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Conservative

2010-12-01T23:28:49Z

ChuckR: /* Early 20th century */

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A '''conservative''' adheres to principles of personal [[responsibility]], moral values, and limited government, agreeing with [[George Washington]]'s [[Farewell Address]] that "religion and morality are indispensable supports" to political prosperity.<ref>[http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/facts/democrac/49.htm United States Department of State] George Washington, farewell address, 1796</ref><ref>Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary has the following definition of conservative: "tending or disposed to maintain existing views, conditions, or institutions : TRADITIONAL"[http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/conservative] Therefore, a conservative Christian would be one that tends to adhere to the morally sound doctrines of the early Christianity and [[Judeo-Christian]] values.</ref>

Former President [[Ronald Reagan]] said, "The basis of conservatism is a desire for less government interference or less centralized authority or more individual freedom."<ref>http://www.reason.com/news/show/29318.html</ref>
[[Image:Aaag.jpg|thumb|Ronald Reagan, the 40th President of the United States, is the epitome of American conservatism.]]

The ''sine qua non'' of a conservative is someone who rises above his personal self-interest and promotes moral and economic values beneficial to all. Alternatively, a conservative is willing to learn and advocate the insights of economics and the morality of the [[Bible]] for the benefit of all, recognizing that the Bible is the most logical book ever written. Specifically, conservatives seek or support:

* [[Classroom prayer]]
* Prohibition of [[abortion]]
* [[Abstinence]] education
* Traditional marriage, not [[same-sex marriage]]
* Respect for [[differences between men and women]], boys and girls
* Laws against [[pornography]]
* The [[Second Amendment]] right to keep and bear arms
* Economic allocative efficiency (as opposed to popular equity)
* The [[death penalty]]
* Parental control of education
* Private medical care and [[retirement plan]]s
* Canceling failed social support programs
* No [[world government]]
* Enforcement of current laws regarding [[immigration]]
* Respect for our military ... past and present
* Rejection of [[junk science]] such as [[evolution]] and [[global warming]]
* Low taxes, especially for families
* Confederationism (less power for the federal government and more for local and state governments)
* A strong [[national defense]]
__TOC__ 
==Hall of Fame==
Conservative scholar Clinton Rossiter<ref> Rossiter, "The Giants of American Conservatism," ''American Heritage'' 1955 6(6): 56-59, 94-96, online in [[EBSCO]]</ref> names [[Alexander Hamilton]], [[John Adams]], [[John Marshall]], [[Daniel Webster]], [[John C. Calhoun]], [[Elihu Root]], and [[Theodore Roosevelt]] to the "Conservative's Hall of Fame,"'' with John Adams as the greatest of American conservatives.

===Presidents===
Periodically a conservative has been elected president of the United States. The most prominent conservative presidents include:
*[[George Washington]] (1789-1797)
*[[James Monroe]] (1817-1825)
*[[Grover Cleveland]] (1885-1889, 1893-1897)
*[[Warren G. Harding]] (1921-1923)
*[[Calvin Coolidge]] (1923-1929)
*[[Ronald Reagan]] (1981-1989)
*[[George W. Bush]] (2001-2009) (with respect to taxes, Supreme Court nominations, and national security)

The most prominent conservative Congresses have been:

*The 80th Congress (elected in 1946)
*The 104th Congress (elected in 1994)

===Movement===
[[Movement conservatives]] are those who accept the logic of conservatism across-the-board, and stand up for its powerful principles despite liberal ridicule. Movement conservative activists include:
*[[Phyllis Schlafly]], opposed [[ERA]]
*[[Larry McDonald]], Congressman, on board [[KAL 007]] when shot down by the Soviets near [[Moneron Island]].
*[[Jesse Helms]], Senator, specialist in foreign policy
*[[Pat Buchanan]], TV commentator
*[[Jerry Falwell]], religion
*[[Michele Bachmann]], columnist
*[[Ann Coulter]], columnist
*[[Rush Limbaugh]], radio
*[[Michelle Malkin]], commentator
*[[Glenn Beck]], TV commentator

===Key leaders===
*[[Barry Goldwater]] - 1964 Republican candidate, lost to liberal Democrat [[Lyndon Johnson]] but revived the conservative movement inside the GOP
*[[Russell Kirk]] - Theorist & intellectual
*[[Irving Kristol|Irving]] and [[William Kristol]] - Notable [[neoconservatives]]
*[[Margaret Thatcher]] - British prime minister between 1979 and 1990, held similar views as Reagan
*[[Milton Friedman]] - Chicago-school [[libertarian]] economist, influential during Reagan administration; leader of the [[Chicago School of Economics]]

==US Voters==
In America, most conservatives support the [[Republican Party]], but not exclusively so. In the 2008 election, 35% of the voters identified themselves as conservatives. Of them, 78% voted for McCain and 20% for Obama, with the 20% accounting for Obama's margin of victory. Only 22% of the voters were liberal; they favored Obama 89%-10%. In the middle were 44% who called themselves moderates. They split for Obama by 60%-39%. (Minor candidates won 2% of the vote.)<ref> See [http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/polls/#USP00p1 Presidential 2008 Exit Poll]</ref>
[[File:Conservative-republican-brain.jpg|thumb|350px]]
===Religious differences between political conservatives and political liberals===
The Barna poll conducted in November 2008 shows significant differences between the 32% of Americans who called themselves as “mostly conservative” on social and political matters; and the 17% who called themselves “mostly liberal” on social and political matters. The others --50%--were moderates with positions somewhere in-between.<ref> See [http://www.barna.org/barna-update/article/13-culture/258-survey-shows-how-liberals-and-conservatives-differ-on-matters-of-faith on line results] </ref>

Some findings:
Political liberals are less than half as likely as political conservatives to firmly believe that the Bible is totally accurate in all of the principles it teaches (27% versus 63%, respectively); to strongly believe that Satan is real (17% versus 36%); and to firmly contend that they have a personal responsibility to share their religious beliefs with others (23% versus 48%).

[Note: "Liberal" and "conservative" in this survey are based on politics]

Liberals are also far less likely than conservatives to strongly believe each of the following:
*their religious faith is very important in their life (54% of liberals vs. 82% of conservatives);
*a person cannot earn their way into Heaven by doing good deeds or being a good person (23% vs. 37%);
*their faith is becoming an increasingly important moral guide in their life (38% vs. 70%);
*the church they currently attend is very important in helping them find direction and fulfillment in life (37% vs. 62%);
*their primary purpose in life is to love God with all their heart, mind, strength and soul (43% vs. 76%);

political conservatives were more likely than liberals to:
*read the Bible, other than at church events, during the past week (57% vs. 33%, respectively)
*attend a religious service during the past week (62% vs. 35%)
*pray to God, other than at a religious service, during the past week (91% vs. 76%)
*share their religious beliefs with others, during the past year (56% vs. 39%, among the born again Christians interviewed from each segment)
*have ever participated in a short-term missions trip, either within the U.S. or in another country (12% vs. 6%)

*2% of conservatives and 11% of liberals were atheist or agnostic
*15% of conservatives and 2% of liberals were Christian evangelicals
*conservatives were twice as likely as liberals to be categorized as born again, based on their theological views about salvation (63% vs. 32%)
*21% of conservatives were associated with the Catholic church, compared to 30% among the liberals.

== Barack Obama and American Conservatism Backlash ==
In October of 2009, Niles Gardiner reported in the [[Britain|British]] newspaper ''The Daily Telegraph'':
{{cquote|This week’s striking [[Gallup]] poll on political ideology is further confirmation that the United States is in essence a conservative nation, which has ironically become even more conservative under [[Barack Obama]]. According to Gallup, 40 percent of Americans describe their political views as conservative, 36 percent as moderate and 20 percent as liberal. This is the first time conservatives have outnumbered moderates in America since 2004.<ref>http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/nilegardiner/100014891/barack-obama-has-failed-to-defeat-conservatism-in-america/</ref>}}

== Conservative news organizations ==
Some of the more notable news organizations which tend to be more conservative are [[WorldNetDaily]] and [[NewsMax]]. [[Fox News]], though often called conservative, tends to be more [[neoconservative]] than [[conservative]].

== Conservative magazines and blogs ==
Well known conservative magazines in the United States include ''[[National Review]]'', ''[[Policy Review]]'', ''[[The Weekly Standard]]'' and others.

