Johnson WH Tape: J. Edgar Hoover explains to LBJ how you can spot a homosexual

[WI_DEM]

Beschloss writes that Hoover believed, based on a report from liberal columnist Drew Pearson, that the Republicans were about to drop a "bombshell" on a Johnson administration official on Oct. 31, a bit of intelligence that he had passed along to Johnson. On the morning of Oct. 31, Johnson telephoned Hoover for new gossip, and the conversation ambled toward a Navy employee. Again, all punctuation in the original.) Beschloss writes in a note that Johnson was having fun at Hoover's expense: "LBJ knew full well the rumors that Hoover was a secret homosexual."


LBJ: … They raised the question of the way he combed his hair and the way he did something else, but they had no act of his. …

Hoover: It's just … that his mannerisms … were suspicious.

LBJ: Yeah, he worked for me for four or five years, but he wasn't even suspicious to me. I guess you are going to have to teach me something about this stuff. … I swear I can't recognize them. I don't know anything about them.

Hoover: It's a thing that you can't tell sometimes. Just like in the case of the poor fellow Jenkins. … There are some people who walk kind of funny. That you might kind of think a little bit off or maybe queer. But there was no indication of that in the Jenkins case.

(Again, all punctuation in the original.) Beschloss writes in a note that Johnson was having fun at Hoover's expense: "LBJ knew full well the rumors that Hoover was a secret homosexual."

http://www.slate.com/id/2211923/pagenum/2