That's why yours truly is aghast that Roger says Sarah Palin’s decision to resign as Governor of Alaska reminds him of the first time that Tricky Dick stepped away from the public eye in the aftermath of losing the California governor race in 1962.
On the commendable stonezone.com, Roger writes that Nixon was fed up with “elitist derision” and “had enough of the liberal media who consistently held him to a higher standard than his Democratic opponents and poked fun at his lack of sophistication — he being the son of a grocer.” Nixon inscribed one into the record books when he said: “You won’t have Dick Nixon to kick around anymore because, gentlemen, this is my last press conference.” Six years later, he was inaugurated President.
Nixon didn’t waste that period wandering in the wilderness. He used the downtime to make money, build a contributor base and mend fences with the Republican grassroots. Nixon was tanned, rested and ready following the Goldwater blow-up debacle of 1964.
Stone believes Palin is following Tricky Dick’s playbook with an eye on the 2012 campaign. He’s got to be kidding.
Remember when VP candidate Lloyd Bentsen demolished Dan Quayle, when he had the audacity to compare his electoral inexperience with that of JFK? Said Bentsen: “Senator, I served with Jack Kennedy. I knew Jack Kennedy. Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. Senator, you are no Jack Kennedy." The same applies to Sarah.
Palin is no Nixon. Stone insults the memory of his former boss by making such a whacky comparison. RMN served in the Pacific during WWII. Upon return, he won a California congressional (with plenty of spitballs) and senate seat. Dwight Eisenhower picked Nixon, whom he loathed, as his running mate. Though Ike and Tricky Dick weren’t the best of buddies, Nixon dutifully traveled the world as VP and had the famous kitchen debate with Russia’s Khrushchev before running as the GOP standard-bearer against Kennedy in 1960.
Nixon had cred.
Palin is former Mayor of nowhere Alaska and half-term governor of one of the country’s least populated states. The Wall Street Journal says Palin got out of the Great North just in the nick of time as energy revenues are drying and tourism tanks.
Stone knows better. He should stick to skewering former New York State Governor Eliot Spitzer and the Empire State’s dysfunctional Senate.
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Note to Roger: Check out odwyerpr.com’s poll on Sarah’s decision to blow Juneau:
33 percent believe she is interested in making millions via writing a book and making speeches;
27 percent believe she hears the rattling of skeletons in her closet;
25 percent agree that Palin is doing a Nixon. And
14 percent say she wants to spend more time with Todd and the family.
(Images via thetriangle.org and sanseverything)
