The Peculiarly Enduring Legacy of JFK

[kandace]

Today is Thanksgiving, but it is also November 22, 2012, which makes it the 49th anniversary of a day that will live in infamy: the assassination of the 35th President, John Fitzgerald Kennedy. The Kennedy Presidency lasted a mere 2 years, 10 months, and 2 days. Yet, the impact of practices and policies initiated by JFK as well as via his brothers still affects us today to a strangely disproportionate degree, for woe as well as weal.

Early presidential campaigns, modern tv based public relations, computerized polling, the primary system, appeals to women and non White racial minorities are all establsihed parts of our political landscape that were pioneered and/or polished via the JFK presidential campaign. We have JFK to thank, or perhaps denounce, for bringing these practices full bore into American Presidential politics.

JFK was also assertive in crafting the idea of the president as non-partisan. When we hear Obama aspire to bipartisanship, he may not achieve that ideal, ut the concept of the President as bipartisan was a very JFK-esque concept that ha stuck. [Political scientist James MacGregor Burns, in his book Running Alone: Presidential Leadership From JFK to Bush II, argues that the bipartisan idea does more harm than good. Nonetheless, it is the template many Presidents aspire to.]

JFK's political legacy has exercised an usuusally strong influence on the political fate of the current President, Barack Obama.

The issue of immigration reform is a hot button issue of our time but it is often forgotten that JFK was an early advocate of reforming the immigration system's discriminatory bias in favor of NW Europeans. Immigration reform, coupled with the Civil Rights revolution that JFK tacitly supported, literally changed the face of America, and made the election and re-election of Barack Hussein Obama a possibility.

While policies advoated by JFK made Obama's rise to the presidency possible, it was the emulation of his brother Ted that enabled Obama to obtain a second term. The Obama campaign's strategy for defeating Mitt Romney was literally borrowed from the Ted Kennedy playbook: the same plan used by Ted Kennedy to defeat Romney in the 1994 Senate race was used by Team Obama to defeat Romney in the 2012 presidential race.

It would not be an overstatement to assert that if there had not been a JFK Presidency, there would be no Obama Presidency.

[BlandFood]

JFK's biggest mistake was getting in bed with the mob, never bite the hand that feeds you. Bobby blew it by going after them after they did their part to have big bro elected. Teddy rots in hell for being the pos he was, I imagine the family of the murdered has an extra supply of 115/145 in a water canon trained on him at all times.

[johnpolitics]

I've never like revisionist history. JFK was a good President. If he had lived he would have done the same thing in Vietnam that LBJ did. LBJ's advisors were all of Kennedy's people. LBJ when further on Civil Rights than JFK wanted to do. His death gave people a mythical view of his life and legacy. He would have beat Goldwater in 1964 but not in a landslide. JFK was more worried about Romney (Mitt's dad) than Goldwater.

[BlandFood]

I've never like revisionist history. JFK was a good President. If he had lived he would have done the same thing in Vietnam that LBJ did. LBJ's advisors were all of Kennedy's people. LBJ when further on Civil Rights than JFK wanted to do. His death gave people a mythical view of his life and legacy. He would have beat Goldwater in 1964 but not in a landslide. JFK was more worried about Romney (Mitt's dad) than Goldwater.

You're probably correct on the highlighted areas, the rest is all speculation.

[Omaha Beach]

Today is Thanksgiving, but it is also November 22, 2012, which makes it the 49th anniversary of a day that will live in infamy: the assassination of the 35th President, John Fitzgerald Kennedy. The Kennedy Presidency lasted a mere 2 years, 10 months, and 2 days. Yet, the impact of practices and policies initiated by JFK as well as via his brothers still affects us today to a strangely disproportionate degree, for woe as well as weal.

Early presidential campaigns, modern tv based public relations, computerized polling, the primary system, appeals to women and non White racial minorities are all establsihed parts of our political landscape that were pioneered and/or polished via the JFK presidential campaign. We have JFK to thank, or perhaps denounce, for bringing these practices full bore into American Presidential politics.

JFK was also assertive in crafting the idea of the president as non-partisan. When we hear Obama aspire to bipartisanship, he may not achieve that ideal, ut the concept of the President as bipartisan was a very JFK-esque concept that ha stuck. [Political scientist James MacGregor Burns, in his book Running Alone: Presidential Leadership From JFK to Bush II, argues that the bipartisan idea does more harm than good. Nonetheless, it is the template many Presidents aspire to.]

