When I taught American government, I would devote an entire class period to Nixon’s impeachment. It was an exciting tale, with late night clandestine meetings, Senate hearings, the discovery of the taping system late one Friday afternoon, the misuse of the FBI, the CIA, and the IRS, the Supreme Court, the articles of impeachment, and finally the one-sentence resignation letter.
Nixon was despicable. If he had succeeded in staying in office, American democracy would have been in mortal danger.
Nonetheless, I cannot imagine Nixon gutting the Endangered Species Act to aid mining and drilling companies. After all, it was the Nixon Administration that pushed the legislation that formed the E.P.A.
Nixon was a ruthless and immoral man who caused the deaths of thousands of American and Vietnamese men and women by prolonging the war, but, as the cliche went, “the system worked.”
Now we have Trump. Again American democracy is in mortal danger. I don’t think anyone now could claim the system is working. It is not only animal and plant species that are going down. American democracy is going down.
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