RIchard Nixon's "Saturday Night Massacre"

[Lefty48197]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/longterm/watergate/articles/102173-2.htm

Here's another sad story from the history of the Republican party, that they don't want you to know. Unfortunately for them, I'm going to tell it. Please be sure to repeat this story often so that people won't be allowed to forget, and so that others can learn about the Republican party.

The story occurred during Richard Nixon's Watergate era. For those of you too young to remember the Nixon administration, I'll try to sum up just how scary they were. The Nixon administration was an evil group. They were hell-bent on punishing anybody who spoke out against them. They sought retribution against their political opponents. They black balled anybody who disagreed with them on any issue, even if the person had been a lifelong friend. They threatened people, they twisted arms, they twisted other body parts. They saw to it that those on their "enemies list" were punished, within or without the law...

Oh wait. I just thought of a metaphor that will help the younger generation understand just who Richard Nixon was: Nixon was exactly like George W. Bush. Just think total f*cking arrogant assh*le.

In that context, back during the Watergate era, when the heat was REALLY on Nixon, he was being investigated by a "Special Prosecutor". (They didn't always investigate blow jobs, once upon a time, they investigated crimes). Being the facist that he was Bush errrr... NIXON ordered his Attorney General, Elliot Richardson to fire the Special Prosecutor, Archibald Cox. "Problem solved", thought Nixon. But there was a problem. The Attorney General had scruples. I imagine Elliot protested to Nixon about "the law, about ethics, about honesty, about morality...".
Nixon wanted nothing to do with any of those things, so he fired the Richardson. Nixon then went to the number 2 man at the Justice Dept., William Ruckelshaus and ordered HIM to fire the Special Prosecutor. He too had a problem with that ethics thing, so Nixon fired Ruckelshaus too.
Tricky Dick then went to the #3 man at the justice Department, and ordered HIM to fire the Special Prosecutor. Man #3 didn't have any problems with ethics, morality, honesty, or the law. He fired the special prosecutor, and thus halted the legal investigation into Richard Nixon's crimes. As a result of the massacre, Congress introduced several bills of impeachment over the next few days.
Who was this #3 man that wasn't bothered by ethics?
Why it was none other than U.S. Solicitor General, Robert Bork, the guy George Bush the prequel nominated for a Supreme Court seat, back about 1989.
Bork's nomination was rejected by the Senate, and he never made it to the Suckpreme Court. After his rejection, the Republicans all cried FOUL! "He was rejected because he was too conservative", lied the Republicans. They even invented the term "Borked" to describe somebody who was denied a court seat "unfairly".
BULLSH*T. As usual, the Republicans lied. The truth is that Robert Bork was rejected by the Senate, for the exact same reason that he was nominated by Bush. He was rejected for his role as Dick Nixon's hatchetman during the Saturday Night Massacre. Likewise, the Republicans nominated Bork because he would do whatever the party wanted him to do. Hitchcock could not have devised a more evil villain than Robert Bork, and here the Republicans go and nominate him for the "Supreme" Court, because of how he helped squash the investigation into Nixon's wrongdoings.
And that's why the Democratic Senate rejected him.
Imagine that, the Republicans nominated a guy who tried to help Nixon dodge prosecution for the crimes he committed, and the Democrats tried to keep that co-conspirator off of the bench. That pretty much sums up the ideals of both parties when it comes to judges. The Republicans will nominated any lawbreaker, as long as he promised to be an activist judge and help implement their conservative Christian fundamentalist agenda.
I'm a little surprised that we didn't hear the term "Borked" while the right wing extremist judicial nominees were being filibustered recently. They may try to pull out the term during one of the upcoming Supreme Court nomination hearings. Just be sure to smile and tell the entire story, when you do hear the term.

[longship]

1. Some more info

I remember John Chancellor reporting on NBC. His words: "In my career as a correspondent, I never thought I'd be reporting these things."

Within ten days Time magazine published a magazine cover with "The Push to Impeach".

Bork has argued that somebody had to stop the resignations and firings. He has said, at the time he pondered whether he would resign immediately after firing Cox, but then thought otherwise when he considered some low-level secretary being head of Justice Department.

Richardson was not fired. He resigned in protest rather than fire Cox. Ruckelshaus was fired by Nixon.

Archibald Cox held a press conference. It was one of the more crucial events in the Watergate affair. Cox was a very soft spoken, grandfatherly-like person. The public loved him and opinion was moved by that press conference, against Nixon.

It was almost ten months between the Saturday Night Massacre and Nixon's resignation. A lot happened in the interim, including indictment and conviction for many of Nixon's high staff, public House Judiciary Committee hearings which approved three articles of impeachment.

[Lefty48197]

3. thanks for the first hand report!

I was in elementary school at the time, so I don't really remember any of the major news events, except for the actual resignation. I do remember the "Borked" episode very clearly, and I just had to shake my head, when I learned of Bork's role in the Nixon coverup.
I also remember Bush Sr. saying that if the Democrats didn't like Bork, then we sure wouldn't like his next nominee. That next nominee was Clarence Thomas. Possibly the last truth spoken by a Bush.

[benddem]

2. This was an incredible night

I kept thinking as the news casts rolled on they would announce that "Nixon went into another room and shot himself." I just didn't see how he could continue...but he did and not for long.

[i miss america]

4. I never realized it was Bork that fired Cox. And speaking of Nixon's

enemies list, our very own Honorable John Conyers Jr. was one of the original twenty. How cool is that?

:toast:

[Lefty48197]

5. TOTALLY COOL!

And exactly what I would expect from John Conyers. I was lucky to get a chance to meet him a few years ago, and I took the opportunity to thank him for all the good work over the years. If everybody in Congress thought like John Conyers, then America would actually be the great country that I was told it was in my childhood.

[Independent_Liberal]

6. Very interesting...

I never knew about this. I learn something new all the time. Thanks!

[struggle4progress]

7. "Bork is a Cox Sacker" -- my favorite T-shirt slogan ..

.. during the fight over Reagan's nomination of Bork to SCOTUS

[AX10]

8. The best thing Nixon did was die in 94'.

[struggle4progress]

9. self-delete

[Name removed]

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[psriter]

11. um...

Bork very seriously considered resigning as well. It was Elliot Richardson, the newly fired former AG, who convinced him to stay on. Richardson and Ruckelshaus had to realize that Cox would eventually be fired if Nixon wanted him to, and they didn't want all the leadership of the Justice Department leaving at once. They had both agreed not to interfere, and their firings damaged Nixon's reputation among the people and among congress.