Qualifier: My father and both grandfathers were great admirers of Coke Stevenson and detested LBJ although they benefited from rural electrification to some degree.
I have recently read Caro's first two books on LBJ and am into the third. I am amazed at the quantity of research and how much he got some of those people to talk to him. I knew a few of them and about many more of them as I am 70 and have lived in Texas for all but two years in the service. It is obvious early in the first book that he dislikes Johnson and that he came to the job of writing his autobiography with a poor background for it. A brief glance at Caro's wikipedia bio explains that.
Disliking Johnson should not be a disqualification. The man's methods, the way he treated people close to him, his dishonest toadying to those above him, his total availability for both disguised and undisguised bribery, his demands for loyalty while giving loyalty only to his own wishes, and his total lack of honor preclude most from having warm feelings for him personally.
Writing positively about LBJ requires justifying the means by the ends, blaming it on his childhood, and/or retaliating with "everyone did it". I dislike all those requirements.
I am nowhere near as conservative as my ancestors, consider FDR to have been both necessary and a great president, consider JFK to have been a naive ineffectual blip in the presidential landscape, and give LBJ his due as a great political practicioner who was incredibly effective in achieving the ends he targeted - some which were highly admirable.
Many of the same things could be said about many despots.
Johnson was a despicable person and Caro accurately, completely, and with a mass of interviews and research captures that in his writing as far as I've read it.
As far as Vietnam, I never blamed it on Johnson. He didn't know squat about the military and relied on the military leaders who happened to be very poor at the time. He got them everything they asked for and they failed to accomplish what they said they could do in the time they said they could do it in. The American public has always had a short attention span for war, and they exceeded it.
Uva Uvam Vivendo Varia Fit
Sumus Tejas, Adios Aggies
I have recently read Caro's first two books on LBJ and am into the third. I am amazed at the quantity of research and how much he got some of those people to talk to him. I knew a few of them and about many more of them as I am 70 and have lived in Texas for all but two years in the service. It is obvious early in the first book that he dislikes Johnson and that he came to the job of writing his autobiography with a poor background for it. A brief glance at Caro's wikipedia bio explains that.
Disliking Johnson should not be a disqualification. The man's methods, the way he treated people close to him, his dishonest toadying to those above him, his total availability for both disguised and undisguised bribery, his demands for loyalty while giving loyalty only to his own wishes, and his total lack of honor preclude most from having warm feelings for him personally.
Writing positively about LBJ requires justifying the means by the ends, blaming it on his childhood, and/or retaliating with "everyone did it". I dislike all those requirements.
I am nowhere near as conservative as my ancestors, consider FDR to have been both necessary and a great president, consider JFK to have been a naive ineffectual blip in the presidential landscape, and give LBJ his due as a great political practicioner who was incredibly effective in achieving the ends he targeted - some which were highly admirable.
Many of the same things could be said about many despots.
Johnson was a despicable person and Caro accurately, completely, and with a mass of interviews and research captures that in his writing as far as I've read it.
As far as Vietnam, I never blamed it on Johnson. He didn't know squat about the military and relied on the military leaders who happened to be very poor at the time. He got them everything they asked for and they failed to accomplish what they said they could do in the time they said they could do it in. The American public has always had a short attention span for war, and they exceeded it.
Uva Uvam Vivendo Varia Fit
Sumus Tejas, Adios Aggies