Nixon

Oct. 21 (UPI) — President Donald Trump accepted the Architect of Peace Award from the Richard Nixon Foundation during a closed ceremony at the White House on Tuesday morning.

Trump earned the award due to his central role in negotiating the current cease-fire deal between Hamas and Israel to end the unchecked war in Gaza that began when Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, CBS News reported.

Award presenters included former President Richard Nixon’s daughter, Tricia Nixon Cox, former national security adviser Robert O’Brien and acting U.S. archivist Jim Byron, CBS News reported.

Trump had argued he deserved to receive the Nobel Peace Prize for securing a cease-fire in Gaza and ending other wars.

Among wars that Trump has said he ended are those between Cambodia and Thailand, the Congo and Rwanda, Israel and Iran, India and Pakistan, Egypt and Ethiopia, and Armenia and Azerbaijan, and Serbia and Kosovo, the president told the U.N. General Assembly on Sept. 24.

The Nobel Peace Prize went to Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, who opposed Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in that nation’s 2024 presidential election, which exit polling suggests Machado won despite Maduro’s victory claim.

The Architect of Peace award is not given annually but instead when foundation representatives decide one has been earned by those who “embody [Nixon’s] lifelong goal of shaping a more peaceful world,” according to the Architect of Peace Award website.

The award last year honored former President George W. Bush, Farah Pahlavi and Reza Pahlavi.

Bush received the award for establishing the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, which globally has saved millions of lives.

The Pahlavis received the award for championing a secular Iranian government, religious freedom and human rights, according to the Nixon Foundation.

Farah Pahlavi is Iran’s former queen, while Reza is her son.

YORBA LINDA — Not all the President’s men were there, but enough to make a strong showing.

Former Cabinet members Henry A. Kissinger and Richard G. Kleindienst were in attendance. So were Watergate figures Maurice Stans, once finance chairman for Nixon’s re-election committee, and G. Gordon Liddy, the convicted mastermind of the bungled burglary.

Former Nixon spokesman Ron Ziegler and Counsel Chuck Colson also paid their respects. Jo Horton Haldeman, the widow of Nixon’s chief of staff, H. R. Haldeman, was in the audience. And so was Rose Mary Woods, the secretary who took responsibility for creating the infamous 18 1/2-minute gap on a critical Watergate tape.

But so was George McGovern, who was among the first named on Nixon’s infamous “enemies list,” and whose presence on the funeral’s exclusive guest list spoke more eloquently of reconciliation than some who eulogized the 37th President.

“This has been a reconciling day for me and, I think, for a lot of other people,” said McGovern, who as the Democratic nominee waged an acrimonious political fight against Nixon for the presidency in 1972 and was buried in a electoral landslide. “I kind of really feel like I’ve lost an old friend, even though we were bitter political enemies through the years.”

Colson, who spent seven months in prison for obstructing justice during the Watergate conspiracy, also spoke of healing.

“I think he achieved in death something he never quite achieved in life–to bring the nation together,” said Colson. “Maybe the wounds of Watergate are now, twenty-some years later, finally healed.”

The guest list for the funeral cut across a broad spectrum of Nixon’s political and private life: Republicans and Democrats, friends and former enemies, family members, entertainers, sports figures, religious leaders and many, many longtime staffers.

At the Yorba Linda Community Center, where many of the guests had gathered before the funeral, the Nixon faithful–wearing either purple or yellow “RN” badges that were their tickets to the funeral–embraced like long-lost friends.

Liddy and Howard H. Baker Jr., the former Tennessee senator and ranking minority member of the Judiciary Committee that held televised hearings on Watergate, rode over to the funeral site together on a shuttle.

Robert H. Finch, who served under Nixon as secretary of health, education and welfare, smiled and shook hands with Donald H. Rumsfeld, the secretary of defense under President Gerald R. Ford.

“I think the Nixon family can feel very, very good about what he accomplished, and who all is here,” Rumsfeld said. “A broad cross-section of the world is recognizing him for what he did.”

From across the Nixon years came Alexander M. Haig Jr., Haldeman’s replacement as chief of staff, and Caspar W. Weinberger, former secretary of health, education and welfare who became Ronald Reagan’s defense secretary. James R. Schlesinger, Nixon’s defense secretary, and William P. Rogers, his secretary of state, joined a few dozen others from the Nixon presidency, including political columnist and presidential aspirant Patrick J. Buchanan, security adviser Brent Scowcroft and former Atty. Gen. Elliot L. Richardson.

Even former Vice President Spiro T. Agnew, who before Nixon’s resignation left office himself in disgrace under a criminal indictment, and his wife, Judy, attended the funeral. Agnew had asked Julie Nixon Eisenhower if he would be welcome at the funeral and was assured that his presence was important. On Wednesday, he was greeted warmly.

“I’m here to pay my respects for (Nixon’s) accomplishments,” said Nixon’s vice president, who resigned in 1973 after pleading no contest to tax evasion. “It’s time to put aside 20 years of resentment, which is what I’m doing at this moment.”

More than 100 members of Congress were on the guest list, including 47 U.S. senators, House Speaker Thomas Foley (D-Wash.), Senate Democratic Leader George Mitchell of Maine and the California congressional delegation.

