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After the line "when Chairman Mao invited a team of American table tennis players to visit China and play against top Chinese players.", please put "This later became known as the Ping-pong diplomacy." This because it's not currently linked on the page. 86.92.144.197 (talk) 19:36, 22 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Partly done: Embedded wikilink in existing sentence instead of adding onto it. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 20:01, 22 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

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In many ways this is a fine article, but I find it strange there is no mention of the subject's predilection for alcohol.

This story is an example of one which discusses it. Any thoughts? John (talk) 19:59, 6 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like to see what more scholarly sources say about things, rather than popular stories. And, well, we've covered politicians drinking to the extent that it affects stuff. If material doesn't come out until thirty years later, I'm wondering if it really affected stuff.--Wehwalt (talk) 21:26, 6 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Summers and Swan, 2000, seems to be the source we need here. Here's a Guardian story about the same thing. Prescription drugs as well. John (talk) 08:10, 7 July 2017 (UTC)–[reply]

Certainly whether more recent biographies and scholarly studies accept that would be a way of showing that. I don't recall seeing that in Black's bio, which is post 2000.--Wehwalt (talk) 08:50, 7 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Part 1 of Guardian story
• New York Magazine, 1976
• Book source: Ronald Powalski
• Book source: Susan Cheever
• Book source: Anthony Summers
• Book source: Lebow and Stein
• Book source: Woodward and Bernstein

I will continue to look and think but I think this is something that belongs in the article. --John (talk) 07:34, 8 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

These all seem to relate to the same incident. Not counting Ehrlichman's statement while awaiting sentencing for felonies. We don't seem to mention LBJ's drinking, even though the National Park Service rather celebrates it. I just don't think there's enough substance here to be worth adding.--Wehwalt (talk) 08:24, 8 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Fair enough. We disagree. What do others think? I remember Joe Haldeman writing about Nixon weeping drunkenly in the White House. And of course another article's omissions needn't restrain us from adding something here on this one. Not to be heavy handed but of course completeness and NPOV are FA criteria. John (talk) 09:27, 8 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

A fairly large number of FA regulars looked over this article and didn't seem to think it was necessary, there's WP:UNDUE for one thing. What makes it so gosh darn important that it must be covered at the top level article, rather than in the Presidency article (if it need be covered at all) or some of the other Nixon articles? But in any event, what would you say? A sentence, a paragraph, a section? And without synthesis.--Wehwalt (talk) 09:40, 8 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I would argue for a well sourced sentence or two. John (talk) 14:48, 8 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Can you give an example of proposed text and sources? I'd tend to omit this in general. --A D Monroe III (talk) 16:48, 8 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I'll continue to read and collect sources before I do this. There is no hurry, and as Wehwalt says, the article has survived this long and even been through peer review in this state. I would say at his stage that I'd be surprised if there would be this many good book and Internet sources describing the drunkenness of other presidents. --John (talk) 21:36, 8 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

"These all seem to relate to the same incident." Yes. John, are you sure your not half reading the sources to reinforce a sort of half thought through, heard somewhere, received belief. Otherwise, please come to the table with a definitive position, rather than wasting time. Ceoil (talk) 22:57, 8 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Pretty sure, thanks. Have a go at reading them yourself and you'll see. John (talk) 06:56, 9 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I already have, before and now. So what now? Ceoil (talk) 11:13, 9 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I'm unhappy that the article characterises the protests against the war as violent. Can this really be justified? John (talk) 10:20, 9 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The monumental policy failure of the "War on Drugs," which still affects the world today, may warrant it's own complete section in this article. - Sleyece (talk) 12:40, 26 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The one passed by a Democratic congress and affirmed by every administration since then?--Wehwalt (talk) 19:19, 26 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It seems odd to me that the war on drugs doesn't get more coverage in this article. The fact that other administrations have continued the policy only makes it more relevant. Orser67 (talk) 10:12, 11 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The "War on Drugs" is still a notable policy change in the Nixon administration, regardless of the concurrence of the Democratic Party-dominated Congress of the time in passing it into law. The War on Drugs began changing our national priorities, our diplomacy and our code of Federal and state laws immediately after its adoption as policy. Passage of laws enabling that policy by Congress doesn't entirely explain its implementation during the Nixon administration, especially given journalism which throws light on the political reasons for the War on Drugs. I agree that the "War on Drugs" ought to be a section with its own heading. loupgarous (talk) 20:43, 9 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Agree on including more. War on drugs itself is notable, and Nixon is noted repeatedly in our article on it. I don't know if it needs more than a paragraph, however. Maybe start by expanding our current mention to that much, and see how it goes? If it does need its own section, it will be easier to see where it fits once we see how its covered. --A D Monroe III^(talk) 21:12, 9 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

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This page lists Richard Nixon as divorced. He was not divorced. Richard Nixon had one wife for his lifetime. SingingM (talk) 06:30, 15 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

That little 'd' is for died, not divorced. Nixon's wife died in 1993. Nothing here to fix. Binksternet (talk) 06:56, 15 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The issue that never seems to go away....

