I just saw Frost/Nixon and I'm depressed...

[CoffeeCat]

As I watched Frost/Nixon reality set in and these facts hit me hard:

1.) Richard Nixon was an angel compared to today's evil neocons and corporatists, which includes Dick Cheney, the entire Bush family,
paid off Congressional members and other warmongering scoundrels.

2.) Richard Nixon had a conscience. He did feel guilt and he felt remorse about perverting democracy and our government, and he
said so during the Frost interviews. The neocons who have their talons in our government have absolutely no conscience.

3) There are no David Frosts and if there was a David Frost, no neocon would get within 50 feet of that media member. Our media
is neutered and run by the corporations. No way in hell would any politician sit down for an open and revealing interview
with a journalist who desperately wanted the truth. How will the truth find the light of day without truth seekers demanding
answers from these people?

4.) The neocons learned a great deal from Nixon. They don't interview with journalists who won't play by their rules. They never,
ever admit wrongdoing. They follow, and have perfected, Nixon's manipulative and smarmy interviewing tactics that keep them in
control of the messaging through intimidation, obfuscation and snake-like, question-dodging ploys.

5.) The American public was united in agreeing that Nixon was wrong. There is no truth any more. On every issue--whether
it be global warming, bank bailouts, health care reform, or the issue of our President's birth certificate--there are two
virulent sides that are given equal time and validation. People like Orly Taitz and the Swiftboatters for Truth are given
as much latitude as they please--to lie and distort. No matter how egregious a crime the Republicans commit--there will
always be a loud contingent of enraged lemmings that defend them with soundbytes heard on the Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh
shows. There is no right and wrong any more.

I don't see a way out of this unless someone from the inside dares to be a hero.

[BrklynLiberal]

1. All true.

[joeybee12]

2. It's a movie...Tricky Dick was a sick, twisted criminal...

...he was also a better politician than most, because he turned left mainly because it was in his interest to...he had no scruples, he had no morals.

[question everything]

7. He was a very complex individual that cannot be summed

in a sound bite.

I have seen a program about him that showed the two sides of him. A brilliant statesman and a paranoid individual.

Had he not have that sense of "everyone out to get me" he could have been considered one of the greatest presidents. As a matter of fact, when the RWers criticize "communist" Obama, they compare him to... Nixon.

[H2O Man]

3. It's a good movie.

Nixon was a terrible human being. He was a rotten president, who attempted to destroy our form of government. Yet, in a sick way, he had a degree of respect for the institution of the presidency. Today's rats do not.

[frazzled]

6. I didn't like the movie

as a movie, that is. I thought Frank Langella's performance was absurdly over the top and not a thing like the real Nixon, and the Frost caricature equally hyperbolic.

The real interviews are at once more compelling and, I dare say, more entertaining.

[H2O Man]

11. Sure.

Real life is hopefully more interesting to everyone. Serious books and documentaries follow. And, after that, would be a movie like this one.

I'm far more interested in what is real, and true, than in being "entertained." Hence, I do not read or watch tv/movies for entertainment purposes. But, I recognize that I am in a minority on that. To each, his/her own.

[Cleita]

4. Well, Nixon and Harry Kissinger nearly destroyed the country of my

birth, Chile. I'm an American citizen but I still feel fondness for the country I was born in and it made me very sad to see what has happened there since the coup orchestrated by the Nixon administration. So I'm so sorry if I don't feel all warm and fuzzy about him. Also, I remember what a unapologetic, in your face liar he was. I think he set the precedent for lying in public on the airwaves for politicians, making it seem all right to do so.

[Enrique]

5. they made him sympathetic to make the movie watchable

Oliver Stone did the same thing with Nixon in "Nixon" and with Bush in "W". When they make movies about our current scoundrels they will make it so normal people can relate to them.

[CoffeeCat]

9. I'm not saying Nixon was a good guy...

Clearly, Nixon was a sociopath. He was a pathological liar, and he perfected
the art of lying. He was a horrible man, and a terrible President.

That's what is so depressing for me. Nixon was a dirty bastard--but it is fact
that he admitted wrongdoing during the Frost interview. He also acknowledged
that what he did was unpresidential and that he failed the American people.

All of that---from a very awful man who had some moments of conscience.

I went back and watched the real Frost/Nixon interviews and Nixon did say all of those
things.

The upsetting part for me is that Nixon was horrible and a real threat to democracy--but
the neocon corporatists who rule currently--are even worse.

[SteppingRazor]

8. Meh, I kinda disagree.

1. Richard Nixon was a shadowy reflexion of today's neocons. He served as president during a high tide for the New Left, and he acquiesced to some fairly liberal policies purely for political reasons. Had he served during a time of resurgent conservatism, as Bush did, he would never have done things like detente with China or the establishment of the EPA. And on the other hand, Nixon was, himself, a warmongering scoundrel, who bombed the living hell out of Cambodia without even properly informing Congress -- something that the Bush administration never did. Bush may have bombed the living hell out of two countries, but he took Congress along for the ride. Nixon felt no such constitutional compunctions.

2. No, he did not have a conscience. Like all sociopaths, Nixon felt regret -- at the fact that he got caught. Had he gotten away with sludging toward re-election, had his firebombing of the Cambodian countryside been greeted with approbation, he would not have lost a moment's sleep.

3. There are no David Frosts? You mean, there are no good-looking, morally ambiguous TV pseudo-journalists out to make a name for themselves? Hmmm .... I don't know about that.

4. Agreed. The only difference between the prototype of Nixon and his modern descendants is that they have improved upon the original model.

[CoffeeCat]

10. I agree with much of your astute analysis...

...but what bothers me is the answer to this question: Can you ever imagine Dick Cheney
having any sort of mea culpa or regret for all of his horrible crimes, including
torture, the slaughter of untold innocent Iraqis and American soldiers, death squads, etc.?

As you said, Nixon was a sociopath who had regret after he was caught.

However, post-Watergate--Nixon was still denying he covered up. Frost cornered him, but
Nixon could have wiggled out of it with some verbal gymnastics. It was as if he was tired
of the energy that all of the denial created.

I can't see Cheney wearing down at all. Nixon had a black heart, but Cheney and gang
have absolutely no heart.

[SteppingRazor]

12. It's certainly a fine point. I don't really know the answer.

I mean, if Cheney had been forced from office, hounded into private life and facing prison until a presidential pardon by his successor (and can you imagine if Obama did that? Whew!), I could maybe see him offering up some mea culpa if he thought it might allow him to get back in the action. In other words, I could see Cheney saying something like, "Sure, mistakes were made, and I regret them, but we always had the best interest of the country, protecting the American people, at heart, and blah, blah, blah..." if he thought that such a speech would make it safe for Republican office holders and corporate boards to do business with him without being tarred and feathered themselves.

So, yes, I can see Cheney apologizing, in a sense, for his actions if he were in the same boat as Nixon. But I certainly cannot see him offering a heartfelt apology. That make sense?