Fair Game

...It cannot be easy for a man who has spent his whole adult life scrambling for office to distinguish between the interests of the nation and the interests of his particular career One had the sense that General Eisenhower was capable of acting without regard for career--but then he had had the Presidency thrust upon him and was lazy to boot John Kennedy, secure in his position as poor Nixon can never be, might have risen to moments of selflessness Lyndon Johnson, that consummate politico, managed to destroy himself on what, m one view, can be seen as a question of principle, but there is little doubt that he, too, was secure in his own force of character Not so the blooding Nixon Everyone is out to get him It goes without saying that Democrats and reporters spend their nights setting up snares on the White House grounds, but even so-called Republicans-- the Scrantons and Hickels of the world--have nothing better to do than criticize a fellow in public for this or that How benign of Daniel Moymhan to refrain from criticism these past two years--but doesn't Moymhan really have a book full of rude remarks in the works9 And now Tncia is going steady with one of Ralph Nader's squirts The only people one can really trust m this life are discreet millionaires who aren't running for office...

...to make me let up Well, they just don't know who they are dealing with . I am going to campaign up and down America until we drive the crooks and the Communists and those who defend them out of Washington " After 20 years, we all know who we are dealing with This Thing Is Bigger Than...

...Fair Game BY WALTER GOODMAN Richard Nixon s Perpetua Crisis Eighteen years ago, Richard Nixon delivered a remarkable speech Not a speech distinguished for its intellect or sensibility or honesty, but for what it exposed of the most guarded politician of our tune Made during the election campaign of 1952, in reply to charges that he had benefited from a "political fund" set up in his behalf, it exhibited for a moment the angry, defensive flesh behind the plastic Subsequently, in his book Six Crises, Nixon told us the political-fund experience "left a deep scar which was never to heal completely " And years later, his defeat in the California gubernatorial race of 1962 combined with the ache of that scar to cause him again to cry out At the climax of a farewell to the press, touching for its boyish peevishness, he told the reporters, "You won't have Nixon to kick around any more " But except for those outbursts, Nixon's public appearances have tended to be models of what the Pentagon would surely call Protective Evasion The President does not like the televised press conference, an event that permits him less than total control, and his on-screen manner is designed to save him from the odd blunder He relies on the old magazine writer's formula First, I will tell you what I am going to tell you, then I will tell you what I have told you Occasionally, there is something of substance in between Considering the constant peril that he may come undone in a fit of spontaneity, it is a tribute to our Chief Executive's powers of self-control that he has managed to carry off his infrequent press conferences without cursing out the conferees for their harassment and persecution Yet if we examine the approach he brings to public issues --wary, gloomy, keyed always to the defensive--we can recognize the bruised spirit within It Isn??t My Fault' In nearly all of his appearances since January 1969, our President campaigner has reminded us that it was not he who started the war m Vietnam or caused the inflation Not that the men who brought us to this pass were not honorable--but it wasn't him Would he have acted differently given the circumstances' Would he have resisted the lure of the tropics7 No--for even if it had been him, which it wasn't, Striking a Blow for Freedom in Southeast Asia was assuredly the right thing to do He is therefore twice innocent Not only did he commit no offense, but no offense has been committed In his famous Fund speech, remember, the main point was that not a penny of the $18,000, offered by selfless rich supporters without expectation of quid pro quo, had gone to their favorite's personal use, but only to "political expenses that I did not think should be charged to taxpayers of the United States of America" And if this double-layered defense were not enough, why, look at the other guy Adlai Stevenson, Vice Presidential candidate Nixon did not forbear from pointing out, was well-to-do Not Stoop7 A year ago, the President declared, "I will not take this nation down the road of wage and price controls, however politically expedient they may seem " Should it turn out that the Administration decides to move toward such controls, we can be sure that he will return to declare, "I will not refuse to take the road of wage and price controls, however politically inexpedient that may seem " No President has been more vulnerable than this one to charges of unrelieved political expediency, and like those lecherous preachers who inveigh endlessly against fornication, he is forever attacking the sin closest to his heart He will not withdraw faster from South Vietnam and leave that brave little bastion in the lurch as lesser politicians have urged Any change in our China policy, he announced a few weeks ago, "wouldn't be based on expediency, it would be based on principle" What principle9 Next question, please Behind the reiterated disclaimers of was secure in his own force of ne is not doing things, * we can hear an echo of a passage from his Fund speech "I know that this is not the last of the smears And the purpose of the smears, I know, is this to silence me...

...Richard Nixon has told us that " 'Selflessness' is the greatest asset an individual can have in time of crisis" Coming from the reigning expert on conduct under crisis, this must be taken to heart Alas, selflessness is a quality not within our President's scope Given to reducing issues to their narrowest compass, lest otherwise he leave himself open at some critically intimate point, for him public and private interests are one and indivisible They always will be one to the candidate who could justify his secret acceptance of an $18,000 businessmen's donation on the grounds that "it is essential in this country of ours that a man of modest means can also run for President, because, you know--remember Abraham Lincoln, remember what he said--God must have loved the common people, he made so many of them ' " Abraham Lincoln Our President is not an engaging performer The stylish JFK ran away with their debates m 1960, and by comparison with scenery shredding LBJ the present incumbent seems constipated His remarks on large issues are invariably banal, the politicking glares through his every utterance But beneath the sluggish prose, the ulterior motives, the drab presence, a passion still burns For Richard Nixon, war, inflation, campus disturbances, riots in the cities are not issues m themselves, they are but further trials of Young Richard come out of the West Whatever the event, the great questions take the same form Can Richard Nixon be blamed9 Will Richard Nixon hold fast9 Will Richard Nixon prevail9 The North Vietnamese use Cambodia as a base and shoot at our reconnaissance planes in order to test Richard Nixon's determination Eighteen years ago an issue arose--the political fund--that really did center on the character and behavior of Richard Nixon, 39 years old and not yet a thoroughly known quantity "This is probably the greatest moment in my life," he said at the time, more prophetically than he could know Ever since, like an aging athlete dreaming of the cheers on the day long ago when he broke the tape, middle-aged Richard has been reaching for that shining, unequivocal victory so rare in politics Though he would name his book Six Crises, only the first belonged exclusively to him His crisis, his victory Now he is America's President, and so now all issues are his He sits at the center of the universe--yet try though he will, he cannot recapture the glory of that hour in 1952 when he gave his talk and the letters poured into General Eisenhower to keep young Richard on the ticket ("You're my boy," said the General ) Those were the days, those green days of a respectable Republican cloth coat and the little black-and-white cocker spaniel dog who was named (by "our little girl, Tricia, the six-year-old") Checkers * Nixon s tues at humor are enough to make one weep for the man Here is his best joke "We cannot protect the value of the dollar by passing the buck" * His support for the SST is not based on "any sense of jingoism,' it's just that he Hunks the United States ought to be first in commercial aviation Take off...