Some notable [[Conservative blogs|conservative political blogs]] include the [[Heritage Foundation]]'s Policy Weblog, ''[[Human Events]]'', [[Michelle Malkin]], Newsbusters, Townhall.com and others.

== Neoconservatives ==

American commentators who ally themselves with the conservative movement but reject its religious or moral underpinnings are generally known as [[neoconservatives]].<ref>Jonah Goldberg, [http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZWMxNWNiNDJkY2JmNTExY2E1MzdkYWU3MWU1MTBiOGU= "What Is a 'Conservative'?"], [[National Review|National Review Online]], 11 May 2005</ref>

In the United States, conservatives are generally characterized by the following beliefs:

# Support of limited government.
# A preference for freedom of opportunity over equality of result.
# Patriotism, nationalism, and support of a strong defense.
# Support of the institution of marriage.
# Emphasis on social values, like prayer and pro-life principles.

In contrast, neoconservatives generally support bigger government and globalism, and tend to downplay the significance of social values.

== Paleoconservatives ==

[[Paleoconservatives]] are conservatives who are more focused on social issues and American sovereignty, and are suspicious of both big government and big business. They also lean against foreign interventionalism. Neoconservatives criticize this with the pejorative term of "isolationism," as they believe in promoting [[democracy]] worldwide, even where different religious or value systems are incompatible with democracy-induced changes in control.

Among paleoconservatives was Democratic Congressman from Georgia, [[Larry McDonald]]. He was also second Chairman of the [[John Birch Society]], and President of Western Goals. McDonald was aboard [[Korean Airlines Flight 007]] when it was shot down by the Soviets near [[Moneron Island]] in 1983.

== Personal conservatism ==
Because Conservatives often have strong political views, there can be a tendency to see conservatism as a purely political ideology. However, there is also a strong personal side to conservatism - being a conservative is as much about applying conservative values to one's everyday life as it is about campaigning and voting for conservative candidates. In general, conservatives can be characterized by a strong sense of personal [[morality]], a willingness to observe their culture's traditions and customs, and a desire to be respectable and to show due respect to other members of the community.
==History of American conservatism==
===Textbook problems===
College-level teaching about conservatism has been distorted by a "liberal state paradigm"--that is, textbooks usually interpret recent American history in terms of the origins and successes of political liberalism--especially the New Deal, the welfare state, labor unions, and Civil Rights for blacks and equality for women. Conservative politics is usually defined as a reaction: as a free market reply to the growth of big government; as an expression of outrage against declining support for tradition and Christian morality. Where the violent Wobblies (IWW) and illegal sit down strikes of the 1930s are seen as heroic, exposing Communist subversion by [[Joe McCarthy]] is denounced as the nadir of political morality.<ref> See Leonard Moore, "Approaching Conservatism," ''OAH Magazine of History,'' 17 (January 2003) [http://www.oah.org/pubs/magazine/conservatism/moore.html online edition]</ref>
===Loyalists===
The [[Loyalists]] of the [[American Revolution]] were mostly political conservatives, some of whom produced political discourse of a high order, including lawyer [[Joseph Galloway]] and governor-historian [[Thomas Hutchinson]]. However when the crisis came, they stood with the Crown as it tried to destroy American political liberties. After the war, the great majority remained in the U.S. and became citizens, but some leaders emigrated to other places in the British Empire. [[Samuel Seabury]] was a Loyalist who stayed and as the first American bishop played a major role in shaping the Episcopal religion, a stronghold of conservative social values. While the Loyalist political tradition died out totally it the U.S., it survives in Canadian conservatism.

===Founding Fathers===
The Founding Fathers created the single most important set of political ideas in American history, known as [[Republicanism]], which all groups, liberal and conservative alike, have drawn from. Two parties were named "Republican"-- the one founded in 1794 by Jefferson and Madison (it disappeared in the 1820s), and the modern GOP founded in 1854.

During the [[First Party System]] (1790s-1820s) the [[Federalist Party]], led by [[Alexander Hamilton]], developed an important variation of republicanism that can be considered conservative. Rejecting monarchy and aristocracy, they emphasized civic virtue as the core American value. The Federalists spoke for the propertied interests and the upper classes of the cities. They envisioned a modernizing land of banks and factories, with a strong army and navy. [[George Washington]] was their great hero.

On many issues American conservatism also derives from the republicanism of [[Thomas Jefferson]] and his followers, especially [[John Randolph of Roanoke]] and his "Old Republicans" or "Quids." They idealized the yeoman farmer as the epitome of civic virtue, warned that banking and industry led to corruption, that is to the illegitimate use of government power for private ends. Jefferson himself was a vehement opponent of what today is called "judicial activism".
<ref>[http://etext.virginia.edu/jefferson/quotations/jeff1030.htm]</ref> The Jeffersonians stressed small government.

===Ante-Bellum: Calhoun and Webster===
During the [[Second Party System]] (1830-54) the [[Whig Party]] attracted most conservatives, such as [[Daniel Webster]] of New England. [[Daniel Webster]] and other leaders of the [[Whig Party]], called it the conservative party in the late 1830s.<ref>The word was originally used in the French Revolution. The British used it after 1839 to describe a major party. The first American usage is by Whigs who called themselves "Conservatives" in the late 1830s. Hans Sperber and Travis Trittschuh, ''American Political terms: An Historical Dictionary'' (1962) 94-97.</ref> [[John C. Calhoun]], a Democrat, articulated a sophisticated conservatism in his writings. Richard Hofstadter (1948) called him "The Marx of the Master Class." Calhoun argued that a conservative minority should be able to limit the power of a "majority dictatorship" because tradition represents the wisdom of past generations. (This argument echoes one made by [[Edmund Burke]], the founder of British conservatism, in ''Reflections on the Revolution in France'' (1790)). Calhoun is considered the father of the idea of minority rights, a position adopted by liberals in the 1960s in dealing with Civil Rights.

The conservatism of the antebellum period is contested territory; conservatives of the 21st century disagree over what comprises their heritage. Thus William J. Bennett (2006) a prominent conservative leader, warns conservatives to NOT honor Calhoun, [[Know-Nothings]], [[Copperheads (politics)|Copperheads]] and 20th century isolationists.

===Lincoln to Cleveland===
Since 1865 the [[History of the United States Republican Party|Republican party]] has identified itself with President [[Abraham Lincoln]], who was the ideological heir of the Whigs and of both Jefferson and Hamilton. As the [[Gettysburg Address]] shows, Lincoln cast himself as a second Jefferson bringing a second birth of freedom to the nation that had been born 86 years before in Jefferson's Declaration. The [[Copperheads (politics)|Copperheads]] of the Civil War reflected a reactionary opposition to modernity of the sort repudiated by modern conservatives. A few libertarians have adopted a neo-Copperhead position, arguing Lincoln was a dictator who created an all-powerful government.

In the late 19th century the [[Bourbon Democrat]]s, led by President [[Grover Cleveland]], preached against corruption, high taxes (protective tariffs), and imperialism, and supported the [[gold standard]] and business interests. They were overthrown by [[William Jennings Bryan]] in 1896, who moved the mainstream of the Democratic Party permanently to the left.

The 1896 presidential election was the first with a conservative versus liberal theme in the way in which these terms are now understood. Republican [[William McKinley]] won using the pro-business slogan "[[sound money]] and protection," while Bryan's anti-bank populism had a lasting effect on economic policies of the Democratic Party.

[[William Graham Sumner]], Yale professor (1872-1910) and polymath, vigorously promoted a libertarian conservative ethic. After dallying with [[Social Darwinism]] under the influence of [[Herbert Spencer]], he rejected evolution in his later works, and strongly opposed imperialism. He opposed monopoly and [[paternalism]] in theory as a threat to equality, democracy and middle class values, but was vague on what to do about it.<ref>Curtis, Bruce. "William Graham Sumner 'On the Concentration of Wealth.'" Journal of American History 1969 55(4): 823-832.</ref>

===Early 20th century===
In the [[Progressive Era]] (1890s-1932), regulation of industry expanded as conservatives led by Senator [[Nelson Aldrich]] of Rhode Island were put on the defensive. However, Aldrich's proposal for a strong national banking system was enacted as the [[Federal Reserve System]] in 1913. [[Theodore Roosevelt]], the dominant personality of the era, was both liberal and conservative by turns. As a liberal he took a tough regulatory approach toward businesses and trusts, and (post-presidency) fought for social insurance for the elderly. As a conservative he led the fight to make the country a major naval power, and demanded entry into [[World War I]] to stop what he saw as the German attacks on civilization. [[William Howard Taft]] promoted a strong federal judiciary that would overrule excessive legislation. Taft defeated Roosevelt on that issue in 1912, forcing Roosevelt out of the GOP and turning it to the right for decades. As president, Taft remade the [[Supreme Court of the United States|Supreme Court]] with five appointments; he himself presided as chief justice in 1921-30, the only former president ever to do so.

