Posted on 10/24/2013 9:26:12 AM PDT by NKP_Vet
John F. Kennedy is lionized by liberals. He inspired LBJ to push for landmark civil rights laws. His “New Frontier” promised new spending on education and medical care for the elderly. His champions insist he would have done great liberal things had he not been killed by Lee Harvey Oswald.
But what if we judge him by the lengthy record of his actual political career, in historical perspective? What if this hero of liberals was, in fact, the opposite of a liberal?
As Ira Stoll convincingly argues, by the standards of both his time and our own, John F. Kennedy was a conservative. His two great causes were anticommunism and economic growth. His tax cuts, which spurred one of the greatest economic booms in our history, were fiercely opposed by his more liberal advisers. He fought against unions. He pushed for free trade and a strong dollar. And above all, he pushed for a military buildup and an aggressive anticommunism around the world. Indeed, JFK had more in common with Ronald Reagan than with LBJ.
Not every Republican is a true heir to Kennedy, but hardly any Democrats deserve that mantle. JFK, Conservative is sure to appeal to conservative readers — and will force liberals to reconsider one of their icons.
(Excerpt) Read more at amazon.com ...
Not to mention Title IX.
And don't forget Wage and Price Controls.
Wow, now you want to go after Reagan to fight for the democratic party to win the 1960 election and give us all that came from the JFK/LBJ years?
What in God’s name is going on here? How insane are you?
You really want to try and convince us that Reagan and Nixon were the liberals and the JFK/LBJ were the conservatives?
This is what you think was to the left of JFK when Reagan was expressing fear at JFK’s liberalism?
“””I heard a frightening call to arms. Unfortunately he is a powerful speaker with an appeal to the emotions. He leaves little doubt that his idea of the “challenging new world” is one in which the Federal Govt. will grow bigger & do more and of course spend more. I know there must be some short sighted people in the Republican Party who will advise that the Republicans should try to “out liberal” him. In my opinion this would be fatal.”””
Or this from the same letter about JFK?
“””I am convinced that America is economically conservative and for that reason I think some one should force the Democrats to publish the “retail price” for this great new wave of “public service” they promise.”””
OR this? You think this is Reagan being to the LEFT of JFK?
“””One last thought,— shouldn’t some one tag Mr. Kennedy’s bold new imaginative program with it’s proper age? Under the tousled boyish hair cut it is still old Karl Marx—first launched a century ago.”””
Are you just totally whacked out in joy over what the election of JFK did to this nation?
You two are confusing a pre-JFK world and America, and Nixon, with the post JFK/LBJ, 1960s, Vietnam war, burning cities, and radicalism and chaos that Nixon governed in and that influenced his politics.
Electing Eisenhower’s veep in 1960 would have meant that America survived and that the 1960s and the resulting legislation mostly never happened, and probably would have led to a Reagan presidency in 1968.
The Kennedys were scum.
“You really want to try and convince us that Reagan and Nixon were the liberals and the JFK/LBJ were the conservatives?”
LBJ was as liberal as the day is long. He hated Kennedy.
LBJ was the crookiest SOB to serve as president in the last
50 years.
Nixon was a MODERATE just like Gerald Ford. He was socially conservative and fiscally moderate/liberal.
The only thing I have said about Reagan is he has given credit to JFK for cutting taxes, which Kennedy did.
I give credit where credit is due and I tell the truth about US politicians. But there are some people that can’t handle the truth.
Of course Reagan used a reference to JFK in 1984 to sell his own agenda, haven't you heard Obama do the same using Reagan? It is smart politics, but you call the actual hand written letter from Reagan when he labels JFK politics as liberal and even Marxist, as "supposedly" being anti-JFK, when nothing could be plainer.
Nixon was far to the right of JFK in 1960, since JFK almost every politician has had to be moderate, you even attacked Reagan because even he was a victim of JFK's immigration.
Something tells me that your love for JFK is related to his immigration goals.
Everybody was pro-life back then except for the Margaret Sangers.
And everybody on earth would have laughed in your face if you had mentioned gay marriage so that's no great accomplishment.
JFK would never have been a Tea Partier. He would have moved with his brother Teddy toward pro-abortion policies and embraced gay marriage.
http://www.redstate.com/2013/01/23/what-did-margaret-sanger-think-about-abortion/
Ground control to those uninformed. Margaret Sanger believed in population control through eugenics. She did not believe in aborting children. Most people don’t know that. She was racist and eugenicist, but not an abortionist.
JFK, like most CATHOLICS before the left-wing, murdering, pro-homosexual lunatics took over the party, was PRO-LIFE. He did not believe in aborting children. His brother Robert was pro-life as was his sister Eunice Shriver. As a matter of fact Ted Kennedy was pro-life until he sold his soul to the devil in the early 70s for a vote. You have ignored the postings where I have provided documentation. As a matter of fact I would say that most Americans, no matter the political affiliation would have thought the murdering the unborn was wrong, that is until the party was taken over by the bra-burning women’s movement long after JFK had died. The radical democrats then sold their soul to the devil to get their vote. You can thank the worthless Teddy for that. His brother who had died years earlier didn’t have a damn thing to do with it.