I see from a discussion in March 2013 that a paragraph was put into the article that was agreed to on Johnson, the peace talks, and the campaign's dealings with Anna Chennault.

Alas, as we Nixon-followers know, the Farrell book and Ken Burns documentary popped the question wide open again. Recently, the following paragraph was inserted into the text underneath the agreed-to paragraph:

In late 2016, historian John Farrell publicized notes in which Haldeman wrote down Nixon's instructions during the campaign (these notes had been provided to the Nixon library by the Nixon estate in 2007). In an October 22, 1968 phone call with Nixon, Haldeman wrote, “Any other way to monkey wrench it? Anything RN can do,” and “Keep Anna Chennault working on SVN” [South Vietnam]. It is not clear whether the government of South Vietnam needed much encouragement to opt out of a peace process they considered disadvantageous.[124]

Aside from growing WP:WEIGHT issues that this places on the article, many new sources have come to light ---a few only in the last few days and weeks--- that call the near-uniform opinion of political pundits and prominent journalists into question; below are the opinions of five of them.

Charlie Hill: "At this point in the film’s arrangement of its story, significance is given to the charge that after the Tet Offensive, then presidential candidate Richard Nixon signaled to President Thieu of South Vietnam that better terms could be had if Thieu rejected negotiations until after Nixon was elected. This calumny was not invented until a generation later, by a professional polemicist aiming to blame Nixon for continuing the war when it could have come to an end in the Sixties. The film’s producers leave its viewers assuming it was true." [1]

Niall Ferguson: "Did the South Vietnamese really need Richard Nixon to have been informed by anybody that there was an October surpsie coming, that they would then need to sabotage? Anybody that's been properly trained as an historian knows that on that test, this case collapses because it was absolutely clear to anybody who read the papers that there was an October Surprise in the pipeline and that, secondly, a Nixon administration would be tougher than a Humphrey administration; that was because they both made their positions absolutely clear. And therefore, the South Vietnamese, who had pretty good intelligence sources of their own, they didn't need any of this to know that this was in the pipeline and that they should hang tough... This is one of the biggest red herrings I've come across." [2]

Luke Nichter: "Because sabotaging the ’68 peace efforts seems like a Nixon-like thing to do, we are willing to accept a very low bar of evidence on this." [3]

Jack Torry: "To those who believe the worst of Nixon, Haldeman’s notes provide conclusive proof that Nixon risked thousands of American lives to win the presidency by secretly telling the South Vietnamese government to boycott peace talks. In a lurid headline, the Huffington Post declared: “Proof that Nixon ‘Monkey-Wrenched’ Vietnam Peace Talks.” But nothing Nixon said that night had the slightest impact on any deal which could have ended U.S. involvement in the war. The undisputed fact is there was no chance for a peace agreement in 1968 which would have been accepted by any American president." [4]

Victor Davis Hanson: "Recently, another old charge of foreign collusion has been resurrected. Democrats allege that during the 1968 campaign, Republican nominee Richard Nixon opened a back channel to the South Vietnamese to convince them to stall peace talks to end the Vietnam War. Supposedly, Nixon was worried that President Lyndon Johnson might order a halt to the bombing. Then, Johnson opportunistically would start peace talks in order to help his vice president, Hubert Humphrey, defeat Nixon in the election. Regardless of these unproven charges and countercharges, Nixon's narrow victory in 1968 was a result instead of a law-and-order message, a new Southern strategy, the third-party candidacy of Democrat George Wallace, an unpopular incumbent Democratic president, an inept Humphrey campaign, and unhappiness with the ongoing quagmire in Vietnam." [5]

Not to mention the Nixon Foundation's many solid questions about the context of the Haldeman notes and Farrell's interpretation of them: https://www.nixonfoundation.org/2017/06/misunderstanding-a-monkey-wrench/

Therefore, it may be time to rethink how we describe the Chennault information in this article, knowing that the last agreed-to text was put in over four years ago and that the subject can (and should) be elaborated on in other articles such as Richard Nixon presidential campaign, 1968.