Pro-business Republicans returned to dominance in 1920 with the election of President [[Warren G. Harding]]. The presidency of [[Calvin Coolidge]] (1923-29) was a high water mark for conservatism, both politically and intellectually. Classic writing of the period includes ''Democracy and Leadership'' (1924) by Irving Babbitt and H.L. Mencken's magazine ''American Mercury'' (1924-33). The [[Efficiency Movement]] attracted many conservatives such as [[Herbert Hoover]] with its pro-business, pro-engineer approach to solving social and economic problems. In the 1920s many American conservatives generally maintained anti-foreign attitudes and, as usual, were disinclined toward changes to the healthy economic climate of the age.

During the [[Great Depression, U.S.|Great Depression]], other conservatives participated in the taxpayers' revolt at the local level. From 1930 to 1933, Americans formed as many as 3,000 taxpayers' leagues to protest high [[property tax]]es. These groups endorsed measures to limit and rollback taxes, lowered penalties on tax delinquents, and cuts in government spending. A few also called for illegal resistance (or tax strikes). The best known of these was led by the Association of Real Estate Taxpayers in Chicago which, at its height, had 30,000 dues-paying members.

An important intellectual movement, calling itself [[Southern Agrarians]] and based in Nashville, brought together like-minded novelists, poets and historians who argued that modern values undermined the traditions of American [[Republicanism]] and civic virtue.

The Depression brought liberals to power under President [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]] (1933). Indeed the term "liberal" now came to mean a supporter of the [[New Deal]] and Roosevelt's powerful [[New Deal Coalition]]. In 1934 [[Al Smith]] and pro-business Democrats formed the [[American Liberty League]] to fight the new liberalism, but failed to stop Roosevelt's shifting the Democratic party to the left. In 1936 the Republicans rejected Hoover and tried the more liberal [[Alf Landon]], who carried only Maine and Vermont. When Roosevelt tried to pack the Supreme Court in 1937 the conservatives finally cooperated across party lines and defeated it with help from Vice President [[John Nance Garner]]. Roosevelt unsuccessfully tried to purge the conservative Democrats in the 1938 election. The conservatives in Congress then formed a bipartisan informal [[Conservative Coalition]] of Republicans and southern Democrats. It largely controlled Congress from 1937 to 1964. Its most prominent leaders were Senator [[Robert Taft]], a Republican of Ohio, and Senator [[Richard Russell]], Democrat of Georgia.
[[Image:Gop-plank.JPG|thumb|275px|1936 cartoon shows GOP building its platform from the conservative planks abandoned by the Democrats]]

In the United States, the [[Old Right]], also called the Old Guard, was a group of [[libertarianism|libertarian]], free-market anti-interventionists, originally associated with Midwestern Republicans and Southern Democrats. The Republicans (but not the southern Democrats) were isolationists in 1939-41, (see [[America First]]), and later opposed [[NATO]] and U.S. military intervention in the Korean War.

===Later 20th century: Goldwater, Buckley, the Dixiecrats===
By 1950, American liberalism was so dominant intellectually that liberal critic [[Lionel Trilling]] could dismiss contemporary conservatism as "irritable mental gestures which seek to resemble ideas." <ref>Lapham 2004</ref> But just as Trilling was writing a revival was underway. In the 1950s, principles for a conservative political movement were hashed out in books like Russell Kirk's ''The Conservative Mind'' (1953) and in the highly influential new magazine ''National Review'', founded by [[William F. Buckley Jr.]] in 1955.

Whereas Taft's [[Old Right]] had been isolationist the new conservatism favored American intervention overseas to oppose communism. It looked to the Founding Fathers for historical inspiration as opposed to Calhoun and the antebellum South.

The success of the Civil Rights movement came in the Civil Rights Act of 1864 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Most conservatives supported both, but [[Barry Goldwater]] opposed them. Until then southern whites (both liberal and conservative) had been locked into the Democratic party. That lock was now broken and southern conservatives started voting for Republican candidates for president in 1964-68, and by the 1990s they were also voting for GOP candidates for state and local office. The southern blacks now began to vote in large numbers, and they became Democrats, moving that party in the south to the left. By 2000, for the first time, all southern states had a conservative GOP and a liberal Democratic party. The region favored the GOP heavily in presidential elections, but split in state contests. In 2008, however, the Obama campaign broke into the solid Republican South, carrying Florida, Virginia and North Carolina.

Goldwater, a charismatic figure whose intense opposition to all New Deal programs angered liberals, was defeated in a landslide in 1964. Goldwater faded and his supporters regrouped under new leadership, especially that of [[Ronald Reagan]] in California, and regained strength nationally in the 1966 elections. Conservatives voted for [[Richard Nixon]] in 1968, who narrowly defeated the New Deal champion [[Hubert Humphrey]], and southern demagogue [[George Wallace]]. Nixon had come to terms with both the Goldwater wing of the party and the still-influential Rockefeller Republicans (Republicans from the Northeast who supported many New Deal programs).

===Nixon, Reagan, and Bush===

The Republican administrations of President [[Richard Nixon]] in the [[1970s]] were characterized more by their emphasis on ''[[realpolitik]]'', [[détente]], and economic policies such as wage and price controls, than by their adherence to conservative rhetoric and more liberal actions.

In the eight years of [[Ronald Reagan]]'s presidency 1981-89 the American conservative movement achieved ascendancy. In 1980 the GOP took control of the Senate for the first time since 1954, and conservative principles dominated Reagan's economic and foreign policies, with [[supply side economics]] as well as a strict opposition to Soviet Communism. Reagan promised to cut welfare spending but failed to do so. He did cut taxes, but raised military spending and created large federal deficits of the sort conservatives had complained about for decades. They stopped complaining, as the deficit issue switched to favor the Democrats (who did balance the budget in the late 1990s).

An icon of the American conservative movement, Reagan is credited by his supporters with transforming American politics, galvanizing the Republican Party, uniting a coalition of economic conservatives who supported his supply side economic policies, known as "[[Reaganomics]]," foreign policy conservatives who favored his success in stopping and rolling back Communism, and social conservatives who identified with Reagan's conservative religious and social ideals.

==Conservatives in Australia==

Australia was once more conservative than England but sweeping [[gun control]] laws pushed the nation leftward toward greater dependency on government in the last decade. In 2009, opposition to government control based on alleged [[global warming]] galvanized conservatives there and they led the [[Liberal Party of Australia]] to a repudiation of an emissions trading scheme.<ref>http://www.smh.com.au/national/shock-result-as-abbott-wins-liberal-leadership-by-one-vote--ets-dead-20091201-k1uz.html</ref> Conservatives also support smaller political parties such as the [[Family First Party]].

==Conservatives in Britain==

In the United Kingdom the present parliamentary opposition party since 1997 is the [[Conservative Party]]. Its current leader is [[David Cameron]].<ref>[http://www.conservatives.com Conservative party UK]</ref>

Up until the mid-19th century, the forerunners of the Conservatives were known as [[Tory|Tories]], and the name has persisted as a common nickname both for the political party and those believed to be in agreement with it. Since the mid-to-late 1970s, British conservatives have been defined by an advocacy of [[laissez-faire]] economics, privatization and lower taxation. In recent years the Conservative Party has moved away from the social conservatism which once characterized it, and the current party policy includes, for example, support for abortion on demand and gay civil partnership and the Kyoto Treaty and to oppose capital punishment (although it should be noted that such policies have little support among the party's grassroots membership) <ref>John Charmley, ''A History of Conservative Politics Since 1830'', (2nd ed. 2008) </ref>

Levels of prayer and worship are much lower in England and Wales than in the U.S., and religious issues thereby play less of a role in public discourse. However, religious issues remain a significant factor in [[Northern Ireland]] and in 2008 religious issues were significant during a special election in [[Scotland]].

In common with conservatives in many other countries, British Conservatives tend towards a patriotic rather than internationalist outlook, and are traditionally skeptical of the [[European Union]].

