Robert A. Caro's life of Lyndon Johnson, which began with the greatly acclaimed The Path to Power, also winner of the National Book Critics Circle ...
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Dec 29, 2008
Matt
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To say that Means of Ascent does not reach the towering heights of Caro's first volume of his Years of Lyndon Johnson is no slight. Path to Power is one of the greatest feats of biography I've ever read. The only reason Means falls short is because it happens to dwell on LBJ's wilderness years.
This was the time between his first failed senate run, during a special election, and his second, successful senate run, which culminated in the famed "87 votes that changed America." More...
This was the time between his first failed senate run, during a special election, and his second, successful senate run, which culminated in the famed "87 votes that changed America." More...
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Jan 13, 2009
Roger
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The second of Michael Caro's trilogy on LBJ. Takes you from his time in House of Representatives to his election to the Senate in 1948. Outlines the influnces on his life, how he amassed power during the FDR years, how he used his friendship with Sam Rayburn to enhance his status, created his wealth, his true war record and his extra martial relationships. The book gives great depth to his "landslide" election by 87 votes to the Senate. Did he steal the election? In the Path to Pow
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Jan 28, 2012
Greg
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Amazing. Caro does it again, but with a much more focused entry than the first volume The Path to Power. That earlier entry followed LBJ's childhood, college years, and ascent from congressional aide to congressman to failed senate candidate. Means of Ascent, by contrast, focuses on eight crucial years in LBJ's career: 1940-48, eight years where his wheels seemed to be spinning in place.
He went off to war—in name only—and found himself unable to return and fight for the senate seat he' More...
He went off to war—in name only—and found himself unable to return and fight for the senate seat he' More...
Aug 04, 2009
Nicholas
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Aug 03, 2009
Frank
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Another amazing part of Caro's LBJ biography. While it is not nearly as good as the first book, it is still full of fascinating stories and revelations.
The book focuses almost entirely on the 1948 Senate election that Johnson won by a mere 87 votes. The election cast a permanent shadow on his career even as it cemented his political future, and therefore warrants an extended treatment. While 700 pages is probably a little too thick a book for this one election, Caro keeps mo More...
Nov 24, 2009
Bill
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Another compelling effort by Caro. This one is brief by his standards (a mere 412 pages) and clearly a bridge between Volumes I and III of his epic The Years of Lyndon Johnson. The writing and insights are as powerful as in The Path to Power, but the period it covers is the least interesting of LBJ's life, his "wilderness years" the period between his first (unsuccessful) and second (successful) run for the US Senate.
The description of how LBJ made millions via his radio More...
The description of how LBJ made millions via his radio More...
Apr 24, 2011
Heman
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The contested election of 1948 that sent LBJ to senate and catapulted his political career- the election that he did steal- is detailed in anecdotes, interviews and documents in Caro's 2nd volume. The man who dressed in custom made shirts and suits, landed with a helicopter in most Texas towns and threw his Stetson into the crowd that had gathered to see a helicopter for the first time in their lives, was a complex man of questionable character. A great leader of men though he was, he yelled at
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Feb 23, 2011
Joe
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Awesome. This is the most riveting volume of the Caro LBJ trilogy. The chapter on Box 13 alone is worth the price of this book. LBJ learned a lesson when he lost the Senate race to Pappy O'Daniel in 1938- Don't call-in all your votes until the other side has called-in all theirs.FDR would later joke with him about this. He didn't let that mistake happen again in 1948. Little did he know he'd have to "manufacture" a few votes, then hide a few more to beat out former Governor Coke Steven
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Oct 15, 2009
Andtruth
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Lyndon Johnson cheats and steals his way to victory in the 1948 Texas Senate race against the honestly-reputationed Coke Stevenson. LBJ's crooked big-money techniques will be recognized by anyone who follows modern politics, and one of the laudatory dust-jacket quotes says the book perfectly captured what it's like to be a politician. And yet we know that ultimately this amoral hustler will become the man to sign the eminently moral Civl Rights and Voting Rights Acts. Some activists say that i
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Jun 11, 2011
Howard
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The second book in a projected four-volume life of Lyndon Baines Johnson by Robert Caro (the fourth and final volume--the Johnson presidency--is due out, according to Caro, in 2013 or '14). Arguably the finest American political biography ever written, Caro gives an unstinting portrait of a man who could have been one of America's greatest presidents...if not for Viet Nam.
