about these "debates"

To be sure, I don't want to be arguing that we'd have been better off if Nixon had been elected in 1960 rather than 1968. Suffice it to say, lots of things would have been Different, whether we want to talk about the Cuba War, how the various civil rights acts would have fared, what the modern conservative movement might have been like without the Goldwater disaster or the Great Society excesses to push them over the edge, etc.

But I've always had this silly idea that elections should be decided on issues ( yeah, I know... dream on... )