Representatives from across the globe, from Angola to Argentina and Singapore to Seychelles, also were in force. In all, 86 countries sent dignitaries to pay respects.

But Nixon had other admirers, too, who had little if anything to do with politics. Comedians Bob Hope and Red Skelton and actor Buddy Ebsen attended with their wives. Former Rams star Roosevelt Grier also attended.

“It was a good send-off to Richard Nixon and his future life,” said Ebsen, who also attended Pat Nixon’s funeral last summer. “There was a feeling of togetherness. It stepped across party lines and it was a beautiful happening. We need that to get all of us together.”

Said Hope: “He was a hell of a guy. Playing golf, you learn a lot about a guy’s character. His was a great character.”

The guest list was indeed impressive, with names like Walter Annenberg, George Argyros, Jesse Helms, William Lyon, Ashraf Pahlavi, Bebe Rebozo, Nelson Rockefeller, Henry Segerstrom, Mary Roosevelt and James B. Stockdale sprinkled throughout.

Orange County also had a large contingent, including a gathering of state senators and assemblymen. All five Orange County supervisors were also invited. The local Republican Central Committee distributed 100 tickets to elected officials, volunteers and others affiliated with the local party, chairman Thomas A. Fuentes said, and just about everyone who wanted in got in.

“It was dignified, sentimental and memorable,” Supervisor Harriett M. Wieder said. “I think it was Kissinger who said that when you look at the quality of a person and whether they lived well, you look at the entirety of the life. That’s how I remember Richard Nixon.”

Mourners spoke about healing and the inevitability that Nixon, in death, may finally have been absolved of his perceived sins.

Former Vice President Dan Quayle joked that Kissinger had captured it perfectly when he predicted that Nixon “would’ve liked to have read and reread all the favorable reviews that he’s had this last week.”

The Rev. Robert Schuller said he was pleased to see those reviews.

“I’m very grateful to God for the respect that’s been shown (Nixon) this last week,” said Schuller. “Society does not forgive. People tend to hold on to their hurts.”

But since Nixon’s death, Schuller said, the public is beginning to “recognize Nixon’s greatness.”

Times staff writers Alicia DiRado, Doreen Carvajal and Eric Lichtblau contributed to this report.

On the Guest List

The official U.S. delegation, members of Congress and the foreign delegation attending the funeral of Richard Nixon, according to the White House:

U.S. PRESIDENTS AND THEIR WIVES

* Bill and Hillary Clinton

* George and Barbara Bush

* Ronald and Nancy Reagan

* Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter

* Gerald and Betty Ford

NIXON ADMINISTRATION OFFICIALS

* Spiro T. Agnew, former vice president

* Peter J. Brennan, former labor secretary

* Frederick B. Dent, former commerce secretary

* Elliot L. Richardson, former attorney general and health, education and welfare secretary

* William P. Rogers, former secretary of state

* Henry A. Kissinger, former secretary of state

* James R. Schlesinger, former defense secretary

* Caspar W. Weinberger, former HEW secretary

* William B. Saxbe, former attorney general

* Alexander M. Haig Jr., former chief of staff

* Brent Scowcroft, former Nixon aide

* Herb Stein, former economic adviser

* James T. Lynn, former HUD secretary

* Charles W. Colson, former special counsel to the President

* Dwight L. Chapin, former deputy assistant to the President

* Kenneth H. Dahlberg, former Midwest finance chairman of the Committee for the Re-election of the President

* Richard G. Kleindienst, former U.S. attorney general

* Ronald L. Ziegler, former press secretary

* G. Gordon Liddy, former White House aide

* Herbert W. Kalmbach, personal attorney to Nixon

* Robert H. Finch, former secretary of health, education and welfare

* Patrick J. Buchanan, speech writer

* Rose Mary Woods, former secretary

* Lyn Nofziger, former staff member

CLINTON ADMINISTRATION OFFICIALS

* Defense Secretary William Perry

* Army Gen. John Shalikashvili, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

* Thomas F. (Mack) McLarty, White House chief of staff

* Strobe Talbott, deputy secretary of state

* Carol Browner, Environmental Protection Agency administrator

* Phil Lader, White House deputy chief of staff

* Dee Dee Myers, White House press secretary

* David Gergen, counselor to the President

* Bruce Lindsey, senior presidential adviser

* W. Anthony Lake, national security adviser

* Lloyd Cutler, White House special counsel

* Robert Rubin, director of National Economic Council

* Mark Gearan, White House communications director

* Pat Griffin, White House congressional affairs lobbyist

MEMBERS OF CONGRESS

More than 100 members were on the list. Among them:

* House Speaker Thomas Foley, D-Wash.

* Senate Democratic Leader George Mitchell, D-Me.

* Sen. Minority Leader Bob Dole, R-Kan.

* Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, D-N.Y.

* Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif.

* Sen. John Danforth, R-Mo.

* Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M.

* Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.

* Sen. Phil Gramm, R-Tex.

* Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah

* Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C.

* Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Tex.

* Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind.

* Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.

