The Monday American: American History Podcast

America reels in the face of the worst economic disaster ever faced. The attempts to bring the country and its people out of the Dust-bowl of despair; only to make things worse as a result. Democracy is challenged on a global stage after it nearly collapsed from the Civil war. America pays a painful price to learn the lessons of economics and what happens when the Government takes too much control even with honest intentions.

Ending the Conflict in Stalemate: The Korean War is a conflict that has been largely forgotten from the memories of current. As so it shows us not only the lessons we can learn from history, but that the simple knowledge of an event happening is a lesson all its own.

When the Chinese launch their first attack against U.S. and U.N. troops at Unsan, everything changed. It was as though the conflict had become a whole new war altogether.  The McArthur loyalists in the military intelligence ensured that anything contradicting the wishes or will of the General was altered or changed in order to fit into the delusions of grandeur he had built up for himself and the men under him in Tokyo. 

The Korean War is known, ironically so, for being America's forgotten war. It was a war that sparked America's involvement in southeast Asia for next thirty years.  Part one of this series on the war begins by explaining how we got to the point of war in Korea, and the history of Korea itself.  One unique aspect of this war is that it never officially ended, and the ramifications of the events are still in place today. 

This episode tells the story of the Battle of the Bulge, one of the worst battles in American history. This battle took place in late December of 1944 in the Ardennes Forest region of Belgium, near the town of Bastogne. 

This episode tells the story of America's journey from the Atlantic Ocean all the way to the Pacific. The great American migration west is a story that tells of America's growth in land as well as national identity.  The Manifest Destiny ideology served as the foundation that the nation built itself upon, in methods both good and bad. America's saga is a story of happiness and tragedy in so many ways, this chapter is no exception to the highs and lows of human behavior. 

Bruce Carlson joins for a conversation regarding the LBJ and Nixon presidencies laying the framework for the expansion of power in the executive branch. Bruce and Andrew talk about that and much more!

Nixon takes the reigns handed down from Lyndon Johnson, the looming cloud of the Vietnam War and what to do next stares Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger squarely in the face. The Nixon administration takes the American people and nation down the path towards "peace with honor" which Nixon aims to achieve through the most paradoxical idea possible. America will achieve peace with honor, according to Nixon, through waging "a war for peace." The war's end would be reached one way or another.

The Tet Offensive pushes the conflict in Vietnam to a boiling point both abroad and within the United States. The American public after Tet, the odd victory without reward, finally was able to see the real situation in Vietnam. What was even more jarring to the public than the "principals" and their malfeasance was the unsettling realization that the war in Vietnam had somehow started a civil war in America.

Part III of the series takes an in-depth dive into the man largely credited for the escalation, continuation and cover-ups regarding the Vietnam War: Lyndon Baines Johnson.  Picking up where we left off in part II, we learn a bit more about who LBJ was and what helped him to make the fateful decisions made throughout his administration regarding the Vietnam War, its escalation and its subsequent veiling to the American public.

William Timmons is a state senator for South Carolina district 6 and is running for congress in South Carolina's fourth congressional district. He is running for the congressional seat being vacated by Trey Gowdy. William is a local businessman and entrepreneur native to Greenville, SC. He was gracious enough to sit down for an interview on the podcast to talk all things politics, campaign and the nation in general.

The Vietnam War has hardly begun in the point where we left off part one and now start part two, yet it isn't difficult for us looking back to see how much destruction is on its way.  Part II continues the story of America's involvement in Indochina and Vietnam and touches on topics such as: The Buddhist Crisis, the JFK assassination, Lyndon B. Johnson's Great Society, The Gulf of Tonkin Incident, as well as the Gulf of Tonkin Congressional Resolution, the Strategic Hamlet Program. 

The Vietnam War remains unique in history with how difficult it was to both avoid the war as well as heat it up. This war (like so many stories in history) has a deep contextual background spanning many years before its actual inception. We attempt to go through the post World War II era of how the Vietnamese country came to be, how it furthered towards all out war and offer an attempt at an explanation as to why we furthered our involvement. 

The full realization of the Confederate States of America that the war cannot be won sets in. General Ulysses S. Grant moves into Richmond, VA and occupies the recently abandoned Confederate governmental headquarters. Robert E. Lee takes his men on a "march from hell" only to realize the only option is surrender; which he does on April 9, 1865. When everything seems to be coming together, the nation loses Abraham Lincoln to an assassins bullet. Altering the course of the new nation forever...

In Part IV of the American Civil War the nation reels from the cost of the conflict. The Battle of Antietam takes its toll as the nation's bloodiest single day of combat - ever. The Battle of Gettysburg becomes the country's most costly single battle, still to this day. The Union army control is given to Ulysses S. Grant who battles Robert E. Lee through the Overland Campaign, inching closer to Richmond where the life of the Confederate States of America seems to be waning.