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troperville

Johnson, a Texan by birth (unlike George W. Bush), after a brief time as a teacher, was elected to Congress in 1937. In World War II, he asked for a combat assignment, but didn't really see much action. He did try to improve conditions for US soldiers.

On his second attempt he was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1948. He became Senate Majority Leader and was chosen as John F. Kennedy's running mate in 1960, after earlier trying to stop JFK's nomination, in an attempt to balance the unpopularity that the more liberal New Englander Kennedy inspired in the Democratic Party's largely conservative Southern base. Johnson is widely regarded as one of the more effective Senate Majority Leaders in recent history, in no small part due to his propensity for unapologetically bullying other Senators. He was also one of only three senators from the former Confederate States (the other two being Estes Kefauver and Albert Gore, Sr., both of Tennessee) not to sign the high-profile, pro-segregation Southern Manifesto in 1956. However, whether this was due to principle, politics (he was known to already be eyeing the White House), his role in the Senate's leadership, or some combination thereof is unclear.

Johnson became Vice President and might well have been forgotten by history, had the events of November 22, 1963 not intervened.

The death of Kennedy meant Johnson became President, being sworn in on Air Force One, with a Roman Catholic missal as no Bible was available.

Here's where it gets rocky for Landslide Lyndon.

The good was his role in the Civil Rights Laws of the 1960s, playing a bigger role than Kennedy did (as a teacher from Texas, he had seen the impact of segregation). This ended legally sanctioned racism and also altered the U.S. political landscape, effectively removing Southern whites from the New Deal coalition that had dominated U.S. politics since 1932, and adding most of the African Americans who hadn't voted for the Democrats in the last three decades^note. This was part of Johnson's broader ideal of "The Great Society." He also amended Social Security to create Medicare for the elderly and Medicaid for the poor; he set up the Department of Housing and Urban Development; much of the work to land on the Moon was done while he was in office, though the project completed a few months into Richard Nixon's term; massively expanded federal money for education; and ended the system of racial quotas in immigration established in the 1920s.

He was elected to his only full term in a landslide in 1964, with help from the infamous "Daisy Girl

" ad, which painted his Republican opponent, Arizona senator Barry Goldwater, as a warmongering extremist who might well start World War III. Johnson won 44 states ^note and 61.1% of the popular vote, breaking America's 28-year-old record ^note.

He is notable as the only U.S. President to attempt to end national poverty, and poverty was indeed drastically reduced during his term. The economy was also in great shape during his presidency, with unemployment getting as low as 3.4% when he left office. To compare, the lowest it has ever been since was near the end of Bill Clinton's second term when it was briefly at 3.8%.

The bad was the Vietnam War, along with the persistent atmosphere of political corruption that surrounded Johnson, including accusations of voter fraud, bribery, and selling government secrets. Critics claimed that his support for Civil Rights was belied by his Senatorial votes against anti-lynching legislation, and that his poverty programs were nothing but cynical ploys to buy votes with handouts. Lyndon's administration carried over JFK's adoption of the "Whiz Kids", a group of RAND Corporation game theorists who were responsible for mind-bendingly complex flow charts and kill quotas. The massive bureaucracies LBJ put in place to administer his grandiose social projects proved to be riddled with waste and inefficiency. His increasing unpopularity, along with his ill health, ultimately led to his decision not to run for re-election in 1968. It appears that the actual independent effect of the war was not the only cause for his low ratings—with his perceived mishandling of domestic issues causing additional public distrust.

On January 22, 1973, Johnson, 64 years old, died of his third heart attack, two days after he would have finished a second full term, only four weeks after another well-respected former Democratic senator who later became Vice President and President died from pneumonia.