* Sen. Sam Nunn, D-Ga.

* Sen. Bob Packwood, R-Ore.

* Sen. Alan Simpson, R-Wyo.

* Sen. Strom Thurmond, R-S.C.

* House Democratic Leader Richard A. Gephardt, D-Mo.

* House Republican Leader Robert Michel, R-Ill.

* Rep. Newt Gingrich, R-Ga.

* Rep. Carlos Moorhead, R-Glendale

* Rep. Bill Thomas, R-Bakersfield

* Rep. David Dreier, R-San Dimas

* Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-El Cajon

* Rep. Robert K. Dornan, R-Garden Grove

* Rep. Elton Gallegly, R-Simi Valley

* Rep. Wally Herger, R-Rio Oso

* Rep. Christopher Cox, R-Newport Beach

* Rep. Jay C. Kim, R-Diamond Bar

* Rep. Howard P. McKeon, R-Santa Clarita

* Rep. Ed Royce, R-Fullerton

OTHER INVITED GUESTS

* The Rev. Billy Graham, officiant

* Lynda Johnson Robb, daughter of former President Lyndon B. Johnson

* Sen. Charles Robb, D-Va.

* George McGovern, Nixon’s 1972 presidential opponent

* Bob Strauss, chairman of the Democratic National Committee when Nixon was President

* Vernon Jordan, former president of the National Urban League

* Pete Wilson, California governor

* Kenneth M. Duberstein, former White House chief of staff

* Dwayne Andreas, former ambassador to the People’s Republic of China

* Buddy Ebsen, actor

* Bob Hope, comedian

* Red Skelton, comedian

* Rupert Murdoch, media executive

* Thomas F. Riley, O.C. supervisor

* Harriett M. Wieder, O.C. supervisor

* Gaddi H. Vasquez, O.C. supervisor

* William G. Steiner, O.C. supervisor

* Roger R. Stanton, O.C. supervisor

* Thomas A. Fuentes, O.C. Republican Party chairman

* Dan Quayle, former vice president

* Walter F. Mondale, former vice president

* Walter Annenberg, former U.S. ambassador

* George Argyros, O.C. businessman

* Reza and Ashraf Pahlavi, self-proclaimed Shah of Iran and his aunt

* Richard Riordan, L.A. mayor

* Jack Kemp, former secretary of housing and urban development

* Bebe Rebozo, Nixon friend

* Henry Segerstrom, O.C. businessman

* James B. Stockdale, retired vice admiral

* The Rev. Robert H. Schuller

* Howard H. Baker, former Senate minority leader, chief of staff in Reagan Administration and the ranking minority member on the Senate Watergate Committee

* Ji Chaozhu, United Nations undersecretary general from China

* James A. Baker III, former secretary of treasury and state in Reagan and Bush administrations

FOREIGN COUNTRIES REPRESENTED

Angola, Argentina, Australia, Azerbaijan, Bahamas, Bangladesh, Belgium, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Brunei, Cambodia, Cameroon, Canada, Chile, China, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Egypt, Ethiopia, Fiji, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Guatemala, Honduras, Hungary, Indonesia, India, Ireland, Israel, Jamaica, Japan, Jordan, Kenya, Korea, Latvia, Lebanon, Liberia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Maldives, Monaco, Morocco, Mozambique, Nepal, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Norway, Oman, Pakistan, Paraguay, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Romania, Russia, Senegal, Seychelles, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland, Suriname, Syria, Taiwan, Thailand, Tanzania, Togo, Tunisia, Turkey, United Kingdom, Uruguay, Venezuela, Yemen, Zambia.

Sources: Los Angeles Times, Associated Press

On October 17, 2025, Nixon Peabody Trust Company disclosed in an SEC filing that it sold 25,734 shares of General Dynamics (GD 0.22%), an estimated $8.11 million trade.

What happened

According to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission dated October 17, 2025, Nixon Peabody Trust Company reduced its stake in General Dynamics by 25,734 shares during Q3 2025. The estimated transaction value, based on the quarter’s average price, was $8.11 million. The fund now reports holding 30,224 shares in General Dynamics, worth $10.31 million.

What else to know

This reduction brings the stake in General Dynamics to 0.75% of Nixon Peabody Trust Company’s 13F assets, as of Q3 2025. Previously, the position made up 1.26% of the fund’s AUM, as of Q2 2025.

Top five holdings after the filing:

• IDEV: $88.54 million (6.48% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
• MSFT: $81.41 million (5.96% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
• AVLV: $71.50 million (5.24% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
• AAPL: $67.89 million (4.97% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
• NVDA: $65.25 million (4.78% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025

As of October 17, 2025, shares of General Dynamics were priced at $331.15, up 7.4% for the year through October 17, 2025 and underperforming the S&P 500 by 3.2 percentage points over the same period.

Company Overview

Company Snapshot

General Dynamics offers business jets, naval vessels, combat vehicles, weapons systems, and advanced IT solutions through four segments: Aerospace, Marine Systems, Combat Systems, and Technologies.

The company generates revenue primarily through manufacturing and servicing defense platforms, business aviation, and technology solutions for government and commercial clients.

