-
The CEO of Canterbury
April 12, 2013 | 9 comments
-
An Oasis of Tolerance
March 26, 2013 | 10 comments
-
At Work and at Prayer
December 15, 2012 | 0 comments
-
Religious Stirrers
November 27, 2012 | 51 comments
-
The Games of August
October 6, 2012 | 0 comments
High Spirits
Black Punches Back
Serious comebacks by two serious men of achievement.
Coming back from death—real death—has only happened once. Its political equivalent has been almost as rare. Yet as 2013 gets under way, recent evidence highlights two examples of this phenomenon: Richard Nixon and Conrad Black.
Last month marked the 100th anniversary of Nixon’s birth. Most of the centenary reassessments of his career must surely have brought a grin of pleasure to the celestial countenance of the 37th president. A savvy political prophet, he was always expecting his shares to rise on the stock market of history.
As early as 1978, I accompanied Nixon to a rowdy meeting at the Oxford Union. Fewer than four years after his resignation from the presidency, he was still at the nadir of his reputation. Tested by a hostile student questioner on Watergate, he replied: “Some people say I didn’t handle it properly and they’re right. I screwed it up. Mea culpa. But let’s get on to my achievements. You’ll be here in the year 2000 and we’ll see how I’m regarded then.”
With an eye on his legacy, Nixon spent the last phase of his life in the unique endeavor of running for ex-president. Despite intermittent taunts from his hate club, he clawed his way back to a position of eminence as a foreign policy sage and well-recognized geopolitical statesman.
His enduring achievements begin with his ground-breaking opening of China, which brought that country out of dangerous isolation. He was the first American president to go to Moscow, where he negotiated the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty. Other Nixonian achievements, with full honor to the role played in them by Henry Kissinger, included saving Israel from near annihilation in the 1973 war and eventually signing the peace treaty with North Vietnam that ended America’s disastrous military entanglement in Southeast Asia. By the time Nixon left office he had brought peace to millions, even if he had not found it for himself.
Although this record is well known, what is underestimated is Nixon’s extraordinary resilience in rebuilding his historical reputation. He donned his mantle as an elder statesman—a hyperactive one—and for nearly two decades traveled, spoke, and wrote influential books and articles. This took courage and effort. But in the end he emerged from the tomb of political death and disgrace, if not quite as another “New Nixon,” at least with a considerable measure of honor redeemed.
IT MAY NOT BE A COINCIDENCE that the Nixonian road to redemption is currently being well traveled by Conrad Black, for he is both an unabashed admirer and an acclaimed biographer of the 37th president. So it is safe to assume that Nixon’s climb back out of the depths must surely have had an influence on the trajectory that Black is now pursuing.
Last year Black published his memoir, A Matter of Principle, chronicling the saga of his extraordinary and largely successful battles with the U.S. justice system. As the book was well reviewed in this and many other journals, there is no need to retread the familiar ground of the story. But it is interesting to look at how Black has demonstrated his own brand of Nixonian resilience. Most impressive has been his willingness to engage in hand-to-hand combat against his adversaries in the most hostile (for him) bear pit in the world: the British press.
On a recent nine-day visit to London to promote his book, he ran the gauntlet of media adversaries with feisty aplomb. While Nixon, albeit through gritted teeth, was coldly courteous to his critics, Black took a different approach and traded insults with his interrogators. “You’re a priggish, gullible, British fool,” Black bellowed at the BBC’s top interviewer Jeremy Paxman, adding that after what he had been through it was lucky to be able to “endure discussion like this without getting up and smashing your face in.” (“Well you…go ahead and…” Paxman muttered in response.)
Black denounced Rupert Murdoch as a “psychopath…like Stalin except that he doesn’t kill people.” Of his adversarial biographer Tom Bower, Black warned, “We’ll take the fillings out of his teeth and the roof off his house when we finally get around to dragging him into court here. He’s a dead man.”
If these comments seem a little over the top in the dignified columns of The American Spectator, it should be emphasized that Conrad Black’s primary mission in Britain was selling books—a branch of show business in which understatement wins no prizes. It reminded me of Boswell’s reply when Dr. Johnson said he’d had a good outing the previous evening: “Yes, Sir, you tossed and gored several persons.”