LBJ emerges from these pages as one of the most ruthless, insecure, and amoral individuals ever to hold the pres More...
LBJ emerges from these pages as one of the most ruthless, insecure, and amoral individuals ever to hold the pres More...
May 07, 2011
Tommy
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Oh my goodness. What was a fairly laborious read for the first half turned into a breathless account of a race to the finish for the US Senator seat for the state of Texas which included the Supreme Court of the United States of America. The last 150 pages kept me tearing the pages as I couldn't turn them fast enough. The minute details of what turned out to be an extremely complex and convoluted state-wide election left me frustrated beyond description. (A complete dismissal of democratic v
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Sep 26, 2010
Mcgyver5
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This is a blockbuster history book. The blocks it busted are many. The first, of course, is my impression of Lyndon Johnson. I really did not know much about him. If this biographer is right, he was completely amoral. A very skilled an energetic man with no moral compass and no self-comprehension. Second is my understanding of Texas history. The part about Coke Stevenson and the 1948 Senate campaign and Precinct 13 was so incredible and so well written that I experienced chills. I just ha
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Jan 01, 2010
Gina
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After reading Robert Caro's first volume in his trilogy on the life of LBJ, I wanted more. The second volume focused on the senatorial campaign between LBJ and Coke Stevenson. I couldn't imagine how a whole book (especially of this size) could focus on one campaign. It held little appeal to me. However, I loved the first volume, so I bought this one. Just like Path to Power, Means of Ascent pulls the reader in and doesn't let go. I feel like i actually traveled back in time to the late 19
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Oct 02, 2009
Sarita
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Ah, Caro. I love you so!
Not that this book isn't incredible on its own, but I am glad that I read this after "Master of the Senate." If I hadn't understood how subtle and how clever ...and how oddly effective and practical... Johnson could be, parts of this story would have been less interesting. In this book, Johnson is so broadly mean-spirited and calculating. The story that unfolds is a look at him galvanizing his political machine and revolutionizing Texas politics. It's More...
Not that this book isn't incredible on its own, but I am glad that I read this after "Master of the Senate." If I hadn't understood how subtle and how clever ...and how oddly effective and practical... Johnson could be, parts of this story would have been less interesting. In this book, Johnson is so broadly mean-spirited and calculating. The story that unfolds is a look at him galvanizing his political machine and revolutionizing Texas politics. It's More...
Aug 16, 2008
Oatleyr
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The next in Caro's amazingly detailed, trenchant, fascinating, truthful, insightful and heartless portrait. What did anyone -- even Lyndon Johnson -- ever do to deserve a biographer like this? Not that I fault Caro: His tenacious and scrupulously accurate determination that the truth be told is journalistic history at its highest level of professionalism. But under, or alongside, the chicanery, the narcissism, the shameless expediency of his subject's persona there also was a charisma, a thoroug
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Jan 23, 2008
Lars
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A few years ago, my cousin's wife was raving about Caro's multi-volume huge biography of LBJ, so with some trepidation, I tackled the first book. That trepidation was cause by its nearly 900-page length, but I found Caro's writing so engaging, and Johnson's life story and his times so engrossing, that I felt some regret upon finishing it. Not enough regret to avoid reading this second volume for some years. Then another cousin who was also raving about the work gave me "Ascent." Sl
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Sep 08, 2007
Howard
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If you are the sort of person who becomes moist eyed over the Great Society DO NOT READ THIS BOOK! Caro promised a warts-and-all bio of LBJ when he began his life's work and Volume 2 of that work delivers warts by the handful. LBJ's service in WW2? He came under fire exactly once and spent the rest of his life bragging about "swabbing decks" and "being in the trenches." Lady Bird's radio station, which was the foundation of the LBJ fortune? He got it through inside info glean
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Dec 03, 2008
I am loving reading the Caro series, but am going to take a break before I tackle the next one. I read Caro's intro to this book about the song, "We Shall Overcome," the day after Obama was elected. I cried like a baby. This book really puts into perspective LBJ's insane quest/need for power. The history also helps me to realize that corrupt leaders who lie about war aren't that new.
