That was why I resolved to write my first drafts in longhand, slowest of the various means of committing thoughts to paper, before I started doing la… - Robert A. Caro

yet the realities of the democratic process in America make it almost impossible to get a road, a bridge, a housing project, a bathhouse or a park approved and built in two years — or four.

After he returned from Washington, Johnson came into Rowe’s room and said, “I agree with everything you said.” Perhaps he did agree — intellectually. But he didn’t take the advice. He couldn’t. He was beyond listening to warnings, as was demonstrated the next day, when the convention opened.

...his success in public relations had been due primarily to his masterful utilization of a single public relations technique: identifying himself with a popular cause. This technique was especially advantageous to him because his philosophy — that accomplishment, Getting Things Done, is the only thing that matters, that the end justifies any means, however ruthless — might not be universally popular. By keeping the public eye focused on the cause, the end, the ultimate benefit to be obtained, the technique kept the public eye from focusing on the methods by which the method was to be obtained.