It serves U.S. and allied government agencies, defense departments, and commercial aviation customers worldwide.

General Dynamics is a leading global aerospace and defense contractor with a diversified portfolio spanning business aviation, shipbuilding, land combat systems, and defense technology.

Foolish take

Nixon Peabody Trust Company scaled back its position in General Dynamics, but even before the sell, this stock accounted for only a small fraction of the fund’s overall portfolio at just 1.26% of AUM — well outside its top five holdings.

It’s worth noting that although General Dynamics has lagged behind the S&P 500, it’s up by more than 25% year to date and 133% over the last five years, as of October 17, 2025. With the timing of this sell-off, it’s not surprising that institutional investors are cashing in on those earnings.

General Dynamics remains a major name in the defense sector, recently securing a $1.5 billion contract with U.S. Strategic Command to modernize its enterprise IT systems.

The company also has a long history of dividend growth, increasing its dividend payout for 28 consecutive years. Defense companies like General Dynamics can already offer some stability and predictability for investors thanks to contracts with the U.S. government, while consistent dividends can be appealing to income investors, too.

Glossary

13F: A quarterly SEC filing by institutional investment managers disclosing their equity holdings.
Assets Under Management (AUM): The total market value of investments managed on behalf of clients by a fund or institution.
Quarter (Q3 2025): The third three-month period of a financial year; here, July–September 2025.
Position: The amount of a particular security or asset held by an investor or fund.
Top five holdings: The five largest investments in a fund’s portfolio by value.
Stake: The ownership interest or share an investor holds in a company.
Defense contractor: A company that provides products or services to military or government defense agencies.
Segment: A distinct business division within a company, often reporting separate financial results.
TTM: The 12-month period ending with the most recent quarterly report.

Despite thousands of contested ballots in Florida’s Palm Beach County, a lot of people are calling on Al Gore to act like a mensch and concede the election to George W. Bush–as they contend Richard M. Nixon did in 1960 when he lost to John F. Kennedy amid rumors of fraud. Even the veteran New York Times reporter R.W. Apple on Thursday quoted from Nixon’s memoirs to this effect.

It’s certainly true that Nixon claimed he spurned advice from President Eisenhower to dispute the election results in order to spare the country a constitutional crisis. (He was saving that for 1973.) And, indeed, Nixon’s version of events now borders on accepted fact. But it’s a myth and a false precedent.

Here’s what really happened: In 1960, Nixon lost to Kennedy by 113,000 ballots of 68 million cast–0.2% of the overall tally. In several states the vote was excruciatingly close. Allegations surfaced that Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley’s machine and Sen. Lyndon B. Johnson’s cronies in Texas fixed those states’ ballots, stealing their combined 51 electoral votes from Nixon and tipping the election. (The final electoral count was 303-219.)

The fraud rumors sent Nixon’s people into conniptions. Republican officials pressed hard for a recount bid, though Eisenhower was not leading the charge. Early on, the president did endorse the idea, but he soon changed his mind, provoking bitterness among Nixon’s aides. According to Nixon’s friend, Ralph de Toledano, a conservative journalist, Nixon knew Ike’s position yet claimed anyway that he, not the president, was the one advocating restraint. “This was the first time I ever caught Nixon in a lie,” Toledano recalled.

More to the point, while Nixon publicly pooh-poohed a challenge, his allies aggressively pursued one. Much of this history has, incredibly, been forgotten as biographers such as Stephen E. Ambrose have propounded Nixon’s line. But a glance at the 1960 newspapers shows that GOP leaders tried to undo the results. They knew it was a longshot, but the effort continued right up until the electoral college certified Kennedy’s win on Dec. 19.

GOP leaders had reason to conduct even a doomed campaign. Even if they ultimately lost, they reasoned, they could still taint Kennedy’s victory. They could claim he had no mandate, galvanize their rank and file and build a winning issue for upcoming elections.

So on Nov. 11, three days after the election, Thruston B. Morton, a Kentucky senator and the Republican Party’s national chairman, launched bids for recounts or investigations in not just Illinois and Texas but also Delaware, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, New Mexico, Nevada, Pennsylvania and South Carolina. A few days later, Robert H. Finch and Leonard W. Hall, two Nixon intimates, sent agents to conduct what they called “field checks” in eight of those 11 battlegrounds.

In New Jersey, local Republicans obtained court orders for recounts; Texans brought suit in federal court. Illinois witnessed the most vigorous crusade. Nixon aide Peter Flanigan encouraged the creation of a Chicago-area Nixon Recount Committee. As late as Nov. 23, Republican National Committee general counsel H. Meade Alcorn Jr. was still predicting Nixon would take Illinois. On Dec. 2, Morton dramatically flew into Chicago while a Cook County recount was underway.

All the while, leading Republicans, as well as Nixon himself, claimed that the vice president had nothing to do with the efforts. But the involvement of such close aides as Finch and Hall makes such an assertion implausible. More likely, Nixon was shrewd enough not to muddy himself directly in the grimy business because, as he later wrote, getting involved would mean “charges of ‘sore loser’ would follow me through history and remove any possibility of a further political career.”

