From Publishers Weekly
Califano, Lyndon Johnson's chief domestic adviser during the last three and a half years of his presidency, was perhaps closer to him on a daily basis than anyone else throughout that embattled period: "I watched him laugh, swear, get angry, cry, get hurt, hurt others, dream, and achieve things most everyone thought impossible." The man who stalks boisterously and often boorishly through these pages was ever the consummate politician, even as the Vietnam war shackled his dreams of the Great Society and sapped his political will. Appalled and shaken by the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy in 1968, Johnson, the author shows, nonetheless found a way to exploit both tragedies for his own good as well as for the country's. "Brave and brutal, compassionate and cruel, incredibly intelligent and infuriatingly insensitive," he was a chief executive who, as the author amply demonstrates, changed the country more than most realize. Califano, who went on to become secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, has written an intimate, balanced and basically sympathetic portrait of the 36th president.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Library Journal
Califano, President Johnson's special assistant for domestic affairs from 1965 to 1969, remembers Johnson as a driven, obsessive, yet compassionate leader, similarly described in Robert Dallek's authoritative Lone Star Rising ( LJ 6/15/91). A dedicated and loyal Great Society foot soldier, Califano emphasizes the legislative actions and policy implications of Johnson's programs. Lacking Robert Caro's graceful style and his excessive emphasis on Johnson's ambition ( Means of Ascent , LJ 4/15/91), Califano's memoirs successfully recount the workings of an expansive, caring, yet quixotic government and the actions of a president who tried and cared. Especially noteworthy are Califano's descriptions of Johnson's fateful decision to pursue simultaneously the Vietnam War and the Great Society; Johnson's anguish over the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy, his long-time political nemesis; and the emergence of the credibility gap. An important book for most libraries.
- Karl Helicher, Upper Merion Twp . Lib., King of Prussia, Pa.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
- Karl Helicher, Upper Merion Twp . Lib., King of Prussia, Pa.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
