Myth America — The Great Society
An essay by Josh Zeitz in the New York Times Bestseller Myth America
In his essay The Great Society, Josh Zeitz dismantles the myth that Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society was a failed experiment. He shows how cornerstone programs—Medicare, Medicaid, food assistance, Head Start, and federal education aid—delivered measurable, lasting gains in health, nutrition, and schooling, particularly for the elderly and low-income families.
Zeitz explains how subsequent political rhetoric recast these achievements as failures, despite the evidence of enduring public benefit. While acknowledging costs and challenges, he emphasizes that the historical record shows the Great Society profoundly improved American life.
“The book brings together outstanding historians who draw on rich, often surprising recent research by themselves and others to present a much more complicated and less congratulatory picture of many of the most contentious issues in the nation’s history. Moreover, these essays treat readers to wonderfully accessible, jargon‑free historical writing…”
In this instant New York Times bestseller, America’s top historians set the record straight on the most pernicious myths about our nation’s past.
The United States is in the grip of a crisis of bad history. Distortions of the past promoted in the conservative media have led large numbers of Americans to believe in fictions over facts, making constructive dialogue impossible and imperiling our democracy.
In Myth America, Kevin M. Kruse and Julian E. Zelizer have assembled an all-star team of fellow historians to push back against this misinformation. The contributors debunk narratives that portray the New Deal and Great Society as failures, immigrants as hostile invaders, and feminists as anti-family warriors—among numerous other partisan lies. Based on a firm foundation of historical scholarship, their findings revitalize our understanding of American history.
Replacing myths with research and reality, Myth America is essential reading amid today’s heated debates about our nation’s past.
With Essays By
Akhil Reed Amar • Kathleen Belew • Carol Anderson • Kevin Kruse • Erika Lee • Daniel Immerwahr • Elizabeth Hinton • Naomi Oreskes • Erik M. Conway • Ari Kelman • Geraldo Cadava • David A. Bell • Joshua Zeitz • Sarah Churchwell • Michael Kazin • Karen L. Cox • Eric Rauchway • Glenda Gilmore • Natalia Mehlman Petrzela • Lawrence B. Glickman • Julian E. Zelizer