Tricky Dick and Dirty Don: How a Compelling Narrative Can Change the Fate of a Presidency

The Political Scene | The New Yorker

The New Yorker

Politics, Washington, News, Obama, Wnyc, President, Lizza, Barack, Wickenden

4.3 • 3.9K Ratings

🗓️ 14 November 2019

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In 1972, Richard Nixon’s political future seemed assured. He was reëlected by one of the highest popular-vote margins in American history, his approval rating was near seventy per cent, and the public wasn’t interested in what newspapers were calling the “Watergate Caper.” But the President’s fortunes began to change when new revelations suggested that he knew about the Watergate break-in and that he had participated in a coverup. In May of 1973, the Senate Watergate Committee hearings were broadcast on television, and millions of Americans tuned in to watch compelling testimony about Nixon’s illegal activities. A narrative emerged, of Nixon as a scheming crook who put his own interests before those of the country. His poll numbers plummeted, his party turned on him, and, in August of 1974, Nixon resigned from the Presidency in disgrace. Thomas Mallon dramatized Nixon’s downfall in his 2012 novel “Watergate.” As Congress again debates the impeachment of a President, Mallon joins Dorothy Wickenden to discuss the power of a good story to affect the course of political history.

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0:44.0	Things people love.
0:48.1	This is the political scene, a weekly conversation with New Yorker writers and guests about politics.
0:56.1	It's Thursday, November 14th.
1:02.4	I'm Dorothy Wickenden, executive editor of The New Yorker. This week, the House of Representatives began public hearings that will determine whether Donald Trump will be impeached. The Democratic
1:08.5	leadership of the Intelligence Committee has called a slate of witnesses
1:12.5	they hope will dramatize a clear, simple narrative that Trump abused his power to rig the 2020
1:19.9	elections in his favor by attempting to convince the president of Ukraine to smear his 2016 opponent, Hillary Clinton, and his potential opponent
1:30.5	next year, Joe Biden. The Republicans say that Trump committed no wrongdoing and that he is
1:36.5	the victim of a political witch hunt. The impeachment of Donald Trump draws inevitable comparisons
1:42.5	to the investigations into Richard Nixon,
1:45.4	who faced public hearings on Watergate in the Senate and the House. Nixon initially had the
1:51.0	strong support of his party, but the riveting testimony at those hearings, along with crack
1:56.4	investigative reporting in the Washington Post and other papers, helped to convince voters and members of Congress that Nixon was a crook who had committed impeachable crimes.
	...

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