For Lawrence O’Donnell, host of MSNBC’s The Last Word, the 1968 U.S. Presidential election was his political awakening, and it has remained one of his abiding fascinations. Today he talks about the war that sunk LBJ’s presidency and the wild election that followed including the indignities suffered by Senator Senator Eugene McCarthy, how the assassination of Bobby Kennedy threw the Democratic primary into chaos, and the impossible political position of the eventual Democratic nominee Humbert Humphrey. He analyzes the strategy behind the unlikely political comeback of Richard Nixon, the disturbingly familiar tone of the racist George Wallace campaign, and how 1968 has set the stage for every presidential election to follow.
Order Playing with Fire: The 1968 Election and the Transformation of American Politics on Amazon or download the audio version on Audible. Watch The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell every week night at 10PM Eastern on MSNBC, and follow him on twitter at @Lawrence. Today’s episode is sponsored by Grasshopper and Credible.com. Please subscribe to Kickass News on iTunes and take our listener survey at www.podcastlistener.com/KICK.
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