The broadcast media (dominated by the [[BBC]]) is almost exclusively liberal in tone. The print media is different with pro-Conservative newspapers like the ''Daily Mail'' , ''Daily Express'' and ''Daily Telegraph'' selling more copies than their rivals.<ref>[http://www.mediauk.com/the_knowledge/i.muk/An_introduction_to_newspapers_in_the_UK Media UK; Introduction to newspapers in the UK]</ref>

== Conservatism and the French Revolution ==

Conservatism in France and the continent generally arose in the after 1790 as a response to the radicalism of the [[French Revolution]].

== Benefits of Conservatism ==

Several facets of conservatism function in unison to make it an effective and powerful philosophy. Conservatism emphasizes personal freedom, independence, and initiative; this allows the [[best of the public]] to rise to their natural level of achievement. Conservatives recognize that [[big government]] fosters dependency and stifles individual achievement--and thus, weakens society as a whole.

At the same time, conservatives also recognize that with individual freedom comes individual responsibility. In the absence of a hand-holding [[nanny state]], it is imperative that each individual take responsibility for his own actions, and exercise his rights and freedoms wisely and with discretion. Thus, [[social conservatism]] is also critical to a successful society, as it emphasizes the importance of morality, duty, and responsibility to one's self and fellow men.

== Also See ==
*[[Conservative resources]]
*[[Previous Breaking News/Conservatives|Articles about '''Conservatives''' from previous "Breaking News"]]
*[[More News/Conservatives|Articles about '''Conservatives''' from "More News"]]
*[[Conservative Links]]
*[[Essay:Fair and balanced is not part of the Conservative platform]]
*[[Conservative politicians]]
*[[Liberal]]

==Further reading==
* Critchlow, Donald T. ''The Conservative Ascendancy: How the GOP Right Made Political History'' (2007)
* Filler, Louis. ''Dictionary of American Conservatism The First Complete Guide to Issues, People, Organizations and Events'' (1987), useful older encyclopedia
* Frank, Thomas. ''What's the Matter with Kansas?: How Conservatives Won the Heart of America'' (2005), a liberal perspective [http://www.amazon.com/Whats-Matter-Kansas-Conservatives-America/dp/080507774X/ref=sr_1_1/103-4827826-5463040?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1193685789&sr=1-1 excerpt and text search]
* Frohnen, Bruce et al eds. ''American Conservatism: An Encyclopedia'' (2006), the most detailed reference
* Judis, John B. ''William F. Buckley, Jr.: Patron Saint of the Conservatives'' (1988) [http://www.amazon.com/William-F-Buckley-Jr-Conservatives/dp/0743217977/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1207759425&sr=8-1 excerpt and text search]
* Kirk, Russell. ''The Conservative Mind''. (7th ed. 2001). highly influential conservative history of ideas [http://www.historyebook.org/ online at ACLS e-books]
* Link, William A. ''Righteous warrior: Jesse Helms and the rise of modern conservatism'' (2008) 643 pages
* Micklethwait, John, and Adrian Wooldridge. ''The Right Nation,'' (2004) influential survey [http://www.amazon.com/Right-Nation-Conservative-Power-America/dp/B000F71124/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1205919226&sr=1-1 excerpt and text search]
* Micklethwait, John, and Adrian Wooldridge. ''God Is Back: How the Global Revival of Faith Is Changing the World'' (2009)
* Nash, George. ''The Conservative Intellectual Movement in America Since 1945'' (2006), excellent scholarly history. [http://www.amazon.com/Conservative-Intellectual-Movement-America-Since/dp/1933859121/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1241925238&sr=1-2 excerpt and text search]
*Pemberton, William E. ''Exit with Honor: The Life and Presidency of Ronald Reagan'' (1998) [http://www.questia.com/library/book/exit-with-honor-the-life-and-presidency-of-ronald-reagan-by-william-e-pemberton.jsp online edition]
*Perlstein, Rick. ''Before the Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus'' (2004) on 1964 [http://www.amazon.com/Before-Storm-Goldwater-Unmaking-Consensus/dp/0809028581/ref=sr_1_1/103-4827826-5463040?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1193684721&sr=8-1 excerpt and text search]
*Perlstein, Rick. ''Nixonland: The Rise of a President and the Fracturing of America'' (2008) [http://www.amazon.com/Nixonland-Rise-President-Fracturing-America/dp/074324303X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1241924189&sr=1-1 excerpt and text search]
* Schneider, Gregory L. ed. ''Conservatism in America Since 1930: A Reader'' (2003)
*Schoenwald; Jonathan . ''A Time for Choosing: The Rise of Modern American Conservatism'' (2002) [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=104931191 online edition] also [http://www.historyebook.org/ online at ACLS e-books]
* Schweizer, Peter, and Wynton C. Hall, eds. ''Landmark Speeches of the American Conservative Movement'' (2007) [http://www.amazon.com/Landmark-Speeches-American-Conservative-Movement/dp/1585445983/ref=sr_1_4/103-4827826-5463040?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1193685365&sr=1-4 excerpt and text search]

== References ==
{{reflist|2}}

==External Links==
*[http://www.aim.org/wls/category/conservatives/ What Liberals Say - Category: Conservatives], [[Accuracy In Media]]
*[http://www.youtube.com/user/rescueKAL007#p/a/FD3DE4F0642C350C/0/1c8v-kgLvhM Pat Buchanan's "Crossfire" interview with [[Larry McDonald]] 3 months before downing of [[KAL 007]], Ron Paul intro]

[[Category:Conservative]]
[[Category:Taxation]]
[[Category:American History]]
[[Category:Reagan Era]]
[[Category:1960s]]
[[Category:New Deal]]

*[http://www.conservativedirectory.com Directory of Conservative Websites - Category: Conservatives], [[Politics]]

[[Category:Conservative]]
{{Conservatism}}

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-11-09T23:09:11Z

ChuckR:

"crisis" should read "Cuban Missile Crisis", please.

== Not Fair ==
It is not entirely fair to lay the blame of the failure of the Bay of Pigs squarely at JFK's feet. There was a lot of urging from the CIA and the military NOT to go ahead with American military itervention on behalf of the insurgents. Considering the atmosphere of the world at that time, I can't say listening to them was a horrible idea. Regrettable that the operation was botched, but the reasons why it was botched are not 100% of JFK's doing.

And it's quite interesting that the hawks in his administration that urged him NOT to intervene in Bay of Pigs are the ones who the author of this article quite cleverly insinuates are the reason why Kennedy kept us safe through the Cuban Missle Crisis, as if without them Kennedy would have been inept. If you're looking for the slightest reasons to praise the hawks in his administration, even if it is to just lessen JFK's abilities as an individual, you could have made mention of the hawks being the driving force behind not intervening in Bay of Pigs, and thus applauded them for it in the process (when keeping in mind that not risking such a blatant and overt challenge to the USSR that would not have been necesary and risked TERRIBLE reprecussions...). But it looks like the author of this article was too concerned with finding anything to blame on Kennedy, and thus missed their opportunity to render more praise unto the conservative hawks. [[User:Jros83|Jros83]] 02:30, 25 June 2007 (EDT)

:To add to the Bay of Pigs discussion, the CIA under Eisenhower actually made the plan, it was recomended to Kennedy once he took office. The way this page reads is as though he is 100% totally at fault for everything. I think he was a do-nothing president that is only popular because he was assasinated, but seriously folks, lets calm down the rhetoric. ALSO: I changed the reference about him being the "youngest president". He was the youngest person ever ELECTED president, but Teddy Roosevelt was actually a year or two younger than Kennedy when he took office. I didn't want to re-write the whole section, but I figured I'd throw in a minor correction. [[User:JamesBenjamin|JamesBenjamin]] 18:54, 29 June 2007 (EDT)

== Sordid personal life ==
Okay, I've tried twice to include something about how Kennedy was a sex fiend and twice they were scrubbed right away. I expect this lionizing nonsense from Wikipedia but I thought the point of this was that conservatives could actually post relevant information about entries of importance without having it waxed by Marxist Wikipedia editors. If I'm missing something, then please tell me why [[User:Billdozer|Billdozer]]
:Show us solid, verifyable evidence from official sources that Kennedy was such a man, and we'll include it. [[User:Karajou|Karajou]] 22:38, 11 March 2008 (EDT)

