[Morgan in Denver]

You bet, please continue. JFK stood down the soviets, but it was he who caused the crisis in the first place by not having a solid foreign policy. He did lay the ground work for the moon, I'll give you that one. Started the Peace Corps, which is a disgrace and waste of American money. I do not remember JFK supporting a strong military, evidence: Vietnam and Korea.

[txradioguy]

JFK and Korea? Umm hate to disappoint you but Harry Truman was POTUS during Korea. Saying that Kennedy didn't have a strong foreign policy becasue of the missile crisis would be like saying Pres. Bush was 'soft on terrorism" becasue of 9/11! If anything a strong foreign policy attitude is what allowed JFK to stare the Commies down instead of caving like the RATS of today would have done. And it wasn't JFK who advocated increasing troop strength in Vietnam. That was purely LBJ. The Peace Corps today may be a waste of money but when it was started it was not.

[OldFriend]

I agree completely with your assessment of JFK. Have nothing but disdain for his so called accomplishments which have been burnished by the media.

[nwrep]

I do not remember JFK supporting a strong military, evidence: Vietnam and Korea.

IIRC, didn't JFK run against RMN on sprucing up our missiles and bridging the missile gap that had been created when we supposedly fell behind during the DDE administration?

Oh, and JFK cut taxes big time, baby!!

[RightWingConspirator]

There is more to the story of "stood down the soviets". JFK secretly agreed to remove US missiles from Turkey as a quid pro quo for the Soviets removing their missiles from Cuba. The US public never knew this at the time, and I doubt if many know today. The newspapers and major media never reported it.

[justshutupandtakeit]

While the merits or lack thereof of JFK can be debated, I don't think you can claim with truth that he caused the Cubean crisis by not having a foreign policy. That was thrown into his lap within months of achieving the office just as 9/11 was for Bush.

Not only had the entire Bay of Pigs been prepared in secret but he was misinformed about major aspects of it and from every indication did not have proper leadership provided by the planners. Dulles and Bissel were both out of the loop when the invasion went down and unavailable. That was inexcuseable and not JFK's fault.

His Sec STate and Sec Def were both Republican as was the SecTreas. His foreign policy was not greatly different from Eisenhower's from what I can see.