From the wikipedia entry:

Helsinki’s effects inside the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, however, were equally unexpected, and far more significant. [...] it gradually became a manifesto of the dissident and liberal movement’… What this meant was that the people who lived under these systems - at least the more courageous - could claim official permission to say what they thought.”

Only the most diehard of the far right wanted Nixon to remain in office.

I don’t disagree with this. Heck, I remember it. What does this have to do with whether or not people wanted him prosecuted or pardoned (your main argument)? Once he was out of office most people were satisfied.

52% is still a majority

Actually, 50.1% is still a majority, which is what Carter got (one of the few Democrats to get over 50% of the vote in the last century– along with FDR and LBJ).

We poo poo Nixon but he was relected in a landslide. Carter,a first term incumbent, was defeated in a landslide.

You’re not going to get me arguing that Carter’s presidency was a good, much less great, one. But he got an electoral drubbing, much preferable to being shamed into resigning from office - a feat only Richard Nixon has been forced to do in our entire history.

Gerald Ford did not excel at the presidency. He kept the seat warm, barely. He was the 20th century version of the 19th century inconsequential presidents.

A. 52% is still a majority.
B. Ford did other stuff that outweighed some people’s desire to put Nixon in the slammer.

The streets

Then why would 48% of the country vote to keep Ford in office even though he kept Nixon “on the streets”? Are we back to OW’s “most diehard diehard conservatives” again?

The streets.

…Carter…four years of a disastrous Presidency. Jay

The endless Republican smearing of Carter continues despite the fact that Carter was a better president that Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Bush Bush.
Of course, when it comes to post-Presidential careers, Carter has been the best in the 20th and 21st centuries. Ford golfed; Reagan took a couple of mil from the Japanese and disappeared into his mental fog; Bush I went for the big bucks.
That smearing continues into Carter’s current book for daring to call the Israeli abuse of the Occupied Territories for what it is

Frankly at the time, most of America wanted him out, except for the most diehard diehard of Republican conservatives.

Carter won 50.1% to 48%. Are you trying to tell us that 48% of the country was made up of “the most diehard diehard conservatives”? Are you just making sh** up?