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Authors: Yevgeny Sulima, Professor, Department of Geopolitics, M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State Uni-
versity, Doctor of Science (Philosophy)
Maximilian Shepelev, Professor, Department of International Relations and State Governance, Southwest
State University (Kursk), Doctor of Science (Political Science)
INAUGURATED ON JANUARY 20, 2017 as the
45th President of the United States, Donald John
Trump was well known to the nation as a businessman
who had never filled any state posts and never craved
the presidency. Back in 1990, he said: "I don't want to
be President. I'm one hundred percent sure. I'd change
my mind only if I saw this country continue to go down
the tubes." This means that by 2015 when he decided
to run on his own money, without sponsors and lob-
byists, to become the best American president he had been absolutely sure that the country was
going down the tubes.
In his eyes, the U.S. looked a weak country that should be tougher and more determined: "Tough is
being mentally capable of winning battles against an opponent and doing it with a smile. Tough is
winning systematically."
Convinced that his country has been engaged in interventionist policies far too long he says that
the U.S. "should look after its interests" and concentrate at its own problems. America should restore
the real sector of its economy by moving back industrial facilities from China and liquidate the un-
equal trade exchange with China.
In his new book, Never Enough: Donald Trump and the Pursuit of Success, Rhys Blakely of The
Times insists that the Nixons were among the first admirers of Trump. Roger Stone who belongs
to Trump's closest circle admitted that "he has, famously, a tattoo of Richard Nixon's smiling face."
The Trump-Nixon parallels are not recent inventions. The New York Times, newspaper with no
soft spot for Trump, called him "a new Nixon" in its coverage of the Republican Party convent in
Cleveland that made Trump presidential nominee.
The media have started talking about a possible impeachment of Trump that reminds of Nixon;
incidentally, Trump is invited to move into the Old Executive Office Building where some of
Nixon's talks related to the Watergate scandal were taped. Trump and Nixon, however, are very dif-
ferent people. The former, with no political experience to talk of, is a man of big business who
knows how to earn money, how to assess people and, more important, how to control the unfolding
processes, the skills that many American leaders had lacked.
There is an opinion that Nixon was deposed because of his policy of détente, believed to be in the
interests of the Soviet Union alone. Interestingly, as could be expected, as soon as Nixon had been
removed, the Congress adopted the notorious Jackson-Vanik amendment that deprived the Soviet
Union of the status of most favored nation until the Soviet Union had removed the limitations on
http://interaffairs.ru
Tricky Dick Avenged: Donald Trump's Politics Through the
Prism of Richard Nixon's Presidency