Johnson took over when JFK
was assassinated, promising to continue in the line JFK had drawn. While this
wasn't necessarily Unger's favorite idea, the issue was that Johnson didn't do
this. In fact, Unger doesn't seem to think that Johnson really did much of what
he told the public he was going to do at all.
According to Unger,
Johnson was big on "saving face". If he didn't think the public would
support him in a decision, he lied to them about what he was going to do, and
went right along with whatever it was.
Most prominently, Johnson
lied about his intent to escalate American presence in Vietnam. He found that
as long as he was not telling the truth, the people supported him, and he was
able to conveniently by-pass congress.
Lies and lack of
transparency in the government's actions made the whole democracy deal a little
bit sticky. With the people generally clueless/misinformed about what was
actually going on in Vietnam, and the President acting outside of Congress'
control, no one was there to check the power of the president.
No comments:
Post a Comment