Conrad Black came, saw, and conquered on his return to London. The tossing and goring left blood on the carpet, some drops of it his own. But he secured good reviews and substantial media coverage, much of it favorable. His roughing up of certain media proprietors and journalists tapped into the anti-newspaper mood here induced by the News International phone hacking scandal. There was much amusement at his valedictory comment: “The London media are the lowest mutation of human life I have encountered (except for American prosecutors), and that does not exclude the many hundreds of people I met in the U.S. Federal prisons.”
Aside from the histrionics and the colorful quotes, Black’s British comeback was notable for some hidden emotions that bear comparison to those of Richard Nixon in the days of his journey toward rehabilitation.
Both were men who in their heyday exercised great power. Their falls were prolonged and painful. Most people subjected to such brutal reversals of fortune would have retreated quietly into obscurity to lick their wounds. But Black and Nixon found inner strength to get back into the arena, to fight on, to ignore the jabs and jokes, and both gained considerable satisfaction from winning back parts of their reputations.
But where did their inner strength come from? Black has been fueled by a burning sense of injustice against his U.S. prosecutors. Nixon, the born-again comeback specialist of six crises, lived by maxims such as “Failure is not falling down. Failure is falling down and not getting up to continue life’s race.” Yet these explanations, though true, are too shallow.
Black and Nixon drew real sustenance from three sources: their families, their friends, and their faiths. Take a bow, Barbara Black, Pat Nixon, Julie Nixon Eisenhower, and Tricia Nixon Cox. Unsung heroes from their private friends were massively important too, particularly in Nixon’s case those much maligned praetorian guardsmen Bob Abplanalp and Bebe Rebozo.
In the faith department, Black’s Catholicism and Nixon’s Quaker roots are significant, for each would have learned that court justice, to say nothing of media justice, is not to be compared to the higher justice that awaits us all. All redemptions have a spiritual factor. I believe that Richard Nixon and Conrad Black saw this—perhaps through a glass darkly, but clearly enough to recognize that they did not recover their reputations entirely through their own endeavors.
About the Author
Jonathan Aitken, The American Spectator’s High Spirits columnist, is most recently author of John Newton: From Disgrace to Amazing Grace (Crossway Books). His biographies include Charles W. Colson: A Life Redeemed (Doubleday) and Nixon: A Life, now available in a new paperback edition (Regnery).
Letter to the Editor View all comments (31) | Leave a comment
More Articles by Jonathan Aitken
More Articles From High Spirits
http://spectator.org/archives/2013/02/25/black-punches-back
Follow us:
ADVERTISEMENT
Current Issue
- The (Real) Great Divide
- The Demise of Money and Credit
- Inside the Gates of Eden
SPONSORED LINKS
FLASHBACK TO: 1995
-
Pope Culture
A man of faith in a godless age is hitting Americans where it hurts.
-
Why the GOP Does Not, Like, Totally Suck
Mr. and Mrs. American Spectator Reader, let P.J. O’Rourke talk sense to your kids.
-
Dames at Sea
-
In the Absence of Guns
In Britain, defending your property can get you life.
-
The Metaphysical Martini
-
Counting the Costs of Clintonism
The debacle of this president’s administration is both a cause and a symptom of the decline of American values. Unless Congress impeaches him, that decline will go on unchecked. An eminent jurist surveys the damage and assesses the chances for the recovery of our culture.
-
Chuck McHagel
It won’t take long for conservatives to scratch this presidential wannabe off their 2008 scorecard.
-
The Legacy of Old John and Mother Fresh-Roasted
-
It’s the Best Time of the Year
The American Christmas, like the songs that celebrate it, makes room for everybody under the rainbow. Is that why so many people seem to be hostile to it?
-
The Bush Crack-Up
Was the President done in by the economy, or by the politics of the economy?
Clip of the Day
ADVERTISEMENT
Let's rumble| 2.24.13 @ 8:54PM
And China is now a our credit master. And her people are free? Not..... Puleeez. And 30 years hence we shall be reading Rove's pleas to historians.
