[AGL] Eat the rich!

[Michael Eisenstadt]

Another trick (Henry Holman told me this one), was as a
congressman during WW II, he arranged that his building
company got the only allocation of building materials
right after the war. The other builders couldnt get any
material. Henry Holman was a Union carpenter and
so knew about it.

His greatest good deed was to force the Civil Rights bill
through congress. Kennedy couldnt do it, didnt have
the chips to call in whereas as Senate majority leader
he knew where every skeleton was and how deep it was
buried.

Mike

Subject: Re: [AGL] !Re: LBJ and Walter....



> Mike,

> There is a book called "A Texan Looks at Lyndon" by an old conservative

SOB

> named J. Evetts Haley (I think I remember). In the book he tells the story

> of how the Johnson family got the Austin radio station, the cornerstone of

> their empire.

>

> Lady Bird's father was wealthy. But after his first wife died he remarried

> and had another family. His first family was not high on the list in his

> will. Lady Bird went to him and asked for her inheritance at a time when

> they (Johnsons) needed cash to swing a deal for the station. They loaned

the

> owner of the station, who was broke and desperate at the time, some $30K

> (her inheritance), to get him by until the FCC approved the sale of the

> station (for around $100K) to a waiting buyer. Collateral on the loan was

> the station. But Lyndon had connections at the FCC and made sure that the

> sale never took place. Finally the owner went belly-up and they

foreclosed,

> taking the station. The FCC rapidly approved the takeover and they were in

> the radio business. Caro confirms much of this story but not all.  Haley

was

> such a hater that he might have exaggerated parts of the story.

>

> When TV was in its infancy they had another scam. The licenses were being

> awarded to radio stations in each market. Often there were several radio

> stations filing for the local license which had to be approved by the FCC.

> The Johnson gang would side with one of the stations in exchange for a

> partnership agreement. The FCC would award the license to the station that

> had taken in the Johnsons (Texas Broadcasting) as partners. And so it

went.

> I watched this happen in Waco where the license was awarded to a

relatively

> new station over the old established station. They ended up with a piece

of

> many stations in areas that grew into large markets.

>

> Don't know how they got the FCC connection but they certainly parlayed it

> into a fortune. They had a similar connection with the Navy which led to

> contracts for Brown and Root (Lyndon's campaign financers for many years)

> like the Corpus Christi naval base. Brown and Root's initial fortune was

> made constructing federal dams on Texas rivers, deals which he helped them

> attain. Some say that the Viet Nam war was ramped up to obtain major

> construction contracts for B&R, like Cam Ranh Bay (a billion dollar deal).

>

> But, you know, Lyndon had a coterie of loyal supporters who would have

died

> for him, gladly, had nothing to do with money. I met some of them in

Austin.

> He could do no wrong in their eyes. He did bring electricity to the Hill

> Country in the 1940's, and all kinds of incentives for depression era

> farmers which saved their asses (while he was Kleberg's secretary). But

his

> reward for these acts was power, he knew how to accumulate it and

ultimately

> when to cash it in.

> G