Bush. The family expects more-accomplished Jeb to take the mantle, but George W. overcomes his dissolute lifestyle to purchase the Texas Rangers and eventually win an unlikely election against popular Democrat Texas Gov. Ann Richards.

George W. eventually follows his father into the White House. The series takes a softer approach in dealing with the still-controversial Bush 43 presidency, but interviews with other family members and V.P Dick Cheney add welcome context. Neither of the former presidents are interviewed for the series.

While the Bush series treats its subjects as American political royalty, “Tricky Dick” approaches the presidency and life of Richard M. Nixon as a study of self-destruction.

Promotional materials for the show have drawn parallels with the Donald Trump presidency. While this is still debatable, Nixon remains a fascinating, if infuriating, leader whose presidency ultimately fell victim to his own shortcomings. The series, which presents new footage of Nixon, casts an appealing spell with its heavy reliance on archival film to recount Nixon’s rise and fall.

In “Will to Win,” we learn that the young Nixon was an opportunist, but the series takes off with “Nixon’s the One.” We see Nixon struggle as Eisenhower’s barely-acknowledged vice president, and later fall short during the run against JFK in 1960, largely in part to a disastrous TV debate performance. A failed run for California governor in 1962 leaves Nixon fuming at his media enemies, as he scolds the press with, “You won’t have Nixon to kick around anymore.”

“Storm Clouds” begins with Nixon’s presidency after a stunning 1968 comeback and tightly-managed campaign that included a promise to end the Vietnam War.

One of Nixon’s own quotes provides the backdrop for “And Then You Destroy Yourself” – the crescendo of anti-war protests, the Watergate scandal, resignation, and life after the presidency. Throughout the series, we hear Nixon intone, “But those who hate you don’t win, unless you hate them. And then, you destroy yourself.”

While “Tricky Dick” may not provide many new insights, it sums up Nixon’s journey into the dark as well as any other documentary out there.

Obama’s Hope for a Digital Presidential Library

Paul Clinton — Mon, 04 Mar 2019 04:39:06 +0000

Barack Obama finds himself back where he started his political career – navigating the bruising landscape of Chicago politics. And he will need some hope and change.

This time, instead of building consensus as a community organizer or seeking support for an Illinois state office, Obama finds himself embroiled in a struggle to establish his presidential legacy on home turf.

The Obama Presidential Center would be built on 19 acres of City of Chicago parkland in Jackson Park on the South Side along the shore of Lake Michigan. The $500 million project would include a museum, event space, athletic center, and other features.

Just don’t call it a presidential library.

“The campus will remove barriers and seamlessly connect the park to the lakefront, unifying it with other local South Side institutions,” according to the Obama Foundation.

The private foundation is spearheading the project, which departs from tradition in several ways. The 13 existing presidential libraries collect all the unclassified papers during a president’s term and preserve them for the historians of the future.

The National Archives and Records Administration then manages the libraries and archives for all the presidents back to Herbert Hoover.

Obama is breaking with precedent with a plan to digitize his memos, letters, social media activity, and other records, so they won’t be stored on site for researchers.

His privately funded center has run afoul with local open-space activists, who hae won a court ruling that could delay its planned 2021 opening.

On Feb. 19, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois allowed a lawsuit from Protect Our Parts to proceed to determine whether the center violates the public trust doctrine, reports CityLab.

Plans for the presidential center have been in the works since May 2017, shortly after Obama left office. However, details were sparse until Feb. 19, when the National Archives released its agreement with the Obama Foundation about how the 44^th president’s records would be digitized. More than 30 million pages will be scanned.

Several historians and presidential library officials have bemoaned Obama’s approach for depriving the public of a central repository.

Timothy Naftali, the former director of the Richard Nixon library, told the New York Times that the move “opens the door to a truly terrible Trump library.”

Public park debates aside, Obama’s privately run presidential library may break from recent tradition, but many popular and successful presidential sites are run by private organizations, including George Washington’s Mount Vernon, Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello, and Andrew Jackson’s The Hermitage.

Donald Trump’s Cabinet Turnover

Paul Clinton — Mon, 25 Feb 2019 05:23:22 +0000

After taking office, Donald Trump increased his cabinet to 15 advisors, but rather than offering a wider-ranging sounding board, his top people have been diminished by high turnover, factionalism, and scandal. Trump has demanded loyalty, and those who stray often find themselves back in the private sector.

Slightly more than two years after he took office, Trump has lost more than half of his cabinet with only seven remaining from the start of his presidency. Several of the eight roles that have turned over have seen multiple secretaries.

When compared to past presidents, the high turnover is historic for this short a time frame. Andrew Jackson purged his cabinet in 1831, following the Eaton affair, slightly more than two years in office. And five of John Tyler’s six cabinet members resigned in protest in September 1841 (five months after he took office) in protest of his policies.

In 1979, Jimmy Carter fired six cabinet members in a single day, as his presidency spiraled toward the end. He had asked for resignations from all 12 to deal with what he saw as disloyalty.

Several of Trump’s advisors have left because they could no longer carry the water, and others have left due to ethical lapses.

Labor Secretary Alex Acosta is the latest to become embroiled in scandal, following a Feb. 21 report from the Miami Herald’s Julie K. Brown that he broke federal law by concealing a plea agreement from 30 underage victims of who were sexually abused by hedge fund manager Jeffrey Epstein while he was U.S. Attorney in Miami.

On April 27, 2017, Acosta had replaced acting Labor secretary Ed Hugler, who had remained in the role longer than expected after Trump’s initial pick, Andy Puzder, withdrew after it came to light that he employed a housekeeper not authorized to work in the U.S. and may have abused his ex-wife.

Earlier this year, Ryan Zinke resigned as Secretary of the Interior and Jim Mattis left the Department of Defense. The former Navy SEAL ZInke left amid investigations into real estate transactions in his home state of Montana. He was told he could quit or be fired.

As the more high-profile departure, Mattis quit because Trump disregarded his advice to keep some American troops in Syria to combat terrorist groups.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions resigned on Nov. 7, 2018 – the day after the midterm elections that swept Democrats into control of the House of Representatives. His recusal from Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia-collusion probe has angered Trump, and Sessions days were numbered.

Trump had fired Rex Tillerson, his first Secretary of State, earlier in 2018 (March 13). A late-2017 GQ article quoted Tillerson calling Trump “a fucking moron.” After firing him, Trump later tweeted that Tillerson was “dumb as a rock” and “lazy as hell.” The U.S Senate confirmed former CIA Director Mike Pompeo as his replacement on April 26, 2018.

Tom Price resigned after seven months as Secretary of Health and Human Services, in September 2017, after reports surfaced that he had spend more than $1 million of the agency’s funds for travel on private jets and military aircraft.

Alex Azar eventually replaced Price on Jan. 29.

Trump fired Obama-era official David Shulkin, Secretary of Veterans Affairs, for another travel scandal on March 28. A department report had criticized him for misusing agency funds for trips by him and his wife.

The Department of Homeland Security has also had two secretaries, after its initial cabinet representative, John Kelly, left on July 28, 2017, to become Trump’s chief of staff.

A few cabinet members have remained in place since the start, including Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin; Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue; Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross; Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson; Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao; Energy Secretary Rick Perry; and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos.