Nixonland: America's Second Civil War and the Divisive Legacy of Richard Nixon, 1965-1972.

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Nixonland: America's Second Civil War and the Divisive Legacy of Richard Nixon, 1965-1972.

by Rick Perlstein

4.19 · rating details · 1,166 ratings · 292 reviews

Told with urgency and sharp political insight, "Nixonland" recaptures America's turbulent 1960s and early 1970s and reveals how Richard Nixon rose from the political grave to seize and hold the presidency.

Perlstein's epic account begins in the blood and fire of the 1965 Watts riots, nine months after Lyndon Johnson's historic landslide victory over Barry Goldwa

...moreTold with urgency and sharp political insight, "Nixonland" recaptures America's turbulent 1960s and early 1970s and reveals how Richard Nixon rose from the political grave to seize and hold the presidency.

Perlstein's epic account begins in the blood and fire of the 1965 Watts riots, nine months after Lyndon Johnson's historic landslide victory over Barry Goldwater appeared to herald a permanent liberal consensus in the United States. Yet the next year, scores of liberals were tossed out of Congress, America was more divided than ever, and a disgraced politician was on his way to a shocking comeback: Richard Nixon.

Between 1965 and 1972, America experienced no less than a second civil war. Out of its ashes, the political world we know now was born. It was the era not only of Nixon, Johnson, Spiro Agnew, Hubert H. Humphrey, George McGovern, Richard J. Daley, and George Wallace but Abbie Hoffman, Ronald Reagan, Angela Davis, Ted Kennedy, Charles Manson, John Lindsay, and Jane Fonda. There are tantalizing glimpses of Jimmy Carter, George H. W. Bush, Jesse Jackson, John Kerry, and even of two ambitious young men named Karl Rove and William Clinton -- and a not so ambitious young man named George W. Bush.

Cataclysms tell the story of "Nixonland" Angry blacks burning down their neighborhoods in cities across the land as white suburbanites defend home and hearth with shotgunsThe student insurgency over the Vietnam War, the assassinations of Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King, and the riots at the 1968 Democratic National ConventionThe fissuring of the Democratic Party into warring factions manipulated by the "dirty tricks" of Nixon and his Committee to Re-Elect the PresidentRichard Nixon pledging a new dawn of national unity, governing more divisively than any president before him, then directing a criminal conspiracy, the Watergate cover-up, from the Oval Office

Then, in November 1972, Nixon, harvesting the bitterness and resentment born of America's turmoil, was reelected in a landslide even bigger than Johnson's 1964 victory, not only setting the stage for his dramatic 1974 resignation but defining the terms of the ideological divide that characterizes America today.

Filled with prodigious research and driven by a powerful narrative, Rick Perlstein's magisterial account of how America divided confirms his place as one of our country's most celebrated historians.

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Hardcover, 881 pages

Published May 13th 2008 by Scribner

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May 12, 2011

Kemper rated it

Shelves: 2011, history, non-fiction, politics

Call us America the Schizophrenic.

How else can you explain a country that embraced a right wing philosophy after a devastating terrorist attack that led to blindly following a moron for eight years, yet finally overwhelmingly rejected those politics by voting in the liberal opposition only to seemingly overnight turn into a nation of screaming maniacs who consider spending a dime on anything but guns and prisons a waste of tax payer money?

The cold comfort I got from readi...more

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Oct 02, 2009

Mike rated it

I'm halfway through this book, and Perlstein's punchy and sweeping account (zeroing in on specific incidents, rack-focusing back out to a big picture) is a pleasure to read, let alone chockfull (hey--what is a "chock"? what does it look like half-empty?) of insights, disturbingly acute analytical asides, a smart-ass view of history that is also determinedly smart. And it reminds me why I think strong political journalism/history matters, and why political campaigns matter.

...moreI'm halfway through this book, and Perlstein's punchy and sweeping account (zeroing in on specific incidents, rack-focusing back out to a big picture) is a pleasure to read, let alone chockfull (hey--what is a "chock"? what does it look like half-empty?) of insights, disturbingly acute analytical asides, a smart-ass view of history that is also determinedly smart. And it reminds me why I think strong political journalism/history matters, and why political campaigns matter.

On the contentious thread under another review (by the very smart Brian) of another book (Wilentz's _Age of Reagan_), another smart commenter noted that he didn't think politicians matter--the system perpetuates itself, and the cults of personality around politicians covers up their complicity in that system. In short, we get distracted by the spectacle of a political campaign, and the ostensible conflict of our political process, in ways that dislocate us from any substantive political engagement or critique. I disagreed when I read it, the comment stuck in my craw. So I want to toss out two rebuttals here. (And, yes, they belong here, because Perlstein's excellent book is exemplary proof of both. But if you want a focused review of _Nixonland_, come back later or seek it elsewhere.)

One, I think our narratives about politics provide the foundations which inform and form our relationship to systems (capitalism, education), issues (civil rights, global warming), communities local and larger. The political process--the campaign--is indeed a largely-symbolic act, but its symbolics are not mere distraction but instead form the core social rituals which define (or reaffirm, or reframe, or rewrite) a sense of who "we" are.

Nixon matters (as do Obama, McCain, Clinton) because the presidential hopeful tries to steer through (or be perfectly, zeitgeistly steered by) the inchoate ideas which structure American consciousness. We vote for someone, in the booth, but what we're doing is looking in the mirror, and trying to vote for who we see (or, as often, who we want to see). NixonLAND is the title, and Perlstein nails it: we're drawn in not so much to the politician who changes the system but the politician who embodies some sense of "Self." The man--or, as now, and ever after?, the woman--on the ballot is the mirror of the masses; what a political campaign illustrates is the on-going conflict over competing symbolic visions of American identity. So, I think politics matters, because it's representative. Less about picking the person who will represent "us" as a leader than the person who represents what we want that "we" to be. Perlstein's book is a brilliant evocation of candidacies as crucibles for social identities.

