Rating: 
Summary: So, what's the point?
Review: The premise of Greenberg's book, evaluating and interpreting opinion's of Nixon, is really a pointless task. Journalists, constituents, and opponents all were attacking Nixon from a partisan perspective and did not really know him anyway. Furthermore, all Presidents and politicians since F.D.R. have created an image to represent strength, goals, or to inspire the country. It is hardly a Richard Nixon thing as Greenberg seems to suggest. If one wanted to really get to know Nixon, then they would interview or have interviewed Julie Nixon Eisenhower, Tricia Nixon Cox, Ed Nixon, the late Bebe Rebozo,or other intimates that were true Nixon loyalists. A journalists opinion, heavily influenced by political persuasion, is not a truthful depiction of any of RN's images. Likewise, the media loved Jack Kennedy and Jackie, so does that imply that JFK was perfect? Absolutely not--what it means is that there was a media bias that helped shape the perceptions of each figure.
Rating: 
Summary: The Three (Four and Five) Faces of Dick Nixon
Review: Was Richard Nixon the second coming of Hitler or the last great liberal president? Or, most likely, the greatest transformation artist since Lon Chaney? With all the spinning by Nixon and his foes, it may be impossible to ever definitively answer who our 37th president was. David Greenberg's compelling book tracks the many colors of this iconic chameleon. The first couple of chapters do a solid job recounting the Tricky Dicky days, kicked off by the warm (?), conniving (?), populist (?) Checkers speech-- Nixon's first great rebound. But it isn't until the Watergate and post-Watergate chapters that the book really takes off with fresh, provocative insights. Greenberg escorts us down the twisted passageways of Nixon's psyche, recounting the many news, historical and entertainment sources that painted Nixon as an emotional cripple whose psychotic manipulations and paranoid rants wracked our nation's trust in government. Was that the real Nixon? The following section reviews the media sources, often prompted by the Nixon PR machine, that attempted to recast the by then ex-president as a great statesman who opened up China and held out an olive branch to the Soviets. Perhaps most suprising, and riveting, is the chapter that discusses the revisionist historians who paint Nixon's as the great liberal in conservative clothing-- the man who took the "Great Society" to new heights, shepherding legislation that integrated schools, bettered the lives of Native Americans, and expanded social programs for the poor. Greenberg while refusing to swallow any of these images whole, uses his keen eye to find the credible core of each Nixonian persona. This is a memorable history that questions history itself, a book that asks-- is it possible to objectively capture any figure from history?
Rating:
Summary: The Three (Four and Five) Faces of Dick Nixon
Review: Was Richard Nixon the second coming of Hitler or the last great liberal president? Or, most likely, the greatest transformation artist since Lon Chaney? With all the spinning by Nixon and his foes, it may be impossible to ever definitively answer who our 37th president was. David Greenberg's compelling book tracks the many colors of this iconic chameleon. The first couple of chapters do a solid job recounting the Tricky Dicky days, kicked off by the warm (?), conniving (?), populist (?) Checkers speech-- Nixon's first great rebound. But it isn't until the Watergate and post-Watergate chapters that the book really takes off with fresh, provocative insights. Greenberg escorts us down the twisted passageways of Nixon's psyche, recounting the many news, historical and entertainment sources that painted Nixon as an emotional cripple whose psychotic manipulations and paranoid rants wracked our nation's trust in government. Was that the real Nixon? The following section reviews the media sources, often prompted by the Nixon PR machine, that attempted to recast the by then ex-president as a great statesman who opened up China and held out an olive branch to the Soviets. Perhaps most suprising, and riveting, is the chapter that discusses the revisionist historians who paint Nixon's as the great liberal in conservative clothing-- the man who took the "Great Society" to new heights, shepherding legislation that integrated schools, bettered the lives of Native Americans, and expanded social programs for the poor. Greenberg while refusing to swallow any of these images whole, uses his keen eye to find the credible core of each Nixonian persona. This is a memorable history that questions history itself, a book that asks-- is it possible to objectively capture any figure from history?
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