Your hatred of all things Kennedy is not healthy. I despised Teddy Kennedy as much as anyone, but automatically thinking JFK if he had lived would have “evolved” into another Kennedy is pure speculation on your part and the record shows if anything he would have switched to the republican party like the majority of conservative democrats did in the 60s. We really have no way of knowing one way or the other. No matter what I post about what others thought about Kennedy and his politics, and no matter what his record shows, you will ignore it. So do yourself a favor and drop this subject. It’s getting tiresome talking to a wall. Try running down Obama for a change.
I didn't say he did.
What I did say was that JFK would have followed Teddy and the rest of the Democrats on abortion. Sexually lax politicians are particularly susceptible to bowing to the Molech altar. Kennedy did not have control over his personal lusts so I don't know why I should think he would have held out against the abortion tsunami that swept away almost all Democrat politicians...MA being one of the leaders of the movement.
Your hatred of all things Kennedy is not healthy
Pul-eeze. I make one post about Kennedy and you say I hate all things Kennedy? I did not hate his tax cut. And he can be commended for not following Daddy Joe into supporting fascism. Don't be hyperbolic.
http://www.redstate.com/2013/01/23/what-did-margaret-sanger-think-about-abortion/
Ground control to those uninformed. Margaret Sanger believed in population control through eugenics. She did not believe in aborting children. Most people don’t know that. She was racist and eugenicist, but not an abortionist.
JFK, like most CATHOLICS before the left-wing, murdering, pro-homosexual lunatics took over the party, was PRO-LIFE. He did not believe in aborting children. His brother Robert was pro-life as was his sister Eunice Shriver. As a matter of fact Ted Kennedy was pro-life until he sold his soul to the devil in the early 70s for a vote. You have ignored the postings where I have provided documentation. As a matter of fact I would say that most Americans, no matter the political affiliation would have thought the murdering the unborn was wrong, that is until the party was taken over by the bra-burning women’s movement long after JFK had died. The radical democrats then sold their soul to the devil to get their vote. You can thank the worthless Teddy for that. His brother who had died years earlier didn’t have a damn thing to do with it.
Your hatred of all things Kennedy is not healthy. I despised Teddy Kennedy as much as anyone, but automatically thinking JFK if he had lived would have “evolved” into another Kennedy is pure speculation on your part and the record shows if anything he would have switched to the republican party like the majority of conservative democrats did in the 60s. We really have no way of knowing one way or the other. No matter what I post about what others thought about Kennedy and his politics, and no matter what his record shows, you will ignore it. So do yourself a favor and drop this subject. It’s getting tiresome talking to a wall. Try running down Obama for a change.
Post was not meant for you. Sorry.
Oh please
You are the one defending the liberal democrat who’s election destroyed America.
You call him Reagan’s “political hero” and ignore that Reagan wrote calling him liberal and Marxist, and now you want to go into fantasy land and pretend that abortion and the pro-life politics were a part of 1950s politics and JFK’s politics.
You describe Nixon and Reagan as being to the left of Kennedy in 1960, the liberals and clearly are thankful that the democrats won and led us into Vietnam and unionized the government and gave us the 1960s, the Bay of Pigs and the Jimmy Carter of his time, except so much worse.
You clearly have some underlying agenda in promoting the left’s hero here at freerepublic, what is it?
What is it you are really trying to push here?
“You call him Reagan’s “political hero” and ignore that Reagan wrote calling him liberal and Marxist”
Written as a note in 1960 to Richard Nixon when Ronald Reagan WAS A DEMOCRAT. JFK WAS A DEMOCRAT. Ever wonder why a democrat would put down another democrat. That’s not too hard to figure out. Reagan was a democrat for years. He didn’t switch parties until 1962. Years later when Reagan was asked about the letter he said Kennedy was a different president than he was a candidate and he was “pleasantly surprised” at Kennedy’s “toughess” as president. He praised Kennedy for his handling the Cuban Missile Crisis.
I have never interacted with such a fanboy of JFK before, I sure didn’t expect to run into such a passionate democrat here at FR.
That “note” was a hand written letter to the vice president of the Unties States from a politically active Ronald Reagan, offering his services to the conservative candidate to run against the liberal/Marxist JFK, he also wanted to switch parties at the time but Nixon said his support would mean more if he remained registered as a democrat.
Nobody, including Reagan was or is going to attack the fake JFK that you and your kind created after his death, that is why Reagan had to play it down during the 1984 election when Mondale brought it up.
