Were Dem's wrong with LBJ?

[zipplewrath]

I was asked to post this as an OP. It originally came up in another thread.

The question is, was the democratic party wrong to have abandoned LBJ in '68?

Basically what happened was that he lost the confidence of the democratic party (which admittedly was just coming out of a very long period of reformation). He had lied his way through the '64 election and then ran up the war in Vietnam despite running against such concepts. There was some concern that the whole "Gulf of Tonkin" affair was a sham. And going into the '68 elections, he was basically committing to a continuation of the war well into his second term.

Along came Robert Kennedy and prepared to challenge LBJ in the primaries. LBJ quickly saw that he might very well lose the primary, and so he bowed out of the race altogether.

So, were the democrats wrong to abandon a sitting president? Should party support and renominate an incumbent president pretty much regardless of what he actually does?

Prior to making assertions about the rise of Nixon, do realize that Kennedy was assasinated in June of the election year and really threw the party into chaos. The sitting VP, who could only distance himself so far from LBJ, became the nominee. We don't know if Kennedy could have won the general election.

[AllentownJake]

1. Who knew Bobby Kennedy was going to get shot in California? nt.

[NJmaverick]

2. I guess to answer that we have to look at what Richard Nixon did

and then speculate what Johnson would have done instead.

[Frances]

3. Eugene McCarthy challenged Johnson BEFORE

Robert Kennedy. Young people cut their hair and replaced their hippy clothes with shirts and ties to knock on doors for McCarthy. It was called "coming clean for Gene."

I was torn between Robert Kennedy and McCarthy after Kennedy entered the race. My guess is that the young people on DU today would have been for McCarthy because he spoke up so early.

I don't know if Kennedy could have won the election.

After the horrible Democratic convention in Chicago, I didn't want to vote for Humphrey. But then I visited my home state of Alabama and saw how popular Wallace was. I realized that Nixon and Wallace were so much worse than Humprhey that I did vote for Humphrey.

[JohnnyLib2]

4. I was very active in those days and don't think so.

The draft, the deaths, and the distrust of government crested at that time. I've always thought that LBJ correctly "read the tea leaves."

Still voted for Humphrey, though, based on his long record and capability.

[ShortnFiery]

5. We need to return to a healthy "distrust of government." We have the same people in the Pentagon

as we did during the last Administration's rule, i.e., Gates, Petraeus and McCrystal to name but a few.

[Hangingon]

6. I think LBJ lost the whole country not just the party.