NYC_SKP has been banned

[calimary]

821. I'm an Eisenhower baby. I remember vague stuff about the Kennedys, mainly

the intangibles. We went from a Grandpa and Grandpa situation in the White House to a younger family that I could relate to MUCH more closely because the Kennedy kids were just a little younger than I was. First time I was aware of someone in the Presidency who was so much more relatable to me personally. Their mom looked like the moms I saw picking their kids up at school. Their dads looked like many of the dads who went to Father-Daughter night. And I liked how Mrs. Kennedy dressed. How pretty she was. Elegant, stylish, classy. I still remember when the nun disappeared from the classroom for awhile, not saying anything, and then coming back with an ashen look on her face, telling us not to scream, but that "President Kennedy is dead."

Then, the little kids moved out of the White House and an older couple took over, with two daughters who were older than I was (LBJ, Lady Bird, and Lynda Bird and Lucy. I do remember one distinct thing about that family just on a personal, visceral level. I noticed that they ALL had LBJ as their initials. Dad - Lyndon Baines Johnson. Mom - Lady Bird Johnson (she actually had a name in her own right, Claudia Alta Taylor "Lady Bird" Johnson, but she went along with the family theme). Big sis - Lynda Bird Johnson. Little sis - Lucy Baines Johnson. Liked Lady Bird because of her whimsical name, and because her pet cause as First Lady was "The Beautification of America." She was concerned by everything from gardens to the great out doors. Wanted to make every city, every highway, every public area prettier, lovelier, cleaner, more wisely managed. Even back then, I seem to have been drawn to that issue and that idea of wise and responsible custodianship of our planet. I liked that they had daughters - I could relate to them somewhat, like older sisters. Didn't start waking up about him for awhile. He unleashed all kinds of uproar, not only via Vietnam but also civil rights. I love the following historical nugget. I bet it's true. Hell, I've heard taped talk from him, emitting from his seat on the toilet!

&quot According to historian Robert) Caro, it was ultimately Johnson's ability to convince Republican leader Everett Dirksen to support the bill that amassed the necessary Republican votes to overcome the filibuster in March 1964; after 75 hours of debate, the bill passed the senate by a vote of 71–29.[89][90] Johnson signed the fortified Civil Rights Act of 1964 into law on July 2.[90] Legend has it that as he put down his pen Johnson told an aide, "We have lost the South for a generation", anticipating a coming backlash from Southern whites against Johnson's Democratic Party.[91]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyndon_B._Johnson

I find it really interesting, TBF, that so much of this recent American history is being brought back. The whole movement surrounding the Civil Rights Act, the anti-war movement (which dominated the 60s and early 70s). It's all being revisited, or at least glanced off like a stone skipping across the surface of the pond. And it grates on me when I hear (mainly) CONS and GOPers and their many apologists insist that revisiting the past is terrible, waste of time, makes no sense, wrong and wrongheaded, distracting, fill-in-the-blank-here. We HAVE TO know what led up to this. We HAVE TO know what caused or provoked or led to this. Whatever the "this" is. We HAVE to retrace our steps to try to get a handle on where it all started, how it all started, when it all started and what the timbre of the times was then. WE NEED TO KNOW THAT STUFF - if we're EVER to avoid making the same mistakes again. Man, I'm just really grokking what "those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it" thing is all about. You've GOT to look back, forage through the past, peel back the layers on the onion, do some digging (something lazy, shallow, and vain-as-hell journalism just doesn't want to bother its collective pretty head about doing anymore) to figure out HOW WE GOT HERE. And WHERE and WHY. Seems to me that's the only way to figure out how to address whatever problem it is.