On the campaign plane, reporters joined the Kennedy staff in sing-alongs about the New Frontier.38 Bouncing along on the campaign plane, separated from the traveling reporters by a red curtain (and, in some cases, by a gaping cultural divide), Nixon could not possibly compete with the glamorous Jack. Reporters could be savage to Nixon. They called him “the cardboard man” because he seemed to be hiding behind a cardboard image, even when he tried to have drinks with reporters and chat with them.