What's a solid, official source? There isn't an official source that says Bill Clinton was, um, serviced by an intern in the Oval Office, but everyone in the world knows it to be true. Similarly, there were no shortage of witnesses who could attest to JFK's ravenous sexual apptetite. [[User:Billdozer|Billdozer]]
:Witnesses came out within weeks testifying as to Bill and Monica's indiscretions; plus there's past indiscretions all over Arkansas, such as Paula Jone's and others lawsuits. These, at the least, made the newspapers at that time. I want to see similar patterns for Kennedy, reported in the newspapers at the time he was a U.S. senator, as well as when he was a U.S. president. [[User:Karajou|Karajou]] 05:47, 12 March 2008 (EDT)

There are other reliable sources than newspapers. The newspapers wouldn't even have printed Clinton's misdoings if the Drudge Report hadn't forced the case into the open. The press was well aware of what JFK was really like but they protected him, as the press tends to do for left-wing presidents. But good luck finding a JFK biography, even a glowing one, that doesn't at least acknowledge some sort of pattern of sexual misconduct. [[User:Billdozer|Billdozer]]

== new material added ==

::{{template|Part of this article was copied from [[Conservapedia]] but the copied text was originally written by me, RJJensen (under the name Richard Jensen) and does not include alterations made by others on that site.||category=Copied Articles}} [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 19:03, 22 November 2008 (EST)

== JFK a conservative? What? ==

I take issue with the two sentences, "JFK, like his family, was middle-of-the-road on domestic issues and conservative on foreign policy" and "The Kennedy family represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party"

Since when did the Kennedys represent the conservative wing of the Democratic party? All of them are liberal stalwarts. As for his foreign policy, it was his idea to pull out of Vietnam, among other things. As far as domestic policy, he was definitely liberal; his civil rights plank, championing of a Medicare-type program, Peace Corps, etc.

I motion that the first sentence be revised to "JFK, like his family, was liberal on domestic issues and middle-of-the-road on foreign policy" and that the second sentence be dropped entirely. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 19:28, 17 October 2009 (EDT)
::Joe Kennedy was always one of the main leaders and financiers of the conservative wing of the Dem party, and was a main supporter of Joe MvcCarthy; Bobby was an aide and supporter of Joe McCarthy. They were all strongly anti-communist and very critical of labor unions (which were much more powerful in those days). The Peace Corps was the main "liberal" achievement, though conservatives have not opposed it. It was JFK who sent forces INTO Cuba and Vietnam to fight Communism. His civil rights plank in 1960 was just about the same as the GOP plank. He did not champion Medicare. The surviving Kennedys turned left after JFK was killed and the father had a stroke. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 17:18, 2 November 2009 (EST)
:::I know that the Kennedys were staunch anti-communists, but I've never heard JFK--or the Kennedy family--described as conservative. Any citations you could make? Also, as for Cuba and Vietnam, one, Cuba changed his opinion on foreign policy. After the Cuban Missile Crisis, Kennedy's foreign policy went from being center-right to being center-left, and his calls for peace and negotiations replaced hawkish rhetoric. Secondly, Kennedy actually wanted to pull out of Vietnam, and had started the motions to do so before he was assassinated. Johnson reversed it, and escalated it. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 21:55, 2 November 2009 (EST)
::::sending combat forces into both Cuba and Vietnam to stop Communism is pretty dramatic example of a conservative foreign policy, not to mention forcing the Russians out of Cuba. In domestic policy he took many conservative positions: he opposed unions (esp Teamsters), opposed deficit spending, and supported tax cuts. He never supported abortion in any form, or gay rights. And (in 1960) he moved the country to acceptance of Roman Catholicism. Finally, he was opposed by the major liberals of the day (E. Roosevelt, Humphrey, Stevenson); for his VP he picked Johnson, considered a conservative at the time. The Kennedy family was known for leading the support of Joe McCarthy in 1950s. As for what people say, try Googling "jfk" and "conservative" and look at the 2 million hits.[[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 22:54, 2 November 2009 (EST)
:::::
Well, first of all, if you Google "FDR" and "Conservative" you get 9,510,000 hits. I guess this makes Old Man Roosevelt the greatest conservative of all time then, eh?

Anyway, let's take a walk through history, shall we? Here's a list of some of Kennedy's liberal traits.

First of all, JFK supported the withdrawal of troops from Vietnam. Not only is this confirmed by Robert McNamara in his film "The Fog of War," but an audio recording of then-Vice President Lyndon Johnson referring to this plan of Kennedy's is also shown. Also, consult Kennedy's National Security Action Memorandum 263, from October 1963, which called for the removal of 1,000 armed forces personnel to be removed by the end of the year.

Yes, Kennedy was--for a long time--a foreign policy hawk. No question. But by the last year of his life (post-Bay of Pigs), he was moving in a more dovish direction. He negotiated the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, and gave a famous speech about world peace at American University on June 10, 1963. http://www1.media.american.edu/speeches/Kennedy.htm

Secondly, John F. Kennedy's tax cut was a demand-side tax cut, not a supply-side cut; Ronald Reagan he was not. You could argue whether a present-day liberal would institute such a measure (probably not), but no conservative would either. http://www.slate.com/id/2093947/ A good article about this.

Your talk of Kennedy not supporting civil rights seems to neglect the entire last two years of his life. Kennedy deployed federal marshalls in 1962 to allow James Meredith to enroll in his first class at the University of Mississippi. Furthermore, after George Wallace infamously blocked the doorway of University of Alabama, John F. Kennedy gave one of his most famous speeches, his civil rights speech, on June 11, 1963. In it, he proposed what would become the Civil Rights Act of 1964. You can find a transcript here: http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Reference+Desk/Speeches/JFK/003POF03CivilRights06111963.htm It is startling to me that you don't know of this. Also note that John, along with brother Robert, helped secure Martin Luther King's release from prison http://www.lib.lsu.edu/hum/mlk/srs216.html

Your claim in the main article that Kennedy never claimed to be a liberal is false. One of his most famous quotes is this, from September 1960, in accepting the New York Liberal Party nomination: "If by a "Liberal" they mean someone who looks ahead and not behind, someone who welcomes new ideas without rigid reactions, someone who cares about the welfare of the people — their health, their housing, their schools, their jobs, their civil rights, and their civil liberties — someone who believes we can break through the stalemate and suspicions that grip us in our policies abroad, if that is what they mean by a "Liberal," then I'm proud to say I'm a "Liberal."" Also note the mention of civil rights.

By saying that Kennedy never supported abortion or gay rights, you're creating a false strawman. Abortion and gay rights were not issues in the 1960s; by this measure, you could just as easily claim that Nixon and Goldwater were liberals because they didn't (between 1961 and 1963) speak out against those two issues. Fact of the matter is, abortion didn't become a major political issue until Roe v. Wade. Had Kennedy lived, and opposed abortion through the 1970s, you may have had a point. The Democrats didn't introduce a gay rights plank to their party platform until 1976; the Republicans didn't introduce one in opposition until 1992.

But while we're talking about modern issues, here's President Kennedy arguing for '''''universal health care''''' in May of 1962 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14A1zxaHpD8

Kennedy signed Omnibus Housing Bill 1961, which proposed spending $3.19 billion on a massive government housing program for the working poor. It also called for the creation of the Department of Housing and Urban Urban Affairs.

Kennedy opposed the quota system for immigration, saying it had "no basis in either logic or reason." He said to Congress on July 23, 1963: "It neither satisfies a national need nor accomplishes an international purpose. In an age of interdependence among nations, such a system is an anachronism for it discriminates among applicants for admission into the United States on the basis of the accident of birth." (Kennedy, John F., Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., 1964, pp. 594-597.)

Kennedy signed HR5143, which abolished the death penalty for first-degree murder in Washington DC.

As for Kennedy and FDR, read "Ask Not: The Inauguration of John F. Kennedy and the Speech That Changed America." Franklin Roosevelt was one of Kennedy's heroes. His "Ask not..." quote and "New Frontier" were efforts to mimick FDR's "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself" and "New Deal," respectively

It's also funny that you claim that the Kennedy family represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party; Joseph Kennedy Sr. strongly opposed the Lend-Lease Act and indeed, any aid to Great Britain at all. In 1940, he famously proclaimed "Democracy is finished in England. It may be here." He supported Chamberlain's policy of appeasement; read "The Dark Side of Camelot" by Seymour Hersh for more. So yes, the elder Kennedy did oppose FDR, but from his LEFT, not his right.