Johnson was a colorful figure, whose rough-edged Texan demeanor contrasted strongly with Kennedy's elegant image. One incident had him exposing his appendicitis scar to the public; in another he picked up his pet beagle by the ears, assuring the onlookers, "He lahks it!" He had odd eating habits, eating quickly and, if someone near him hasn't finished eating yet, taking their food to eat, as if it was nothing out of the ordinary. Perhaps his oddest habit was conducting meetings on the toilet (Perhaps one of the best nonsexual examples of Coitus Uninterruptus). Satirical portrayals in media usually focused on playing up his Texan-ness to a comical degree.

And here

, he orders pants.

Lyndon Johnson provides examples of these tropes in media:

Alliterative Family: His children all had the initials LBJ — and his wife was nicknamed "Lady Bird" Johnson.
A Real Man Is a Killer: Anyone wanting his political favor had to go out to his Texas ranch and kill animals (so called "hunting") that were driven toward them as they sat in a blind.
Boisterous Bruiser
Bunny-Ears Lawyer: The 'toliet seat meetings' come to mind...
Cluster F-Bomb: Dropped as many cluster F bombs on the Oval Office as he dropped cluster real bombs on the 'Nam.
Et Tu, Brute?: "If I've lost Cronkite, I've lost Middle America!" Check and mate.
Everything Is Big In Texas: A boisterous, raw, quirky and proud Texan who was easily the tallest man in any room.
Gag Penis: LBJ's party piece was pulling out what he nicknamed "Jumbo", not least when he was giving his famous toilet-seat interviews; by all accounts, Johnson's Johnson lived up to its name.
Ironic Echo: Goldwater chose "In your heart, you know he's right" as his audacious campaign slogan. Johnson's camp had their rejoinder prepared: "In your guts, you know he's nuts." (They also had backups: "In your heart, you know he's too far right" and "In your heart, you know he might.")
- Their other cunnin' electoral tactic was to book tiny sign space under the huge "In your heart, you know he's right" signs to put a little placard, in the same colours and font, saying "Yes. Extreme right."
Ironic Nickname: "Landslide Lyndon" was originally meant to mock Johnson's first election to the Senate, which he won very narrowly. It became less so in 1964.
Kavorka Man
Made of Iron: He was legendarily tough: it took him several hours to realize he was experiencing his first heart attack.
My New Gift Is Lame: He made headlines when he gave the Pope a bust of himself. A bust of Lyndon Johnson.
No Sense of Personal Space: "The Johnson Treatment" was less about not having a sense of personal space and more about deliberately invading other people's to influence them. The fact that he stood six feet and four inches definitely helped.
Riddle for the Ages: The nomination of Kennedy over Johnson is a confusing business, and an air of mystery still looms over the fateful decision to make him Kennedy's VP. The one thing everybody agrees upon is that a preexisting blood feud existed between Johnson and Jack Kennedy's younger brother Bobby, which made cordial relations with the family impossible.
The Scapegoat: Johnson is commonly seen as the President that got America into the Vietnam War. (So much for JFK's pledge to "bear any burden".) Part of the reason he left office was due to angry crowds of protesters outside the White House accusing him of murdering their children.
Screw The Advice, I'm Doing What's Right: Johnson and his wife marched in JFK's funeral procession despite being told not to by the Secret Service and the FBI, in fear of a second assassination. He was later paraphrased as saying he "could do, should do, would do, and did" march in the procession.
Sensitive Guy and Manly Man: With his Vice President Hubert Humphrey. Johnson was a boisterous, domineering loudmouth who enjoyed hunting and speeding along his ranch in a pickup truck. Humphrey was a gabby, yet sensitive man who was prone to tearing up. He also let Johnson dominate him during the extant of their working relationship.
- Johnson once took Humphrey hunting and told him to shoot a deer. Humphrey nearly broke down in tears over it. LBJ didn't give it a second thought.
Slobs Versus Snobs: LBJ never ceased to loathe the Kennedy family, who (to be fair) hated him in kind.
Theme Initials: He was apparently a bit obsessed over his initials (Hey, it worked for Roosevelt and Kennedy, amirite?): he had LBJ on his wristcuffs, gave out pens with LBJ on them during his trips to other countries, his wife was nicknamed Lady Bird Johnson (real name Claudia, and that nickname actually predated LBJ; He proposed to her on the day they first met), named his children Lynda Bird and Luci Baines Johnson (his first daughter was born 10 years after his marriage), and his pet beagle's name was Little Beagle Johnson.
Vindicated by History: Yes and no. Loathed at the time of his presidency because of the Vietnam War, viewed more favorably by scholars in hindsight for his domestic program, and they often place him in the Top 15 for his domestic successes. The public, however, still remembers him more for the Vietnam War, and his approval rating is only above Richard Nixon and George W. Bush as far as modern Presidents go.