I would propose we scrap the existing two paragraphs, and settle for something like the following:

Johnson's negotiators hoped to reach a truce, or at least a cessation of bombings, in Vietnam prior to the election. On October 22, 1968, candidate Nixon received information that Johnson was preparing a so-called "October surprise" to elect Humphrey in the last days of the campaign, and his administration had abandoned three non-negotiable conditions for a bombing halt.^[1] Whether the Nixon campaign interfered with any ongoing negotiations between the Johnson administration and the South Vietnamese by engaging Anna Chennault, a prominent Chinese-American fundraiser for the Republican party, remains an ongoing controversy. While notes uncovered in 2016 may support such a contention, the context of said notes remains of debate^[1] and it is not clear whether the government of South Vietnam needed much encouragement to opt out of a peace process they considered disadvantageous.^[2]

Thanks, Happyme22 (talk) 22:47, 12 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Any comments on this proposal? Happyme22 (talk) 02:38, 25 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Your solution is acceptable to me.--Wehwalt (talk) 04:30, 25 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I updated the article with the solution above. Happyme22 (talk) 02:56, 11 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Images are placed here unlike in any other article. Why?Ernio48 (talk) 23:28, 23 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Please review the discussions on this talk page and its archives.--Wehwalt (talk) 09:22, 24 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Under the VP list for Nixon's presidency, Gerald Ford is not hyperlinked to Gerald Ford's page. Maherblast (talk) 02:49, 29 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

But he is just above that as successor.--Wehwalt (talk) 03:17, 29 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, I didn't catch this. The successor part was actually below the vice-president part, so that may have been confusing. Plus Lyndon B. Johnson is linked twice, so I figured it wouldn't hurt. Anon126 (notify me of responses! / talk / contribs) 03:41, 29 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

 Done Anon126 (notify me of responses! / talk / contribs) 03:38, 29 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I don't have a strong view on it, but this is something that seems to go back and forth in this and other political articles.--Wehwalt (talk) 16:16, 29 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

All the five sons of Richard Nixon's parents were named after kings of Britain. There were three Donalds who were kings of Scotland.Barney Hill (talk) 17:23, 1 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The lead should include "American politican," per consensus reached on similar articles. Going to copy-paste consensus from Barack Obama archived talk page at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Barack_Obama/Archive_81#%22American_politician%22.

"American politician" Is it really necessary to state the obvious that Obama "is an American politician"? The lede at Calvin Coolidge (also a featured article) serves a more straightforward introduction:

John Calvin Coolidge Jr. (/ˈkuːlɪdʒ/; July 4, 1872 – January 5, 1933) was the 30th President of the United States (1923–29). The fact that Obama is an American is stated later in the same paragraph, i.e. The first African American to assume the presidency. Either introductory sentence below should suffice:

Barack Hussein Obama II (/bəˈrɑːk huːˈseɪn oʊˈbɑːmə/ (About this sound listen); born August 4, 1961) served as the 44th President of the United States from 2009 to 2017. Barack Hussein Obama II (/bəˈrɑːk huːˈseɪn oʊˈbɑːmə/ (About this sound listen); born August 4, 1961) was the 44th President of the United States (2009–17). As the past tense might suggest that Obama is no longer alive, I would prefer option #1.--Nevé–selbert 00:22, 13 December 2017 (UTC)

Neve-selbert I've BOLDly Implemented #1. Agree, that doesn't add anything. Being an american politician is obvious from being an american president, and it doesn't add any information. Galobtter (pingó mió) 11:42, 13 December 2017 (UTC) Agree on the issues with 'was', which is used elsewhere in the lede. Other than not including a death date, nothing explicitly states he's still alive. So in that same spirit of boldness I've changed the second "served" in the lede to "has served", to make his present-tense-ness explicit without making a big deal of it.DewiMorgan (talk) 20:15, 28 December 2017 (UTC) Sorry, I just changed the "has served" to "served" without checking here first. My thinking is that while "was" in the opening sentence usually applies to a dead person by WP convention, there's no such issue with using plain ol' was for past events elsewhere in BLPs. I think we have already seen that trying to avoid "was" elsewhere does introduce some awkwardness, but I won't fight about it. EricEnfermero (Talk) 20:38, 28 December 2017 (UTC) That's fine! I fully agree with your revert reason ("is alive, but his state leg service is wholly in the past"). I'd inadvertently introduced ambiguity there, in trying to remove it, and I'm glad you caught that! And I agree on the awkwardness: the "has" just made that line read in a more cumbersome way anyhow. It also tickles me slightly that I'm not alone in thinking far too deeply about such tiny nuances of meaning :) DewiMorgan (talk) 21:57, 28 December 2017 (UTC) I believe that the American politician statement should stay for consistency with other presidential articles. See Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter, George W. Bush, and Bill Clinton. CatcherStorm talk 04:24, 3 January 2018 (UTC) Concur with CatcherStorm. This is how most articles on recent presidents are done. (The rationale is: politician is what he IS, similar to physician or writer or musician or academic. President is a title he held at one time in his life; it's not who he IS.) I'm going to put it back the way it was, pending discussion. We don't change the lede on highly visible articles like this without getting consensus first. --MelanieN (talk) 04:31, 3 January 2018 (UTC)