Discussion 6:
Question 1: Zinn portrays the Nixon presidency in general as a failure all on its own and the Watergate scandal adding to the failure as a dirty play by Nixon. Zinn thinks Nixon was involved in “dirty tricks” because he thinks Nixon knew all about and personally orchestrated the Watergate scandal. He proves this by telling us that top Republican and Democratic leaders in the House of Representatives that they would not support any criminal proceedings against him.
Question 2: Schweikart and Allen’s interpretation of this period in American history is different from Zinn’s because he tells more of and focuses on the achievements and victories of this period of time while Zinn tells of the good and bad and focuses mostly on the
…show more content…
Zinn presents his information in a way that he looks at the good and bad the same, focuses a little bit more on the bad than good but is not inclined one way or the other too much if at all.
Question 2: The overall view of Schweikart and Allen is patriotic, showing that even through the bad things The United States is a major power off the world and most if not all of its actions are great things. Such as FDR bringing the U.S. out of the Depression, helping win World War 1 and World War 2, and disarming countries of some of their nuclear weapons making the world safer. While the overall view of Zinn is The United States is not all that it’s cracked up to be so to speak, the U.S. has done some very bad things in its past and some of the good things did not turn out to be as good as expected. Such as the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and how it responded to Labor Unions and strikers. This demonstrates that many people 's accounts of history are very different and you have to figure out what is the real truth, not just believe what some people say, because people have very different opinions from one another and just plain and simple we are all different, nobody has the same ideas and opinions someone else
Schweikart has written over twenty books in his career including popular titles such as, “A Patriot’s History of the United States” and “48 Liberal Lies About American History.” This book analyzes seeming insignificant events and looks at the short and long-term effects on the United States of America. In this book, seven events are looked through in detail and their effects on American Government are explained.
How far do you agree that the key factor influencing Richard Nixon’s election as President in 1968 and 1972 was the popularity of his policies on the Vietnam War? 30 marks Richard Nixon ’s election as President in 1968 and 1972 was influenced by many factors, all of which had an influence on who voted for Nixon and why. There were many people in America at the time who were sick and tired of both the civil rights campaign and the ongoing counter culture movement, along with numerous protests and riots that were sweeping the nation. Nixon appealed to these people, whom he deemed ‘Middle America’ or, ‘the silent majority’. Most of the factors that influenced Nixon’s election appealed to this section of society, while in contrast, alienating other groups, such as Afro-Americans and those involved with counter culture.
An example is his statement on Fidel Castro, “We’ve never had anything against dictators” (14). This gives a problem of misinterpretation for the audience that comes from the fact that the speech is written down instead of being spoken. It is easy for an audience to be clueless on the fact that he uses “we” to talk about the United States instead of his opinion as well. Additionally, how Zinn concludes his speech is not well built up in the speech, “What we must do—whether we teach or write or make films—is educate a new generation to do this very modest thing: change the world” (32). While his conclusion has a good message, it feels like it comes out of nowhere in the speech.
On the domestic aspect, citizens were beginning a new chapter in which they did not trust the government. Stemming back to Lyndon B Johnson and the Credibility Gap of the Vietnam War, the most recent, most devastating attitude change surrounded the Watergate Scandal and the aftermath. During Nixon’s presidency, he was attempting to bug the Democratic Party headquarters located in the Watergate Hotel. While his henchmen were placing the bugs, they were caught, thus causing a huge controversy amongst Americans. Although Nixon attempted to cover up his ties to the break in, it eventually came out that he ordered it to be done.
“I thought the Vietnam war was an utter, unmitigated disaster, so it was very hard for me to say anything good about it” - George McGovern. There are numerous controversial topics dispersed among the subject of American history due to the amount of unethical decisions that have been made in order to improve the lives of the people or keep America out of the clutches of war. Throughout American history, historians have debated the ethical impact that the Vietnam war had on the United States. Although some people may believe that the Vietnam War achieved the goal of avoiding communism and protecting the people, the overarching idea is that it was an unjust war because of the countless lives that were lost from the participating countries, the
The chapters of our textbook, America: A Narrative History, written by George Brown Tindall and David Emory Shi, takes us on a historical yet comparative journey of the road to war and what caused the American Revolution, an insight into the war itself, and a perception to what life was like in America after the war was over. The essays of the book, America Compared: American History in International Perspective, collected by Carl J. Guarneri gives us a global context and a comparison between the North and South Americas in the dividing issues of labor, slavery, taxes, politics, economy, liberty, and equality. Part One These chapters in our textbook Tindall describes; the road to the American Revolution, the road to the surrendering of the British, and the road to the American colonists receiving their independence and developing the government which the people of the United States will be governed by. The road to the American Revolution consisted of several events, which escalated to the war that began April 19, 1775, as the tensions between the American colonies and the British Government advanced towards breaking point.
