Astral Codex Ten

Vietnam War

4 min read

Vietnam War

Article

Vietnam War is a recurring concept in the Astral Codex Ten archive, appearing 3 times across 3 issues between May 07, 2021 and June 23, 2023. The archive places it in contexts such as “consider how LBJ lied about the Vietnam War”; “avoids commenting on the Vietnam War or the civil rights movement”; “The Vietnam War and the Civil Rights Movement”. It most often appears alongside LBJ, Robert Caro, civil rights movement.

Metadata

  • Category: Concepts
  • Mention count: 3
  • Issue count: 3
  • First seen: May 07, 2021
  • Last seen: June 23, 2023

Appears In

Source Context

Recovered passages from the original issue text. When the raw archive preserved outbound links inside the source passage, they are listed directly under the quote.

Your Book Review: The Years Of Lyndon Johnson
May 07, 2021 · Original source
I could speculate about diffuse, inchoate things. But let's get specific. Suppose LBJ is found frozen in the Arctic ice, is brought back to life (à la Captain America), and runs for president again. (He only was elected once before, so the 22nd Amendment would not prevent him.) Would you vote for him? If you think of LBJ fighting for civil rights, he seems like a second Lincoln. If you consider how LBJ lied about the Vietnam War, he makes Nixon look trustworthy.
Your Book Review: The Outlier
July 08, 2022 · Original source
In 1970 Carter runs for governor again. This time, however, he decides to do whatever it takes to win. He runs a sleazy campaign that flies in the face of his modern-day reputation as kindly and honest. His campaign strategy has two core planks: 1) pretend to be a racist to appeal to the masses, and 2) avoid taking a stand on any other issue. Carter describes himself nonsensically as a “conservative progressive” and avoids commenting on the Vietnam War or the civil rights movement. He’s so good at pretending to be racist that the white supremacist White Citizens Council endorses him. He even wins the endorsement of his old opponent, outgoing Governor Maddox, who’s term-limited from running again. As far as anyone can tell, Carter never expresses any second thoughts about his disingenuous behavior during the campaign. Having passed through his spiritual crisis, he’s now guided by an unshakeable faith in his own goodness—a faith that justifies a victory by any means necessary.
Your Book Review: Public Citizens
June 23, 2023 · Original source
Nader and his employees were pretty much all liberals. But they were a different kind of liberal than the ones who created the New Deal. The Vietnam War and the Civil Rights Movement (and, later, Watergate) had caused them to lose faith in government, and they were distrustful of so-called “experts” and of centralized power in general11. This distrust was why they operated through their own independent organizations, rather than by running for office or working with existing groups like the labor movement. Many of them were followers of the radical organizer Saul Alinsky, who emphasized an explanation for leadership failures that focused on structural issues, not individual choices. “Through experience,” he wrote, “you learn to see people not as sellouts and betrayers. [Morality is] largely a rationalization of the point you happen to occupy in the power pattern at a given time.”
Inline links: 11