Healing Richard Nixon

Richard M. Nixon remains an enigma even thirty years after his resignation. Of the many portraits of this complex man, none have been more intimate or revealing than this memoir from his personal physician, friend, and confidante of more than forty years, John C. Lungren, M.D. Dr. Lungren, with his son and co-author John C. Lungren Jr., portrays Nixon as a paradoxical man -- intense, compassionate, guarded, intelligent, resilient, deeply religious, enormously successful but ultimately tragic. Lungren describes his battle to restore the president's health after his resignation and reveals previously unknown details about Nixon's two intensive hospitalizations, his near fatal vascular collapse, and his depression. Lungren experienced firsthand Nixon's thoughts and feelings during the public scrutiny of federal prosecution for his role in the Watergate break-in. Accused of shielding his friend, Lungren himself came under fire; his private office was even burgled in an apparent attempt to copy Nixon's private medical records. Using previously unpublished sources, original correspondence, and private photographs, Healing Richard Nixon places Nixon in a new light. No future research or conclusions about Nixon -- the man or the president -- will be complete without consulting this fascinating memoir.

Richard M. Nixon remains an enigma even thirty years after his resignation. Of the many portraits of this complex man, none have been more intimate or revealing than this memoir from his personal physician, friend, and confidante of more than forty years, John C. Lungren, M.D. Dr. Lungren, with his son and co-author John C. Lungren Jr., portrays Nixon as a paradoxical man -- intense, compassionate, guarded, intelligent, resilient, deeply religious, enormously successful but ultimately tragic. Lungren describes his battle to restore the president's health after his resignation and reveals previously unknown details about Nixon's two intensive hospitalizations, his near fatal vascular collapse, and his depression. Lungren experienced firsthand Nixon's thoughts and feelings during the public scrutiny of federal prosecution for his role in the Watergate break-in. Accused of shielding his friend, Lungren himself came under fire; his private office was even burgled in an apparent attempt to copy Nixon's private medical records. Using previously unpublished sources, original correspondence, and private photographs, Healing Richard Nixon places Nixon in a new light. No future research or conclusions about Nixon -- the man or the president -- will be complete without consulting this fascinating memoir.

Richard M. Nixon remains an enigma even thirty years after his resignation. Of the many portraits of this complex man, none have been more intimate or revealing than this memoir from his personal physician, friend, and confidante of more than forty years, John C. Lungren, M.D. Dr. Lungren, with his son and co-author John C. Lungren Jr., portrays Nixon as a paradoxical man—intense, compassionate, guarded, intelligent, resilient, deeply religious, enormously successful but ultimately tragic. Lungren describes his battle to restore the president's health after his resignation and reveals previously unknown details about Nixon's two intensive hospitalizations, his near fatal vascular collapse, and his depression. Lungren experienced firsthand Nixon's thoughts and feelings during the public scrutiny of federal prosecution for his role in the Watergate break-in. Accused of shielding his friend, Lungren himself came under fire; his private office was even burgled in an apparent attempt to copy Nixon's private medical records. Using previously unpublished sources, original correspondence, and private photographs, Healing Richard Nixon places Nixon in a new light. No future research or conclusions about Nixon—the man or the president—will be complete without consulting this fascinating memoir.

Modern biographies of Richard Nixon have been consumed with Watergate. All have missed arguably the most important perspective on Nixon as California's native son, the only U.S. president born and raised in California. In addition, Nixon was also a son, brother, friend, husband, father, uncle, and grandfather. By shifting the focus from Watergate and Washington to Nixon's deep, defining roots in California, Paul Carter boldly challenges common conceptions of the thirty-seventh president of the United States. More biographies have been written on Nixon than any other U.S. politician. Yet the territory traversed by Carter is unexplored, revealing for the first time the people, places, and experiences that shaped Richard Nixon and the qualities that garnered him respect from those who knew him well. Born in Yorba Linda and raised in Whittier, California, Nixon succeeded early in life, excelling in academics while enjoying athletics through high school. At Whittier College he graduated at the top of his class and was voted Best Man on Campus. During his career at Whittier's oldest law firm, he was respected professionally and became a chief trial attorney. As a military man in the South Pacific during World War II, he was admired by his fellow servicemen. Returning to his Quaker roots after the war, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, the Senate, and the vice presidency, all within six short years. After losing to John Kennedy in the 1960 presidential campaign, Nixon returned to Southern California to practice law. After losing his gubernatorial race he reinvented himself: he moved to New York and was elected president of the United States in 1968. He returned to Southern California after Watergate and his resignation to heal before once again taking a place on the world stage. Richard Nixon: California's Native Son is the story of Nixon's Southern California journey from his birth in Yorba Linda to his final resting place just a few yards from the home in which he was born.

