Speaking as part of a panel about presidential books during Sunday’s Face the Nation, author Doris Kearns Goodwin couldn’t help but devote a few moments of her time to heaping praise on the “ambitious” man who she first worked for in politics in then-President Lyndon B. Johnson from the 1960's.
Kearns Goodwin interjected during the panel’s conversation to first remark that most of the men and women who seek the Oval Office are “all ambitious when they run for president, but is their ambition doubled” because it should be asked whether or not they want to see through “something that will stand the test of time” for the benefit of “the people.”
Of course, the person she was specifically thinking about when she made this statement was Johnson:
I think about the risks that Lyndon Johnson took when he became President after Kennedy died, he made priority to have that civil rights bill that would end segregation in the south pass. If he had failed in that, his whole presidency would have failed, he would have never been elected in November.
Touting him for enacting the various pieces of legislation that “he knew he was going to undo the South for a generation for the Republican Party,” the famous liberal author proclaimed that “he took that risk and then once that ambition was fulfilled,” he wanted to move onto other topics that including voting rights, affirmative action, and fair housing.
Attempting to take a step back from exclusively hyping her former boss (and an indirect plug of her book on him), she concluded: “When you feel that as a president, if you're really able to use that power to do something important, then you become a different person.”
The relevant portion of the transcript from CBS’s Face the Nation on November 29 can be found below.
CBS’s Face the Nation
November 29, 2015
11:16 a.m. Eastern
DORIS KEARNS GOODWIN: You know, I think one thing I'd like to add. I think what they're looking for, they're all ambitious when they run for president, but is their ambition doubled? Is it for the people and accomplishing something that will stand the test of time? When I think about the risks that Lyndon Johnson took when he became President after Kennedy died, he made priority to have that civil rights bill that would end segregation in the south pass. If he had failed in that, his whole presidency would have failed, he would have never been elected in November. Even succeeding he knew he was going to undo the South for a generation for the Republican Party, but he took that risk and then once that ambition was fulfilled, then he wanted to go for voting rights, then he wanted to go for affirmative action, then he wanted to go for fair housing. When you feel that as a president, if you're really able to use that power to do something important, then you become a different person.
