The book I am reading now is An Unfinished Love Story, by Doris Kearns Goodwin. She must be one of my favorite authors and this is her latest book. It is a ‘personal history of the 1960s’ in the USA, based on her own experiences and particularly those of her husband Dick Goodwin, who was a speechwriter and confidant to JFK, LBJ and RFK.
I am progressing toward the end of the book and there is a chapter describing the pressures on President Lyndon Johnson about the Vietnam war. Johnson accomplished a great deal toward his domestic agenda, The Great Society, but got his panties in a bunch about the war. He kept doubling down on the war, sending more and more troops, in the face of mounting protests back home in USA. Eventually, his trusted confidant Dick Goodwin came out publicly against the war, as did Bobby Kennedy and many others. Johnson was running for re-election in the midst of this and Goodwin was working with McCarthy and Kennedy to defeat his former mentor and friend LBJ for the Democratic nomination.
On March 31, 1968 Johnson made a stunning speech. He announced that he was preparing to end the war and withdraw troops…and had decided not to seek another term as President. President Johnson withdrew his nomination.
Doris Kearns Goodwin said that “Johnson had done something extraordinary by putting the country above his own ambitions.”
I read this line today, just days after President Joe Biden had withdrawn his candidacy for a second term and couldn’t help but think that Doris must be considering writing the same thing…that Joe put his country above his own ambitions.
I – like many – applaud what Joe Biden did and believe he is not just a decent man, but was a good president. He did the right thing by withdrawing, however, and I feel hope now for the first time. Can Kamala Harris win and keep that first class asshole and his proposed Vice-asshole out of the White House? I sure hope so.
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