In the end, these efforts came to naught. In some cases (New Jersey, Illinois), the GOP obtained recounts but they didn’t change the final vote. In other cases (Texas), judges rejected the GOP’s bids for recounts. As it turned out (as several academic studies have concluded), some fraud existed, but not enough to alter the outcome.

Still, because of the ruckus that the Republicans kicked up, they succeeded in tainting Kennedy’s triumph. Nixon proved canny enough to wage his battles while escaping opprobrium. Nixon may have been a loser, but he was nobody’s fool.

Genocide and displacement has been on my mind this month as “October 7^th” comes and goes. The world is at war. Trump has been re-elected President of the United States and displaced poets are searching for hope, sanctuary and a place/space to call home.

Nixon Mateulah is a Malawian-born award-winning poet, short story writer and novelist. I am in conversation with him today.

He is thoughtful in his answers. They are detailed, comprehensive in scope, and technical. He holds nothing back and is quite straightforward in his approach. It has been some hours since I last spoke with him. He is studying at the University of the Western Cape and greets me every day with a text message that reads, “Good morning, Abigail. I trust you’re well.”

Somehow, one day, a few years ago we got to talking, I think it was Nixon who had approached me. He had just self-published a book. A friendship was formed and we struck up a correspondence. Over the years, the apprentice has surpassed the master, told a few stories, found his niche in academia and even garnered awards and prestigious writing fellowships.

In his own words, “A poet faces a number of challenges in the micro-climate, but at the same time, it offers us the opportunity to better relay our cultural heritage to others without sounding foreign and being overly didactic. I am a keen observer of human life and many critics feel my writing echoes more on social realism.”

But I want to know what makes Nixon tick. I want to delve into the depths of his psychological framework. I ask him exactly what makes him happy or sad about being a poet and writer from Malawi living in South Africa and does he feel people look up to him in some ways and why does he think they look up to him?

“Poetry makes me happy in a sense that it replenishes my sanity. I come from a very unfortunate upbringing. I lost my father, the breadwinner of our family soon after I had written my final secondary school exams. Being first born in the family of five, I had to step into my father’s shoes and try to steer the destitute family further away from poverty. I was a kid who had never experienced adult life. I was very traumatised and melancholic. I had to find a job immediately to start supporting my family, unfortunately I couldn’t get a job. I could not go to college when what we needed most in the family was food.”

His story will make you blink back the tears and applaud his bravery, the bold steps he took in forging a new life in a different country with perhaps a more forgiving landscape.

“Then I sold my father’s only valuable asset – the bicycle, to finance my transport to South Africa.”

Here I pause as I read these words. My mind reflects upon the time I advised him to seek a traditional publisher for his novel.

“I left Malawi on 12 December 1996. The money was not enough to take me to Pretoria, my fare ended at Beitbridge, and a Good Samaritan paid for my taxi fare to Pretoria. I have lived in South Africa almost twenty- eight years now, three years in Pretoria and twenty- five years in Cape Town.”

I tell him that he has the makings of an educationalist. His life has been difficult, tough, and challenging to say the least. He has achieved much, built a legacy for his children, for others to follow in his footsteps.

“What makes me sad as a poet living in South Africa is that I find that immigrants living in South Africa are painted with one xenophobic brush and we are not represented in the poetry landscape of South Africa. I took upon myself to write about our experiences, stories that push one to leave one’s home when home is the mouth of the shark, when home is the barrel of a gun, as poet Warsan Shire puts it. People look up to me as I am a living testimony to them that wherever we come from must not limit our determination to soar high up in society.”

He continues in the same vein, “We must look to our poets for solutions, our novelists for answers and our short story writers for “the way in, the way out”.”

“Everyone is capable of achieving anything as long as he puts his mind to it. I came here with a high school certificate, doing all kinds of odd jobs, and today I am finishing my Master’s degree in Creative writing.” I wonder how many other Nixon Mateulahs’ are are out there, underdogs barely surviving in post-apartheid South Africa.  

There are a number of minor and major challenges and setbacks facing poets in the micro-climate that we are living in in Africa today. I ask Nixon to talk to me about some of the more vital aspects of his writing.

“Live reading is an art that must be mustered. The first time that I read to an audience was terrifying; but there is always a first time to everything, and with time I managed to improve my reading. Most of us poets are introverts. To entertain the audience, you have to dramatize your reading, that was the skill that I lacked in the beginning. You need to intrigue them, amaze them with your performance, and at the end leave them begging for more.” I can hear that he is an introvert in his answers. Every poet is an introvert at heart.

“Who and what inspires you creatively as a poet? What made you want to be a poet and do you keep a journal? Is there anything else you would like to share?” I ask.