His book is also a sterling example of how to write a narrative which is itself "inside" the meta-narrative struggles of such political processes. It's crucial that we see through the bullshit which passes for analysis in most mainstream political journalism. David Brooks recently noted an already-tired truism about Obama, that B.O. needs to break down his elitism, that he needs to hang out with people who eat at Applebee's. Eugene Robinson, hearing that, snapped back that he had trouble taking such sociology seriously from critics who themselves don't ever eat at Applebee's. Exactly. The echo chamber of most punditry and too much political journalism not to mention much political history is people ostensibly standing outside the fray, commenting on it; the goal is to fight the estrangement and alienation from such symbolic battles by forcing readers (viewers, listeners) into the fight. I try to seek out those writers (like Perlstein, like Hunter Thompson, like Richard Ben Cramer) who are revelatory in their ability to define the clash of narratives, to see the forest for the trees, to stay inside the narratives (and not to pretend to some objective outsider position "commenting on" the process)--to see the crowd as well as the candidate, to see the history informing a given moment's "big issue," to avoid cheap-seat sociology and remain on the floor of the convention. People who engage in, don't just comment on, the symbolics. Because such political journalism brings you into the political struggle--makes you care, makes you define your own stance in/against the narrative. (Say what you want about Limbaugh and the even more pernicious radio nuts--they GET it. And so do Jon Stewart and Colbert, whose explicitly ironic engagements do far more to engage the critical attention to such narratives than 1000 columns by Brooks.) Perlstein's got a point of view, but not an ax to grind--he recognizes that political symbolics become real and illuminating when engaged politically.

Avoid CNN, and Chris Matthews. Read the Perlstein. As a complement, go read Hunter Thompson's _Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72_ and Robert Coover's infuriating and hilarious _Public Burning_. (less)

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Aug 18, 2011

Chris rated it

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I enjoyed Nixonland very much, as Perlstein managed to intermingle many events and personages that were new to me with those of which I was considerably more aware, and to do so with an effortlessly breezy, witty, and readable style; however, this is a long book, and as the pages piled past it felt long—although it never dragged or stalled, it did eventually prove exhausting in the sheer accumulation of details on electioneering and strategizing, rioting and reacting, Vietnam maneuvering and Was...more

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Jul 22, 2011

John rated it

I put Perlstein’s Nixonland on my "to read" shelf, after I read a very effective and thorough review of the book in the September 1/8, 2010, edition of The Nation. Perstein's book is a must-read for any one interested in the Republican Party's calculated obliteration of whatever tatters and remnants of New World democracy still informed the American polity during the years that Perlstein examines.

I found that this book, although a great read, as one would expect from a muc...moreI put Perlstein’s Nixonland on my "to read" shelf, after I read a very effective and thorough review of the book in the September 1/8, 2010, edition of The Nation. Perstein's book is a must-read for any one interested in the Republican Party's calculated obliteration of whatever tatters and remnants of New World democracy still informed the American polity during the years that Perlstein examines.

I found that this book, although a great read, as one would expect from a much honored journalist, contains a major flaw - at least from a historian’s perspective. Although Perlstein apparently felt he needed the devices of "national consensus" and its antagonist to enhance the drama in his narrative, he didn't establish at the outset that such a consensus existed for Nixon to assail and extinguish. And I doubt that such a consensus obtained at all. Goldwater and consensus in the same sentence?

Besides, I don't think Perlstein needed these tricks. It's quite sufficient, and dramatic, to demonstrate, which he did by the way, how Nixon and the Republican Party entered upon/exploited the politics of rage and bigotry, following the lead of George Wallace and fellow white supremacists, to entice into their fold angry, white Americans, mostly racist, cultural and moral degenerates in the best of circumstances. He set the stage for decades of distractions that allowed Republicans to cut taxes for their own, i.e. corporate and financial elites, the wealthiest Americans, in order to transfer the cost of government, including the costs of empire and the national debt, to middle and working class Americans, the "little people" who pay taxes at all (to quote the late and long-lamented Leona Helmsley), and allowed, even encouraged, American elites to plunder the Treasury and the world. I like especially Perlstein's discussion of Nixon's exploitation of organized religion and multitudes of Bible-beating cultists to consolidate the power of American elites. None of this entirely captivating account requires a red-herring.

In the end, a fine, although willfully and unnecessarily flawed, book. It only reinforces my fundamental view that the US, the country that has presented the world most of its wars from Korea and Vietnam to the presidential tantrums of Iraq and Afghanistan, has always had the leadership it deserves.
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Aug 01, 2008

Pglusman Glusman rated it

I am of the age where, until his death in 1994, I considered Nixon to be the omnipresent evildoer. He was around when I was born, and he was still around 47 years later. You couldn't get rid of him. I felt the boomers would be more correctly called the "Nixon Generation." I was too young to remember him vilifying Helen Gahagan Douglas, but I do remember him as Vice-president getting (literally) stoned in Caracas. I remember him running againt Pat Brown for Governor. His, "...moreI am of the age where, until his death in 1994, I considered Nixon to be the omnipresent evildoer. He was around when I was born, and he was still around 47 years later. You couldn't get rid of him. I felt the boomers would be more correctly called the "Nixon Generation." I was too young to remember him vilifying Helen Gahagan Douglas, but I do remember him as Vice-president getting (literally) stoned in Caracas. I remember him running againt Pat Brown for Governor. His, "you won't have Nixon to kick around anymore" speech. His secret plan to end the Vietnam war. Every word that came out of his mouth was a lie. And when it got exposed in 1973-1974 it was so much fun to watch the hearings on television and see his weasels and gofers up before the Senate Watergate Committee turning on each other as Nixon solemnly stated: "I am not a crook." That was when congresspersons and senators had some guts and would bring up a sitting president on charges.

Perlstein was born in 1969, the first year of the Nixon presidency. He writes, however, like he was in the middle of it. His narrative is lively, ironic, and ultimately, depressing. The country, in the years since, has not progressed but regressed. Nixon, in retrospect, looks like a wise man. Despite his "enemies list" he seems a civil libertarian compared to what we have now. Surely he is responsible for the beginnings of what American politics have descended into, but other, more skilled practitioners have dug the hole far deeper than Milhouse could ever have dreamed.

Perlstein takes us through the years 1964-1972 as if they had happened yesterday. That was when America fractured into what Perlstein terms the Franklins and the Orthogonians, representing very roughly the in crowd and the out group and Nixon's Whittier College. We are now red and blue staters.

Perlstein, with a few exceptions, gets it right. (The SDS chant was "Ho, Ho, Ho Chi Minh, NLF is gonna win" and not "Ho Chi Minh is gonna win."

