"We haven’t bled enough. It’s never enough for these sons of bitches."

[ND-Dem]

31. he was all those things, but his domestic policies were more liberal than reagan's --

or Clinton's, for that matter.

Three Democrats have held the position of commander-in-chief since the Richard Nixon era, but if you ask philosopher Noam Chomsky, it was the 37th president and infamous Watergate casualty who was truly the last liberal to preside in the Oval Office.

During a discussion on HuffPost Live, Chomsky weighed in on the minimum wage debate, blaming neo-liberals for keeping talk of wage increases off the table until now...

In the 1950s and 1960s, before Nixon took office, minimum wage stayed on track with productivity. However, that pattern fell off in the next decade. After six years of stagnant wages and escalating costs of living, the Nixon administration stepped in -- in 1974, Nixon signed an amendment to the Fair Labor Standards Act. That law raised wages by more than 40 percent.

Fast-forward to today, and once again lawmakers and the White House have found themselves in a debate over what constitutes an acceptable minimum wage for Americans.

Obama signed an executive order a few weeks ago raising the minimum wage of federal contractors to $10.10 an hour. The president hoped that his move would encourage more businesses to raise their hourly wages as well.

But even the new $10 hourly rate is less than what minimum pay would be if adjusted for inflation...It's all part of what Chomsky described as a neo-liberal assault on economic policy... "Part of the neo-liberal assault was the minimum wage in real value started declining, and not growing. As GDP of economy grew, as productivity grew, minimum wage stagnated. So it should be raised considerably."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/21/noam-chomsky-richard-nixon_n_4832847.html

•He got us out of Vietnam.

•He was a keen foreign policy type whose diplomatic efforts strengthened our relationships with both established and emerging world powers.

•He implemented the first significant federal affirmative action program.

•He dramatically increased spending on federal employee salaries.

•He oversaw the first large-scale integration of public schools in the South (something the crackers where I grew up were none too happy about).

•He proposed a guaranteed annual wage (aka a “negative income tax”).

•He advocated comprehensive national health insurance (single payer) for all Americans.

•He imposed wage and price controls in times of economic crisis. This wasn’t a terribly good idea, but it was the furthest thing from a conservative idea. Truth is, it was positively socialist.

•He indexed Social Security for inflation and created Supplemental Security Income

•He created the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and the Office of Minority Business Enterprise.

•He promoted the Legacy of Parks program.

•He appointed four Supreme Court Justices. Three of them voted with the majority in Roe v. Wade.

Now, am I telling you Nixon was Mother Teresa? No.

http://www.alternet.org/newsandviews/article/641730/if_nixon_were_alive_today,_he_would_be_far_too_liberal_to_get_even_the_democratic_nomination