Word: frosts
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...Richard Nixon and a tenacious David Frost revived memories of the Viet Nam War and the domestic dissension that it sowed, that was the startling defense of the former President for some of the actions of his Administration against the antiwar movement...
...exchange, part of the third of the televised Nixon-Frost interviews, was fascinating. Nixon insisted that when "a threat to internal peace and order of significant magnitude" was involved, a President could readily use otherwise illegal acts, including burglaries (he preferred the euphemism "warrantless entries"), wiretaps, mail openings, and IRS and FBI harassment against any "violence-prone" dissenters. But if this was so vital to national security, why not ask Congress to make such acts legal? "In theory," said Nixon, "this would be perfect, but in practice, it won't work." It would alert the targeted dissenters, he said...
...Frost kept probing for Nixon's view of the limits on presidential power. If burglary is all right, why not murder? "Ah, there are degrees, ah, there are nuances, ah, ah, which are difficult to explain," replied Nixon. He said that it might have been better to kill Hitler before he could order the murder of millions of Jews. Frost reminded Nixon that domestic dissidents were hardly comparable to the perpetrators of the Holocaust. Nixon finally agreed that only "the President's judgment" determined what was legal under this Nixonian doctrine of presidential supremacy...
...away with it." Nixon paraphrased a Civil War statement by Abraham Lincoln: "Actions which otherwise would be unconstitutional could become lawful if undertaken for the purpose of preserving the Constitution and the nation." Said Nixon: "Now that's the kind of action I'm referring to." Again, Frost refused to equate preserving the Union in the 1860s with deterring dissent in the 1970s...
...Frost probed Nixon's motives in striking out at his critics, the former President anticipated the questions. "Am I paranoiac about hating people and trying to do them in?" he asked. "The answer is: At times, yes. I get angry at people ... but an individual must never let hatred rule him." His bitterness showed when he described Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked the secret Pentagon papers, as "the punk." It also showed toward the Kennedys as he related how Jack and Jackie had never once invited him and Pat to the White House for a meal, even though...