imagined, being planned, was over and over very, very tragically. the democratic nominee becomes hubert humphrey. i proudly accept the nomination of our party. the republican nominee becomes richard nixon. it s time for new leadership of the united states of america. 68 was the year from hell. the whole country was in an uproar. there was a constant chaos. president johnson still harbored hope of getting peace in vietnam. he was even probably a little more optimistic in august than he was in march. the north vietnamese surprised the white house by saying, let s get together. let s talk. they have started efforts of peace talks in paris, the so-called paris peace talks. lbj believed he would win the
martin luther king. 1968, historians say it was the single most consequential year of the 20th century. that s when the country all but came apart. ten hours before he is about to address the nation on the future, he hasn t made the decision. he said i may have a little ending of my own. good evening, my fellow americans. lbj is becoming more and more isolated. he s an island in the white house. hey, hey, lbj, how many kids did you kill today? if the american public isn t supporting, you cannot succeed. i thought we were winning. cold hard facts. we donal have control. he could no longer do the thing he is best at. getting legislation through
that same age. he could feel it. president johnson was in his bed at the ranch. he had some severe pains. he reached over, grabbed a phone and called the head of the secret service. before those agents could reach him, the coronary killed him. mrs. johnson s words were tom, dent make it. lbj feared dying alone. and perhaps it was fate that lbj died alone in his bedroom on the afternoon of january 22nd, 1973. and just as he foretold, he died at the age of 64.
war. nixon was doing whatever it took to be elected. lbj wanted to do whatever he could do to end the war. by the time we left office, there was not a single piece of information that tied this directly to president nixon. it was only in very recent years when the bob halderman notes were disclosed out of the nixon library that it was directly ordered by nixon. that was the smoking gun. in the final analysis, we actually had a better deal going at that time than we did when we pulled out of vietnam in 75. and in that time frame, the lives lost was about 25,000.
warning. i think johnson s decision was one of the results of a new hampshire primary. lyndon johnson was not a quitter. i think he had counted his votes and he didn t see it as a winning proposition. a substantial amount of the support for the war in vietnam had diminished. there are many who saw lbj s opting not to run again as quitting on the war in vietnam. lbj believed that by making this tacit gesture, ho chi minh would agree to come to the peace table. he really thought that he could resolve the war and settle the war in vietnam if he didn t run. he said nobody can say that what i m doing is political. i m doing it because i want to settle that war. i want to get the boys home. and the other factor was still his health issues. he had a phrase that i bet i