It’s All Too Hazy

Sometimes only one word is needed to describe what effect a certain object or event has on a person, and for me that event is the visit to the LBJ museum and the word is confused. Don’t get me wrong. Confusion might bring a bad connotation with it most of the time, but this time I was very satisfied with the museum and what I saw in it. Yet, I could not form an opinion. Every time I was really close to forming my own viewpoint on what kind of president LBJ was, I would remember a specific scene from Fog of War.

Therefore, the whole time I was in the LBJ museum, Fog of War was in my head. The museum made me realize that some parts of rhetoric are stronger than others, and the strongest, once implanted in your head, are hard to change, unless even better rhetoric is developed. One scene from Fog of War was just not leaving my mind. The part where LBJ was talking to McNamera over recorded audio and he is heard saying that he wants people in Vietnam to be killed. He wants people to be hurt. At that exact scene, not only did my jaw drop to the floor, but I was forced (by my conscience) to spread the word to my roommate. And there we stood discussing how the President of The United States just said that.

So as I turned the corner and saw all the rhetoric that gave a positive look at everything that JFK did, all I could think about was him wanting to see people die. No matter how many acts of good he committed for the minority, I could only see him as a wanting murderer. But there was a side of me that, eventually, began to see that there was, essentially, a fog in war. The point of Fog of War was to show that there is so much more than the surface that needs to be understood, but I do not think it did as good of a job as the museum did at making that point. I might not have been able to get that scene out of my head, but I was definitely convinced that I am not looking at the whole picture, and I do not see some of the things that are involved in the depths of politics and war.

One of the ways it portrayed this image of another side to LBJ and war was trying to get the audience of the museum to feel sympathy for LBJ and his stressful timing. It showed all letters that were sent to LBJ by people who were disappointed with the war, and showed the sadness that overcame the president and his wife when Kennedy died. It showed that he had a soft side too, and war was not the only thing in his head. This sympathy caused me to see him as a human, and as a friend that I could relate too.

Although the museum did not convince me that LBJ was a great president, it did weaken the Fog of War rhetoric that showed him that he was nothing but a bad president that wanted war and did not accomplish anything else. This is why I am struck with some confusion. Which rhetoric should I believe, and can I escape it all at all.