Jack London| 2.25.13 @ 6:22AM
Jonathan Aitken – former Conservative Member of Parliament in the United Kingdom for 24 years, and a former British government Cabinet minister. He was convicted of perjury in 1999 and received an 18-month prison sentence.
Conrad Moffat Black, Baron Black of Crossharbour,is a Canadian-born former newspaper publisher, a historian, a columnist, a UK peer, and convicted felon for fraud.
Richard Nixon – at least he didn’t serve time.
Jack in Wi| 2.25.13 @ 7:22AM
Conrad Black has written 2 big, friendly, biographys of FDR and Nixon. On top of that he was an enabler of Neocon central for years. That is how he got in trouble. As soon as he got in trouble, the Neocons left him like rats from a sinking ship. The poor guy just wasn't conservative. He was and is a faux conservative intellectual. He is still deluding himself.
Jack London| 2.25.13 @ 8:00AM
Funny how the article is written by a crook about a crook writing about a crook...
Arnie| 2.25.13 @ 8:29AM
HA! Wow. Thanks for that info Jack.
CJW| 2.25.13 @ 8:33AM
Commie Jack
Are you talking about Bubba and mrs Bubba?
Albert Constantine Jr.| 2.25.13 @ 8:43AM
...sort of like R Kelly singing a song about Mike Tyson doing a monologue on Bill Clinton...
KennesawJack| 2.25.13 @ 9:16AM
more like Bob Menendez writing an ode to Slick Willie eulogizing Ted Kennedy, wouldn't you say?
KennesawJack| 2.25.13 @ 9:28AM
Or, even more likely, Barack Obamarx serenading Saul Alinsky paying homage to Lenin.
Albert Constantine Jr.| 2.25.13 @ 10:01AM
How about Clinton coming out with his own karaoke Al Green serenade to the current POTUS (to the tune of "Let's Stay Together"):
I'm... I'm so jealous of you
Doin’ what you want to do
No one on the right stoppin’ me...
'Cause you... bought a majority-y-y-y...
And then you brought on Hillary-y-y-y...
Let me say that when, barry
when I was the president
Ooo...
famous white house resident
Is what I... need...
Let me... be the one you come running to...
I'll... never be untrue...
Ooo baby...
Let's build a bath house...
I’ll be your man and your mouse
who needs michelle ‘cause I’ll be your belle
Ooooo... Oooo... Yeah...
Whether to buy or sell, as we all go to hell
KennesawJack| 2.25.13 @ 10:43AM
SNAP to the 10th power!
CJW| 2.25.13 @ 1:06PM
Albert and K Jack
Want to hear something truly bizarre?
I just received a letter inviting me to hear John W. Dean, ( a/k/a the rat-weasel) speak on "How Watergate Revolutionized Legal Ethics." only $50, and I get 3 CLE credits.
John Dean speaking on legal ethics? You cannot make this up. It seems he has found a new gig making money, speaking on legal ethics.
Maybe Bubba will be co-speaker on how to testify at depositions, and Charlie Rangel on paying you income tax, and Jesee Jr. on campaign funds, and mrs Bubba/Panetta on protecting our embassies.
KennesawJack| 2.25.13 @ 2:20PM
Maybe Geithner would be better qualified than Rangel on the income tax piece. I suppose they could team-teach, though.
Albert Constantine Jr.| 2.25.13 @ 4:50PM
Perhaps Mr. Dean will at last confess he ordered the Watergate burglary to steal back his fiance's name (later wife) Maureen's name from Larry O'Brien's little black book of escorts for the politically connected Democrat VIPs.
CJW| 2.25.13 @ 5:55PM
That was mentioned in Silent Coup as the reason for the break in. Dean said he would sue Gordon Liddy for repeating the story, I don't know if he did sue.
Why would anyone break in the Dem headquarters? Just schedules of events and campaign literature. Made no sense.
Maybe I should pay the $50 for the seminar and ask how Mo is doing, what she is doing, and maybe Mo will be there.
obadiah| 2.26.13 @ 2:45PM
Why? Liddy had a bigger prize in mind and this was a trial run. Liddy wanted a promotion and got stoned and figured out this was the way to do it. Or Dean wanted the promotion. There was an environment that encouraged guys who wanted promotions to pull bag jobs.