Jan 05, 2012
Kathy
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As always, Caro's detailed work really makes you feel that you're in the moment. (Especially the helicopter scenes!!) At the same time, he paints the big picture and shows how issues in politics today relate to our political past. Not as well written or riveting as The Path to Power-- if you were going to skip one in the trilogy, this would be the one to skip. The portrait of Coke Stevenson juxtaposed with Lyndon Johnson is an interesting one: illustrates how the old way of campaigning wasn't go
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Jul 29, 2011
Wonderful novel. It suffers a little from Caro's tendency to find heroes to contrast with his main focus. Not sure I would have given either Coke Stevens or Sam Rayburn the sort of glowing praise they get in this book, but overall, it was another triumph in biography from Caro.
Mar 01, 2009
David
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Caro is still working on his fourth volume in his biography of Lyndon Johnson. This was the second, the one where he painstakingly details the 1948 Democratic Senate primary election in Texas which turns out to be one of the most important American elections of all time.
Nov 06, 2010
Teddee
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Great narrative of LBJ's senate campaigns of 1942 and 1948, highlighting his revolutionary use of modern campaign techniques, and describing in detail the shocking election fraud and vote buying that LBJ was forced to use to win his first seat in the senate
Aug 11, 2008
Aaron
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Caro is an old fashioned historian in that all of his books double as morality plays and this is most apparent in “Means of Ascent.” To the book’s benefit, Caro treats seriously Johnson’s direct role in fixing his election to the Senate. However, in his rush to dirty Johnson, Caro is willing to overlook the faults of his opponents (the principle one of which also attempted to win by fraud and supported lynching). In practice, this book is really a very long piece of investigative journalism This
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Aug 03, 2010
Jessica
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In my view the best of the 3 Caro books on Johnson. (All are great.) He made me care about Coke Stephenson someone I'd never heard of before. I'm just hopefully Caro stays healthy enough to finish this wonderful series.
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Jan 30, 2011
Robert
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All of Caro's volumes on LBJ are first-rate, but this is the most entertaining of the three. The story of Landslide Lyndon is worth the price all by itself.
Oct 22, 2010
Paul
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Volume Two of Caro's masterwork of biography and history continues with a detailed and vivid description of how the villain Lyndon Baines Johnson and his financiers bought the United States Senatorial election of 1948.
Nov 19, 2010
Naglerr
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If you ever want to know how a political operative works his way to power, this is the book. One of a trilogy, but this is the best.
Dec 02, 2010
Evan
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The last 150 pages or so of this book are riveting. Reading it as if it were fiction, it would be part political satire, part John Grisham novel, part Old West duel to the death. Remember 2000 in Florida? If you thought that was good, you're in for a treat.
The 1942 to 1946 years are ably done for a non-Caro biographer, but it seems clear that Caro either did not do his typical tireless research for these years, or what he found did not fit his overarching thesis about Johnson, or not More...
The 1942 to 1946 years are ably done for a non-Caro biographer, but it seems clear that Caro either did not do his typical tireless research for these years, or what he found did not fit his overarching thesis about Johnson, or not More...
Jul 10, 2009
Mark
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About a man that wanted to assert his importance in the world, and posssess it all. Impressive and sad at the same time.
Dec 30, 2009
Jon
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A great biography that gives you an idea of the complexity and ferociousness of perhaps our greatest legislator.
