Anyone familiar with Robert Caro’s devastating biography of LBJ, Means of Ascent, knows that Johnson was filled with the hates and prejudices, some real, some imagined, that never left him throughout his life. All of what Caro, a Pulitzer Prize winner of the biography of Robert Moses, wrote about Johnson’s hubris and ability to seek revenge were never refuted by Johnson’s supporters. Instead, Caro was chided by that group for allowing publication while LBJ’s wife and children were still alive. One wonders if such latitude would have been granted to Richard M. Nixon.
But if Johnson could feel some sympathy toward the poor Mexicans in southern Texas, he was no fan of the black residents of that area. He was less than adulatory toward the behavior and actions of Rev. King, something I know from an event that happened more than forty years ago.
During my first assignment overseas to a South American country, I paid the customary visit to various heads of section, including the Legal Attaché, who is normally an FBI Agent. Over the next few weeks, our conversational topics expanded, and during one discussion of the rioting that had taken place in the U.S., he brought up the subject of Rev. King. Let it be said that few people, myself included, at that time knew of King’s philandering and the plagiarism of his doctoral dissertation. The Legal Attaché spoke at some length that when Johnson wanted to be amused, “he would play the tapes of telephone conversations,” obtained by the FBI, between King and the women he frequented. And LBJ’s choice of words to describe King’s political involvement were less than complimentary, too.
The irony here is that the “Great Society” of Johnson, who clearly despised King, set in motion not only the placing of the monstrosity that now regales all visitors to our nation’s dysfunctional capital: the enormous statue of King, whose features remind me of those of Pharaoh, but also the affirmative action hoax that have weakened our nation’s educational institutions, and, in some definite way, the election of Obama.
Anonymous
January 20, 2014 10:42 am
“I’ve found this great deal on a cottage up in the Poconos. It’s like a scene out of a Robert Frost poem.”
Stucky
January 20, 2014 10:59 am
“Martin, if I had a son, he’d look just like you. Hey, you want some Skittles?”
Stucky
January 20, 2014 11:05 am
LBJ: “That white woman you raped in Selma just gave birth to your child.”
MLK: “Fuck. What did dat ho name him?”
LBJ: “Barack.”
Nonanonymous
January 20, 2014 11:26 am
Notice the power politics at play? LBJ’s chair is higher than MLK’s. Coincidence? You decide!
Joe Rocket
January 20, 2014 11:37 am
Hell, I don’t care if you plagiarized your dissertation- I can hardly even read, myself!
card802
January 20, 2014 11:50 am
“You’re doing Gods work, Martin, and to show our appreciation we’ve booked you a room at your next stop in Memphis, yeah, room 306, it has a nice balcony and everything….”
Keith Snyder
January 20, 2014 7:59 pm
Caption? Now that’s gonna be tough in light of the possibility that LBJ was involved in MLK’s murder.
Just sayin’
What year is the photo?
card802 I think has a good one.
Keith Snyder
January 20, 2014 8:04 pm
Oh and one more thing. Everyone seems to focus on the MLK philandering. Well LBJ is rumored to have died screwing HIS mistress.
And as for the publication of an LBJ bio while his wife was still around-she deserved any possible pain it may have brought her. The woman was a horrid, racist, cretin. And that’s being generous.
DaveL
January 20, 2014 8:46 pm
“Martin, I don’t have forty acres and a fucking mule for all your people. How about perpetual food stamps?”
gilberts
January 20, 2014 11:48 pm
“So it works like this-you give up all this peachy self-righteous stuff-that’s what we do, anyway-and we’ll keep blacks unemployed, but grant them all sorts of free stuff as long as they will nurture grievances and resentment and threaten white people all the time, keeping the white people too scared of them to ever oppose us and too busy working hard to avoid EVER having to live with them. Pretty cool, huh? And, in return we’ll build a statue of you in China and name at least 1 street in every ghetto after you and some dead guy named Euclid”
Seriously-why are the 2 worst streets in every ghetto MLK and Euclid?
chrsub8rt
January 21, 2014 4:44 am
You’re gonna have me killed aren’t you? Son, it’s nothin personal now. All this talk of dreams of peace, love and togetherness is starting to affect people and its making my bosses nervous that you might threaten the war machine somehow. I will promise you this though, we’ll make it quick, do it on a beautiful morning, and blame some dupe cracker for the crime.