This process and conditions mentioned beforehand is determined by two things. It is only by either setting boundaries between historical process i.e the research, writing, and interpreting of our findings and the historical knowledge (what we know or think to have happened). The other process is by combining the same historical process as already mentioned before with historical narratives (stories from the “past”) that we deem how history works. No matter which way we approach on how we believe history to work, there will always be some instances in which some narratives are being “silenced” whether intentionally or unintentionally and force us to see from a certain point of view. Because of these silences, we are not given the whole truth of the matter and are left to accept a certain standpoint that is being presented to us as in the case with
The thirty seventh president’s tone throughout the speech was genuine and anguished. He stated frequently his regret towards his resignation; when this passage is read aloud, it is stressed heavily on pathos and that Nixon defended his decision with the selflessness of his own emotions and did what is better for the country (“American”). In his speech, Richard Nixon establishes his credibility and then goes on to show the logic of why he is resigning along with sparking the reader’s emotions in defense of him through the use of frequent fallacies and rhetorical devices. Nixon goes on to speak of his accomplishments and the tasks he hopes the American people will achieve with a new president, but those ideas are shadowed by the steady reminders by Nixon himself of the circumstances that are causing him to resign the Presidency that overall make Nixon’s arguments to logic and his credibility seem
While writing Seven Events That Made America America Larry Schweikart was possibly trying to inform readers of important events that happened throughout history that have been forgotten or have not gotten the attention that they deserve. When Martin Van Buren had his “nightmare” about the impending statehood bill for Missouri in 1819 was going to be the start to big problems in America. Van Burens main goal was to eliminate the issue of slavery in the south. Martin Van Burens big ideology was that he was from the North but had southern values that gave him an advantage because that made him the only plausible national candidate. Van Buren got an idea of using the newspapers as propaganda instruments to inform citizens of his new party which allowed more people to learn about his party faster.
Ultimately the true challenge was stagflation the process were unemployment and Inflation were both rising, which shouldn 't really happen in a government. This essay will show how Nixon and his administration faced each of these problems and their overall effect. As stated before the Vietnam war was
Everybody was tricked and put into their lies and they thought they could trust these men, but when they gained the trust of others they began voicing their opinions and putting down restrictions. Both of the armies used people 's devastation against them for their gain of power but the two situations were different in the way that one was political and the other they played the role of the savior to gain
On August 8th, 1974 at exactly 9:01 pm, Richard Nixon--former President-- gave a speech that would affect both United States history and the american people. Richard Nixon’s argument and claim lay within the textual aspects, in other words, his tone, attitude, and the strategic ways of presenting to his audience. In this historical speech, Richard Nixon broadcasted his character, past decisions, and future advice to the people of the United States in order to justify his resignation from the presidential office. The rhetorical stylistic tools were effective and instrumental in backing up the argument. Recognition of audience was important, because it will determine his attitude and tone, which was innocence.
History does not always convey the absolute truth. It offers only one side of the story. The strong and powerful voices always drown out the sounds of the weak and beaten. The winner’s word will always be taken over the loser’s. The content that lies within the textbooks was not written by the defeated.
Undoubtedly, America has confronted many adversities throughout its history. Moreover, during the course of these challenges America prevailed, and ultimately formed a nation that has the ability to continuously adapt. There exists a myriad of examples that would support this claim; however, this essay will focus on four major events occurring between the 1860’s and 1920’s. The first event is how the American social status changed before and after Abraham Lincoln’s assassination. The second event is how the Civil War played a role in creating a need for Reconstruction, and how Reconstruction culminated in the Industrial Revolution.
In his essay, Hills explains how Nixon evokes the intended response from the immediate audience by gaining support for the war. Nixon states in his speech, “tonight-to you, the great silent majority of my fellow Americans-I ask for your support.” Here, Nixon uses resentment in sacrifice in lives and finance, longing for some action in a marked direction were strategies used to gain support instead of “teaching.” This in turn allowed America to continue in the war which proves that he agrees with Foss for Nixon’s primary role was not that of a teacher or