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  Introduction: Studying Presidents and the Presidency

  Lori Cox Han

  "This chapter provides an overview of presidential studies and the current state of presidency research. Having a better understanding of topics such as the different eras usually associated with the presidency and the methods of study used by presidency scholars can aid students in learning about the various facets of the institution of the presidency as well as those who have held the office. This chapter considers the general categories used to organize presidents and their presidencies by historical eras, which provides a sense of how the institution itself, along with the day-to-day job responsibilities of the president, has evolved throughout U.S. history. Next, the state of presidency research is considered, including how the various 8 methodological tools now available to presidency scholars have greatly expanded our understanding of presidents as political actors and the presidency as a political institution. Finally, the plan of the book explains how the essays in this volume illustrate the new and emerging trends within presidential studies and how that research provides both a guide and a basis for analysis of the presidency for students. If the 2020 presidential election, the presidential transition, and the early months of the Biden administration show us nothing else, it is that the presidency continues to challenge the conventional wisdom of presidency scholars while forging new areas of research and exploration."

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  Introduction to Hatred of America's Presidents: Personal Attacks on the White House from Washington to Trump

  Lori Cox Han

  "To provide a better understanding of the current state of affairs as related to hatred of presidents, this edited volume provides historical and political context to explain how we got to this point."

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  Introduction to Richard Nixon and Europe : The Reshaping of the Postwar Atlantic World

  Luke A. Nichter

  The U.S.-European relationship remains the closest and most important alliance in the world. Since 1945, successive American presidents each put their own touches on transatlantic relations, but the literature has reached only into the presidency of Lyndon Johnson (1963-9). This first study of transatlantic relations during the era of Richard Nixon shows a complex, turbulent period during which the postwar period came to an end, and the modern era came to be on both sides of the Atlantic in terms of political, economic, and military relations.

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  The Nixon Administration and American Foreign Relations

  Luke A. Nichter

  Assessments of President Richard Nixon’s foreign policy continue to evolve as scholars tap new possibilities for research. Due to the long wait before national security records are declassified by the National Archives and made available to researchers and the public, only in recent decades has the excavation of the Nixon administration’s engagement with the world started to become well documented. As more records are released by the National Archives (including potentially 700 hours of Nixon’s secret White House tapes that remain closed), scholarly understanding of the Nixon presidency is likely to continue changing. Thus far, historians have pointed to four major legacies of Nixon’s foreign policy: tendencies to use American muscle abroad on a more realistic scale, to reorient the focus of American foreign policy to the Pacific, to reduce the chance that the Cold War could turn hot, and, inadvertently, to contribute to the later rise of Ronald Reagan and the Republican right wing—many of whom had been part of Nixon’s “silent majority.” While earlier works focused primarily on subjects like Vietnam, China, and the Soviet Union, the historiography today is much more diverse – now there is at least one work covering most major aspects of Nixon’s foreign policy.

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  A Presidency Upstaged: The Public Leadership of George Bush, Joseph V. Hughes Jr. and Holly O. Hughes

  Lori Cox Han

  A president who distances himself from stagecraft will find himself upstaged. George H. W. Bush sought to “stay the course” in terms of policy while distancing himself from the public relations strategies employed during the administration of Ronald Reagan, his predecessor. But Bush discovered during his one-term presidency that a strategy of policy continuity coupled with mediocre communication skills “does not make for a strong public image as an effective and active leader in the White House", as author and scholar Lori Cox Han demonstrates in A Presidency Upstaged.

  Incorporating extensive archival research from the George Bush Presidential Library at Texas A&M University—including documents only recently available through requests made under the Freedom of Information Act—Han thoroughly examines the public presidency of George H. W. Bush. Han analyzes how communication strategies, relationships with the press, and public opinion polling shaped and defined his image as a leader. The research for this study also includes content analysis of press coverage (both print and television) and major public addresses during the Bush administration.