JFK's political legacy has exercised an usuusally strong influence on the political fate of the current President, Barack Obama.

The issue of immigration reform is a hot button issue of our time but it is often forgotten that JFK was an early advocate of reforming the immigration system's discriminatory bias in favor of NW Europeans. Immigration reform, coupled with the Civil Rights revolution that JFK tacitly supported, literally changed the face of America, and made the election and re-election of Barack Hussein Obama a possibility.

While policies advoated by JFK made Obama's rise to the presidency possible, it was the emulation of his brother Ted that enabled Obama to obtain a second term. The Obama campaign's strategy for defeating Mitt Romney was literally borrowed from the Ted Kennedy playbook: the same plan used by Ted Kennedy to defeat Romney in the 1994 Senate race was used by Team Obama to defeat Romney in the 2012 presidential race.

It would not be an overstatement to assert that if there had not been a JFK Presidency, there would be no Obama Presidency.

You left out, by accident im sure, that JFK was in favor of tax cuts during a recession, not raising taxes as the current occupant of the White House. You also left out that little something about losing his, nerve during the Bay of Pigs invasion that led to the Berlin Walk and the Cuban missle crisis but you probably were not alive then so you do not remember like i do leaving your home in the morning to go to school not knowing if you were going to live long enough to come home. Then there was that other little thing called Vietnam that grabbed my generation of young men by the throat. When JFK came into office the US had 500 military advisors there. When he was killed less than 3 years later there were 16,000 in country. All LBJ did was expand what Kennedy started.

[musicmd]

You left out, by accident im sure, that JFK was in favor of tax cuts during a recession, not raising taxes as the current occupant of the White House. You also left out that little something about losing his, nerve during the Bay of Pigs invasion that led to the Berlin Walk and the Cuban missle crisis but you probably were not alive then so you do not remember like i do leaving your home in the morning to go to school not knowing if you were going to live long enough to come home. Then there was that other little thing called Vietnam that grabbed my generation of young men by the throat. When JFK came into office the US had 500 military advisors there. When he was killed less than 3 years later there were 16,000 in country. All LBJ did was expand what Kennedy started.

JFK, wanted to end the nam conflict, what recession ?

[Omaha Beach]

JFK, wanted to end the nam conflict, what recession ?

The recession that was going on in October of 62. If he wanted to end the Nam conflict then why did he increase troop strength from 500 advisors to 16,000 before he was killed? Revsionist BS.

[musicmd]

The recession that was going on in October of 62. If he wanted to end the Nam conflict then why did he increase troop strength from 500 advisors to 16,000 before he was killed? Revsionist BS.

The Korean conflict and the Vietnam War greatly influenced the economy. There were some downturns in the economy, but they were minimal. These occurred in 1953, 1957, and 1960. During this period, unemployment was becoming a problem because the demand for unskilled labor was decreasing and the labor force was growing at a rate faster than the demand for employees.
Go back to your drawing board.

500 advisors to 16,000 LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL is troop strength

The U.S. launched an embargo against Cuba in February 1962. The Dow dropped 26.5% from its post-election height of 728.8 on December 1, 1961 to its June 26, 1962 low of 535.76. Tensions were heightened in October 1962, and the Dow dropped 2% the day after President Kennedy's speech. What a recession. LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL

[Omaha Beach]

The Korean conflict and the Vietnam War greatly influenced the economy. There were some downturns in the economy, but they were minimal. These occurred in 1953, 1957, and 1960. During this period, unemployment was becoming a problem because the demand for unskilled labor was decreasing and the labor force was growing at a rate faster than the demand for employees.
Go back to your drawing board.


500 advisors to 16,000 LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL is troop strength

Instead of your usual non responsive gibberish look up a speech JFK gave in 1962 where he said the answer to a recession was tax cuts to stimulate the economy instead of tax hikes. Also look up the number of US personnel in Vietnam as of Janary 61 compared to November 63. Get some facts before you respond. You dont have to sound like a fool all the time.

