by Cliff Ball
Chapter 7
“Lyndon, I put you on the ticket so you can push my agenda regardless of whoever was President, and so far, you haven’t done that. All we’ve gotten at this point is a near nuclear war with the Soviets because of that buffoon who is the President, a stupid attempt at trying to oust Castro, along with him having a dalliance with that Hollywood whore. What do you plan on doing about it?” Gregory was annoyed with the Vice President of the United States, and had no problem telling him so.
“Jack is scheduled for a campaign trip to Texas in a few weeks, I’m sure I can think of something,”
“You think you can think of something? Don’t you have something more solid than that? You aren’t that dumb, Lyndon, because if you were, you wouldn’t have gotten this far. I thought you were ruthless with your opposition,”
“I am. Trust me, I have something in store for young Kennedy. He won’t know what hit him. My friends in Texas are looking forward to taking down that Yankee, so don’t worry about it, Mr. Evans,”
“Do not tell me what to do, Lyndon. You should worry about what I think, because you can be easily replaced in 1964 with someone more compliant. You seek power and I’m willing to give it, but remember that you’re on a short leash. Understood?”
“You’ve made your point as crystal clear as you can,”
“Good. When you’ve rid us of Kennedy and you’re in the top spot, we’ll begin work on my agenda. Anything else you need to tell me?”
“No, Mr. Evans.” Johnson meekly replied.
“Then we’re done here. Please step out of the limo so I can be on my way,” Johnson stepped out of the car and shut the door. The limo took off and Johnson walked back to his car to go back to D.C. to prepare for the day when he would be President.
A few weeks later, Kennedy’s motorcade traveled through Dealey Plaza in Dallas when shots rang out. The President was shot and killed in a matter of moments. Johnson was waiting at the airport, near Air Force One, to take the oath to become the next President of the United States. Gregory was annoyed with Johnson for being so obviously eager to take the oath, but he decided not to say anything because he didn’t think the media would mention Johnson’s whereabouts until he took the oath. Jackie Kennedy boarded the plane, Johnson took the oath, and made sure pictures would be taken of the grieving widow, to make it look like she approved of the new change in leadership. He stalled to take the Oath until the photographers finally showed up so they could see and record Johnson taking the Oath of Office to become the new President of the United States.
After Johnson won the 1964 election over Barry Goldwater, Gregory went to him and said, “You’re going to expand the role of government in people’s lives, take it further than Franklin Roosevelt ever took it,”
“How are we going to do this exactly?”
“You’ll declare a war on poverty, even though the poorest people in the United States are still much richer than the poorest people in Africa or India. You will create new government agencies, expand the role of the government in healthcare, education, voting rights, and put more people on welfare. You will also eventually introduce Civil Rights legislation that will bring more people into the Democrat Party, and you’ll also open the borders of the United States to everyone who wants to come, not just Western Europeans. It’ll dilute the influence of conservative, religious European ancestry Americans and this country will be easy for the government to control. I initiated the first steps of diluting Christian influence by having Madalyn Murray O’Hair get the Supreme Court to ban prayer in schools. We’ll do even more later on,”
“She was pretty effective at getting that ruling. Anyway, why would I introduce Civil Rights legislation? You know we Democrats prefer that blacks stay under our thumb, don’t you? Can’t let them get too uppity,”
“Oh, they’ll continue to stay under your thumbs, especially if you give them and poor whites welfare, federal government sponsored education, and introduce a completely different culture into the United States that will encourage the reliance on government. They’ll run away from the Republicans as fast as they can. With what I’m proposing, the government will control who votes and who doesn’t, or even how often, since they’ll be on the government dole. In twenty or so years, enough of those people will be programmed to think the Republicans and the religious types are the ones keeping them down. They’ll be low-information and no-information voters who don’t know anything. The government should control the schools and what young minds should know. None of them should be taught enough to give them the idea they should care about what goes on in my domain. They should be given reasons to vote for your party. Promise them a free lunch. They won’t know any better. Progressives will write the history any way we want. In forty years or so, the United States as a conservative, religious nation will cease to exist as it is known and the Progressives will be in complete control,”
“That sounds like what we’ve been trying to do for the past sixty years, ever since Teddy Roosevelt got it into his noggin’ that government was the solution to everything. Ever since, we’ve been obstructed in our goals by one world event after another. Now, speaking of Civil Rights, what are we going to do about that King character, he’s getting way too influential for my taste and he would resist all of what you want me to do,”
“Don’t worry about him, I’ll take care of him when the time comes. Even though the Republicans have always been the party of equal opportunity and equal rights, you will take that role for yourselves. They want people thinking, voting, and doing everything for themselves. That needs to stop and I’m sure you don’t want that to happen either. Anyway, I’ll have my people bring you the speech I want you to say during the State of the Union and we’ll go from there. History will see you as sympathetic to the plight of the poor and a great reformer. Any questions?”
“What should I do about Congress if they complain about all of this government spending?”
“That’s all taken care of. Congress is filled with men I have bought for specifically this purpose; they’ll do whatever you want and vote for whatever you and I want,”
“A great majority of Americans are going to resist you know. They’ll resist all of this government spending and putting people on the government dole. What do I do about that?” Johnson asked, worriedly.
“If you begin to have a backlash, I propose you expand the involvement in Vietnam, and have the Department of Defense draft a lot of young men whose families lean anti-government or are religious in nature. Of course, you’ll also get young men who are part of the establishment, which I’ll use later on to bring about more control over the American people. I’ll get my people to whip anti-authority types into a frenzy, have them accuse returning soldiers of being baby killers, or I’ll get them to cause riots, and maybe a couple of them will terrorize parts of the United States. That will give you the distraction you need to get our agenda passed. No one, not even future Republicans, will attempt to take it out of the books as the law of the land. Are you on board?”
“You bet your bottom dollar I am. I look forward to informing Congress and the Nation about what I plan on doing. This should be interesting times.”
“Of that, I have no doubt.” responded Gregory with a large, menacing smile on his face.
The next four years were interesting and violent times in the United States. Lyndon Johnson began his term by declaring his Great Society during the State of the Union. Wanting to instigate more race problems and problems between the various sects of the Civil Rights Movement, Gregory paid some members of Nation of Islam to assassinate Malcolm X. Gregory even attempted to control the unrest by making the Alabama marches, led by Martin Luther King, Jr., spiral out of control by sending in State Troopers to mistreat the black protestors’. Of course, that gave the state a black eye. The Watts Riot in Los Angeles wasn’t instigated by Gregory or his associates, but it helped give Gregory ideas of what he could possibly do to cause other similar incidents to happen acros
s the United States.
Johnson also signed an immigration bill abolishing quotas based on national origins, which Gregory hoped would start the process of bringing the United States to its knees.
The war in Vietnam intensified, and the Soviets then demanded that the United States leave the area, while Johnson decided to start micro-managing the war.
Gregory told the professors he owned to begin to teach against the United States being involved in Vietnam. When the indoctrination took effect, students started protesting, began to treat returning soldiers roughly, and Gregory even convinced a couple of them to denounce their involvement in the war and throw away their medals.
After this tumultuous four years, Lyndon Johnson decided he wouldn’t seek a second term as President of the United States, which disappointed Gregory. Meanwhile, Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. were thorns in Gregory’s side, so he had both of them assassinated. Unfortunately, Richard Nixon ended up being elected President in 1968, and Gregory decided that he would look into creating ways of fixing American elections in the future.
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