Robert Rosen

In the course of working on my latest book, about Observation Post, a radical student newspaper at City College in the 1970s, I needed to get permission to quote a poem that ran in a post–election day issue in 1972. That was the election in which Richard Nixon defeated antiwar candidate George McGovern in a landslide, carrying 49 out of 50 states. The despair among those who wanted to see an end to the endless slaughter in Southeast Asia was palpable.

The poem, "S.O.P." (Standard Operating Procedure), is from an anthology, Winning Hearts and Minds: War Poems by Vietnam Veterans, and as I say in my book, it communicated "the obscenity of what four more years of Nixon means." I reached out to the poet, Larry Rottmann, having no idea if, after 53 years, he was still alive.

Rottmann is alive and living in Springfield, Missouri, and he gave me permission to quote his poem in full. He also reminded me that tomorrow, April 30, is the 50th anniversary of the day Saigon, the capital of South Vietnam, was captured by North Vietnamese troops, marking the end of a war that began in 1955.

Rottmann and other Vietnam veterans will be commemorating the anniversary, April 30 and May 1, at the State Historical Society of Missouri, in Columbia. The event will feature the screening of a documentary, Voices From Vietnam, written, narrated, and produced by Rottmann, and a live presentation, A Different Vietnam War, by Rottmann and the other vets.

For more information about the Fall of Saigon 50th Anniversary: "Voices From Vietnam," please click here).

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On May Day, as the majority of Americans wallow in the misery of Donald Trump, I've returned to the 1970s to explore some of that old-time misery. In the book I'm working on, Nixon is president; Agnew is vice president; teenagers are being drafted out of high school and sent to Vietnam to die for the greater glory of Nixon-Agnew; and people in Berkeley, like the Red Star Singers, are writing and recording songs like "Pig Nixon."

I came upon a reference to "Pig Nixon" in the January 24, 1974, issue of Observation Post (OP), the radical/pornographic student newspaper at the City College of New York that's the main setting for my work in progress. The title intrigued me and sure enough, more than 50 years later, there it was on YouTube. So I gave it a listen, and can only wonder why a song this catchy got no radio play that I'm aware of. Fortunately, OP's music critic knew about it.

Now we need a song about that other ex-president who continues to set new standards for piggishness. Everybody should sing it.

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All my books are available on Amazon, all other online bookstores, and at your local brick-and-mortar bookstore.

I invite you to join me on Facebook or follow me on X or my eternally embryonic Instagram or my recently launched Threads.