“Ordinary people inspire me creatively. I am an ordinary person and there are plenty of stories to write about. With so many stories bubbling up in my head, I felt I could not write them all in novels, so looking at poetry; a genre that demands to economise words to tell a story, I decide to best tell my stories with honesty, courage, precision and compassion by building blocks of poetry which captures stories in vivid imagery like paintings. In poetry words are like bricks in a wall, you take out one brick, the wall is incomplete. As a poet I cannot go out without my journal and if I don’t have a journal, I make sure I got a pen and paper or shop slip with me. Whenever an idea strikes my fancy, I jot it down, whatever I observe worth of poem I jot it down for use later, so it is important for a writer to keep a journal. Take a bus or a train to town and by the time you get off your head will be swimming in a sea of stories. A journal is like a bank where a writer draws out his notes for stories.” I am mesmerised by his words and how he commands language at will.

“I am not a person who takes dreams seriously and most of my dreams I forget them, but this particular dream stayed with me the whole day, then I had to write it down:” I read his words and then I listen for them, for the imagery and visuals to follow.

“I wake up in the morning/I go out and sees no one in the street/No car, no dog, no sounds of day/I run to the cemetery/I find no tombstone or grave/I look up, the sun still hangs up there and unfriendly wind dances the tree branches without a song/I run around the neighbourhood like a mad man looking for his missing bag/“Where are the people?” I shout out like a loudhailer/I run back home, jump onto bed and fall asleep/Next morning, I wake up to a beautiful day/Everybody is back and life goes on as usual without dreams.” I am in awe of this cultural practitioner’s powers and poetric competence.

Nixon reminds me of Haruki Murakami in his interests. He, like Murakami, is a runner.

“I like reading, running, watching soccer and listening to music. I am a fan of old school music; I like to go down memory lane and reminisce about the bygone days. For books, I read widely, though poetry is my main preference over novels. I like to read books that stimulate my creative muse.”

Nixon Mateulah gives me a lot to think about and to be grateful for my own journey as a poet. He is a dreamer, a hard worker, an enigma.

“Growing up we were into karate movies even though we could not understand the stories involved. We were after good, daring fighting. Bruce Lee, Van Damme, Jackie Chan were our favourites and we had to pay at video shops to watch these movies. Now that I can understand the stories behind a movie, I like to watch real life stories; stories that mirror our own lives. I have just watched a new movie: ‘Divorce in the Black’ by Tyler Perry. It has a universal social issue it addresses that echoes in our societies today. It is appalling to note that divorce is shooting high among middle classes than working classes. Eva and Dallas’ story is the epitome of the sick societies that we live in.”  

I ask him, as I am tempted to ask any writer/poet/novelist with roots in the African continent, what motivated him to write doing the pandemic?

Nixon writes that it is hope that recharged his writing batteries. “Writing can heal a disease better than medicine sometimes. You give a poem to a sick person about a person who survived the same disease the patient is suffering from; the patient’s hope of living will increase than when he was just taking medication. So I kept on writing stories and poems to uplift our hopes for a propitious tomorrow.”

I ask him who are the poets and writers that influence his writing, and that inspire him. Nixon is bold in his discourse and extrapolates.

“First and foremost, I should say as a high school kid I was intrigued when I learnt that in Nigeria, a young man of twenty-one years had written and published a complete novel (Flowers and Shadows), and that young man was Ben Okri. Since that time, I said to myself I would like to be like him. I started taking writing seriously and it paid off. Soon after writing my high school exams I published two stories in the local newspapers.

“It was a big deal that time, a high school kid publishing a short story in the newspaper and people reading it! There are so many poets that have influenced my poetry: our own celebrated poet, Jack Mapanje made us poets in Malawi to believe in ourselves, that with hard work we can conquer the world with our poetry. I was also greatly influenced by the poems of W.H Auden, Thomas Hardy, William Wordsworth, A.E. Housman etcetera and when I arrived here in South Africa I found a number of poets who intrigued me with their poetry, the likes of Oswald Mbuyiseni Mtshali with his bestselling collection – Sound of a Cowhide Drum, Don Mattera, Denis Brutus, and many others. Today South African poetry echoes out with new voices, the likes of Nick Mulgrew, Koleka Putuma, Kobus Moolman, Salimah Valiani, Sarah Lubala, Musawenkosi Khanyile, Gabeba Baderoon, and many others whose works are very phenomenal and inspiring.”

He says being alive motivates him. That he feels fortunate every day when he wakes up and sees the sun rising. Then he knows he still has time to contribute to this day, to make it a good day. 

“No person can guarantee me that when he walks to bed every night can say that if this is my last day to live, I have done what is good and whatever happens whilst I am asleep must happen.”

He leaves us now with a quote by his favourite writer and I am reminded of Ludwig Wittgenstein.

“When land is gone and money’s spent, then learning is most excellent” – George Eliot.

Nixon Mateulah is a poet’s poet. Find his literary work online.

“I am not a crook,” President Nixon said in 1973.

“I’m not a dictator,” President Trump insisted on Monday.

And with that, another famously false presidential proclamation entered the annals of memorable statements no president should ever feel compelled to make.

It took months more for Nixon’s crimes to force him to resign in 1974 ahead of his all-but-certain removal by Congress. But a half-century later, Trump is unabashedly showing every day that he really does aspire to be a dictator. Unlike Nixon, he doesn’t have to fear a supposedly coequal Congress: It’s run by slavish fellow Republicans who’ve forfeited their constitutional powers over spending, tariffs, appointments and more. Lower courts have checked Trump’s lawlessness, but a too-deferential Supreme Court gets the last word and empowers him more than not.

