Don't Let Trump Drive You Out Of The Country... I Think

I Left The U.S. When Nixon Was Elected— Good Times— But Once Was Enough

The 1968 presidential election was very close and everyone I knew was talking about leaving the country if Nixon won. I’m not saying Nixon was as bad as Trump, but he was hated by normal people back then as much as Trump is today. This is how the election went:

• Richard Nixon- 31,783,783 (43.4%)

• Hubert Humphrey- 31,271,839 (42.7%)

• George Wallace- 9,901,118 (13.5%)

I was a senior in college and already thinking about leaving the U.S. anyway. Nixon’s win was a last straw. What the hell was wrong with people! I sold some hash, paid for a brand new VW camper van that I would be able to pick up at the factory in Wiesbaden for an incredibly cheap student discount price. I don’t think Trump is going to win but when young people I know— and not so young people I know— ask me about leaving the country if he does, I counsel against doing so… unless they really want to live overseas regardless of Trump.

Although, when I was very very young, my grandmother escaped from Europe when things started getting hairy for Jews there. No scholar, her theory was that Jews in America were very smart because the ones with the smart genes left and the idiots started (and perished). So there is that.

But for me, Nixon was the last straw but… I didn’t want to go to graduate school like all my friends, I was very strung out on drugs and I really did love travel and had this romantic idea about spending a couple of years driving from Europe to Afghanistan, India and Nepal. And then I lived (mostly) in Amsterdam for a few years, living a lifestyle that wasn’t very American. Is that for you? It worked out great for me. Years later, when Warner Bros was looking for young executive with international experience to promote… no one had more international experience that I did. I would up skipping over a couple dozen executives with more seniority than I did and would up as the president of one of the divisions. That wasn’t something anyone could have foreseen… just Nixon hatred.

Everyone in Brooklyn, where I lived, hated Nixon. When he ran against JFK in 1960, Kennedy won Brooklyn 646,582 (66.2%) to 327,497 (33.5%). In ’68, Nixon lost again— 489,174 (63.1%) to 247,936 (32.0%). And even in Brooklyn there were people like Fred Trump who voted for George Wallace— 33,563 (4.3%). No one really hated other politicians in those days, just Nixon. As far as I can remember, Nixon, like Trump today, was an extremely  divisive figure from the start, the 1950s, when he ran an ugly campaign against California Senator Helen Gahagan Douglas. The intense opposition to him in the 1960s stemmed from his aggressive stance against “communism,” the tactics he used to rise to power, and his association with McCarthyism. He played a major role in the House Un-American Activities Committee and we all grew up seeing as a ruthless, calculating politician willing to smear opponents to advance his career.

By ’68, as Nixon ran for president again, the country was in turmoil over the Vietnam War, civil rights and deep cultural shifts. Nixon's “law and order” rhetoric was seen as a veiled appeal to those frustrated by the social upheaval, and his opposition saw him as a threat to the progress made in the civil rights movement and a figure who could escalate Vietnam. Many feared he would return to his authoritarian tendencies and crack down on dissent— an attitude that would later be borne out in the way he handled anti-war protests and civil rights demonstrations as president.

For people like me, the Vietnam War was a lightning rod. No one trusted him but he campaigned on a “secret plan” to end the war, yet once elected, he escalated it, including bombing campaigns in Cambodia and Laos that were kept hidden from the public for years. The draft and the rising death toll for Americans and Vietnamese fueled anger, especially as Nixon appeared to prioritize a “peace with honor” over a swift end to the conflict.

Much like Trump, Nixon had an “us vs them” rhetoric that was polarizing, and he tended to inspire fierce loyalty from his supporters and equally strong opposition from his critics. His handling of the anti-war and civil rights movements— often seen as heavy-handed and punitive— alienated younger generations and progressive activists, many of whom, like I said, expressing the desire to leave the country if he won. Something between 30,000 and 125,000 did, mostly to Canada.

Later, the Watergate scandal destroyed Nixon’s historical reputation. His paranoia, use of political dirty tricks and willingness to abuse power to attack perceived enemies was vindication for many who had opposed him since the '60s, further cementing Nixon as a villain in American history, although most people see Trump as far worse.

Early this morning, Gallup reported that although the U.S. and Canada are the two top destinations for migrants, record-high numbers in these two countries want to permanently leave their own countries. 21% of Americans said they would like to permanently leave the country and move someplace else, the highest number ever. I wonder if it’s because Trump keeps calling the country a garbage dump.

Yesterday, Rick Perlstein suggested that people may have to make decisions about their lives’ trajectories if Trump wins. He painted a very grim picture… a ‘can’t happen here’ series of scenarios. But what if they do happen here? I was in Holland visiting my old friends from the ‘70s this past summer. I was tempted to check out some places I could live… just in case. And then I remembered that Holland had just elected Geert Wilders' party to lead the new right-wing coalition government there.

Also yesterday, Noah Smith wrote that “If Trump wins the election next week, as he is currently favored to do… there will be outrage after outrage, every week, over and over, just as there was during Trump’s first term. Trump’s constant mix of defiance, clumsiness, and aggression will define our media environment for the next four years, just as it defined 2016-2020.” Things have gotten calmer since Trump lost 4 years ago— despite Musk having turned Twitter into a swamp of divisiveness and hatred. But it is still Trump’s “rhetorical style that is deliberately designed to provoke conflict, division, fear, and unrest. And Trump does this all day, every day… Nor is rhetoric the only thing Trump does to foment unrest. He’s the only major presidential candidate ever to fail to accept an election result. He has promised to pardon the people who attacked Congress on January 6th, 2021— a clear encouragement for repeat violence. If elected again, he will certainly appoint people like Michael Flynn— who has declared that “the gates of Hell— my Hell— will be unleashed” on Trump’s political enemies. If Trump is elected next week, I expect unrest in America to rise again— not to the level of 2020, and perhaps not even to the level of 2017, but above the level of 2024. A Trump reinstatement would break the trend toward social peace that America has been on in recent years— it would diverge from the historical parallel of the 1970s.”

If Trump becomes President again, the next four years of our politics will be defined by his aggressive and often unhinged rhetoric, his accusatory lies, his petty revenge, his persecution of political and personal opponents, his violation of every possible norm, and his feuds with the military and with other key national institutions. That sort of thing foments and encourages unrest on both sides of the political aisle. It encourages rightists to do violence on Trump’s behalf against his perceived enemies. It encourages liberals, centrists, and progressives to very justifiably take to the streets in protest. And it creates a climate of bitterness, anger, and controversy in every online space.

If Harris wins, in contrast, I foresee a continuation of the national calming trend under Biden… [I]f Trump loses, our nation can finally rest. Trump wasn’t the only cause of the craziness of the late 2010s, but he was one cause, and he’s the only major piece of that era that’s threatening to come back. I would prefer that we leave the 2010s in the past, where they belong.

If you got stuck on Smith’s peremptory “as he is currently favored to do,” don’t worry about it at all. He has no special knowledge or even insight into who is or isn’t currently favored to win. Although historian Allan Lichtman does and he’s still predicting Kamala takes it. In a dispute between shady sports bettor Nate Silver and Lichtman, I’m going with Lichtman.