John F. Kennedy Kennedy established the President’s Commission on the Status of Women to examine issues of women's equality. Who chaired this group? Eleanor Roosevelt, whom you claim he opposed.

It's ashame that you felt the need to lock the page, enshrining your uncited and biased new article as "fact," and stifling what should be a robust debate and exchange of ideas. It also upsets me that you think I should "read more and think more," when clearly you aren't aware of (or simply chose not to mention) a great deal of what Kennedy believed or what policy directives his administration took. You do bring up good points about areas of his conservatism; he was a hawk for a while, he was tough on crime, etc. I don't mean to demean those points at all; you make them eloquently. But as I've clearly shown, he was quite liberal in many areas as well. My guess is, if he were alive today, he would probably be a Democrat in the mold of Joe Lieberman, or perhaps Evan Bayh. Hopefully, we can resolve this, and re-write the passage together to find a better balance, and more accurately show that Kennedy worked in both conservative and liberal directions in his long and illustrious career.
[[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 13:30, 5 November 2009 (EST)

'''Addendum''': In reviewing what I wrote, I realized I left out an important component: Medicare. You claimed that Kennedy "Never championed Medicare." This is incorrect. In fact, he championed it during both his campaign and his presidency, and was one of the individuals who actually popularized the moniker "Medicare." Review these links: 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpMNdYhRq90 President Kennedy explains importance of Medicare bill to Congress 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gu1HyCeEus&feature=related Candidate Kennedy defends Medicare 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFesycofKk4 Madison Square Garden debate with Medicare opponent Dr. Edward Annis 

On December 7, 1961, Kennedy said at the opening of the AFL-CIO Convention: "Those who are "too old to work and too young to die" must be protected through Social Security system against the staggering costs of medical care. The time has come, in this next session of the Congress, to face the fact that our elder citizens need these benefits-that their needs cannot be met in any other way-and that every member of the Congress should have an opportunity to vote this bill up, or vote it down and tell the people why."

In September 1961, he wrote to the Chairman of the Senate Special Committee on Aging: "I consider the proposal to provide health insurance for the aged under Social Security one of the most important measures I have advocated."

The Politics of Medicare is a good read. However, a Google Books search of "John F. Kennedy" and "Medicare" nets many more similar quotes to what I posted, as well as news reports from the 1960 campaign concerning his advocacy for Medicare. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 20:02, 8 November 2009 (EST)

::1) Kennedy sent the troops into Vietnam. He made the commitment. He did rotate units but there is no evidence he planned to end that commitment. That was wishful thinking by liberals who liked him.
 2) the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty had both liberal and conservative elements (esp as a device to control China)
 3) the tax cut was praised by Reagan and many conservatives in urging their own tax cuts in 1981.
 4) the quote "If by a "Liberal" they mean ..." avoids almost all the main liberal positions of the day, re taxes, spending and labor unions, for example. He of course had to say nice things because he needed the Liberal party line in the election.
 5) Kennedy enforced federal court orders but civil rights was low on his agenda and he was never a main supporter from 1948 till his death.
 6) Kennedy did oppose the quota immigration system of 1924--as did most conservatives too.
 7) Kennedy never supported abortion or gay rights, and always voted the conservative Catholic position on such issues.
 8) he signed the death penalty repeal which was on the liberal side
 9) Kennedy did admire FDR's political skills and rhetoric and tried to emulate them. As did Reagan.
 10) the 1940 business is a bit complicated because it's not clear how much JFK agreed with his father. His father represented the conservative opponents of aid to Britain, including for example Taft and Lindbergh. The left (John L Lewis) opposed aid because Russia strongly opposed aid to Britain.
 11) He needed Eleanor Roosevelt's support and appointed her. She was A CONSERVATIVE on women's issues and she strongly opposed the ERA.
 12) Medicare: yest hat was a liberal position Kennedy took. The articles says that he had a mixed record on domestic issues.
 13) "uncited and biased new article." if you call CP administrators names you'll get in trouble. I actually read all the books that are listed and I expect people to be familiar with come of them before they jump in. I you want to propose a paragraph, run it thrugh here first.[[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 20:37, 8 November 2009 (EST)
 
 
 
No one is calling you any names, for one. It is a matter of solid fact that the revision you put into the new article has very few citations and many statements of opinion that wouldn't be found in any reputable encyclopedia, conservative or otherwise. A statement like "Kennedy was basically a conservative, but he had to appeal to a primarily liberal base, so he offered symbols for the liberals while following a conservative course in foreign and domestic policy" that doesn't have a citation has no business being there.
 
Re: your list: 
1.) Re-read what I wrote concerning Kennedy and Vietnam, and watch The Fog of War. Kennedy made the commitment, but he also began taking the steps necessary to withdraw. In discussing this issue in the article, we should take steps to show that Kennedy became conflicted as the war dragged on. Take a look at this http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hs2AWQQgQffeC3pmWebC22GqdBGwD9BO80E80 
2.) Any sources for this claim? If you can provide some, I'm willing to concede the point and agree with you. However, in all that I've read, I have never seen such treaties described as being conservative. 
3.) Of course it was praised by Reagan; typically, when a president is trying to get a measure passed that has broad support within their base but little-to-none from the other party, they will invoke the memory of a president from the other party. Bush II did this with Franklin Roosevelt and Social Security. Candidate John Kerry did this with Ronald Reagan in talking about his foreign policy, etc. As I stated before, you're right, no liberal would pass a tax cut like this nowadays. HOWEVER, with it being a demand-side tax cut designed to benefit the working class (rather than a trickle-down tax cut), this is not something that many conservatives would enact either. 
4.) Whether what Kennedy described also applies to today's liberals is irrelevant. My point in bringing it up was to show you that your claim in the article--"Kennedy refused to call himself a liberal"--is patently inaccurate. 
5.) Your response here is simply inaccurate. Yes, Kennedy enforced court orders. And you're right, he was not a prominent supporter of civil rights for MOST of his life. But by 1963, this was changing. Again, I direct you to the speech he gave June 11, 1963. In it, he proposed what would become the Civil Rights Act of 1964. You can find a transcript here: http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Reference+Desk/Speeches/JFK/003POF03CivilRights06111963.htm 
6.) The sponsors of the Immigration and Nationality Act (which reformed the quotas)--Rep. Emanuel Celler and Sens. Phillip Hart and Ted Kennedy--were all Democrats. All opposition either came from Republicans or conservative Southern Democrats. I would describe this as a middle-of-the-road act at best. Kennedy considered this to be a matter of civil rights; http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=60440 
7.) I never disagreed with you here. All I did was state that these were NOT issues during the time Kennedy was active in politics (1948-1963). NO ONE supported gay rights or abortion at that time; neither were political issues. By that measure, FDR and Truman would both be conservatives, as neither of them spoke out in favor of either. You can't hold Kennedy to standards that didn't exist. Furthermore, your claim that he "always voted the conservative Catholic position on such issues" is also incorrect, as 1.) Those issues never came up in the senate, and 2.) There is no public record of John F. Kennedy's position on abortion or gay rights. 
8.) I'm glad we agree 
9.) More than admiring FDR's political skills, he also admired (most of) his policy decisions. Refer to Kennedy's speeches on Medicare, or again to "Ask Not" for more. 
10.) Whether JFK agreed with his dad is irrelevant. My reason in bringing up Joe Sr.'s appeasement beliefs was to refute your claim that the Kennedy family "represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party." That was not true during Joe Sr.'s time, and it wasn't true during JFK, RFK, and Ted's time. 
11.) Your statement here that Eleanor was a "CONSERVATIVE" flies in the face of what you said earlier (that she was one of the liberals that Kennedy opposed). Which is it? 
12.) No disagreements here. This was, however, in response to your claim that Kennedy "never championed Medicare." Clearly, he did. At least you admitted you were wrong. 
 
 
Have you really read the books I listed? Much less, viewed the speeches or other links I provided? Clearly, you still have some misconceptions about his record.
 
 
Also, I am not suggesting we revise the article to say that Kennedy was a flaming liberal. Of course he wasn't. But the way it stands now--with Kennedy being described as "basically conservative"--is simply inaccurate. Between Medicare, civil rights, $3.19 billion being spent on government housing, the promotion of the Department of Urban Affairs, the Peace Corps, his move to abolish the death penalty in DC, and reforming the quota system, clearly he was not "basically conservative." This article needs to take a more nuanced view, and reflect the fact that Kennedy held MANY liberal positions in addition to having some strong conservative stances as well.
 
