LBJ was an excellent movie because they only presented the first half of Johnson’s legacy…the civil rights legislation.
Woody Harrelson played a great Johnson, which would be so hard to perfect because he was one of a kind. The story briefly covered Kennedy’s transition and presented Johnson’s early endorsement of Kennedy’s prior agenda…the fight for civil rights.
The movie provided an excellent insight into the strained relationship between the Kennedy camp and Johnson. My opinion has long been that the only person on the planet that could get the legislation passed by the Senate was Johnson because he had been the powerful majority leader of the Senate for many years and was able to call in many ‘IOUs’. Kennedy would likely never have succeeded.
Thankfully, the second half of the LBJ legacy, Vietnam, was omitted!
R.J. Meyer