A must read for anyone who wants to understand late 20th century history. My only quibble is that Perlstein stopped with the election of 1972, and did not bring it forward to the more fun and amazing Watergate scandal times of 1973 and 1974, when we all watched the hearings and marveled at Sam Ervin ("I'm just an old country lawyer") digging up things we could not believe.

Now everyone takes that same dishonesty, immorality and dirty tricks in the white house as base-line normality.

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Jun 15, 2008

John rated it

This book is nowhere near the caliber of Perlstein's earlier book on Goldwater. "Before the Storm" told the story of the origins of the New Right as a social movement, and did so with aplomb and panache. "Nixonland" by contrast is an often-tedious rehash of a lot of things we already knew about the poisonous person and political institution that was Richard Milhous Nixon.

Perlstein goes in for the unmistakable psychological contours of Nixon the man, the special c...moreThis book is nowhere near the caliber of Perlstein's earlier book on Goldwater. "Before the Storm" told the story of the origins of the New Right as a social movement, and did so with aplomb and panache. "Nixonland" by contrast is an often-tedious rehash of a lot of things we already knew about the poisonous person and political institution that was Richard Milhous Nixon.

Perlstein goes in for the unmistakable psychological contours of Nixon the man, the special combination of sycophancy and resentment that characterizes the "authoritarian personality." He also goes in for the gruesome day-to-day events of the Nixon White House, unable to tear himself away from observing every detail like a horrified motorist observing a bloody ten-car pileup. It is familiar territory: Nixon the paranoiac and anti-Semite; Nixon the wounded political sado-masochist; Nixon the petty and venal gangster who enjoyed nothing more and indeed relished the thuggish plots against his ever-lengthening list of "enemies," always trying to outdo and one-up even his own loathsome "ratfuckers" in his enthusiasm for the intrigue of common hoodlums.

It is familiar to all of us, in fact, because it is all quite notoriously there in The Tapes, but Perlstein can't manage to bring anything fresh and exciting to the material, so that this lengthy book comes perilously close to being downright boring. And it all leads to a conclusion that is downright trite, seeming to castigate "extremists on both sides" for the much-hyped "divide" in US politics. Perlstein -- who is a leftist or at least a left-liberal -- slides unbelievably into a too-easy moral equivalence, where the stupidity and self-marginalizing narcissism of the US left is somehow assigned the same moral responsibility for our current state as the downright murderous behavior of the right that he has just spent over 700 pages painstakingly describing. It would not go too far to say that Perlstein emerges here as the kind of "consensus" historian he also likes to ridicule, even if he positions himself at the left edge of the consensus.

I should add that the book's one redeeming feature is that it cuts through the evasions that always mark discussions about the US right's appeal since Goldwater, George Wallace, and Nixon: Perlstein is well-aware that it was, and is, all about racism. This is a welcome contrast to other commentators of a liberal (and -- in the case of Thomas Frank -- even a leftist) bent, who puzzle over the conundrum of why a critical mass of working-class white voters consistently votes against their own interests, and chalks up this behavior to Republicans' skillful manipulation of a mishmash of cultural resentments, none of which is necessarily any more important than the other. The "God, guns and gays" mantra that has been around since Reagan, or the "acid, amnesty and abortion" attacks that buried McGovern for Nixon's benefit, all fit this narrative. By no means does Perlstein consider these appeals unimportant (indeed, as we've seen, a major problem with this book is Perlstein's insistence that everything but the kitchen sink that turned up in his research has to be thrown in). But Perlstein is too smart and too much of a real leftist not to understand the primacy of white supremacy in all of this, and to his credit he does not simultaneously patronize and flatter the rank-and-file voters of the "backlash" by pretending that their concerns are cultural anxieties to be "understood" if not embraced; rather, his narrative does draw out the unmistakable continuity of the "Silent Majority" that has dominated politics in this country for forty years with the much-earlier traditions of the night-rider and the lynch-rope. Strom Thurmond's guiding role in Nixon's rise gets the prominent place it deserves. For that I'd like to give the book two-and-a-half stars, but its flawed overall structure can't allow me to give it three.(less)

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Feb 05, 2009

Bookmarks Magazine added it

Perlstein's writing earned high marks from almost all critics; even the conservative columnist George Will, whose review in the New York Times was at times quite negative, called the book "compulsively readable." Other reviewers' opinions seemed to depend on what they were looking for from Nixonland. Some accepted Perlstein's book as a work of synthesis, a much-needed historical exploration of why today's politics are so vitriolic. Others were more skeptical of Perlstein's choice to ce

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Jan 23, 2009

Stop added it

Read the STOP SMILING review of Nixonland:

When it’s written well, with style and wit and invention, I prefer nonfiction to any other form of writing.

You won’t find those qualities on display in mainstream journalism. You have to look on the fringes or dig into the recent past: when Rolling Stone was printed like newspaper and committed to left-field literary journalism; back when Esquire featured some of the great writers of the century; when you could tell it like it is ...more

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Jan 15, 2009

Joshua rated it

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Pearlstein writes a gripping account of how the breakdown of the American postwar consensus in the 1960s. Pearlstein uses cultural and biographical anecdotes to build a larger narrative, connecting dispersed events and providing understanding to a chaotic period in American history.

Out of the postwar consensus came two feuding groups, which have divided American politics from 1968 onwards. One group on the left, comprised of intellectuals, minorities, feminists and counter-culture y...morePearlstein writes a gripping account of how the breakdown of the American postwar consensus in the 1960s. Pearlstein uses cultural and biographical anecdotes to build a larger narrative, connecting dispersed events and providing understanding to a chaotic period in American history.

Out of the postwar consensus came two feuding groups, which have divided American politics from 1968 onwards. One group on the left, comprised of intellectuals, minorities, feminists and counter-culture youth, who sought to remake America by tearing down or reforming many of the institutions most central to the American way of life; such as the military, the police, political parties, the government, schools, universities and the family. This group saw America as not only imperfect but also sick, and that without dramatic reform doomed to fascistic tyranny. This group of starry-eyed reformers sought to remake the country, ending the Vietnam War, police brutality, the politics of smoke filled rooms and segregated schools.

