Robert Caro (via azspot)
Josh's blog
Posts tagged Lyndon B. Johnson
“ Abraham Lincoln struck off the chains of black Americans … but it was Lyndon Johnson who led them into voting booths, closed democracy’s sacred curtain behind them, placed their hands upon the lever that gave them a hold on their own destiny, made them, at last and forever, a true part of American political life. ”
- MR. REYNOLDS:
- Mr. President, in the ghetto, I think they say that is just talk, white man's talk. What is your reaction to that?
- THE PRESIDENT:
- You know what my reaction to it is.
- MR. REYNOLDS:
- Isn't there this sense of despair, this growing estrangement between white and nonwhite?
- THE PRESIDENT:
- What is your answer to it, Frank?
- MR. REYNOLDS:
- Well, I would hope that-I don't know that my answer is necessarily the one, sir, that we want.
- THE PRESIDENT:
- What is your answer, though, Frank?
- MR. REYNOLDS:
- My answer is that it is not talk, and that there will be an attempt made. But can it come in time? I am thinking of these young--
- THE PRESIDENT:
- If not, what? What is your solution? What do you recommend?
- MR. REYNOLDS:
- What do you think you should do, sir?
- THE PRESIDENT:
- You are not going to answer it now? You are not going to give us your recommendations or your thoughts?
- MR. REYNOLDS:
- My recommendation is to get going as fast as we possibly can on all the programs that you have just mentioned.
- THE PRESIDENT:
- That is what we are doing. We accept your recommendation and we will carry it out.
“ [America] is the uncrossed desert and the unclimbed ridge. It is the star that is not reached and the harvest sleeping in the unplowed ground. ”
— Lyndon B. Johnson
“ I want you literally to kiss his fanny from one end of Washington to the other. ”
— JFK to Kenneth O’Donnell, on LBJ
(Source: The New York Times)
“ I now know the difference between a caucus and a cactus… In a cactus all the pricks are on the outside. ”
— Lyndon Johnson
(Source: The New York Times)
“ I never think about politics more than 18 hours a day. ”
— Lyndon Johnson
(Source: The New York Times)
“ Throughout his life Johnson had demonstrated a compensatory grandiosity that spawned legends. In one of them, German Chancellor Ludwig Erhard asked Johnson whether he had been born in a log cabin. “No, no, no,” LBJ answered, “you’re confusing me with Abe Lincoln. I was born in a manger. ”
— Robert Dallek
(Source: The New York Times)
