Caroline wrote an op-ed piece in the NY Times today endorsing Obama. I wonder how Hillary will react.
“OVER the years, I’ve been deeply moved by the people who’ve told me they wished they could feel inspired and hopeful about America the way people did when my father was president. This sense is even more profound today. That is why I am supporting a presidential candidate in the Democratic primaries, Barack Obama…”
Well if her Uncle ends up endorsing him as well, I think Hillary will continue to sweat. This is far from over - I think Caroline’s words were genuine and I hope people listen to her.
Her uncle Teddy endorsed him today… I just read about this from another message board.
I imagine she quitely muttered some obscenity under her breath and then went back to work. Caroline Kennedy’s hardly the first person to endorse Obama. It’s not like she was a member of the Clinton inner circle and “owed” Hillary an endorsement.
While that may play well in MA I’m not sure a womanizing drunk is a good endorsement.
MA residents (who were turning to Clinton until pretty recently) and old guard traditional Democrats- Clinton’s base. Also, Teddy’s still a titan in the backroom, if this thing does turn into a brokered election, she would have wanted him on her side.
Hey, we’ve had some mighty fine presidents who were womanizing drunks. :dubious:
If Kenedy is a drunk, we should find out what whisky he prefers, and send a case of it to all senators. They can find their own women.
“A President like my Father” coming from one of JFK’s offspring I would consider that an insult.
If Kennedy hadn’t been shot that day in Dallas he’d be known as a pretty poor President. It’s interesting that Kennedy overshadows Johnson in the public’s eye when it was Johnson who actually got meaningful legislation passed during his Presidency.
Don’t have much use for the whole “de mortuis” thing, eh, Martin? 
Not really, especially not when they are historical figures who out of academic integrity must be analyzed in an honest and balanced manner (eventually all important historical figures are well, going to be dead.)
But he was.
Your speculation on how he would have otherwise fared in history is, well, pure speculation.
Say what you will. but the Kennedy name is still respected by many, and not only in the Democratic Party. So will Caroline and Ted’s endorsements mean anything? Who knows? I doubt that it will hurt Obama.
In a recent MSNBC article about the unprecedented interest in the Democratic Primary by people in foreign countries, there is already excitement and optimism about the simple fact that a woman and a black man are seriously in the running for President of the United States.
The biggest right-wing newspaper in Germany (Bild) has even anointed Obama with the moniker of the “black John F. Kennedy”. The fact that Berliners could even use that phrase, given the almost saintly status of JFK in that city, is beyond amazing. That speaks volumes as to how the rest of the world sees this primary election.
I never said anything to contradict this. I agree that being compared to JFK is a good thing as far as public perception goes. But the truth of the matter is serious political observers should be very worried about a man who compares well to JFK, JFK more or less is the standard example of a President who was “all style but no substance.” The man was incompetent, almost to a criminal degree.
I can only hope for America that if Obama is elected he doesn’t prove to be as incompetent a President as Kennedy was. I really don’t care too much about how Obama is being perceived by the rest of the world, or even by this country. The only thing I really care about is that whoever is elected does a good job. Partisan politics is one thing, but I think any logical American would want their President to be effective in office, even if they are from a different political party.
I am not quite sure what revisionist swift PTO boating organization you belong to, but let’s just say that your opinion of JFK falls somewhere deep in the minority of public opinion…sort of like the people who also think Dubya will someday be considered a great President.
Indeed. Here’s a conservative OP-ED from the UK’s respectable (albeit Murdoch-owned) Times today: Is Barack Obama the next JFK?
I’d like to ask this mass of well-informed people to point at one of JFK’s accomplishments as President.
JFK gave good speeches and was extremely likable, but he was a failure as a President. It has been my experience that more historians have started to give JFK mixed reviews over the past few years than ever before, I think as time passes and more of the people who are studying that time period in history are no longer emotionally connected to the JFK mirage his public perception will continue to plummet.
What’s interesting is if you ask people “what did JFK do as President?” people will usually point to his handling of the Cuban Missile Crisis–when in fact the truth of the matter was we came off worse strategically from the CMC than we had been before it started. It’s only because a large portion of the agreements reached at the end of the crisis were kept secret for years that people thought Kennedy had handled it well. When in truth we were forced to give up missiles in Turkey and the USSR only had to refrain from moving missiles to Cuba so the Soviets came out ahead by my figuring (we had to remove missiles we had had in place for years, whereas the only cost to the Soviets was losing a bit of face in not getting to put new missiles in Cuba.)
I have no idea why you feel the need to use the term “swift boat”, that’s completely an irrelevant term in this discussion. The simple truth of the matter is JFK achieved very, very little as President. He made some nice talk and made some good pledges (like making it to the moon) but he never actually implemented much himself. He was not good at working with Congress–one of the least fair things that is often said is that Johnson was able to get legislation through Congress because Congress felt bad that Kennedy had been killed so they passed Johnson’s stuff. That just wasn’t the case, Johnson was a master at working the legislative branch, he’d been a major player in the legislative branch for many years whereas Kennedy was a playboy-do-nothing Senator that rarely even bothered to show up at the Senate for deliberations or votes.
Despite having over a decade of political service under his belt, Kennedy had done very little in Congress. LBJ on the other hand worked hard while in Congress making important connections and learning how legislation works, by the time LBJ became vice president he was one of the most powerful men in the U.S. Congress and was able to very effectively handle congress as President.
I think that goes a wee bit too far. Part of the job is appearances, after all, and generally while I can understand not caring how your leader is seen by us non-American types, they do represent you to the world and as such I would have thought you’d care at least a bit.
The very fact that JFK is often ranked by Americans as one of our best Presidents, on par with Lincoln, Washington, FDR (I personally detest FDR but he at least had a huge portfolio of tangible accomplishments) is why I really don’t care too much about what Joe America thinks about the President. Obviously a President has to be popular enough to lead, but a President does not have to be romanticized ala Kennedy to be a good leader. Considering America’s most popular living former President amongst Europeans is Jimmy Carter (easily the worst President of the past fifty years–and Nixon was a crook and was still better) tells me I really shouldn’t care too much about what Joe Europe thinks, either.
Part of being a competent President is properly handling diplomatic relations. However, European governments don’t negotiate with the President of the United States based on how much the public in those countries views the POTUS as being “JFK-like” Nixon was one of the most effective diplomats we’ve had in the 20th century, as was T.R., and both were not celebrated personalities in Europe.
Cite? I’d have thought it was Clinton, to be honest.
Where is Lloyd Benson when you need him?