Another group on the right, comprised of working class, suburban and rural whites, had grown up in and drawn security, if not strength from the institutions that the previous group was trying to tear down and remake. When faced with the threat to their way of life they reacted with a strong backlash.

Pearlstein uses Richard Nixon’s political battles from close loss to Kennedy in 1960 to his dominating re-election over George McGovern to tie his narrative together. This is a powerful narrative device, but I believe it gives to much credit to Nixon. Other politicians such as Ronald Reagan, discovered how powerful a tool division could be. Nixon proved reluctant to use the tools of division until he saw how effective they could be. However, he proved far more comfortable as a divider than a uniter.

I think this also gives the right more of the blame for creating division than perhaps it deserves. As Pearlstein points out it takes two sides, equally intransigent and unwilling to compromise to create division; and the splintering that tore the left and the Democratic party apart, demonstrates that many on the left where just as unwilling to compromise as people on the right.

While Pearlstein introduces many minor characters in the 1960s and early 1970s who would later play larger roles in American politics (George H. W. Bush, George Bush, John Kerry, and Karl Rove), he does little to directly tie the period that he covers to later political events, leaving it to the reader to connect the dots for herself.

Nixonland, which was published in early 2008, by noting the politics of division are still dominant in America today. I wonder what he would say about Barack Obama’s election. Have the politics of division ended? As George Will, notes in his New York Times review of the book, which came out last may, the chaos that Pearlstein describes would be completely unfamiliar to Americans today.

George Will’s review can be found at:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/11/books/...
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Jan 13, 2009

Jeff rated it

Shelves: biography, non-fiction, history

This is a lengthy, but very detailed, discussion of how the modern political landscape came to be. Writing too much about it would rehash the book, but the author comes from his background as an analyst of Barry Goldwater's effect on the FDR-Truman consensus to discuss how Nixon leveraged, and extended, social divisions and the rifts in American public consciousness to create his political career.

If you think you fully understand the modern culture wars, and everything that went on ...moreThis is a lengthy, but very detailed, discussion of how the modern political landscape came to be. Writing too much about it would rehash the book, but the author comes from his background as an analyst of Barry Goldwater's effect on the FDR-Truman consensus to discuss how Nixon leveraged, and extended, social divisions and the rifts in American public consciousness to create his political career.

If you think you fully understand the modern culture wars, and everything that went on in the 1960s, you don't... until you've read Nixonland.

Surprisingly, the book does actually acknowledge Nixon as a pitiable, if not exactly sympathetic, character. He did seem to believe in himself as a man with a higher calling--setting the correct international policy and stance towards the world--but it's hard to take this too seriously when you consider everything else he did, from the dirty tricks and crimes to his widely migrating domestic positions and even manipulation of foreign affairs (e.g. the prosecution of the Vietnam war), in order to ensure he could grasp the reins of power. At some point you have to question your status as divinely ordained charioteer if you feel it's necessary to crash into rocks to keep your hold...

As for the book itself, Perlstein's writing style is personable, interesting, and engaging. He treats his narrative voice self-consciously, frequently presenting events speaking from Nixon's perspective (or that of his prejudices), giving us a certain insight into the man's psychology (while disavowing that this book is meant as a psychobiography, which it definitely is not). However, his narrative voice may be a bit too glib and winking for some readers. One habit I found particularly annoying was his insistence on referring to major political figures by diminutive versions of their first names, even when those are not the names by which they are famous, and in one or two cases where this introduces some ambiguity. Also, he's quite ready to throw in references to some famous figures as asides, with no explanation. This poses less difficulty for the reader who is already a political junkie with a good knowledge of the last forty years' history, but I can imagine, in fifty years' time, that it might make the book unreadable in parts. And I swear I'll scream if I see another politician described as "glad-handing," whatever that even means.

In all, this book is highly recommended. One word of warning: if you care about politics in America, it will likely be quite depressing, or at least make you want to tear your hair out. Sadly, no matter how much dramatic tension the narrative pulls together, we all know that in the end the bad guys won this one. Steel yourself for it.(less)

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Jan 02, 2012

Ron rated it

I just finished “Nixonland” by Rick Perlstein. It is a sweeping history of the United States between the years 1965-1972. Nixon himself is the central character, but the book is not really about Nixon. Rather, it is about the political conditions that allowed a seemingly dull, washed-up ex-Vice President to recover from defeats at runs for the Presidency and Governorship of CA to become a twice-elected President of the US.

Those political conditions are indeed harsh. Although the countr...moreI just finished “Nixonland” by Rick Perlstein. It is a sweeping history of the United States between the years 1965-1972. Nixon himself is the central character, but the book is not really about Nixon. Rather, it is about the political conditions that allowed a seemingly dull, washed-up ex-Vice President to recover from defeats at runs for the Presidency and Governorship of CA to become a twice-elected President of the US.

Those political conditions are indeed harsh. Although the country has elected a Democratic government in a sweeping fashion in 1964, merely one year removed from theat election it seems to be falling apart. The book opens with the Watts riots in 1965. The country had not seen inward-pointing violence like this in 100 years. The African-American community of Watts was self-destructing; worse, the instigators of the riot threatened to take the violence to the “quiet” communities.

Nixonland tells the story of the split in America that followed the debate about what to do to pacify the riots, and how it was Nixon who figured out how to exploit that split for political advantage. Perlstein calls one group the Franklins; these are the élites, the liberals, who insist that the riots were caused by lack of resources and opportunities. The other group, the Orthogonians, the “Silent Majority” as Nixon would call them, were the ones who saw lawlessness and chaos and wanted hellfire punishment for and protection from the mobs.

Anger and frustration turned into outrage as the Franklins, who controlled the government at the time, passed and attempted to enforce civil rights legislation. And it seemed that with each new advantage given to the rioters’ communities, more riots occurred. Detroit and Newark followed Watts in going up in flames. More aid to the cities, in the form of a War on Poverty, gave more resources to the poor at a time when they were asked to fight an increasingly unpopular war in Vietnam.

It was Nixon who saw that the Orthogonians supported the war and wanted the riots to stop at any cost. They also did not want racial integration or their taxes raised to fight poverty. And they didn’t appreciate looking like fools in the Franklins’ press.

Sound familiar? For whom was Sarah Palin introduced into this year’s Presidential race? Palin is the ultimate Orthogonian, and is playing the part for her fellow Orthogonians. Do I even need to draw the analogies?

