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‘Selma’ distorts the truth about LBJ
Washington Post ^ | January 5, 2015 | By Richard Cohen

Posted on 01/06/2015 9:41:34 AM PST by Brad from Tennessee

Before I came to dislike the movie “Selma,” I was deeply moved by it. Twice it brought me to tears. A crane shot of Martin Luther King Jr. leading thousands of demonstrators over the Edmund Pettus Bridge was one such moment, and so was the vicious attack on John Lewis — bravely, steadfastly walking into the beating he knew was coming. Today, Lewis is a member of Congress. Forever, he’ll be an American hero.

Too bad, though, that the movie had to go Hollywood on Lyndon Baines Johnson, who, as if from the grave, has bellowed his protest. In its need for some dramatic tension, “Selma” asserts that King had to persuade and pressure a recalcitrant Johnson to introduce the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The movie also depicts Johnson authorizing FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover to smear King and — as King himself suspected — try to drive him to suicide. It is a profoundly ugly moment.

But a bevy of historians say it never happened. It was Robert F. Kennedy, the former attorney general, who authorized the FBI’s bugging of King’s hotel rooms. Yet, for understandable reasons, Kennedy appears nowhere in the film. By 1965, he was no longer the AG and, anyway, he remains a liberal icon. But LBJ — Southern, obscene and, especially when compared to the lithe Kennedy, gross of speech and physique — was made the heavy. He should get a posthumous SAG card. . . .

(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...


TOPICS: Editorial
KEYWORDS: blacks; civilrights; hollywood; hoover; jedgarhoover; johnson; kennedy; lbj; libmyths; mlkjr; moviereview; rfk; selma
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To: Brad from Tennessee

Why did LBJ refuse to run for a second term? Think about it. LBJ was ruthless. The hippies frightened him out of running? Hardly. Something big kept him from running again.


21 posted on 01/06/2015 10:03:33 AM PST by blueunicorn6 ("A crack shot and a good dancer")
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To: Salamander

LOL! Perfect! Actually it should say “I was deliberately murdered”.


22 posted on 01/06/2015 10:04:53 AM PST by GrandJediMasterYoda (Obama: 7 acts of blatant treason and counting.)
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To: Brad from Tennessee

I remember LBJ well. He was a lowlife dirt bag.


23 posted on 01/06/2015 10:06:16 AM PST by windsorknot
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To: Brad from Tennessee

IMHO, Johnson was complicit in JFK’s assassination.


24 posted on 01/06/2015 10:06:19 AM PST by Dr. Thorne ("Don't be afraid. Just believe." - Mark 5:36)
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To: Borges
I am saying that Shakespeare might be great literature, but if whomever wrote it was intentionally inaccurate it doesn't qualify as historical. In earlier movies, I'd still expect them to be as accurate as possible, or not qualify as an historical dramatization of the era.

History texts are so messed up with modern interpretations. I would hope that novels, movies, TV etc that pass themselves off as based on history do their best to get it right.

25 posted on 01/06/2015 10:06:30 AM PST by grania
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To: NorthMountain

So lets put you in the place of the average black guy in Selma in 1965. You aren’t allowed to vote, or even register to vote. You just take it?


26 posted on 01/06/2015 10:07:45 AM PST by bigdaddy45
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To: Brad from Tennessee
"...the movie’s director, Ava DuVernay, responded not with a detailed rebuttal but with a brushoff of a tweet: “Bottom line is folks should interrogate history. Don’t take my word for it or LBJ rep’s word for it. Let it come alive for yourself.”

Isn't this the liberal approach? I'll tell you some lies and codify it as a movie and you can find out for yourself what the truth really is. Of course it will be too late to matter.

27 posted on 01/06/2015 10:08:36 AM PST by Portcall24
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To: bigdaddy45

Yes, the celebration of the start of Western collapse.


28 posted on 01/06/2015 10:10:08 AM PST by AEMILIUS PAULUS (It is a shame that when these people give a riot)
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To: cripplecreek

Yes he is.


29 posted on 01/06/2015 10:12:11 AM PST by jospehm20
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To: dangus

I was going to say that the truth isn’t all that great, either.

LBJ was no hero. He started the final act of the destruction of the black family and he laid the groundwork for generations of welfare dependents and he also laid the groundwork for the legalization of abortion - which long ago had killed more black people than Hitler had killed Jews.


30 posted on 01/06/2015 10:12:56 AM PST by MeganC (It took Democrats four hours to deport Elian Gonzalez)
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To: grania

Dramatists and historians use different tools. The goals and methods are different. The criteria are different. If you want history then read a history book or watch a documentary.


31 posted on 01/06/2015 10:13:00 AM PST by Borges
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To: Responsibility2nd
“While I give the Kenyan credit for skyrocketing high into 2nd place (and in fact he may well take that # 1 spot), he is still not as bad as LBJ.”

Now let's not get too hasty. You've left out the peanut farmer idiot entirely. And let's not forget that we have slick willy to thank for the prostitution of the social securities disabilities benefit and the subterfuge of the actual cost of welfare.

Really, picking a worst president is quite a challenge - although you can be certain he will be a democrap.

32 posted on 01/06/2015 10:13:11 AM PST by I cannot think of a name
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To: Snickering Hound

Actually, driving his car into the water shows he could at least work with Ted Kennedy.


33 posted on 01/06/2015 10:13:52 AM PST by MeganC (It took Democrats four hours to deport Elian Gonzalez)
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To: Borges

No one takes Shakespeare’s “History” plays as serious history. Alexandre Dumas’ butchery of history was well known. Nobody ever claimed he was writing history, either. As for the use of cultural anachronism, it may seem artsy to pretentious morons, but to most people it’s just annoying.


34 posted on 01/06/2015 10:14:10 AM PST by FredZarguna (O, Reason not the need.)
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To: AEMILIUS PAULUS

So people walking peacefully across a bridge to obtain the right to vote (among other things) was the start of Western collapse? Or was it the Alabama State Police beating the crap out these same people? Which was it? Do enlighten me.


35 posted on 01/06/2015 10:14:56 AM PST by bigdaddy45
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To: GrandJediMasterYoda
Gee, anyone get the feeling that racial tensions in this country are being deliberately stoked?

As a matter of fact I do.

36 posted on 01/06/2015 10:15:01 AM PST by Slyfox (To put on the mind of George Washington read ALL of Deuteronomy 28, then read his Farewell Address)
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To: GrandJediMasterYoda

;]


37 posted on 01/06/2015 10:15:32 AM PST by Salamander (No more nights of blood and fire..)
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To: blueunicorn6

I think LBJ declined to run again because the Peaceniks shifted the blame to him for continuing the war in Vietnam. So at that point he had lost the left as well as the right, and was pretty much unelectable. Presumably he did his own polling and decided it was hopeless.


38 posted on 01/06/2015 10:16:02 AM PST by Cicero (Marcus Tullius)
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To: dangus
You can’t possibly ever depict Johnson as evil enough. The first truly demonic American president.


39 posted on 01/06/2015 10:16:10 AM PST by Iron Munro (Conservative Epitaph: Don't Cry For Me , You Still Have Two More Years Of Obama)
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To: MeganC
He could at least work with like Ted Kennedy

Fixed that for ya. :)

40 posted on 01/06/2015 10:17:08 AM PST by Salamander (No more nights of blood and fire..)
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