I lived in “Good Times” Charlie’s Congressional district while he was in Congress. Like they say, a busted clock is right twice a day, for on every other issue Charlie was a disaster. His major, perhaps sole contribution was to be a water carrier in Congress for East Texas timber baron, Arthur Temple (Temple-Inland).
Charlie’s reputation as a boozer and womanizer was well-known throughout the region, thus I was always amused and chagrined that the fine Christian folk of East Texas elected and re-elected that putz time after time. Of course, the area was yellow dog Democrat country (and had more than its share of voter irregularities), but still...
This was well document in the book and Crile’s take was that they voters knew about Charlie but he was like the son you could always forgive no matter what.
A flawed man can have one redeeming event in his life and in Charlie’s it was Afghanistan. In one thing in his life he can say “I made a difference”.