More than anyone, Nixon understood the Orthogonians; hell, he was one. He was a master of stoking and exploiting the differences between the Franklins and Orthogonians while appearing to unite the country. This was possible because this division was not equivalent to the division between Democrat and Republican. Nixon cared little for party lines, as his appointment of Democrat John Connally as Treasury Secretary shows. Rather, it was the desire to beat the Franklins into the ground, at any cost, was what motivated Nixon and his circle.

Nixon of course didn’t invent these divisons. It’s really not clear when they formed: they could be a legacy of the North-South divisions. But the fact is, voting patterns in 1966 became apparent to Nixon and dictated how he would prosecute his path to the Presidency. Democrats swept in 1964, taking many Republican seats. After the riots of 1965 and 1966, however, those seats lost to the Democrats in 1964 were regained in 1966, and then some.

These Orthogonians played by the rules. They worked, married, raised kids, bought a house, paid taxes and their bills, and lived the American dream. Suddenly, the law and order they inherently understood was breaking down around them. Worse, there were Franklins on the TV set, in the newspapers, telling them that they were at fault. Telling them that the system favored them over the negro. Telling them that the war in Vietnam against evil Comunism was itself evil. Telling them that it was the smelly long-haired hippies with the foul mouths and disgusting sexual practices that were good and cool and better than them.

These people didn’t see themselves as racist, but they saw what happened to Watts, and Newark, and Detroit, and they didn’t want that to happen to them. The whites got away and were able to gate themselves off. But then the courts established that the schools had becomes segregated, especially in the North where such things just didn’t exist, and busing ensued. Control was being lost.

Nixon was able to seize on the anxiety and fear of this environment and exploit the divisiveness that such feelings encouraged. The Republicans were also a more disciplined party, so the more liberal members would still support Nixon as the candidate, while the Democrats were literally in higgledy-piggledy in 1968. Although Nixon was not able to bring in many new Republicans in 1970, the Democrats proved themselves in even more disarray in 1972 with the McGovern candidacy.

I think Perlstein’s point is that this division exists today. Call it what you will: Red State/Blue State, liberal/conservative, etc. But it’s there. Reagan may have been a great president, but the resurgence of the Republican party as it exists today is not his doing, it is Nixon’s. Nixon may be seen as an effective liberal by his party today, but his uniting of the Orthogonians against the Franklins is his enduring legacy. And one that must be understood to understand what drives opposition to Barack Obama, and the methods behind the prosecution of that opposition.(less)

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Sep 21, 2011

Patrick McCoy rated it

Shelves: history

I found Rick Perlstein’s meticulously researched, exhaustive biography of Richard Nixon, Nixonland: The Rise Of A President And The Fracturing Of America, absolutely fascinating. It basically spans from his first campaign in 1966 and ends after his last campaign in 1972. The book is about how the politics of the 60s created the culture wars between left and right that still thrive in today’s politics. Perlstein is amazing in how he weaves in the stories of political players who later come into p...moreI found Rick Perlstein’s meticulously researched, exhaustive biography of Richard Nixon, Nixonland: The Rise Of A President And The Fracturing Of America, absolutely fascinating. It basically spans from his first campaign in 1966 and ends after his last campaign in 1972. The book is about how the politics of the 60s created the culture wars between left and right that still thrive in today’s politics. Perlstein is amazing in how he weaves in the stories of political players who later come into prominence-people like Al Gore, Jesse Jackson, john Kerry, etc. it is fascinating how Nixon cultivates the silent majority and feeds on their fears promising law and order. The fear stemming from the inner city riots that began with Watts in 1964, the Vietnam war and the fight against it at home, school busing and sexual education, civil rights, radicals bombing buildings, vigilante shooting and beating radicals, assignations, and the drugs are just some of the issues frightening Americans in those times. Nixon capitalized on these fears and was elected twice. I also like how Perlstein commented on how certain films had a cultural effect on society; movies like Bonnie and Clyde and its display of violence as well as Nixon’s favorite the jingoistic Patton. Perlstein also comes up with an effect metaphor of the social divide from Nixon’s college days that helps explain Nixon’s behavior and motivations: the battle between “The Orthogonians” and “The Franklins.” In Nixon’s college days there was a club of the well bred wealthy, good looking types for whom everything came easy called “The Franklins.” Nixon resented them and formed his own club of the strivers who had to double their effort to succeed: “The Orthogonians.” Kennedy-a textbook Franklin. This massive text (a hefty 748 pages not including the end notes and bibliography) was a page turner nonetheless. I was slowed down by its weight and left it at home on many occasions to lighten my load. I think it is essential reading for anyone interested in the 60s or American politics.

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Feb 01, 2011

Larry rated it

There is a reason searing biographies and movies are made about Nixon and not about, say, Gerald Ford or Dwight Eisenhower, or Carter. Unlike those amiable nice guys, Nixon was a true head case and his deep, deep neuroses were used to his advantage, to carve out the politics of personal grievance that shaped the political landscape for two generations. He was a paranoid borderline sociopath but almost pitiable in how his lifelong feelings of inadequacy were heightened in an arena where he really...moreThere is a reason searing biographies and movies are made about Nixon and not about, say, Gerald Ford or Dwight Eisenhower, or Carter. Unlike those amiable nice guys, Nixon was a true head case and his deep, deep neuroses were used to his advantage, to carve out the politics of personal grievance that shaped the political landscape for two generations. He was a paranoid borderline sociopath but almost pitiable in how his lifelong feelings of inadequacy were heightened in an arena where he really was at a distinct disadvantage, money-wise and family-wise. It's like great, sickening performance art, watching a man wound himself on purpose. Without putting Nixon on the couch too much, Perlstein does a good job of exploring how Nixon's obsessive, relentless drive combined with his rage/anguish at not having been born into the lucky sperm club (like his nemesis JFK), and how those twisted views not only haunted him and caused his downfall, but were channeled and used to tap into the same latent fears in the common men and women who would become his supporters. "You think you're not getting ahead? You're right. 'Those people' (the liberals, the blacks, the Harvard elite, the gays, the Jews, war protesters, etc.) hate America and they're taking rights away from you, and they hate you AND they're making fun of you hard working people who love America. I understand you, I am one of you, and I hate these people too and I say it's all right to hate them." That's the unspoken, and sometime spoken, heart of Nixon's appeal - reaching out to tap fear and xenophobia (mostly fear) and sadly this politics of personal grievance (versus the politics of issues) been honed to a fine point and ubiquitous today. It was LBJ who said, when he signed the civil rights legislation, that he lost the south for the Democrats for decades. But it was Nixon who exploited that, with his infamous "southern strategy," a strategy that has been used by every R candidate since. (Was it just a coincidence that Reagan kicked off his 1980 campaign in a small Mississippi town known for nothing other than the murder of civil rights workers, calling for "states rights" - a dog whistle to bigots?) But I digress. This book is a fascinating portrait of a man and how he bent politics based on his very damaged psyche, and filled with all sorts of juicy "I never knew that" facts about history. (Did you know that in the aftermath of the Kent State shootings that the majority of Ohioans approved of what the national guard did because the protesters had... gasp, long HAIR?) I did not. (less)

