I would have to say that Richard Nixon is probably the most gifted and skilled political practitioner, in his pre-presidential years, of all of the American presidents in the 20th century.
Reagan was the most important American political figure of the latter half of the 20th century. No one was more central to his emergence and success than Bill Buckley.
Ever since Richard Nixon walloped George McGovern in the presidential election of 1972, political pundits have treated as a truism the proposition that liberals are out of step with the rest of the nation, and therefore all but unelectable outside the precincts of the Northeast -- give or take a college town here or a ski resort there. During the course of every presidential election for the past forty years now, Republicans have sought to wield the word liberal as if it were a six-gauge shotgun.
Presidents are always also storytellers, purveyors of useful national mythologies. And surprisingly enough, Richard Nixon, this awkward man who didn't even really like people, had not been so bad at this duty - at least in the first four years of his presidency.
Richard Nixon was a Republican presidential candidate who encouraged crooks to commit espionage against the Democratic National Committee in order to gain an edge in a presidential election.
Everyday Americans really having the power here. People may remember, or you may have heard if you weren't there during the [Richard] Nixon years, we had one of the worst Presidents ever on record but we the American people have the sense of our own power. We were in the driver's seat.
Throughout American history, we have elected presidents who had not been honest man. Warren Harding, Richard Nixon, to some extent, Lyndon Johnson just to name a few.
Richard Nixon is very much a self-made man in the six years prior to his emergence as a national figure. Between the moment he's elected to Congress in 1946 and the moment he's inaugurated as Vice President in 1953, he conducts nothing less than a kind of prodigy of American political self-advancement.
Richard Nixon had a kind of Walter Mitty fantasy life. He was a man with a grandiose thoughts: dreams of not simply being president but maybe becoming one of the truly great presidents of American history.
D-Day represents the greatest achievement of the american people and system in the 20th century. It was the pivot point of the 20th century. It was the day on which the decision was made as to who was going to rule in this world in the second half of the 20th century. Is it going to be Nazism, is it going to be communism, or are the democracies going to prevail?
Nixon was the most dishonest individual I have ever met in my life. He lied to his wife, his family, his friends, his colleagues in the Congress, lifetime members of his own political party, the American people and the world.
With nearly two years remaining in his presidency, George W. Bush is alone. In half a century, I have not seen a president so isolated from his own party in Congress - not Jimmy Carter, not even Richard Nixon as he faced impeachment. Republicans in Congress do not trust their president to protect them.
To me, the funniest American of the Twentieth Century is Richard Nixon because he had the most to hide, and he was so bad at hiding it. To me, that's what's really funny - people who think they're doing a great job of hiding stuff, and it just keeps leaking out.
Wellington Webb was one of the most significant mayors of the latter half of the 20th century. His natural political instincts are almost unrivaled.
More than Nixon or any other 20th-century president, Clinton has devoted his life to winning and keeping the presidency.
God Bless America started to become an almost ritualistic incantation at the end of political speeches really with Ronald Reagan. It appears occasionally before, but it was not that common. And of course since it was a song that wasn't written by Irving Berlin until the 20th century (laughter), none of the 19th century presidents said God Bless America at the end of speeches, either. I think that the symbolism which suggests that everybody is religious and that even presidents who believe in church and state feel obliged to do this.
That's a chapter - the last chapter - of the 20th ... 20th ... the 21st century that most of us would rather forget. The last chapter of the 20th century. This is the first chapter of the 21st century.