“Hey, hey, LBJ! How many kids did you kill today?” became a standard refrain at rallies against “Lyndon Johnson’s war” in Vietnam. The term “credibility gap,” if not the dissembling that led to it, originated with Johnson’s presidency. The Democratic Party seemed bound for permanent majority status after a landslide victory in 1964, but the polarization that stained Johnson’s last year in office spilled over into riots at its 1968 convention. Yet early in his sudden presidency, as he comforted a grieving nation and orchestrated the passage of historic measures to extend civil rights and battle poverty, Johnson appeared a good bet to have his likeness carved on Mount Rushmore.
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