Americans are indeed in proverbial uncharted waters. Four months ago, conservative columnist David Brooks of the New York Times wrote — uncharacteristically for a self-described “mild” guy — “It’s time for a comprehensive national civic uprising.” It’s now past time.

Perhaps more troubling than Trump’s “not a dictator” comment was a related one that he made on Monday and reiterated on Tuesday during a three-hour televised Cabinet praise meeting (don’t these folks have jobs?). “A lot of people are saying maybe we like a dictator,” he said. Alas, for once Trump isn’t wrong. MAGA Republicans are loyal to the man, not the party, and give Trump the sort of support no president in memory has enjoyed.

A poll from the independent Public Religion Research Institute earlier this year showed that a majority of Americans — 52% — agreed that Trump is a “dangerous dictator whose power should be limited before he destroys American democracy.” Those who disagreed were overwhelmingly Republicans, 81% of whom said Trump “should be given the power he needs.” Americans’ split on this fundamental question shows the extent to which Trump has cleaved a country founded and long-flourishing on checks and balances and the rule of law, not men.

That Trump would explicitly address the dictator issue this week reflects just how head-spinningly fast his dictatorial actions have been coming at us.

The militarization of the nation’s capital continues, reinforced with National Guard units from six red states, on trumped-up claims of a crime emergency. Trump served notice in recent days that the thousands of troops and federal agents will remain on Washington’s streets indefinitely despite a federal law setting a 30-day limit — “We’re not playing games,” he told troops on Friday — and that Chicago, Baltimore, New York and perhaps San Francisco are next.

In all cases, as with Los Angeles, Il Duce is acting over the objections of elected officials. But who cares about stinking elections? Trump warned on Friday from his gilded Oval Office that Washington’s thrice-elected Mayor Muriel Bowser “better get her act straight or she won’t be mayor very long, because we’ll take it over with the federal government.” And after Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, another Democrat, slammed Trump for his threats, El Presidente replied that he has “the right to do anything I want to do.”

This is scary stuff, and it’s being normalized by the sheer firehose nature of Trump’s outrages and by the capitulation of his Cabinet, Congress, corporations and rightwing media. That’s why the remaining citizenry must take a stand, literally.

Trump’s sycophants atop the Pentagon and intelligence agencies, the equally unfit Pete Hegseth and Tulsi Gabbard, continued their purge of senior military officials and intelligence experts whose loyalties to Trump are suspect. And on Friday, the FBI raided the home of former Trump advisor John Bolton, in a chilling signal to other critics.

In a first for a president, Trump on Tuesday tried to fire a member of the independent Federal Reserve board, Biden appointee Lisa D. Cook, in apparent violation of federal law aiming to protect the Fed against just such political interference. The Fed’s independence has been central to the United States’ role as the globe’s preeminent economic power; investors worldwide believe the central bank won’t act on a president’s whims. But Trump is determined to cement a majority that will deeply cut interest rates, inflation be damned. Cook is suing to keep her job, setting up a Fed-backed showdown likely headed to the Supreme Court. Despite its partiality to a president’s power over independent federal agencies, the court has repeatedly suggested that the Fed is an exception. Let’s hope.

Trump, who regularly assails Democrats as socialists and communists, now boasts of compelling private corporations to give the government a stake. Speaking on Monday about a new deal in which the beleaguered head of chipmaker Intel agreed to give the government a 10% stake, Trump declared, “I hope I have many more cases like it.” And yet we get more crickets from Republicans who profess to be the party of free enterprise and free markets.

The president’s campaign against federal judges who oppose him continues as well. On Tuesday it was one of his own appointees, U.S. District Judge Thomas Cullen, who tossed Trump’s lawsuit against the entire federal judiciary in Maryland. To accept the president’s suit, Cullen wrote, would violate precedent, constitutional tradition and the rule of law.

Alas, such violations pretty much sum up Trump’s record so far.

He’s trying to rewrite history at the Smithsonian Institution, including whitewashing slavery, and dictating to law firms, universities and state legislatures. On Tuesday, Trump had Republican state legislators from Indiana to the White House to press them to join those in Texas and other red states who are, on his orders, redrawing House districts expressly so Democrats don’t win control of Congress in next year’s midterm elections.

Amid all this, the New Yorker was out with an exhaustive review of Trump’s finances that conservatively concluded that he’s already profited on the presidency by $3.4 billion. If he’s not careful, Trump won’t only be denying he’s a dictator; he’ll be echoing Nixon on the crook rap.

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Lisa Berns, the niece of retired Gen. Colin L. Powell, passed by a newsstand in Los Angeles over the weekend and found herself reacting with dread and alarm to the news that Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin had just been assassinated.

The Orange County woman’s reaction surfaced again Wednesday, when her uncle announced he would not be running for President, a decision that, in Berns’ words, “hasn’t ruined my day. . . . It takes a lot of the pressure off of us. It takes the worry away.”

“People in public office just put themselves at risk every day, so I’m not unhappy that he decided not to run,” she said.