Bob K| 2.25.13 @ 9:21AM
Likely so, but never the less all men of "wit." A characteristic of men of the Right and almost always missing in men of the Left.
Bob K| 2.25.13 @ 9:23AM
Did you get that Arnie, you half wit!
loulou| 2.25.13 @ 10:54AM
No he didn't get it.
C. Vernon Crisler | 2.25.13 @ 12:22PM
What is "Neocon central"? Is this a reference to nefarious Jewish bankers?
C. Vernon Crisler | 2.25.13 @ 12:20PM
Yes, Aitken lied about staying in a French hotel in 1993 and having it paid by an Arab, and he also appears to have lived a Clinton-like life.
But he also converted to Christianity while in prison, a British version of Colson.
CJW| 2.25.13 @ 1:08PM
I believe he credited Chuck Colson for his conversion.
C. Vernon Crisler | 2.25.13 @ 10:30AM
Nixon and Kissinger's foreign policy Machiavellianism did much to damage America's commitment to anti-Communism and liberty in the world.
KennesawJack| 2.25.13 @ 11:49AM
Tell that to the Russians, Lithuanians, Latvians, Estonians, Ukrainians, Poles, Czechs, Albanians, Romanians, Georgians, Kazahks, Uzbeks, Armenians, Turkmen, Tadzhiks, Croats, Bosnia-Herzegovinians, and the Hungarians.
C. Vernon Crisler | 2.25.13 @ 12:03PM
Reagan already did that....
KennesawJack| 2.25.13 @ 12:25PM
Nixon's China policy was the initial step in the downfall of the Soviet Union. We are fortunate to have had Republican Ronald Reagan recognize the opportunity to hasten its demise and seize it.
C. Vernon Crisler | 2.25.13 @ 1:17PM
I respectfully disagree that Nixon's opening to China contributed to the downfall of the Soviet Union. All that Nixon did was remove the bright line of our foreign policy from anti-communism & liberty to the gray pragmatism of detente. In reality, Nixon (and Ford) only paved the way for Jimmy Carter's hapless foreign policy.
Historian Steven Hayward has a good discussion of Nixon in his Age of Reagan books, and it is not favorable.
CJW| 2.25.13 @ 6:06PM
Disagree. This is the first I have heard of blaming Nixon for Carter's foreign policy.
Carter was a bumbling idiot. His foreign policy was in line with the congressional Dems that cut off all aid to S.Vietnam in Jan 1975 thus leading to the victorious N. Vietnamese invasion.
Then Carter abandoned our ally in Iran, the Shah leading to Khomeni. It was Carter who stated we had to "get over our inordinate fear of Communism."
The only way you can blame Nixon is to say his resignation and Ford's pardon helped Carter win in 76.
I agree with KJack that the China policy helped the downfall of the Soviet Union. It contributed and accelerated the divisions within the commie bloc and showed that Russia was not the leader of the world commies. That was one of the reasons for Nixon's move to China. Once the other countries in the Soviet bloc saw China tell Russia to go to hell, it reduced the power of the Russians.
obadiah| 2.26.13 @ 2:30PM
Black and Nixon drew real sustenance from their rage. Nixon was a Quaker in name only.
Let's rumble| 2.26.13 @ 6:42PM
Well, there seems to be some disagreement here. By no means do I think Nixon was a great president and now we have a cheerleader for his immortality? Nixon made America sick to it's stomach opening the door for Carter. Much the same way Bush opened the door for a worse monster. Those two facts alone should be enough to resign them to the dustbin. Lets move on people, we have a country to take back.
axbucxdu| 2.27.13 @ 11:20PM
You closed the gold window and in doing so embarked on the great monetary leap forward to QE nirvana. It's long passed 2000, Mr. President, but I'm still nonplussed by fiat money, OSHA, EPA, the experiment with wage and price controls, filling gas tanks per inspection sticker, Chinese freeloading, etc. etc. Watergate is the least of your problems.