I'm halfway through listening to a history book that covers Nixon's Watergate scandal, and the way it characterizes the general public's spectrum of emotions is quite similar to what I see today under Trump.

Nixon did the same sorts of attacks on the media that Trump does, and there was daily discussion among the populace of whether he might be impeached and how deep his criminality ran and that caused quite a lot of stress and psychological extremism among the people. It seems very much the same situation replaying itself, and the general US populace seem to be having a very similar psychological reaction.

Whatever you think about Trump, the current period is clearly a politically stressful time for the US, and that does take a psychological toll on its citizens. You don't necessarily have to blame Trump for that - you could equally say "well if the media stopped printing such inflammatory headlines, and liberals all stopped panicking about Trump separating families / banning Muslim immigration / threatening to pull out of NATO / building a wall / tariffs / ALL CAPS THREATENING IRAN ON TWITTER, etc. the country could calm down and support the president and everyone would be less stressed." But I would point to Trump's choice to consistently take a confrontational approach against the media and liberals etc rather than a conciliatory approach, as a major factor in inflaming stress and tensions. Trump seems to not have taken on board the idea that he's the president of the whole country and instead sees himself still in the 2016 primaries as the leader of the MAGA faction over and against the Hillary faction and the media. That choice to deliberately and intentionally be divisive as a President, rather than reach out and try to be conciliatory in your public words and speeches, makes Trump unusual, and it's not surprising it's caused unusual amounts of stress for Americans.

And here comes one of the worst afflicted to defend this nonsense.

Quick, go find a safe space with puppies and crayons!

Thanks for giving us an example of TAD.

Mind sharing the name of this book?

The book is called "Nixon isn't even worth a footnote but what about Obama?" It is written by Mountain Man with foreword by Alan Dershowitz.

(Sorry for the bad joke).

Sure, it's The Invisible Bridge: The Fall of Nixon and the Rise of Reagan.

One section I was listening to last night seems particularly analogous to this thread:



Also, it was interesting hearing how Gerald Ford attempted to unite the country after Nixon's divisive presidency, by making clear he was president of all Americans rather than a partisan:

Thanks

I was a kid when Ford became president. I remember him as a nice guy who didn't do anything.

Huh. The book has a larger than typical percentage of negative reviews, and most of them actually give cogent reasons for their negativity. Having read them, I can see the book's attraction for you - lots of psychoanalysis and a marked anti-conservative bent.

Except bump his head on Marine One and be somewhat of a klutz. And golf.

Ironically he was probably the most athletic and physically fit president we had in generations

This is true?

He played football earlier in life.

Your comment inspired me to go look at the negative reviews... and I regret doing so because you're totally wrong about the "actually give cogent reasons" part and I think I actually lost a few braincells reading them.