White Stone and Sun Were Not a Good Choice

The LBJ Museum kind of tripped me out. First of all I thought it was freaking far away and I didn’t think I could walk there so I felt like a complete idiot when I drove there and it wasn’t even a mile from where I live. I also would like to know who thought using white stone for both the actual structure and the floor was a good idea…it was so bright I couldn’t even really find the entrance haha I also realized that I went there to take pictures outside it when I was in 6^th grade for the Future Problem Solvers (FPS, if your school did this let me know so I don’t feel so weird) state competition, but we didn’t actually go inside… so it was basically just a really weird experience for me.

I finally got in though and was greeted by the lady at the front desk. She was one of the nicest people I’ve met in Austin thus far so I really enjoyed talking with her and she knew where my hometown was so that was kinda nice. Anyways, on to what I saw and liked.

The inside was beautiful and I really enjoyed all the memorabilia displayed in the LBJ timeline. Seeing all the First Lady stuff was cool too. The LBJ Humor thing freaked me out, but other than that I really enjoyed the Museum as a whole. I even bought a shirt, which is probably the most hideous thing ever and I will be wearing it to class tomorrow. One thing I did notice was that the Vietnam section was a lot smaller than I expected it to be. Coincidence? I think not.

Therefore, I propose that for the video we argue that the Vietnam War is the elephant in the room when it comes to U.S. History. Until this class I really didn’t know all that much about it and I think that has a lot to do with the fact that it’s often just shoved in a small corner of a Museum, while the Holocaust, which is not even more awful, just as awful of an event has a whole entire museum dedicated to it alone. Why? Why doesn’t America want to talk about what happened? and What do we really know about it the Vietnam War because of this? and furthermore, will the War in Iraq be the same?

I want to do the interviews and the whole “go find what people know thing”, the whole shebang, but I also want to do something fun… Dress Cristina up like Patton and deliver his speech to showcase rhetoric. Or dress Ron up as McNamara and do a play on what Morris did…I don’t know, just something to spice it up and give the viewer a switch from facts. And Erica, I like your idea of doing it from our prospective and showing our journey. Show where we started from and maybe why we started there and how this class has taught us the true rhetoric of Vietnam.