Adit Garg Week #14- Political Efforts to Control Rememberance
One of the things I like the most about my APUSH class is that we are constantly reminded about how politicians try to control how an idea is perceived or remembered. One such situation is Woodrow Wilson. Woodrow Wilson was looking to expand American democracy into other countries, and so he announced that America would get involved in World War I. However, this announcement got a lot of opposition from citizens; they believed that this was not America's war to fight and that they should stay neutral. Woodrow Wilson's solution to this opposition was the Espionage Act; the act would punish all sorts of opposition to the war. On top of that, Woodrow Wilson started an agency with tons of members that constantly pushed out propaganda to the American public. Let's put this into perspective. Millions of Americans were risking their lives to fight in the war. Citizens were doing the right thing by being skeptical about our decision going into the war, but Woodrow Wilson decided to block out all that skepticism by controlling the freedom of speech of Americans. Woodrow Wilson was trying his best to fight communism globally while passing communistic policies in his own country in the process.
However, the most interesting instance of an American president doing everything in their power to control how they become remembered is Richard Nixon. After the Pentagon Papers were released that exposed how the previous administration lied to citizens about the severity Vietnam war, President Nixon became afraid that the same people who leaked the Pentagon Papers would also leak information about President Nixon. He hired the plumbing group, an investigative group in the White House that was looking for personal information about the leaker in order to blackmail him. When President Nixon realized that a building called the Brookings Institute had documents that could make Nixon's administration look bad, he called on the plumbing group to break into the building and take out the documents. Although, the papers were not found in the building. It just goes to show that political power has an aspect about it that is corrupting, and that politicans will do everything in their power to gain it.
(Richard Nixon sitting with member of Plumbing Group)
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteHi Adit, First of all, I must commend you for taking both APENG and APUSH as that must be a lot of work. I haven't learned about these things, but I'm honestly not surprised that politicians try to control how they are remembered through corruption. Even I recognize the importance of impressions and how they last for a while, so I often do my best to give people a good first impression of myself while hiding a lot of my flaws. Perhaps the best way to avoid having people remember a dishonest version of you is to be the best version of yourself so that there is nothing to hide.
ReplyDeleteAPUSH, while it does go quite heavily into American history, only just scratches the history of these individual presidents. Nixon was paranoid during his presidency and also believed that the FBI had him, the President of the United States of America, under heavy surveillance. It was later found in declassified documents that this was indeed the case, that they had actually been wiretapping his phones. Nixon, while being the first president to resign due to the mess that was WaterGate, was still one of the better presidents, even as memories of his presidency have been lost to Watergate and its massive publicity.
ReplyDeleteHi Adit, I think your blog post covers a very important topic regarding political corruption and the suppression of information. Today, it is basically common knowledge that politicians lie and hide information in order to try to protect their image and reputation. However, before the Vietnam War, Americans trusted the government and believed that presidents were truthful. However, during the Vietnam War, the media helped expose the credibility gap and the Pentagon Papers revealed that the government was hiding information from the public. This, forever, changed the trust the American people had in their leaders and in the government. I also definitely agree that measures made by the government can change the way certain events are viewed. One example is slavery which is remembered in a very whitewashed and glorified way.
ReplyDeleteHi Adit! I really liked the opening of your blog by beginning with the example of Woodrow Wilson. Although they faced a lot of countering thoughts from citizens, their mindset to stay neutral is very good for society. From taking documents away from others to controlling the freedom of speech that Americans should be able to freely exercise for themselves, politicians are increasingly taking advantage of the power they are given with their role. The communistic policies that are usually passed are usually enacted out of the politician’s interest rather than the consent of the public. In special regard to situations when they are making final decisions about attending war or not, this is when global efforts are necessary; however, the president does not take the opinion of the public when making these decisions. Thank you for your blog, Adit, and I look forward to reading your next blog!
ReplyDeleteHi Adit, it's funny because I was also going to write my blog post about discussions in APUSH, but I chose something else. It's definitely an interesting perspective on the topic of memory, and I think many presidents were obsessed with their legacy and their "brand." Lyndon B. Johnson was definitely one of those figures. He wanted to leave behind a great legacy(which didn't really happen) but that's not the point. Richard Nixon and Donald Trump also felt the same way about their presidency, and did whatever they could to preserve their legacy a certain way, even if that meant doing questionable things.
ReplyDeleteHi Adit! I agree that it's remarkable to see the various methods that politicians employ to control their image. Although, it is unfortunate that sometimes historical figures and not just politicians are largely remembered for their mistakes and ignored for their actual contributions. In Nixon's case even, he did establish the Environmental Protection Agency and the Clean Water Act even though his later scandals were despicable. I suppose it's ultimately a result of our evolutionary negativity bias when remembering famous people. Nonetheless, you are right about power being corrupting and people who gave in to that probably do deserve to have their legacy tarnished with criticism.
ReplyDeleteHey Adit, I find your discussion of this topic very interesting as it really shows the way that communications have affected politics. For one, I'll have to agree that the manipulation of messages and content that politicians utilize on a daily basis is fascinating, as it really has significantly impacted the way that they are perceived. Simple communications have resulted in the lasting impacts on their legacy. However, it stands to reason that when crimes or wrongdoings are committed by people of power, it leaves a more lasting impact, as these people were entrusted to do their jobs by the people of America.
ReplyDelete