Richard Nixon’s Warm and Fuzzy Side

A recently released document from the Nixon White House provides an illuminating window on Nixon and his modus operandi. In it, Nixon complains that the public doesn’t appreciate his good and caring side. It’s hard to say what is the most amusing part about it: The false humility (”Again, such things, to be believable, have to be discovered, and one of the great factors that should be emphasized is that the President does not brag about all the good things he does for people.”), the outrageous mendacity  (”The line that the President always takes the heat and never shifts the blame should get out.”), the false air of education (”I have used the Latin phrase over and over again, ‘Esta en su casa.’”), or the unintended irony  (”we have gained the liability of being known as a ‘PR-obsessed administration’ and have been less successful in PR than in any other area of undertaking.”, “100 years from now political scientists will praise us for our process.”).