Good Nonsense: How the Good Guys Finally Won

Good Nonsense: How the Good Guys Finally Won

From Good Nonsense by Josh Billings
While Woodward and Bernstein were getting the glory and sales after Nixon took the hint, the book that really explained how RMN's near-impeachment happened was written by Jimmy Breslin--How the Good Guys Finally Won: Notes from an Impeachment Summer. The rope and scaffold for Nixon weren't initially prepared for him. They were prepared for Vice-President Spiro Agnew, who eventually resigned for heavy duty bribery while governor of MD before he could be impeached. But, as Breslin noted, Tip O'Neill, in getting the machinery ready for Agnew, got people used to the idea of impeachment, past all the hand-wringing and "oh, no, it won't work" and "what will it do to the country?" that similar hand-wringers are now going through. So, when the time came for Nixon to face the Congressional music, the legislators and the public, and Nixon, were psychologically prepped and the possibility was real. A masterful bit of politicking by O'Neill, who knew how the game was played and, imagine this, was willing and ready to play it.

Clearly, Breslin's book has relevancy now.

Read the rest of Josh Billing's full post on his blog