The fundamental argument this book is, first, that Richard Nixon, though not gen
erally regarded as a charismatic or emotionally outgoing politician like Frankli
n Roosevelt or Ronald Reagan, did establish profound psychic connections with th
e American people, connections that can be detected both in the brilliant electo
ral success that he enjoyed for most of his career and in his ultimate defeat du
ring the Watergate scandal; and, second and even more important, that these conn
ections are symptomatic of many of the most important currents in American life.
The book is not just a work of political history or political biography but a s
tudy of cultural power: that is, a study in the ways that culture shapes our pol
itics and frames our sense of possibilities and values. In its application of Ma
rxist, psychoanalytic, and other theoretical tools to the study of American elec
toral politics, and in a way designed for the general as well as for the academi
c reader, it is a new kind of book.