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Dec 29, 2010

Leslie rated it

Shelves: history

This book taught me a great deal about the directions American politics has taken in the past few decades. It's not a biography of Nixon, but rather an examination of the shifts in American politics and culture from the early sixties to the early seventies, and Nixon provides a good lens through which to see those shifts. What we get in the mass media about the sixties is pretty rose-coloured these days, full of peace signs, civil rights, and idealism (prompting laments that kids these days aren...moreThis book taught me a great deal about the directions American politics has taken in the past few decades. It's not a biography of Nixon, but rather an examination of the shifts in American politics and culture from the early sixties to the early seventies, and Nixon provides a good lens through which to see those shifts. What we get in the mass media about the sixties is pretty rose-coloured these days, full of peace signs, civil rights, and idealism (prompting laments that kids these days aren't nearly as idealistic and nonmaterialistic--hah!), or caricatured (stoned hippies, goofy clothes, people dancing funny to old music--the stuff of retro nights or costume parties). We all like to think that, if we'd been there, we too would have been fighting the good fight, cheering on Martin Luther King, Jr, hoisting anti-war signs; WE wouldn't have been taken in by all that nasty racism and that grossly unjust, mishandled war. Really? Most people then were scared witless by the changes of the sixties that seem so charming or stirring to many now, and people who are scared witless do very stupid things, believe what seems comforting, are very easy for unscrupulous operators to manipulate. Nixon was very, very good at using people's fear (of uppity blacks, of smelly hippies, of pushy women's liberationists, of unpatriotic war resisters), at encouraging it and whipping it up, so he could put it to work in shoring up his own power; he could distract them from messy facts with canny stage managing, sabotage of the opposition, a willingness to tell any lie or do any dishonest deed, and a skillful use of their anger. So they let themselves be lied to, because the lies were more comforting and believing that their president and their military and political leadership were lying to them was too terrifying. And Nixon's approach has dominated the political scene ever since. Keep people angry, keep people afraid (of school busing and prayers in classrooms, of blacks and "wise Latinas", of gays who want to get married, of abortion, of affirmative action and "reverse racism," of vaguely defined terrorists whose primary characteristic is that they're different from us) stage manage the hell out of everything you do, leave nothing to chance, whip them up with enthusiasm about vague words and slogans (freedom! the dignity of marriage! tea parties!), and they might not notice as you rob them blind.

As much as I liked this book, I must make one criticism: the copyediting was frequently terrible. Really, a publisher like Scribner's should do better. If they have competent copyeditors on contract, none of them worked on this book. The errors are everywhere, errors I'd be ashamed to have missed if I were the copyeditor. Here's one small example (and there are many, many more): "The officers clamored roofward to hunt him down" (384). The word intended here is clearly clambered. One error like this is a minor problem (even the best copyeditors miss things), but the misused words, ungrammatical sentences, and tangled punctuation aren't occasional but typical. That aside, I think this book is essential reading for anyone interested in American politics or who is affected by American politics, as those of us who aren't American frequently are, whether we like it or not. (less)

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Oct 03, 2009

Don rated it

This works as a summary of the Nixon years from 1962 through his re-election in 1972. As that era recedes in history and distance tends to blur our recollection, this book is a useful reminder of just how venal and, yes, psychotic Nixon was in his years as President. We forget how deep the political corruption of his reelection campaign ran and how dishonest he was with the public during his campaigns and his administration.

Perlstein is less successful in trying to draw parallel...more

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Aug 26, 2009

Terry rated it

Shelves: non-fiction

Yeaaah, this was somewhere between two and three stars for me, personally. It's quite well-written, which to me means intelligently written, or, written for an audience the author assumes is intelligent, which I appreciate. Occasionally though Perlstein lapses into these weird, almost conversational, sarcastic asides which seem out of place and sort of inappropriate for a work of history and politics. The book is EXHAUSTING in its detail of back-room politicking, so if you are deeply interested ...more

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Apr 16, 2009

Christopher Carbone rated it

In 1964 LBJ achieved the largest popular vote victory in Presidential history capping off the most liberal movement in America. Just 8 years later, Richard M. Nixon would win the largest electoral land-side in Presidential history, ushering in the most Conservative administration in American history. How did this happen?

From Watts to civil rights legislation; from Woodstock to the riots in Chicago, Nixonland is a look at how one of the most reviled men in American history tapped in...more

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Feb 13, 2009

Billy rated it

Shelves: 20th-century-1960s

A brilliantly written, left-leaning polemic against the rise of Nixonian conservatism, Perlstein examines why a democratic electorate awared LBJ an overwhelming victory in 1964 but, in 1972, awarded an almost similar victory to Nixon’s brand of conservatism. He focuses on three main points.

1. American’s voted for LBJ because to do anything else would “court civilizational chaos.” Either years later, they voted for Nixon for the very same reason. In short, LBJs stance on poverty a...more

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Jan 11, 2011

John Martin rated it

If you're looking for a thorough explanation of the American political landscape in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, buy this book. Then read it (which I finally did, after staring at it for six or seven months as it sat on my bookshelf).

I've never been satisfied with the labels used to try to explain how we're divided. Conservative and liberal, red state and blue state, and even Republican and Democrat all miss the mark, and all seem to mean different things to different peo...moreIf you're looking for a thorough explanation of the American political landscape in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, buy this book. Then read it (which I finally did, after staring at it for six or seven months as it sat on my bookshelf).

