Helen Gahagan Quotes


To avoid the issues you make up bogus issues.


Citations

Helen Gahagan, 1900-1980, U. S. Congresswoman (Democrat, CA), Comment on Richard M. Nixon's campaigning, Quoted on PBS The American Experience: Richard Nixon, September 25, 1992

Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations

Related Quotes

CREEP in the Nixon Campaign. He was himself a convicted Watergate conspirator. Mitchell did not approve the plan, but did not fire Liddy either.


Accusing her of being a fellow traveler with Communist sympathies, Nixon called her "the Pink Lady" and said she was "pink right down to her underwear." See {627826} and {619498}. Douglas and her campaign thought the accusations were so absurd that at first they did not even bother to respond. Nixon repeated the them and stayed “on message” and by the time that Douglas, who had opposed communism all her life, was believed to be one or at least a “fellow traveler” by most Californians—and finally she responded with statements like this, but it was way too late to turn public perception around. She awarded Nixon the derogatory nickname “Tricky Dick” which the majority of the public used for him throughout his career--{600036}.


Cautioning his vice presidential candidate against the hyperbolic rhetoric and campaign tactics for which he was notorious:


Ford, then Vice President, was attending a Senate Republican policy luncheon during the Watergate crisis. The senators began discussing the possibility of sending a delegation to President Nixon, advising him to resign.


President Reagan had asked Ford, Nixon and Jimmy Carter to attend the funeral of assassinated Egyptian President Anwar Sedat. In the plane flying to Egypt, Nixon was trying to play off the ex-presidents against each other, and making nasty remarks about various political figures. The others including Ford were offended.


There was no way of reopening the investigation into the assassination without the public finding out that the CIA and FBI both had deliberately misled the Warren Commission and the House Investigating Committee in the original investigation. Nixon and other politicians who likely knew of the scandal did not want the confidence of the public eroded in this important agencies, and that was probably his motivation for the turn down rather than trying to cover up facets about the assassination itself.


Most politicians find it so in public reaction which is why they try and campaign with discussions of moral issues.


When Nixon was running for President in the 1968 Presidential campaign, he learned from Henry Kissinger that the Johnson administration had made an agreement with the Russians and North Vietnamese that America would stop the bombing of North Vietnam if there would be Peace Talks to end the Vietnam War. Nixon feard that although the polls showed him ahead of Vice President Humphrey, the announcement of ongoing peace talks would bring many of the anti-war Democrats who were not supporting Humphrey because of the Vietnam War out to vote for Humphrey to support the Peace Talks. Nixon decided to sabatouge the Peace Talks by persuading Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu not to come to the peace table so there coulod be no talks. He accomplished this by having Anna Chennault, an extreme right-wing fund raiser who was the widow of General Chennault of Flying Tiger fame and who had connections with all the right wing politicans in Asia, get word to President Thieu that President Johnson would sell him out in the peace upcomming peace talks, and that if he would boycott the peace talks till after the American Presidential election, Nixon as the New Presidnt would be sure that Thieu would remain in control of South Vietnam or there would be no peace and America would continue the war until the North Vienamese would agree to a peace that kept Thieu in power. Earlier, Nixon had appointed Anna Chennault as the Offical Spokesperson of the Campaign on Asia. What Nixon did was a felony--private citizens are not alowed to intere with government negotiatons or descussions with foreign governments, under the Logan Act Many think that the action was legally Treason. Hoever, Nguyen VanThieu did boycott the peace talks despite all the entreaties of President Johnson and his administration. There were no peace talks and the public never even knew that there had been this attempt. The anti-Vietnam War voters mostly did not vote and Nixon won a close race. Shortly after the election, before Nixon could be sworn in, via the FBI Johnson learned of Chennault's activities but thee was no evidence to tie Nixon to the South Vietnam refusal to come to the peace table. It neever became a public issue although several leading politicians had learned what had really occured--see Quotation 664238. However, 0ver 40 years later, when Nixon's Chief of Staff's notes were finally made public, the smoking gun was dislosed and Farrell wrote this in his 2017 Biography of Richard Nixon. See Related Quotes for quotations from H. R. Haldman's hadnwritten notes of his phone call with Nixon, and other evidence that had also been uncovered.


Helen Gahagan
Helen Gahagan
  • Born: November 25, 1900
  • Died: June 28, 1980
  • Nationality: American
  • Profession: She

Helen Gahagan Douglas was an American actress and politician. Her career included success on Broadway, as a touring opera singer, and the starring role in the 1935 movie She, in which her portrayal of the villain inspired Disney's Evil Queen in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937).