 
As a final note, I would appreciate it (simply from a perspective of readability) if you could type more accurately and with less typos. As it stands now, your typos are frequent and egregious, and it takes me several moments to figure out what you mean. I don't mean this personally, it's just something that I'm struggling with; as a college professor, I'm sure you understand. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 21:20, 8 November 2009 (EST)
:::'''Addendum''': Also, it's pretty funny that you said "I you want to propose a paragraph, run it thrugh here first." (Translation: '''If you''' want to propose a paragraph, run it '''through''' here first"). Clearly, you did not do this yourself; you abused your administrator privileges by unilaterally inserting your own edits (with NO prior discussion) and then locking the article when others who dared to disagree with you attempted to edit your contributions. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 21:26, 8 November 2009 (EST)
 on 1), there is overwhelming proof that Kennedy escalated the commitment in Vietnam by a factor of 20; there is no contrary evidence. Fits hawk position.
 2) read a little more.
 3) JFK's rhetoric on tax cuts sounds like Milton Friedman. JFK fits "middle of road"
 4) read Leuchtenburg
 5) most Republicans voted for the Civil Rights Bill--conservatives in the North approved it. for a liberal view look at Humphrey and JFK. JFK fits "middle of road"
 6) The Dems controlled Congress and wrote most all the laws. But immigration reform in 1965 was bipartisan. The main opponents were Dems who controlled key committees. Fits "middle of road"
 7) JFK followed the very strict Catholic line on these issues--how conservative would you like?
 9) no. he rejected WPA-CCC-FERA model of relief of unemployment instead called for economic growth (esp Appalachia) and retraining as cure for poverty. Conservative here.
 10) Conservatives split in 1940 but at least half opposed Lend Lease. JFK's position is unclear. (His father and brother spoke out against it but he was quiet uin public and privately advised his father to support aid to Britain for political reasons. See O'Brien)
 11) Eleanor Roosevelt was normally a leading liberal but she strongly opposed the ERA, and that put her alongside the conservatives on the issue to which Kennedy appointed her.
 12) on Medicare JFK was on the liberal side and I was wrong to say otherwise. (He failed to get anything passed, however, and was considered a weak advocate.)
 the death penalty was not one of his issues. Public housing was still a bipartisan issue (Taft had coauthored the basic law.) he was mildly liberal on Department of Urban Affairs. In all, a mixed domestic record. As for foreign policy, he was strongly on the hawkish side and that included the Peace Corps as an anti-Communist agency. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 22:18, 8 November 2009 (EST)
 
 
You're still missing my point on several issues here, and either debating positions that I don't hold or creating strawmen.\
 1.) I am NOT suggesting that JFK didn't escalate Vietnam. He absolutely did escalate the conflict, and as you said, this clearly fits in the conservative category. As I mentioned in one of my first comments, Kennedy was a foreign policy hawk for most of his career. What I was trying to point out was that, post-Bay of Pigs/in his final year, Kennedy began to grow warier of our Vietnam commitment. At the very most, he wanted to pull out; at the very least, he was reconsidering. "Fog of War" evidences this, the audio tape of Johnson evidences this, and the AP link I provided re: the Kennedy tapes also evidences this. His National Security Memorandum withdrawing 1,000 personnel from active duty is even MORE proof of this. A discussion of Kennedy's foreign policy should account for the fact that he was a hawkish conservative for most of his life, but by his final year, was starting to move in a more dovish, liberal direction. Read his speech at American University re: World Peace.
 4.) I am NOT suggesting that the "liberal" that John F. Kennedy was describing equals the "liberal" of today. Of course it doesn't; as I have already stated numerous times, Kennedy would likely be a moderate or conservative Democrat today. The reason I mentioned this Kennedy quote is NOT to suggest that he would be a liberal of today's standards; I mentioned it because the article states that Kennedy "refused to call himself a liberal." This quote of his--where he quite literally calls himself a liberal--firmly proves otherwise.
 7.) I am not saying that John F. Kennedy disagreed with the Catholic line. I am not saying he held liberal positions on abortion or gay rights. What I am saying is this: to use the issues of abortion and gay rights to judge whether John F. Kennedy--a 1960s politician--is a liberal is anachronistic, misleading, and inaccurate. Abortion and gay rights were not political issues in the early-1960s, for one. Secondly, MOST politicians on both sides of the aisle held anti-abortion positions. It wasn't until the late-60s and early-70s that abortion even became an issue. Thirdly, gay rights was not even ''discussed'' in the 1960s; it didn't even make a Democratic party platform until 1976. Fourthly, Kennedy didn't speak publicly on any of these issues anyway. In summation: to oppose abortion and oppose gay rights in the early 60s was a very mainstream political position. This does not make Kennedy conservative. It places him well within the mainstream of the Democratic party in the early 1960s. As I am sure you will agree, America has become more liberal over the last 45 years. To judge a 1960 politician by what's considered liberal today isn't historically accurate.
 10.) Yes, JFK's position is unclear. I am not debating what JFK's position here was. The reason I mentioned this is in reference to the statement in the article that the Kennedys "represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party." For Joseph Kennedy to take liberal stances such as this one suggests that the Kennedys were not conservative stalwarts.
 
 
As for your other arguments:
 2.) I've read plenty, and I've not seen the Nuclear Test Ban treaty described as "conservative." I've seen it described as liberal plenty of times, and I've also read it described as being a middle-of-the-road, pragmatic measure. But never "conservative." The burden of proof is on you, sir; you are the one making the assertions.
 5.) Again, you are judging the 60s milieu by present-day ideological standards. To do and say the things JFK did with regards to civil rights--in particular in his June 11 speech--was most definitely a liberal move by 1963 standards.
 9.) As you said, he did call for retraining and economic growth. As for him "opposing" the WPA-CCC-FERA, all of those organizations were disbanded by 1948, when Kennedy first became active in politics. Again, a strawman. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 00:26, 9 November 2009 (EST)

'''Addendum''': The Peace Corps was not, is not, and has never been "an anti-communist agency." I'm not sure where you got that from. That's never been the general thrust of the Peace Corps, ever. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 00:27, 9 November 2009 (EST)
::::Joe Kennedy was pretty conservative on most issues--indeed that was a major reason so many liberals distrusted JFK. As for issues of morality, JFK always supported the most conservative moral position in his day as represented by the Catholic Church. On the Peace Corps see what the historians say: "The Peace Corps was not designed as an overseas antipoverty program; '''it was to be a weapon in the Cold War arsenal''', one President Kennedy hoped would demonstrate to the world that "a new generation of Americans has taken over this country ... young Americans [who will] serve the cause of freedom as servants of peace around the world, working for freedom as the communists work for their system." quote from ''The Politics of the Peace Corps & Vista'' By T. Zane Reeves (1988). Page 20. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 01:25, 9 November 2009 (EST)
::On unemployment remedies: that was a major issue in 1960-61 and liberals wanted a return to the New Deal solutions, whick Kennedy said NO. He instead picked the conservative options of growth and retraining.[[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 01:26, 9 November 2009 (EST)
::on Test ban: JFK and his closest advisers not only seriously discussed but also actively pursued the possibility of a joint military action with the Soviet Union against China's nuclear installations in early 1963. In their quest for a limited nuclear test ban, Kennedy and his associates sought to aggravate tensions between the Soviet Union and China to a point where the Soviets might join with the United States in a military act against China. see the important article by Gordon H. Chang "JFK, China, and the Bomb" ''Journal of American History'' 1988 74(4): 1287-1310 [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 01:31, 9 November 2009 (EST)
:::
 
A few things
 1.) I'm not denying that Kennedy adhered to Catholic doctrine re: morals. What I'm saying is this: it was not conservative to have such beliefs in the '40s, '50s, and early-'60s. In fact, it was quite mainstream. We can't use that as a litmus test for Kennedy's conservatism
 2.) You've scored a point here; I've not read "The Politics of the Peace Corps & Vista," and I was unaware that he considered it as such. I hadn't read his November 4, 1960 speech in Chicago from which that quote came from (pretty surprising, seeing as I've read most of his speeches). So, apologies there.
 3.) I was also unaware that there was a movement in the '60s to return to New Deal style programs of relief. However, does choosing the policies of growth and retraining make Kennedy conservative, or middle-of-the-road? Government-sponsored retraining especially seems like something that would either be considered moderate or maaaybe slightly liberal. So I would argue that, while Kennedy didn't align with liberals on this issue, he was more middle-of-the-road/moderate than he was truly conservative.
 4.) I've read the Chang article, and it buttressed what I said earlier about how the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty is frequently discussed as being moderate or pragmatic. It doesn't put forth any argument for the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty being a conservative measure. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 18:09, 9 November 2009 (EST)

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-11-09T05:27:41Z

ChuckR:

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-11-09T05:26:32Z

ChuckR:

User talk:RJJensen

2009-11-09T02:28:49Z

ChuckR: /* John F. Kennedy (again) */

[[/Archive 1]]
==Trinity==
You reverted my edits to the Trinity page, with the comment "The Trinity is Christian". I was a bit baffled by this, but then realized that I had used the Torah as a source. The Torah is just the Old Testament, and is part of the Christian Bible. I did not realize that my language would be so confusing (I am used to it, my parents converted from Judaism to Baptist Christians). You will find that much of the Hebrew Bible (The old Testament) supports Christian concepts. This is because Christian concepts are universal truths!