[Rael]

The Korean conflict and the Vietnam War greatly influenced the economy. There were some downturns in the economy, but they were minimal. These occurred in 1953, 1957, and 1960. During this period, unemployment was becoming a problem because the demand for unskilled labor was decreasing and the labor force was growing at a rate faster than the demand for employees.
Go back to your drawing board.

500 advisors to 16,000 LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL is troop strength

It might not be enough to fight the war, but it was certainly above the "adviser" threshold, wouldn't you think? It certainly was an escalation, was it not?

[Steveg85321]

IMO John Kennedy was a product of his time politically. The reason his legacy is so disproportionate is because he was classy, youthful, attractive (same with his wife) and because he was killed in office, a horrible shock I can remember well. That event changed the world, mostly because it destroyed our trust.

I also remember Kennedy's great quote from his inaugural address, "Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country." Contrast that with the principles on which Barack Obama and the Democrats campaign today, which is basically to pander to the attitude, "What's the country going to do for me; I'm entitled, even if the whole thing collapses. Somebody else can pay for it."

[zenwalk]

He understood the importance of hope and delivering on it. Did he get it all right? No. No one ever does.

[flyboy56]

"But the President believed the UN had to have a future and he decided to speak forcefully on the real issues confronting the Assembly and the world: a stronger United Nations – disarmament and a nuclear test ban" JFK speaking at the UN

A stronger UN and preventing a strong US military complex may have played a large role in his assassination.

[ms maggie]

I've never like revisionist history. JFK was a good President. If he had lived he would have done the same thing in Vietnam that LBJ did. LBJ's advisors were all of Kennedy's people. LBJ when further on Civil Rights than JFK wanted to do. His death gave people a mythical view of his life and legacy. He would have beat Goldwater in 1964 but not in a landslide. JFK was more worried about Romney (Mitt's dad) than Goldwater.

I'm not certain that JFK would have gone the same route as LBJ in Vietnam. 2 reasons: Kennedy was rightly skeptical of military advisors after Bay of Pigs and Cuban missile crisis. Also, the people who were most opposed to the war were Kennedy's kind of people--the journalists, academics--both groups were loathed by both Johnson and Nixon and probably hardened their resolve. Don't think that would have been the case with Kennedy. Never know obviously.

[DaggerJohn]

... Also, the people who were most opposed to the war were Kennedy's kind of people--the journalists, academics--both groups were loathed by both Johnson and Nixon and probably hardened their resolve...

Weren't most of the "Best and Brightest"--Bundy, Rostow, certainly McNamara,--who were famous hawks on Vietnam left over from Kennedy's days? Also, the journalists like Ben Bradlee, James Reston, Phil Graham etc, who had Kennedy's ear or were his friends, weren't they hawkish as well?

[zenwalk]

Weren't most of the "Best and Brightest"--Bundy, Rostow, certainly McNamara,--who were famous hawks on Vietnam left over from Kennedy's days? Also, the journalists like Ben Bradlee, James Reston, Phil Graham etc, who had Kennedy's ear or were his friends, weren't they hawkish as well?

There weren't hawks and doves per se. That's more modern. There were Democrats, Republicans and idiots in Texas (that part hasn't changed).

[flyboy56]

Johnson's advisors were the CIA. The same advisors whose advice Kennedy rejected regarding the Bay of Pigs. Kennedy made it clear he would only use US military advisors in Vietnam. It was Johnson's decision to escalate the war when he became President. I'm sure he saw visions as a victorious war president by defeating the commie bastards in just a few short months and then he could get on with his Great Society vision for America. He misjudged those commie bastards and Vietnam ended up killing him. So much for being "King of the World" LBJ. May you forever rot in hell you tyrant.

[zenwalk]

There's lots of tea leaves that need reading when you try to predict what Kennedy would have done in VN. He had Diem popped presumably to "fix" the fundamentals in the country. Unfortunately things instantly became sloppy and hard to control and JFK probably felt the "break it you buy it" Pottery Barn rule and responded by pulling America deeper into the game.

The Quiet American (the original with Audie Murphy) is a very good picture of what we were like back then. There's a newer version with Michael Caine which is dramatically very good but the history feels revised.

[Sprightly]

Positive opinions of Presidents are always elevated in death. Personally, I don't believe that he was fit for office.

[zenwalk]

Positive opinions of Presidents are always elevated in death. Personally, I don't believe that he was fit for office.

Why not?