The Sullying of a Good Man. [View all]

[Godot51]

The Sullying of a Good Man.

I’ve never had any love for LBJ. And the more I’ve learned about him since his presidency and since his death has made me doubt him even more. His foreign policy, as well as the basic foreign policy of the United States after WWII until today, was a disaster.

I’m not one of those JFK worshippers who believes that, if Kennedy hadn’t been assassinated, all would have been well in the world. It is possible he would have handled Vietnam better but likely not. His generation saw too much evil in “communism”.

The decision of Johnson to not run in the 1968 election was possibly the first step on the way to fascism in America, to where we are today. It was only a bit of luck that Nixon was brought down before he tried to ensure a permanent republican legacy for future elections.

Whether Nixon was insane or not, perhaps anyone who actually wants to be president after having already lost is insane, does not matter. The matter is that he saw power as an end of itself and we were very close to his dream.

In my opinion LBJ would have defeated Nixon in ’68. It may have been close but there were still enough “southern” democrats who would have voted for Johnson, there were the many Blacks who had good reason to support Johnson and his landslide of ’64 was a thing.

Hubert Humphrey was another thing. He was seen, by the south, as a little too liberal. He was seen by anti-war protesters as a little too close to Johnson. He was seen by many “moderates” as a little too wishy-washy and undecided.

Humphrey wasn’t a good campaigner, and Johnson was a good campaigner. Johnson was at his best when speaking to the people in his Foghorn Leghorn accent. He had a certain, odd charisma that neither Humphrey nor Nixon had. They were basic papier-mâché men.

And, as was shown a few years later, Edmund Muskie was very unpopular. Vice presidential choices are really case by case (Agnew? Palin? Quayle?) but can have either positive or negative returns. He was too liberal for the era.

I find the Joe Biden debacle disheartening to the extreme. How much is his responsibility and how much is the attitude of the times is unknowable. In general, unless he had resigned for his candidacy long before winning his primaries, it was too late.

I have nothing against Kamala Harris. It is possible that if Biden had turned the election over to her as the primaries began it would have shown his trust in her and been a better thing but I was only all for her either in 2028 or if Biden was incapacitated.

Americans today have no patience. They need, want, must have, will have, desire everything immediately right now. Looking at History, would the United States have survived many of its crisis’ if today’s people had been those choosing basic policies?

The Revolution took years, the War of 1812 was a complete screw-up. the War with Mexico was a lie (an awful lot of wars begin as lies), the Civil War cost hundreds of thousands of lives and uncounted wounded, damaged and maimed. The Depression? WWII?

Who today could have waited for these events to resolve themselves? Washington would have been fired. Lincoln would have been impeached. Roosevelt would have been voted out of office after his first, failure of a term.

And what did Joe Biden do? He lead us out of the trump inspired, conservative nightmare that is still waiting. A few rich men are still waiting to take over America, socially, economically, culturally and politically. They always know what is the best for “us”.

Was Joe perfect? Anyone who looks for perfection is a fool, a liar or a pretender. And, sadly, America is full of these people. Most of them are white, most of them are men, most of them have little or no power and are willing to give everything up to an illusion.

Am I a fool, yes. I expect people to act rationally. I expect people to learn. I expect people to know themselves. I expect people to study, not skim, over History, society and humanity. I expect people to give up on obvious failures, such as war, religion, prejudice and hate.

Someday, in a future unknown, people will study Joe Biden and wonder at the forces against him. They will look at the current crisis and believe that if only this or that had happened all would be right in the world. This is a common excuse and lie.

Biden will be blamed for his resigning, his inability to resign quicker, his belief that his good work was not completed. I hope he has a long and fruitful life but many such sullied men die soon after. Johnson did, Nixon hung on forever so we’ll have to see.

The media today are overjoyed at their perceived power. They are probably even angry at Joe for not giving up earlier. They’ll probably continue their basic trump ignoring until the day the police shut those down who don’t publish the lies.

The media will soon abandon any pretense of supporting Kamala Harris. They will find every little fault, defect and misstatement and, if they don’t, they’ll make them up. Hillary Clinton needs to advise the Harris campaign from afar from day one.

The same dumb incel/redneck/white-rights fools will vote against Harris. Her race, her color, her sex and her background will disgust and determine her fate with this large voting block of America. Can the Black, Hispanic, a few white women and the LGBT society win?

Today, I’m an angry old man. My health is questionable. my heart is questionable, my faith in even people I once trusted is questionable. I am not resigned but I am unsure. I am afraid. I am unable to trust those on either side at all.