His "conservatism" was more in the interest of taking liberal elites and social workers, while his "liberalism" was largely in the interest of getting ahead of and/or coercing liberal ideas so they couldn't campaign on them. His presidency, in retrospect, has few things policy-related that should appeal to either a liberal or a conservative, this in the political success, he contributed greatly to the rightward bent of the nation, though he can hardly be attributed with having triggered such a thing. Even discussing his personal views is a difficult task, as different aides and recordings will tell you different things. His racial policy is itself a strange phenomenon. He advanced agencies like the Office of Minority Business Enterprise, somehow became the "greatest school desegregator in history", and according to Buchanan and others had genuine concern for African-Americans, while at the same time scuttling busing, advancing various "tough on crime" tactics that would affect blacks, and is on record saying that he preferred abortion in the case of a mixed-race child. He as well signed legislation in 1974 that would be viewed favorably by proponents of "community-oriented policing". It's ironic, of course, that conservatives rebelled against Ford and not him, since Ford, while likely personally more liberal, presided over a more conservative economic approach and started rolling back detente under the guidance of Rumsfeld and Cheney, though one could reason that, regardless of who held office by 1976, conservatives would have attempted to oust him. It's as well ironic that a man who had been able to churn such vitriol and hatred from the left nevertheless almost won the presidency in 1960 and won a landslide in 1972. This irony is as well at the crux of Nixonism, pitting all sides against each other to win vast swaths of the middle and the right. Hell, in 1960, you could've stated, with history on your side, that Nixon was the candidate more favorable to civil rights. His presidency is a good example of the triumphs and failues of both ideologies on the American political scene. He was able to placate New Deal liberalism enough to not offend a good deal of its benficiaries, while also doing so in the name of a middle class conservatism. Someone to his right would have threatened the New Deal benefits that many Americans were attached to, someone to his left would have threatened the cultural sensibilities of middle America. He adopted several personas, and pursued policies to the detriment of each of them. The man who was endorsed by unions in his re-election nevertheless pursued free trade; the man who had friends in the business world and was backed by them signed into law the EPA and other environmental protections; the anti-communist who would protect you from the Soviets sought detente; the centrist who didn't threaten the status quo made himself the bedfellow of Dixiecrats and spoke to anti-war protesters at the Lincoln Memorial. My "conclusion" would be that he simply was a conservative interested in co-opting the liberal policies that were in vogue, while also taking up the mantle of the conservative rhetoric that was becoming popular. However, he goes well beyond a simple one-word or even one-sentence explanation. If you examined the presidencies of any other president after him, you might run into a similar debate, but the causes for question about their ideologies were exceptions. For Nixon, the contradictions were the rule.
Like I said, pragmatic genius.
Poll