Pat Nixon may be the least understood of modern first ladies. Although public opinion polls rated her one of our nation's most admired women, few Americans really knew much about her. This first scholarly biography of Thelma Ryan Nixon—the first biography in thirty-five years and the first to access her papers-goes further than any other book to show readers the real Pat Nixon. Lester David's The Lonely Lady of San Clemente painted her as a tragic figure while Julie Nixon Eisenhower's adoring Pat Nixon: The Untold Story fell short of offering an objective portrait. Now Mary Brennan moves beyond the oversimplified appraisals of this neglected first lady to provide a powerful study of a complex and fascinating presidential spouse. Drawing on Mrs. Nixon's recently opened papers-as well as on recollections of both friends and adversaries—Brennan debunks the myth of "Plastic Pat" and fleshes out the real woman behind the stories and stereotypes. The Nixons had more in common with small-town Americans than with Washington society, and Brennan shows that part of Pat's difficulty in dealing with the political world was that she never quite left the "normal" Pat behind. Political and social upheaval during her husband's presidency further complicated her role as first lady, as she had to confront a shifting cultural terrain with the whole world watching. Brennan emphasizes Pat's activism—the first presidential wife to serve as official government representative, as well as the most traveled—and examines her complicated relationship with her husband. Often seen as a "good soldier," Pat, in reality, engaged in constant warfare with her husband and his advisers as she tried to protect her own schedule from interference from the West Wing. Blending empathy and objectivity, Brennan shows that Pat Nixon was a strong woman caught up in circumstances beyond her control who did as her ancestors had done: gritted her teeth and got the job done as best she could. This account of an embattled first lady opens a new window on the Nixon years and finally allows Pat Nixon to take center stage in her own life.

"Nixon's the One!" proclaimed his campaign paraphernalia. "Tricky Dick!" retorted his detractors. From presidential savior for conservative America to bte noire for the political Left, the Richard Nixon persona has worn many masks and labels. In fiction and poetry and pop songs, in television and film, no other national political figure has so thoroughly saturated our public consciousness with so many contrasting images. Focusing on the process of Nixon's continuous reinvention, Daniel Frick reveals a figure who continues to expose key fault lines in the nation's self-definition. Drawing on references ranging from All in the Family to Zappa and the Mothers of Invention, he shows how Nixon has become one of America's most durable and multifaceted icons in the ongoing and fierce debates over the import and meaning of the last sixty years of national life. Examining Nixon's autobiographies and political memorabilia, Frick offers far-reaching perceptions not only of the man but of Nixon's version of himself-contrasted with those who would interpret him differently. He cites reinventions of Nixon from the late 1980s, particularly the museum at the Richard Nixon Library and Birthplace, to demonstrate the resilience of certain national mythic narratives in the face of liberal critiques. And he recounts how celebrants at Nixon's state funeral, at which Bob Dole's eulogy depicted a God-fearing American hero, attempted to bury the sources of our divisions over him, rendering in some minds the judgment of "redeemed statesman" to erase his status as "disgraced president." With dozens of illustrations-Nixon posing with Elvis (the National Archives' most requested photo), Nixonian cultural artifacts, classic editorial cartoons—no other book collects in one place such varied images of Nixon from so many diverse media. These reinforce Frick's probing analysis to help us understand why we disagree about Nixon—and why it matters how we resolve our disagreements. Whether your image of Nixon is shaped by his autobiography Six Crises, Oliver Stone's surprisingly sympathetic film Nixon, John Adams's landmark opera Nixon in China, or by the saga of Watergate, Reinventing Richard Nixon expands on all perspectives. It shows how, through these contradictory mythic stories, we continue to reinvent, much like Nixon himself, our own sense of national identity.

Despite an abundance of literature on Richard Nixon, the man behind the most spectacular crash-and-burn career of modern political history has remained an enigma. What lay behind his obsessive hunger for power and control, his paranoid attacks against enemies real and perceived, his refusal to accept defeat? Why did a man who had achieved so much feel so unfulfilled even at the height of his power? And what drove the president responsible for such triumphs as the opening of relations with China to the depths of the most devastating political scandal in American history? Richard Nixon: A Psychobiography is the first thoroughgoing psychological portrait of the 37th president, drawing upon telling interviews with Nixon intimates, published and archived materials, while employing a rigorous psychoanalytic methodology. Tracing the development of Nixon's complex psyche, the authors provide new insight not only into his unconscious motivations but also into the way they influenced his political actions, whether shrewd or disastrous. The authors explore Nixon's difficult upbringing—his mean-spirited, abusive father and often-absent mother; episodic physical trauma and mental deprivation; the tragic deaths of his two brothers; his rejection by the first woman he hoped to marry; and the long pursuit of his eventual wife, Pat. Nixon emerges as a narcissistic man with an extraordinary sense of purpose, yet one who suffered from inner conflicts and self-destructive tendencies. His desire to heal difficult political conflicts and his need to punish himself continually were attempts to reconcile the crippling contradiction between a grandiose self image and an impoverished private sense of worth. Projecting his own devalued self image onto others, attempting to control and destroy them, Nixon surrendered to the excessive suspiciousness that would eventually lead to his downfall. Here are the three faces of Nixon's complex psyche—the grandiose persona, which manifested itself in bold policy moves like "The New Federalism" and the China initiative; the peacemaker, whose desire to heal internal conflicts can be seen in the policies of détente and the "Southern" desegregation strategy; and the paranoid degraded self, which struck out against those who had humiliated him and was responsible for the bombing of Cambodia and the Watergate break-in. This probing analysis makes intelligible the moments in Nixon's presidency that have provoked much speculation but few answers, from his attempt to talk to Vietnam war protesters during a pre-dawn visit to the Lincoln Memorial to his keeping of the White House tapes. A more nuanced, more humanized Nixon emerges in a book that also provides compelling evidence that the politics of a nation is subject to the unconscious needs, fears, and fantasies of its leaders.