I've never been satisfied with the labels used to try to explain how we're divided. Conservative and liberal, red state and blue state, and even Republican and Democrat all miss the mark, and all seem to mean different things to different people. Conservatives say they're for smaller government, but then support government expansion when their candidate is in office. Liberals say they're for the little guy, and then favor giving unaccountable bureaucrats power to experiment with the lives of millions. The contradictions are everywhere.

This books lays out the true story of what actually separates (most of) us into our two camps, and what has divided us since Nixon emerged on the scene. On one hand, you have those who feel they are smarter than everyone else, and therefore should be trusted with power. On the other hand, you have everyone else-- those who feel they are being taken advantage of and told how dumb they are by the first group.

Nixon was the first major candidate that made a career fighting (exploiting?) the second of these two types of voter. He and his "silent majority" we're sick of being kicked around by those with the fancier upbringing (think JFK), and for the first time, they were going to make a political issue of it. First Nixon went after alleged communists and Hollywood types (they're not like us-- they hate America). Then he went after those pushing the Great Society programs (they're not like us-- they're lazy, or enable those who are lazy). Then he went after hippies and students (they're not like us-- they're privileged and can afford to skip class to protest a war they'll never have to fight). Nixon was the candidate for the other people-- those who felt the world changing and leaving them behind, and who resented that they were never consulted.

Today, Nixon's followers are still with us, and have been with us since Dick gave his final double-victory sign upon leaving office in '74. They voted for Reagan after he made Carter and Mondale look like wimpy elitists. They tried (unsuccessfully) to label Clinton as a out-of-touch liberal. In 2000, they supported George W., after he successfully convinced the country that he was a simple-spoken everyman who understood them, despite the Ivy League pedigree and the aristocratic upbringing. The fact that Bush Jr. promised more government barely seemed to matter to self-proclaimed conservatives; Bush's opponent was Al Gore. Gore was the quintessential elitist, and didn't deserve the support of regular people.

Today, Nixon's legacy lives on, through Sarah Palin and the increasing numbers of Republican candidates who run from any position that might make them seem too smart for their own good. The death tax, environmental legislation, healthcare reform and a slew of other initiatives that Nixon himself either did or could have supported are now complete non-starters for Nixon's descendants. If a conservative candidate can label an issue as the brainchild of the liberal elite, it doesn't matter how much sense it makes-- no candidate hoping to get the Nixon voter will go anywhere near it.

Goldwater may have given a voice to pure conservatives, but it was Nixon who expanded what it meant to be a "conservative," and therefore made it possible for a Goldwater candidate to get elected. By the time Reagan ran in 1980, millions of working-class Democrats and independents abandoned their roots and began voting against their economic self-interests-- not because they necessarily agreed with what Reagan stood for, but because he made them feel that he was on their side, and wouldn't talk down to them.
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Jun 26, 2011

David rated it

· review of another edition

I figured I should read this after a while on the shelf. A good book, a great theory and premise, but for me, It was like I had already read it.
At The Economist, "Lexington" was a big fan of this book, and requested we do an interview/podcast. So we did. Mr Perlstein was an excellent guest and a good interviewee and I think the final productions was good. At the time, I had, sadly not read the book,so I quickly hit the reviews and did a skim. Now that I have, it was good, but l...more

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Feb 01, 2010

Eric Kibler rated it

The adventures of Tricky Dick, from his first congressional race to the 1972 presidential election and the emergence of Watergate. Not only that, but the historical and political events of the day that provide the contextual backdrop. This is a very long book, but is chock full of information. Reading this took me back to the political science classes of my youth. Everyone is here: JFK, Dr. King, Malcolm X, LBJ, Eugene McCarthy, HHH, Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Gerry Ford, John Kerry, Jane Fonda,...more

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Feb 07, 2012

Karl H. rated it

"Some of my best friends have hated Nixon all their lives. My mother hates Nixon, my son hates Nixon, I hate Nixon, and this hatred has brought us together. Nixon laughed when I told him this. "Don't worry," he said, "I, too, am a family man, and we feel the same way about you."

-Hunter S. Thompson

Truth be told, the country was not always so divided. Following the New Deal, the nation was moving increasingly to the left- culminating with LBJ's land...more"Some of my best friends have hated Nixon all their lives. My mother hates Nixon, my son hates Nixon, I hate Nixon, and this hatred has brought us together. Nixon laughed when I told him this. "Don't worry," he said, "I, too, am a family man, and we feel the same way about you."

-Hunter S. Thompson

Truth be told, the country was not always so divided. Following the New Deal, the nation was moving increasingly to the left- culminating with LBJ's landslide victories and Great Society. It seemed at one point that the Republican party might be wiped out, so strong was this Liberal Consensus. But roiling beneath this was a growing discontent from two factions: what Richard Nixon would call the "Silent Majority" and the increasingly radical racial and anti-war factions on the left. And this discontent would blow the country apart in a decade of massive violence. Violence on both sides, as it turns out, since the radical right dished out riots and domestic terror just as often as the radical left.

Nixon didn't invent this divide. What he did coin was a cynical, vicious and scorched earth politics that dominates the political discourse to this day. In Nixon's world, there were many enemies, and none greater than the truth. Concerned about the possibility of peace in Vietnam before the election costing him votes, he leaked information to the Vietcong that they could expect better terms once he was elected, undercutting peace negotiations. To him, winning the election was more important than the welfare of the country. Nixon, as it turns out, was a greater crook than most people would imagine. He wiretapped his opponents regularly and leaned on the FBI and IRS to monitor and audit his opponents. Nixon invented the concept of politics as a war- one where any measures were justified to beat the enemy, no matter how illegal or harmful to the nation.

Nixon's other gift to us was his political jujitsu, his ability to insinuate a lie, and then when called on his lie, turn around and play the victim. He was marvelous at inventing attacks against himself and turning them against the unsuspecting opponent, who thought they sensed weakness. As Thompson wrote in his obituary, “He had the fighting instincts of a badger trapped by hounds. The badger will roll over on its back and emit a smell of death, which confuses the dogs and lures them in for the traditional ripping and tearing action. But it is usually the badger who does the ripping and tearing. It is a beast that fights best on its back: rolling under the throat of the enemy and seizing it by the head with all four claws.” That was Richard Nixon all over. He would let a few protestors into his rallies just so his legions could shout them down in front of the cameras. And make no mistake, this effect was planned. After the disastrous JFK debates, Nixon left nothing to chance when it came to the mass media. He had one of the most staged campaigns in history. Nearly all of it took place in TV studios where all of the audience was hand-picked and the press was not allowed. It was he who popularized the idea of the mainstream media, and he who put the most pressure on the media to cover him his way or lose access.