Lisa Berns’ mother, Marilyn Berns, whose only sibling is Powell, said she had never discussed the dangers of running for office with her brother, “But I know that it concerned us–my husband and our family. I think Colin’s decision was made prior” to Saturday’s tragedy in Israel.

“I wasn’t surprised [by Wednesday’s announcement] because Colin called me [Tuesday] night and told me what his decision was,” said Marilyn Berns, 64, a teacher at Martin Elementary School in Santa Ana until her retirement in June. “I’m pleased about the decision. It’s important to us that he do the thing he feels most comfortable with. . . . We were all getting very edgy about it.”

Berns said that her brother’s consideration of seeking the presidency had left his family subject to prolonged stress.

“There was this monumental decision that had to be made,” Marilyn Berns said. “Both of them [Powell and his wife, Alma], along with their kids, were just meeting and meeting and thinking it over. I didn’t realize until I spoke to him the gravity of what my brother was dealing with. That was very disturbing to me. I got a little teary over that.”

Elsewhere in Orange County, the response was less personal and more political as Democratic and Republican leaders found a common ground: Albeit for their own reasons, both parties agreed that Powell had done the right thing–the only thing he could do, really–in not seeking the White House.

But private citizens throughout the county reacted glumly, saying that Powell’s decision deprived American voters of a candidate whom many felt was potentially the best President of anyone in public life.

Others expressed relief, however, saying the timing just didn’t feel right.

Numerous political pundits said Wednesday that Powell’s wife had been “adamant” about having him decline, language with which both Berns women took issue.

Marilyn Berns said that her sister-in-law “has a lot of input” into her husband’s choices and that “they do things together as a team”–to a point.

Even if Alma Powell had strongly resisted her husband’s running, “she’s not the type of woman who is so forceful that she would ram her views down someone’s throat. That’s not Alma Powell’s style. She gives her input, and that’s it. She doesn’t beat a dead horse.”

“I haven’t talked to my aunt [Alma, Powell’s wife]. I don’t know that she’s adamant about him not running,” said Lisa Berns, a computer saleswoman in Orange County, “but I don’t think she’s got a burning desire for him to run.

“I don’t know what she feels precisely about Rabin’s assassination. I don’t know that it played a big part in their decision, but I will tell you this: I was in L.A. over the weekend visiting friends. I hadn’t been watching the news, or reading the newspaper.

“But at 5 o’clock when I walked by a newsstand and saw that Rabin had been assassinated, my heart sank. I don’t know if anybody else in the family had it cross their minds, but it certainly crossed mine.”

The Berns family is so concerned about its own privacy that both mother and daughter asked not to have published the name of the Orange County community where the family lives.

Despite her uncle’s decision, “I think he would have been great” as President, Lisa Berns said. “I think he would be good at anything he sets out to do. He’s obviously very bright, very well spoken, level-headed, cool. . . . He knows how to work under tremendous pressure in various capacities. He’s a fair person, an eminently decent person.”

On other fronts, Democrats and Republicans across the county were not about to try to persuade Powell to change his mind.

“If he had run, it would have made the Republican [presidential] race even uglier than it is already,” by pitting the moderate Powell against GOP conservatives, said Irvine attorney Jim Toledano, chairman of the Democratic Party in Orange County.

“The announcement comes as no surprise to me,” countered Thomas A. Fuentes, chairman of the Republican Party in Orange County. “I never met a party activist who was favorable to [Powell’s] nomination during all the time the press was touting it.”

It was always the media and never the GOP constituency who wanted Powell to run, Fuentes said, claiming the negative feeling was far more prevalent in the ultraconservative, Republican stronghold of Orange County.

“If there were ever a media-contrived candidacy, this was the best example,” Fuentes said. “To carry our banner requires some time of service to the party and also the full embrace of the values and ideals of the party–and that was lacking.”

Fuentes suggested that party regulars felt the would-be candidate had not yet paid his dues, noting that Powell’s most trusted advisers “obviously shared with him the reality that there was no Powell ground network. There has to be some structure, some network, some reality to a campaign. That not being in place, I think he just came to grips with reality.”

But some people reacted to Wednesday’s news with disappointment.

At the Richard Nixon Library & Birthplace in Yorba Linda, about 150 people watched Powell’s announcement on a big-screen television. Many were both surprised and crestfallen at his decision. “I really thought he had the impetus and the appeal to win,” said 54-year-old Beverly Nocas of Pasadena. “He’s very articulate and I think he could have done a lot for us.”

Norma Canova, a 50-year-old resident of Yorba Linda, said, “I think he could have had a great role in healing racial problems in this country.”

But several onlookers, who had gathered to watch a fashion show called “Dressing the First Lady,” expressed relief.

“I couldn’t vote for him because I don’t know what he stands for,” said 81-year-old Henry Boney of San Diego. “I know that he’s a good salesman though. He created a lot of publicity for his book.”

Newport Beach resident Elaine Parks said she was “very impressed” with Powell, but was heartened by his decision to stay out of the race.

“It would have been divisive to the party, and we need complete unity to beat the current President, which I sincerely hope happens,” Parks said.