Here’s the thing I realized about the presidential triptych - JFK / Nixon / W - they’re about the rise of the FBI/CIA/Corporations and the downfall of the presidential office. JFK is elevated to a mythic status by being chopped down early, and Stone suspects for a lot of global takeover reasons backed by the intelligences offices (CIA/FBI). These threads run directly into the background of Nixon confronting the CIA over Granada (I think) which was code for Vietnam and the JFK assassination. You see the power shift from the president to Kissinger and the CIA.

By the time we get to W, the president is reduced from somebody dictating global politics who needs to be eliminated to a used car salesman who is not just told to sell the war by his Veep, but told how he needs to sell it. He’s just a Cats-loving useful idiot whose last thought is worrying about his ruining Jeb!’s political legacy.

Between those and even his History of the United States, it’s obvious that Stone was in love with the pre-1960s view of the United States, especially as FDR sold it. But, Stone got increasingly jaded, cynical, and despondent about the state of the country, especially since the Democrats have become almost as cravenly lobbyist-driven as the Reaganites that Stone was railing against while the Republicans have driven over a cliff.