Perlstein demonstrates all of this about Nixon with a strong interesting voice and impeccable sourcing. He manages to make the turmoil of those times seem alive, and relates it to America today. Even though this is a massive book, it kept me rapt the entire time. Nixon is gone now. Most people prefer to forget the Republican between Goldwater and Reagan, the man who won the biggest electoral landslide in American History. Unfortunately, his legacy still lives on in the politics of the far right today, more so than either of the other presidents. We are still living in Nixonland.
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Jun 08, 2010

John rated it

Great, compelling, engrossing history of the late 60s. In 1964 LBJ and the Democrats won a landslide election. The Republicans were split and in disarray. The Dems passed the Civil Rights Act, Voting Rights Act, Medicare and Medicaid, and it looked like the country was pretty unified. But Vietnam and the Civil Rights protests caused a civil war in the Democratic party, Nixon was elected in 68, and re-elected in a landslide in 72. This book is about how the country split in that time period, betw...more

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May 01, 2009

Kelly rated it

This is a long, meandering, but ultimately gratifying exegesis of a major paradigm shift in the American political landscape. It hop-scotches its way through the 1960s (mainly) to reveal how Richard Nixon and others lassoed pockets of aggrieved conservatives into a durable political coalition. It is both biased and honest: an emerging hallmark of the latest style of journalistic political writing. It's also written with complex and confusing quirks of syntax that, while creative, tend to slow...more

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Oct 28, 2009

AJ rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: biographical, non-fiction, educational

I learned a lot in this book which isn’t to say it was great. At times I felt Perlstein was rushing through the end of a level in super mario brothers, blindly racing with the theme music to make sure he got to that final pipe…AH! Perlstein created a steady drumroll with facts and headline news articles, marching down the path (avec mario) with a sense of dread and despair that weren't all together honest. At times his facts were just wrong or so subjective they were misleading. His review of ...more

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May 09, 2009

Kenneth rated it

How the United States could both put Barack Obama into the White House and seriously consider Sarah Palin as a Vice Presidential candidate finds some explanation in this book, which was like a yoke around my neck (in a mostly good way) for the better part of a week. The creation of the Red-Blue divide and its exploitation by Nixon is at the book's heart, but perhaps the book's most interesting lesson is just how violent the "Summer of Love" 60's/70's actually were, from the riots in W...more

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Jan 27, 2012

Gnucius added it

Richard Nixon cast in the roll of political-system spoiler during the transitional period from the Great Society Liberalism of the United States under Lyndon Johnson, beginning in 1964, through to the utter rout of Democratic contender George McGovern by the political mastermind himself in 1972. This book snaps, crackles, and pops with energy, zigging from political machinations in Washington or on the campaign trail in Alabama to explosive, racially-based riots in Watts and Newark; zagging from...more

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Jan 13, 2010

Tom rated it

Very readable, and quite enjoyable. The thesis is a compelling one, and one that makes a lot of sense. The current culture wars between Red State and Blue State started in the mid-1960s and this book makes a pretty good case making that clear.

I would rate this book higher if it were a little more objective. Now, I'm a diehard liberal, but there are times when reading this book that I felt a more objective approach would have served his thesis much better. In many cases I agreed with ...more

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Feb 02, 2009

Jim Fiorentino is currently reading it

I am still reading this "page turner". It is the history of the 60's, as seen through Nixon's political machinations. I always saw the 60's as being from '67 to '75 or Sgt. Peppers to the first Beegee's disco hit but I now see the period as '65 to '74 or Watts to Watergate. LBJ was right in his prediction that Civil Rights legislation would turn the South Republican for a generation. He did not anticipate that the suburbs would also be lost. And while the South remains a wasteland...more

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Sep 05, 2011

Brian rated it

This book is about redefining a decade, and Perlstein for the most part pulls it off. The 60s become an era not simply of ideological divides. Rather, it’s when those divides were actively exploited for political gain. So much so that our nation’s personality changed, and 40 years later the backlash and the silent majority remain. (You can’t help but think Palin during the Checkers Speech.) The book is far too long, and some of the brilliant themes are stretched a little thin: not everything is ...more

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About Rick Perlstein

Eric S. "Rick" Perlstein (born 1969) is an American historian and journalist. He graduated from the University of Chicago with a B.A. in History in 1992. He is a former writer for The Village Voice and The New Republic and the author of numerous articles in other publications. Until March, 2009 he was a Senior Fellow at the Campaign for America's Future where he wrote for their blog abou...more

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Books by Rick Perlstein

Before the Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus

The Stock Ticker and the Superjumbo: How the Democrats Can Once Again Become America's Dominant Political Party

Richard Nixon: Speeches, Writings, Documents

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“It is a lesson of the sixties: liberals get in the biggest political trouble - whether instituting open housing, civilian compliant review boards, or sex education programs - when they presume that a reform is an inevitable comcomitant of progress. It is then they are most likely to establish their reforms by top-down bureaucratic means. A blindsiding backlash often ensues.” — 1 person liked it

“It is a lesson of the sixties: liberals get in the biggest political trouble - whether instituting open housing, civilian compliant review boards, or sex education programs - when they presume that a reform is an inevitable comcomitant of progress. It is then they are most likely to establish their reforms by to-down bureaucratic means. A blindsiding backlash often ensues.” — 0 people liked it

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title link	preview: Nixonland: America's Second Civil War and the Divisive Legacy of Richard Nixon, 1965-1972.
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BBCode	[url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2393575.Nixonland?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1266785666m/2393575.jpg[/img][/url] [url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2393575.Nixonland?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]Nixonland: America's Second Civil War and the Divisive Legacy of Richard Nixon, 1965-1972. by Rick Perlstein[/url]

Nixonland: America's Second Civil War and the Divisive Legacy of Richard Nixon, 1965-1972.

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