Tearing Apart the Great Society

 

Who else remembers Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society? I was 8 when President Johnson was sworn in after President Kennedy was assassinated. I was 13 when Johnson decided not to run for re-election. Although he accomplished a great deal, he was most connected to the Viet Nam war.

After JFK was assassinated, Johnson was determined to carry out programs Kennedy had wanted to get off the ground. In 1964, Johnson announced the beginning of The Great Society. New and revolutionary programs need creative names, like The New Deal during FDR’s administration.

Johnson had a lot of experience and power. He’d been the Senate Majority leader before becoming JFK’s Vice President. He knew how to negotiate with or strong-arm opponents into voting for sweeping social reforms.

I was busy being a little kid and then an insecure teenager during the Great Society. I didn’t really become aware of what was going on in the country until Rev. Martin Luther King and then Senator Bobby Kennedy were both gunned down and assassinated.

Here is what was created or passed during the Great Society:

Civil Rights Act

Voting Rights Act

Job Corps (as part of the War on Poverty)

Affirmative Action

Medicare/Medicaid

Head Start

Elementary/Secondary Education Act

Housing and Urban Development Act

National Endowment for the Humanities/Arts

Water Quality Act

Consumer Product Safety Commission

Child Safety Act

Immigration & Naturalization Act

I’m sure I haven’t listed all of Johnson’s accomplishments. He was a better President than he gets credit for because of his ability to get so much done.

The Great Society was meant to make lives better for people, especially those marginalized or living in poverty. Of course, Republicans hated it.

By the time Johnson left office and Nixon was voted in, I had begun following the news more closely. However, I didn’t see that, behind the scenes, Nixon and his party began working to tear the Great Society down. Nixon found favor with Judge William Lewis Powell.

Why?

Powell was irritated with activist Ralph Nader. I totally remember Nader. He was the activist lawyer that labored for consumer protection rights. He went after the auto industry’s poor safety record. I remember news stories focusing on his exposure of the Ford Pinto’s danger issues. Nader was instrumental in the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act passed in 1966.

Powell saw Nader’s successes and the formation of Nader’s Raiders to fight consumer safety issues with other corporations as a dangerous path to (gasp!) socialism. So, Powell wrote a memo. I have read articles that Powell’s memo is a blueprint for conservatives to infiltrate political offices, local, state, and federal with people who would work to take down Great Society social reforms. Ultimately, the strategy would be to place conservatives on the Supreme Court which could sway and undo all of these acts and programs.

It was to be a long game. It would take years to accomplish.

The Powell memo went from the Dept of Commerce to President Nixon’s desk. Nixon was most favorably impressed. He nominated William Lewis Powell to the Supreme Court in 1971, not too long after Powell had written that memo.  That was a bare blip registering with me that fall of my junior year in high school, but it was the beginning of the long game to upend democracy in favor of some kind of conservative right-wing rule.

Now fast forward 40-50 years. We have an ultra-right-wing corrupt majority on the Supreme Court. The Civil Rights Act of 1965 was eviscerated, making it harder AGAIN for people of color to vote. The Court has made decisions to weaken the Water Quality Act in favor of corporations.

Most recently, the court overturned affirmative action in college admissions. That’s probably going to lead to the same thing when it comes to employment.

The Court and Rethuglicans in Congress are bound and determined to gut any and all of the programs that would benefit “regular” people—people like you and me. Cases in point: forced changes to the SNAP (food stamps) and WIC programs that would make it more difficult for low-income people to feed themselves and their children.  Think of it: Rethuglicans are okay with hungry children.

We know that Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid are the number one targets of the thugs in power. They are waiting breathlessly for the first opportunity to do make seniors and the disabled suffer more than they already do.

Democracy hangs on by a thread.

President Biden is making headway trying to reverse the Rethuglican machinations of the last 40-50 years. Sadly, he gets little credit and continues to suffer a low approval rate.

Thanks to President Biden’s efforts to rebuild the middle class, unemployment has gone down, new jobs are being created every month, and the economy is better. We haven’t gone into a period of inflation. I don’t understand why half the country has a poor opinion of Biden.

Helpful accomplishments:

Lower the cost of prescriptions, especially for Medicare/Medicaid recipients.

Inflation Reduction Act, a broad program that addresses climate change, credits, and incentives for companies to develop energy-saving products, financing for homeowners to switch to more environmentally friendly sources of heating/air conditioning/electricity, infrastructure (repairing roads & bridges)

Gun safety—doesn’t go far enough but it’s a start. It does provide funding for mental health.

An attempt to cancel the horrendous student debt. I call it an attempt because, of course, the conservatives are yelling and screaming and challenging it in courts. I believe it’s a case before the Supreme Court now.

The CHIPS Act will encourage growth in American companies.

American Rescue Act, which provided stimulus checks to everyone suffering from the covid pandemic and quarantine. It also provided funds to help stimulate the economy, and it worked.

Veterans from the wars in Afghanistan and Iran suffered side effects from the burn pits. Rethuglicans didn’t care to help with the vets’ health issues resulting from the burn pits. The PACT Act helps vets get the care they need.

When SCOTUS overturned Roe v. Wade, other fundamental rights could be endangered. So, President Biden signed the Respect for Marriage Act into law. It protects same-sex and interracial marriages, which was a possible next target.

Bidenomics: a total rejection of Reaganomics (the trickle-down strategy that only benefits corporations. Nothing ever trickles down to the people who need it)

These are just a few of what President Biden has managed to get done in spite of strong opposition from the Rethuglicans. Biden negotiates for what he wants and has been successful. Yet, he is denigrated and put down because of his age, never mind the fact that Congress and 2024 presidential candidates are close in age.

President Biden is trying to uphold the vision of the Great Society.

Why does half the country think it puts us in the wrong direction? These are people who would benefit from these programs. They vote against their own best interests, supporting greedy and criminal white men who are interested only in giving tax cuts to the rich. I just don’t get it.

Do we want to go down the road of fascism and suppression, where the 1% live in luxury and the middle class continues to disintegrate? Or do we want to save the Great Society? I think we Democrats need to become a lot more vocal and drown out Rethuglican noise. And we need to vote, vote, vote.