THREAD. For those interested in behind the scenes, organizing nuts and bolts of how the '60s voter registration drives in Mississippi and the anti-war and ‘Dump Johnson’ movements came together, this is essential viewing. +
activistvideoarchive.org/citizen-the-po…
activistvideoarchive.org/citizen-the-po…
Telling interviews with David Halberstam, Barney Frank, Ted Kennedy, Sam Brown, David Harris, Peter Yarrow, Rick Weidman and others. Al Lowenstein’s network (of which I was a minor part) was incomparable. +
What comes through is AL's willingness to attack entrenched interests, operating against all ‘consensus opinion’ without any real power base of his own. He was a ‘citizen activist’, goading others to get involved and showing them how (then leaving them to get on with it).+
Stunning recollections of a mid-60s mtg of 40 student body presidents with SoS Dean Rusk, in which Rusk rolls out the ‘domino theory’ of the Viet Nam War and warns that, if Russia and China persist in their aggression, the U.S. might go nuclear and “some people will get hurt.”
One sad aspect: a youthful, idealistic Greg Craig speaks at length about the work with SNCC on voter registration. The same Craig who was acquitted of charges related to his work at Skadden Arps for Paul Manafort and Viktor Yanukovych.
