Blue Moon Playlist Review Club - Season 2 - Episode 27 - Out on blue 6 - Gone Too Soon (pg 438)

Johnny Cash did an album called Bitter Tears which was a collection of songs about native american history. Cash thought he was part Cheyenne himself but I don't think there was anything to back this up. There's a couple of songs about individuals, the most famous of which is The Ballad of Ira Hayes, about the indigenous american who was one of the six marines who raised the flag at Iwo Jima. It's not a happy tale.

There's a 'revisited' version of the album called Look Again To The Wind recorded by some of the greats of americana. I'm going with the version on that record.

Kris Kristofferson, Gillian Welch, David Rawlings - The Ballad of Ira Hayes

(I nearly went with Steve Earle's version of Custer, as having been a little kid who loved a 'cowboys and indians' film, George Custer was quite possibly the first historical figure where I realised that popular culture and history are two very different things).
 
My final song on a historical politician will be about my birth-year president: Lyndon Baines Johnson (LBJ)

LBJ had big plans for his presidency being focused on "The Great Society", that was aimed at expanding civil rights, public broadcasting, access to health care, aid to education and the arts, urban and rural development, and public services.

He sought to create better living conditions for low-income Americans by spearheading the war on poverty. As part of these efforts, Johnson signed the Social Security Amendments of 1965, which resulted in the creation of Medicare and Medicaid. Johnson made the Apollo program a national priority; enacted the Higher Education Act of 1965, which established federally insured student loans; and signed the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, which laid the groundwork for U.S. immigration policy today.

Johnson's stance on the issue of civil rights put him at odds with other white, southern Democrats. His civil rights legacy was shaped by signing the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the Civil Rights Act of 1968.

All of those things noted above would have made him one of the most popular presidents of our time, certainly among the most effective, especially those final 3 acts which were major overdue laws needed for equality.

Unfortunately, he also escalated a campaign against communism which ultimately made him a one term president. By 1968, no matter how much good he had accomplished, he was mostly remembered for the full-scale military intervention in Vietnam.

This song covers that last aspect (somewhat humorously, I might add):

“Lyndon Johnson Told the Nation” – Tom Paxton

Have no fear of escalation, I am trying everyone to please
 
threespires said:
Johnny Cash did an album called Bitter Tears which was a collection of songs about native american history. Cash thought he was part Cheyenne himself but I don't think there was anything to back this up.
Click to expand...
That is correct on the backing up part. And when his daughter, Roseanne Cash, was on the "Finding Your Roots" PBS series in the US a few years ago, they found her Global DNA Admixture was:
92.3% European
3.8% Western Asian
3.3% Sub-Saharan African (on both Mother and Father sides)
0.6% Unassigned

If there's Native American in there, it's pretty negligible and these tests are pretty accurate up to the past 500 years.
 
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