You gotta offer a prize, or nobody will participate.
LBJ: okay, here’s how it works. I give your people free money, free housing, free healthcare, free food and you vote for democrats. We got a deal?
“I’ve found this great deal on a cottage up in the Poconos. It’s like a scene out of Robert Frost poem.”
How about we get a case of Ripple and have our way with that fine bitch Jackie O.
I already took out JFK when he got out of line. So, don’t mess with me BOY, or you’re next.
Vincent Chiarello writes:
Anyone familiar with Robert Caro’s devastating biography of LBJ, Means of Ascent, knows that Johnson was filled with the hates and prejudices, some real, some imagined, that never left him throughout his life. All of what Caro, a Pulitzer Prize winner of the biography of Robert Moses, wrote about Johnson’s hubris and ability to seek revenge were never refuted by Johnson’s supporters. Instead, Caro was chided by that group for allowing publication while LBJ’s wife and children were still alive. One wonders if such latitude would have been granted to Richard M. Nixon.
But if Johnson could feel some sympathy toward the poor Mexicans in southern Texas, he was no fan of the black residents of that area. He was less than adulatory toward the behavior and actions of Rev. King, something I know from an event that happened more than forty years ago.
During my first assignment overseas to a South American country, I paid the customary visit to various heads of section, including the Legal Attaché, who is normally an FBI Agent. Over the next few weeks, our conversational topics expanded, and during one discussion of the rioting that had taken place in the U.S., he brought up the subject of Rev. King. Let it be said that few people, myself included, at that time knew of King’s philandering and the plagiarism of his doctoral dissertation. The Legal Attaché spoke at some length that when Johnson wanted to be amused, “he would play the tapes of telephone conversations,” obtained by the FBI, between King and the women he frequented. And LBJ’s choice of words to describe King’s political involvement were less than complimentary, too.
The irony here is that the “Great Society” of Johnson, who clearly despised King, set in motion not only the placing of the monstrosity that now regales all visitors to our nation’s dysfunctional capital: the enormous statue of King, whose features remind me of those of Pharaoh, but also the affirmative action hoax that have weakened our nation’s educational institutions, and, in some definite way, the election of Obama.
“I’ve found this great deal on a cottage up in the Poconos. It’s like a scene out of a Robert Frost poem.”
“Martin, if I had a son, he’d look just like you. Hey, you want some Skittles?”
LBJ: “That white woman you raped in Selma just gave birth to your child.”
MLK: “Fuck. What did dat ho name him?”
LBJ: “Barack.”
Notice the power politics at play? LBJ’s chair is higher than MLK’s. Coincidence? You decide!
Hell, I don’t care if you plagiarized your dissertation- I can hardly even read, myself!
“You’re doing Gods work, Martin, and to show our appreciation we’ve booked you a room at your next stop in Memphis, yeah, room 306, it has a nice balcony and everything….”
Caption? Now that’s gonna be tough in light of the possibility that LBJ was involved in MLK’s murder.
Just sayin’
What year is the photo?
card802 I think has a good one.
Oh and one more thing. Everyone seems to focus on the MLK philandering. Well LBJ is rumored to have died screwing HIS mistress.
And as for the publication of an LBJ bio while his wife was still around-she deserved any possible pain it may have brought her. The woman was a horrid, racist, cretin. And that’s being generous.
“Martin, I don’t have forty acres and a fucking mule for all your people. How about perpetual food stamps?”
“So it works like this-you give up all this peachy self-righteous stuff-that’s what we do, anyway-and we’ll keep blacks unemployed, but grant them all sorts of free stuff as long as they will nurture grievances and resentment and threaten white people all the time, keeping the white people too scared of them to ever oppose us and too busy working hard to avoid EVER having to live with them. Pretty cool, huh? And, in return we’ll build a statue of you in China and name at least 1 street in every ghetto after you and some dead guy named Euclid”
Seriously-why are the 2 worst streets in every ghetto MLK and Euclid?
You’re gonna have me killed aren’t you? Son, it’s nothin personal now. All this talk of dreams of peace, love and togetherness is starting to affect people and its making my bosses nervous that you might threaten the war machine somehow. I will promise you this though, we’ll make it quick, do it on a beautiful morning, and blame some dupe cracker for the crime.