I am having trouble researching an idea. I recall during the Reagan campaign of 1980 a theme of yearning for a restoration of an idealized past. I saw during the Kerry campaign the idea of the new Kennedy – his initials were JFK, he was a “PT boat” officer, etc. Even in the Clinton campaign, they unearthed that video showing that Clinton had met Kennedy as a child and also yearned for a ‘new Kennedy’.
with Obama, there was a yearning to reach back to Kennedy and even further to FDR.
My question: were there images/themes in the Kennedy campaign of “restoration” to an earlier time? To when? FDR? From what I have read, this theme was more toward a better future – the “torch has passed to a new generation”.
I am not asking for an opinion here, but whether anyone knows of any book, etc., that specifically refers to the imagery and rhetoric of his campaign – past or forward looking, or recalls from your own memory.
This book would be a good start: I think his “ask not” speech sums it up pretty nicely. The modern era had never seen such a young, charismatic and forward-looking candidate who talked about a bright, shining future for America.
If I understand the OP’s question, I would say that the current theme of nostalgia started during the Reagan era. (I am sure that there have been earlier eras that employed nostalgia in campaign tactics, but I don’t recall that sort of theme in Kennedy’s campaign or any subsequent campaign until Reagan. I would also not consider nostalgia to be a significant aspect of most of those campaigns, just that it occurred.)
From the depression onward, the U.S. pictured itself striving to overcome obstacles–the Depression, WWII, “communism.” Then it got caught in four successive “downer” presidents, Johnson who got hopelessly mired in Vietnam, Nixon the crook, Ford the unelected who battled inflation and the aftermath of Vietnam and Watergate, and Carter, who lacked either the political smarts or the personal charisma to accomplish much. This meant that appealing to earlier successes, or even serious struggles, struck a chord that resonated with people wondering how we went from the “best” nation in the world to a nation with a lot of mundane, but intractable, problems. (A serious analysis of history would have challenged both the claims of the earlier successes or current failures, but it had an emotional resonance.)
When Reagan used his appeals to our “great” past so effectively, that theme entered the political process as an effective tool. Prior to that time, it was not really needed.
(I would not be surprised to discover that some of the nostalgia inspiring melancholy had already begun to enter the American psyche even earlier. I suspect that Kennedy’s appeal to the New Frontier of space was not an accident, but an effort to keep a goal in front of the populace on which we would concentrate rather than dwelling on how we used to be so much better. Unfortunately, the quagmire of Vietnam along with the troubles associated with inflation that that war produced caused too many to question the promise, (to say nothing of the expense), of colonizing space, so that effort fizzled out. Ray Bradbury’s 1984 short story, The Toynbee Convector addressed that very issue.)
Kennedy entered presidential politics at a unique time in US history:
-the country had had 8 years of the old, grandfatherly Dwight Eisenhower presidency-Eisenhower was seen as stodgy and cautious (one of the truly great American presidents, however)
-the USA was in a an economic boom-the (Eisenhower interstate highway system and affordable automobiles were allowing people tp move out of the cities)
-the enormous (and effective) public relations empire that Joe Kennedy had set up (in the 1940’s) was flooding the media with stories about the wonders of the Kennedy machine
All of this combined to make JFK one of the most touted presidents in history-all at once the guy symbolized youth, good looks, and the feeling that nothing was impossible.
Of course, there was a major disconnect between reality and image-Kennedy proved to be a dud at foreign affairs (nearly went to war over Cuba), embarked upon an (ultimately) disastrous war in Vietnam, and started an era of huge expansion of the Federal Government-which plagues us to this day.
People who remember Kennedy either love him or hate him-you still see old, yellowing photos of JFK on many government office walls.
Do you have some examples of how he started this ‘huge expansion’? The only thing that comes to my mind before having coffee is the Peace Corps, which was hardly the catalyst for large government programs. If anybody started down the road with social programs, it was Roosevelt, not Kennedy, who was not in office long enough to put large programs in place.
Your last comment seems to be a bit of urban legend. I worked for the government for a lot of years and was in a lot of offices both in the US and overseas: never saw a photo of Kennedy.
Indeed. Johnson shepherded the Great Society legislation, not Kennedy.
I know this GQ, but I think I can safely say that most Historians regard Kennedy as a mediocre president, even if he has been mythologized in many American minds as one of the greatest.