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  Off to the (Horse) Races: Media Coverage of the "Not-So-Invisible" Invisible Primary of 2007

  Lori Cox Han

  "While it may seem obvious to even the casual observer of U.S. politics how important news media coverage is for a presidential candidate in the heat of the primary or general election battle, it is the media attention garnered during the pre-nomination phase of the campaign that can play a crucial role in deciding if the candidate even makes it to the first nominating contest. Often referred to as the "invisible primary;' the pre-primary period for the 2008 election occurred earlier and lasted longer than in any previous campaign in modern American history...This chapter will consider two aspects of news media attention during the 2007 invisible primary. First, the role of the news media as the "great mentioner" was considered by analyzing how often candidates' names were mentioned in news coverage...Second, a more specific analysis will be provided of the four candidates presenting a potential first to U.S. presidential politics-Hillary Rodham Clinton, Barack Obama, Bill Richardson, and Mitt Romney-and the news coverage each received during the invisible primary."

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  Public Leadership in the Political Arena

  Lori Cox Han

  "In this chapter, I address the concept of leadership and the Important role that it now in the process at all levels and in various branches of I offer a definition of leadership and the various political that encompass this of governing. The vast scholarly literature that has developed in recent decades on the topic of presidential communications offers an excellent assessment of the contemporary importance of public leadership. I a brief overview of public strategies and how they have evolved over time (particularly in concurrence with technological advances in mass as well as relevant examples' that help us to understand the of public leadership. Finally, I conclude with an assessment of how public leadership specifically has shaped the overall definition of political and how that contributes to the dynamic of the current political environment within American government."

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  The President Over the Public: The Plebiscitary Presidency at Center Stage

  Lori Cox Han

  "In this chapter, I will address the question of the usefulness of the public presidency in the current political environment (that is, can a president’s communication strategy make a difference in terms of what he achieves), as well as the constitutional danger, if any, posed by a president’s attempt at public leadership. Has the public presidency, and its focus on the public aspects of the office, thrown the constitutional balance of power between the three branches out of balance? Does the president really gain political power within the constitutional framework of our government if he is a skilled and effective communicator? Or have we just been duped into thinking that an image of strong presidential leadership on our television screens equates success in the arenas of domestic and foreign policymaking? Finally, I offer a brief assessment of Bill Clinton and George W. Bush and their respective efforts at public leadership, and argue that our definition of what constitutes a “good communicator” may be permanently altered due to Bush’s reelection in 2004."

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  The Rose Garden Strategy Revisited: How Presidents Use Public Activities

  Lori Cox Han

  "The overall goal of this study was to determine how often, and in which formats, presidents choose to go public, and if differences exist in that pattern during their reelection efforts. This chapter also considers the major developments within the public presidency during the twentieth century, and how those developments contributed to the patterns in public activities that have emerged for Presidents Hoover through Clinton."

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  Life After the White House: The Public Post-Presidency and the Development of Presidential Legacies

  Lori Cox Han and Matthew J. Krov

  "This chapter considers two distinct yet related issues: First, we examine the role that continuing press coverage of a former president plays in the development of a presidential legacy; and second, we consider the impact of Clinton’s lingering presence in the news media in the first year after he left office and how that has shaped the early phase of his legacy. While the historical rankings and public approval ratings of former presidents can and do shift—sometimes dramatically—in the years after leaving office, news coverage during the first year can be important in setting a tone as to how the president will be viewed and the public role that he will assume, as well as what news organizations view as significant from his time in office. A recent study on press coverage of former presidents Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush suggests that the amount of post-White House coverage decreases after the first year out of office; once both the press and the public are satisfied in knowing how the former president is adjusting to his new responsibilities, then he is no longer viewed as tremendously newsworthy. Therefore, the first year of coverage is important if the former president hopes to create positive coverage through his public activities by working 'toward the goals in which he believes in the hopes of drawing both media and public attention . . . [since] an ex-president with a rigorous agenda is bound to capture more media attention than one with a less rigorous postpresidential schedule.'"