“””Walter F. Mondale, the Democratic Presidential nominee, has charged that Ronald Reagan, in a 1960 letter to Richard M. Nixon, likened the ideas of John F. Kennedy, Mr. Nixon’s opponent in that year’s Presidential campaign, to those of Karl Marx and Adolf Hitler.”””.
Are you going to let us know what is behind this bizarre effort to rewrite history for a liberal democrat who was a disaster as president, that you are doing?
You clearly have some deeper motive to be promoting the 1960s democrat party, what is it?
No the one with a deeper motive is you. Your hatred of someone whose been dead for 50 years is not normal. You ignore the truth when the the truth is given to you. You refuse to read any information that would know would make you think. So my message to you is simple. What do you put down a man who was not even president for two years and NEVER post anything negative about Barack Obama. The only thing I have ever saw from your postings is constant putdowns of the Catholic Church and now your abnormal obsession/hatred of John Kennedy. So like I said, do yourself a favor and write the person that wrote the book JFK - Conservative. Then go back and forth with him and tell him his head is up his rear and you know more about Kennedy than any man alive. From your constant ramblings about him you would think you were related to him and you have private information than none of us knows. I also find it funny you seem to think anyone that was ever a democrat was the scum of the earth, except Ronald Reagan, who was a democrat for almost 20 years. Why didn’t Reagan switch parties in the 50s? He wrote the “note” you like so much in 1960, about a ANOTHER DEMOCRAT, but didn’t see fit to become a Republican for two more years. But you sugarcoat anything like that. All it is bad Kennedy, the scum of the earth, he destroyed everything. He completely destroyed the office of the presidency in less than two years.
Try telling the truth about Obama for a change. Who in the hell is the closet democrat around here, one that rants and raves about long dead democrats and never posts a damn thing negative about the SOB that is destroying the country as I write this.
I thought your entire reasoning for being on FR was to put down the Catholic Church. Guess I was wrong. But I one know thing. It’s not to tell the truth about about Barack Obama.
And for your information, I started voting in 1968 and I have never voted for a democrat in my life. But I do tell the truth about politicians, no matter what party they’re in and that’s something you can’t handle, because you have shown you CAN’T HANDLE THE TRUTH.
And if Reagan or anyone else thought Nixon was a conservative, they damn sure got fooled when he became president.
No, my interest in JFK is natural, I am a conservative on a conservative political site discussing a liberal democrat presidency that I lived through and who is the hero of the democrat party and the American left, and I agree with President Reagan about JFK.
What doesn’t fit here is having the 1960s democrat destruction of America defended as you try to create a lie about the left’s hero.
That is why you keep attacking me and Reagan, and other opponents of the democrats, you don’t seem to know much about Reagan.
1948 was the last time that Reagan voted for a democrat president, in 1952, 1956, and 1960, Reagan campaigned against the liberals, get that? He was a campaigner for republicans long before he he formally switched registration.
As a now uncloseted JFK 1960s democrat, why don’t you post a thread about Obama being a “Reagan Hero” and a conservative, then you can see if anyone challenges you.
Well, maybe his death somehow inspired the country and the Congress to get behind civil rights, but I really don't see JFK as some kind of inspirational "better angel" for LBJ. Give Johnson more credit on this. There are enough other things to fault him with.
He was also pro-life (appointing pro-life Byron White to the Supreme Court) and would have thought the idea of sodomite "marriage" the dumbest thing he ever heard in his life.
Everybody would have felt that way about gay marriage back in 1960 -- maybe even in 1990 or 2000 -- and virtually everybody was pro-life back then.
And last, but not least, if JFK were alive today and in politics, he would be a Tea Party conservative. He would have absolutely nothing to do with the anti-God, left-wing nutcases that make up the democrat party.
You mean his whole family, his staffers, and most of his constituents? More likely he would have followed the rest of his family deep into the liberal camp.
But hypotheticals like this are pointless. What do you mean by "JFK"? A guy born in 1917 that you pick up in 1963 and drop off in 2013? Chances are that guy would need a while to get his bearings and whose to say what he would have thought after that. Or a guy born in 1917 who's still alive now at 96? Either he'd be too out of it now for his opinions to carry much weight, or he would have followed his family's path leftward.
JFK was an interesting case in his own day. He wasn't that liberal or left-wing. But that was in the far less ideological era dominated by Eisenhower, before all the upheaval that came later in the 1960s and 1970s. I don't see Kennedy being especially independent minded or strong enough to resist that leftward current. But that's my own unprovable hypothetical.
So far as Republicans are concerned, Joe wasn't the first "outsider" to see that he could have more power and influence in the Democratic Party. That goes on even now, and the GOP was much more the WASP party in those days.
Two cautions: 1) in those days people did vote more on the basis of ethnicity than ideology -- certainly whether you voted for Herbert Hoover or Al Smith was more about religion and ethnicity than about political philosophy -- and 2) if that's the David Nasaw biography, many people have criticized it for being a whitewash or a puff piece.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.