I, for one, agree with the historians . . . and a lot of other people who were around back then would agree with me. The best things JFK did for his legacy was to sleep wth Marilyn Monroe and to get assassinated.
Well, he was President for almost three years. He was in Texas in the first place to kick off his reelection campaign. He died too young, but we’re not talking William Henry Harrison here in terms of “He wasn’t President long enough to judge his administration.”
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Your last comment seems to be a bit of urban legend. I worked for the government for a lot of years and was in a lot of offices both in the US and overseas: never saw a photo of Kennedy.
Well, I’d invite you to visit the Waltahm District Court (MA)…or the Middlesex County Courthouse…both feature yellowing photos of JFK on the walls.
I agree that the use of nostalgia as a political lever is a relatively recent phenomenon. Over the long haul, most American elections have turned on economic issues, war or the threat of war, domestic policy, the personalities of the candidates, or the public’s approval or disapproval of the incumbent.
This is way too harsh. JFK established the Peace Corps, which is still going strong and doing a lot of good for the US around the world. He set a bold goal of landing a man on the Moon by the end of the decade; the Apollo program is still one of the greatest accomplishments of human history. He very skillfully handled the Cuban Missile Crisis, which is still a model of modern crisis management; it could even be said that he saved civilization. After early half-heartedness, he fully committed the US Government to civil rights for the first time since Lincoln. He rebuilt the US conventional military capability, which had deteriorated since the end of the Korean War and had left us dangerously reliant on nuclear weapons. He cut taxes, faced down Big Steel and did much to spur the economic boom of the Sixties. He authorized the negotiations for and signed into law the Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, which has kept radioactivity out of our air and water for decades now. He honored the arts and literature like no President before him, and he inspired a generation to public service.
Kennedy had many faults, to be sure, but he was actually a pretty good President.
Which might not have happened at all:
[ul][li]if not for the botched Bay of Pigs invasion in April 1961. Doing it halfway was a sure recipe for disaster. He should’ve gone with it all the way or called it off.[*]If he had handled the June 1961 Vienna summit with Khrushchev better. Khrushchev might not have had the balls for the Cuba confrontation. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vienna_summit:[/li][quote=wiki]
He later claimed of Khrushchev, “He beat the hell out of me” and told NYT reporter James ‘Scotty’ Reston it was the “worst thing in my life. He ravaged me.”
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The legislation didn’t get going until President Johnson and his “legendary arm-twisting skills” (as Cecil put it) did the job and actually got the laws enacted.
Inheriting a mess is no excuse in the first place, and he made the mess much worse. See “The Bay of Pigs”. And even though Eisenhower had started the planning, it still was JFK’s decision to go ahead.
To return to the OP, I was 23 in 1960 and voting in my first presidential election and there was little or no (I would have said no) harking back to any past era. It was all about the bright new future ahead of us if we elected JFK.
As for what he actually accomplished, well he did not grow the government (he cut taxes quite a bit), did start the peace corps, and got us embroiled in Viet-Nam. We can only speculate if he woule have escalated the way Johnson did.
Kennedy really couldn’t do this. The Democrats’ nostalgia was for the New Dealers (Truman was not popular), and Kennedy was not popular with them. Eleanor Roosevelt was not enthusiastic about his candidacy, and if you think about the famous line from his inauguration speech, you can read it as a poke at the liberal wing of the Democratic Party.
In any case, even wihtout the assassination, Kennedy was one of our most popular presidents. He had the highest average approval rating of any postwar president, and the highest low point in his approval ratings.
Really? Because it’s not like inheriting your dotty old aunt’s cat. I don’t know what era you grew up in, but the Cold War was a terrifying and overwhelming problem when I was growing up. There were no solutions at that time and no way to make things better. The Soviets were beyond belligerent, provoking confrontation whenever and wherever possible. Krushchev was no real improvement over Stalin, other than forgoing the slaughter of his own people. Kennedy haters are fond of bringing up the Bay of Pigs to sum up his entire presidency, much like Nixon haters use Watergate and ignore the good things Nixon was able to achieve before his ego destroyed him. The BOP was a mistake in retrospect, and Kennedy placed entirely too much credibility in the CIA’s plan, but it was not the sum total of his tenure in the White House.