Tim Weiner, the Last Nixon Basher

Bashing Nixon

          Tim Weiner joins a dwindling list of Nixon bashers with his new book, One Man against the World, purporting to advance new information about our 37th President.  While the rest of the world has come to realize that Richard Nixon was one of the most important presidents of the 20th Century, Weiner makes the preposterous assertion that Nixon was a suicidal drunk who left the country unattended during his last years in office.

Not a Quitter

          Anyone who has seriously studied Nixon and his presidency knows that above all, he was not a quitter.  Nixon’s life and career were a series of mountains and valleys and even in the depths of despair, he always rose to the challenge of climbing the next hill.  For such a man, resigning the presidency must have been the most difficult thing imaginable, yet he did it for the country he loved and served so well.  In so doing, he spared us from a long, drawn out battle, which he knew he could not win.  The overwhelming combined forces of the liberal media and a liberal Congress had been out to get him from day one.  Despite having the odds stacked against him, suicide would have been out of the question for a man like Nixon and he would never have been derelict in his duties as president.

Last True Statesman  

      Perhaps Mr. Weiner can be forgiven for his distorted view of a great American president.  After all, he has been a reporter for the New York Times, a flagging tabloid known principally for its liberal bias.  In addition, he is a graduate of Columbia University, one of the most liberal institutions in the country.  We are happy to see that at least Tim pronounces his last name according to the correct grammatical rules as in ‘whiner’, unlike the infamous Anthony Weiner who pronounces it as in ‘hotdog’.  All that notwithstanding, thoughtful students of U.S. history will continue to regard Richard Nixon as one of the last true statesmen and one of the two best presidents of the past one hundred years.