In 1964, Democrat Lyndon Johnson won the presidency in a landslide victory; eight years later, Republican president Richard Nixon was reelected in an equally lopsided race. In his new book, Nixonland, historian Rick Perlstein looks at the chaotic years between those elections, a time marked by protests, social upheaval, assassinations and an unpopular war.

Perlstein is a senior fellow at the Campaign for America's Future, where he writes the blog The Big Con. He has written for The New Republic Online, Slate, the Village Voice, Newsday and The Nation.

Richard Nixon: Speeches, Writings, Documents, a Nixoniana collection compiled by Perlstein, will be published in September 2008.

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