Johnson in fiction:

Unsurprisingly, Oliver Stone's JFK paints him as a supervillain who rubber-stamps the Vietnam War in order to get elected. The plot relies on the so-called "Wise Men", fourteen unofficial 'advisors' from the World Bank and other organizations who oversaw the war from start to finish, as the real leaders; Johnson is just a Puppet King in the movie.
Metal Gear Solid 3 opens with a tense conversation between Johnson and Premier Khrushchev. The latter is preparing to be overthrown by Brezhnev and is no mood to cut deals. Johnson bestows the code name "Big Boss" unto the hero in the ending sequence.
In Forrest Gump the title character moons Johnson.
- Unintentionally. In the book, Gump and Johnson were sharing the stories of their respective surgical scars — Johnson from gallbladder surgery, Gump from being "wounded in the buttocks." A photographer just happened to walk by at the inopportune moment, and spun the story.
A lot of other works set in the Vietnam era, such as Across The Universe, usually mention him in a big protest scene.
An unnamed Johnson is seen from behind, petting his beagle, in Batman: The Movie, as he announces the fate of the representatives of the United World Organization.
In Seinfeld, when asked if an (apparently very ugly) infant more resembles the mother or the father, Kramer replies "Lyndon Johnson."
- In "The Outing", the characters argue who was the ugliest world leader of all time. George suggests Johnson.
- Also, in one episode, George misses his boss' instructions because George failed to follow him into the restroom where he continued to talk, unaware that George hadn't followed him. Jerry says: "He pulled a Lyndon Johnson on you," adding that apparently an entire Vietnamese bombing campaign was planned as Johnson recovered from some bad Chinese food.
In King of the Hill, Buck Strickland is physically based on Johnson, and shares many of his more unflattering traits.
- Hank hero-worships both of them; among the presidents, only his appreciation for Ronald Reagan rivals that of LBJ.
  - In addition, Hank's prize bloodhound Ladybird is named after Claudia "Lady Bird" Johnson, the President's wife.
During the Kennedy administration, Vaughn Meader recorded a comedy album entitled The First Family. Johnson appears in only one sketch:
Johnson: Ah'd like to say somethin', if Ah might!
JFK: Must you, Lyndon?
In The Right Stuff, Donald Moffat gives a compelling portrayal of LBJ. "You know what the Russians want?"
In the film version of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, Ponty is seen leaning in to the White House windows to say, "Good morning, Mr. President!" to an LBJ lookalike.
Dino Spumoni "caught his ear" in an episode of Hey Arnold, a possible reference to a controversial incident in which Johnson was photographed picking up his dog, Little Beagle Johnson, by his ears.
Appears in the Mary Shelleys Frankenhole episode "LBJFK", asking the good doctor to put his brain in JFK's more appealing body.
Never seen or heard in The President's Analyst, but it's him. A self-described 'typical American' proclaims that he's a liberal in the same tradition as the President: "You know — we're for civil rights!" In a location shot outside the White House gate we see his beagles being walked.
We Were Soldiers references Johnson's administration obliquely; Johnson comes off as something of an Obstructive Bureaucrat. This appears to be more or less what Joe Galloway, the co-author of the original book, really thought of Johnson.
In HBO's The Path To War he is portrayed by Michael Gambon as a tragic hero whose noble and compasionate domestic goals end up destroyed by the Vietnam War.