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That’s a good start to understanding LBJ, but also falls short just by dint of its brevity. To really understand him you’d also have to delve into his own lowly
by travmatt 9y ago
That’s a good start to understanding LBJ, but also falls short just by dint of its brevity. To really understand him you’d also have to delve into his own lowly birth and social shame, his time as a school teacher, and much more. If you’re really interested I’d recommend Caro’s first book on LBJ, he really captured the context and character of Johnson in his early years.
- ArialAnemone 9y agoCaro's first book on him is excellent and I'm ashamed to say I haven't continued beyond that. Inefficient time scheduling and all that. It's eye opening to see how far and calculating climbing the ladder of power can be and the multiple forces that can swirl in a man like LBJ to motivate him to his means, towards that end. As for the actual effect of his policy... Social apocalypse in the (non-professional) black community. Talking about "feral blacks" is half crude racism and half honest everyday empiricism. Churn the males into free prison labor and subsidize the creation of more prison labor bodies by subsidizing single motherhood and overall dysgenics. It's a cluster you can't talk honestly about in this sort of political climate. Tribal feelings take over global facts, so to speak. And of course you have the weird effect of technology masking what would normally be complete squalor. When I was homeless, my online persona was the same as when I was housed. The type of boredom, that churns into action, was slaked by following the everyday tunnel of links and bits of random information. A king of all but bounded within a smartphone, so to speak.