Haha, yeah the rain has been murderous all week long! I had the misfortune of planning to drive into Athens today, only to find all the roads underwater! I didn't realize until you messaged me that my talk page has the info intended for my user page, so thank you for your inadvertant help (also, yes, it appears my grammar died while I was writing it!) Are you from the area as well? Always good to meet a fellow southerner who understands the Obama Crisis. There are so many hayseed liberals down here it makes me sick! Don't worry tho, you won't hear me crying out for a confederate south:) Long live a STRONG CONSERVATIVE UNION, with a surplus export of integrity! [[User:RoyP|RoyP]] 20:33, 21 September 2009 (EDT)
::thanks for the update. I'm actually a Yankee now living in Montana, but I have had a strong interest in the South since I studiesd with C. Vann Woodward some years back.[[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 20:36, 21 September 2009 (EDT)
:::I can forgive a Yank, I used to be one (Mt. Vernon, Washington)! Unfortunately, that town's Conservative fervor lives solely in the words of one Glenn Beck (that man's done for intelligent conservatism what Sean Penn did for photographers dentistry.) [[User:RoyP|RoyP]] 20:45, 21 September 2009 (EDT)
::::Now, what kind of a snide insult is that? Beck is a thoughtful, honest fighter for the conservative cause, and if people are angered at the government by his exposés, all the better for the nation. Both he, and those of us who respect him, are intelligent people. [[User:DouglasA|DouglasA]] 20:59, 21 September 2009 (EDT)
:::::Forgive any intrusion or stamping upon your own loyalties. But surely you must admit that the movement suffers from a lack of Irving Kristol or William Buckley type figures. I long for the days when conservatism nakedly confessed that the intellectuals were the brains of the movement while the power of the people were its fists. OF COURSE a weapon must be weighted properly, with the correct balances, but it is only in retrospect that people might discuss its craftsmanship and the components which constituted it. I would venture to say that anyone slain by Excalibur would comment on anything but the sharpness of its blade, which in this most basic analogy, would comprise the incisive wit of conservatives who have lived and then gone to meet God in heaven. The fires of anger burn with intense heat in the belly of American conservatism, but to stoke these fires, as Beck often does, produces little but flash and smoke. It will be some current or future leader, a Reagan-type, I pray, who shall light his torch with such a flame and bring it to the halls of Congress or to the Obama home and say, "See, this same flame has burned for ages now let it singe you!". God, conservatism, the side of moral right; all are the same, and united they are all consuming. But it must take SOMEONE...a prophet, a politician who does God's work, a priest with God's word in him...someone, SOMEONE must carry that torch. [[User:RoyP|RoyP]] 21:15, 21 September 2009 (EDT)

== Quakerism category ==
Thanks for setting it up! I'll try to contribute a few more new articles to insert. --[[User:MarkGall|MarkGall]] 14:20, 22 September 2009 (EDT)

== "Revert vandalism" on the Chavez article ==

Does [http://www.conservapedia.com/index.php?title=Hugo_Chavez&curid=5224&diff=703420&oldid=703401 this edit] really count as "vandalism"? Or would it be more fair of you to qualify it as a different point of view? A point of view that may be criticized, perhaps, one that may or may not be backed up by whatever evidence is cited--but where is the "vandalism"? [[User:Wayne|Wayne]] 08:44, 25 September 2009 (EDT)
::it's vandalism--it was designed to attack and denigrate and damage a CP article. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 10:10, 25 September 2009 (EDT)
:::Introducing a different point of view--with a citation, no less--is denigrating and damaging to the article? Is the article that fragile? [[User:Wayne|Wayne]] 10:25, 25 September 2009 (EDT)
:::that was his goal. to sabotage the article by making it contradictory. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 10:38, 25 September 2009 (EDT)
::::Would it not add to the credibility of the article and the site as a whole to engage with the ideas that the editor brought to the table on their own merits--or lack thereof-- as opposed to dismissing them as vandalism? [[User:Wayne|Wayne]] 12:16, 25 September 2009 (EDT)
:::::vandals seeking to weaken or ruin articles are not welcome here. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 12:20, 25 September 2009 (EDT)

== speedy delete? ==

[[Nonlineardog]]

== Dear Dr. Jensen, ==

i think your edits are far above the average quality here. I am quite liberal (and not American), so i don't always agree with your opinions, however i enjoy to read your articles, since they are written in a quite concise and interesting manner from the right distance of view and i usually learn something about topics i don't know much about.

Regards, --[[User:Stitch75|Stitch75]] 12:45, 5 October 2009 (EDT)
::thanks! :) [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 13:22, 5 October 2009 (EDT)

Why did you revert my edit calling for a citation? [[User:AZF|AZF]] 17:11, 7 October 2009 (EDT)
::you're making work for other people; if you want to add a citation please do so. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 17:14, 7 October 2009 (EDT)
:::The person who made the initial assertion was making work for other people. [[User:AZF|AZF]] 17:19, 7 October 2009 (EDT)

==Columbia==
In the 1872 painting; are you sure she holds a school book? Might it be the Bible?--[[User:Jpatt|Jpatt]] 00:03, 13 October 2009 (EDT)
::my students always ask that--it says "School Book" on it. you can read it at [http://cprr.org/CPRR_Discussion_Group/2005/11/question-american-progress-by-john_11.html larger image] [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 00:07, 13 October 2009 (EDT)
:::Thank you, a beautiful picture btw.--[[User:Jpatt|Jpatt]] 00:13, 13 October 2009 (EDT)

== Milton/Paradise Lost ==
1st of all, thanks for the encouragement on my talk page. We now seem to be sort of collaborating on the Milton and PL pages. I came across some public-domain images of Blake's watercolors for PL that would be great to add to that page. How do we go about making that happen? [[User:ChrisFV|ChrisFV]] 17:58, 29 October 2009 (EDT)
:yes--it's fun! I can upload files if you gove me URL's or email to me at rjensen@uic.edu [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 18:04, 29 October 2009 (EDT)
::Here is the site: http://www.pitt.edu/~ulin/Paradise/Blake1808.htm [[User:ChrisFV|ChrisFV]] 20:09, 29 October 2009 (EDT)
:::OK which ones do you want to use? 04:45, 30 October 2009 (EDT)
::::So hard to choose! I think "The Expulsion from Eden" (Book XII) is essential for the PL article. If there is room, my next choice would be "The Downfall of the Rebel Angels" (Book VI), and then "The Temptation of Eve" (Book IX). [[User:ChrisFV|ChrisFV]] 11:24, 30 October 2009 (EDT)
::::: done: see File:Blake-xii.jpg File:Blake-vi.jpg and File:Blake-ix.jpg [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 05:19, 31 October 2009 (EDT)

== William, Mary, etc. ==

Hello Richard;

Just noticed you doing some 17th century history - could I ask for a bit of a hand getting William of Orange's article up? He doesn't have one, at the moment, I think, and 'William and Mary' redirects [[College of William and Mary|here]]. Thanks, and nice articles. [[User:AungSein|AungSein]] 14:45, 1 November 2009 (EST)
::look at [[William III]]. :) [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 15:16, 1 November 2009 (EST)
::::Pesky Stadtholder ... ;) [[User:AungSein|AungSein]] 15:22, 1 November 2009 (EST)

== DerekE ==

Just because someone is a "nasty vandal" is no need to erase every sign of his presence from the website. That's a tactic that might have been appropriate for the great Soviet Encyclopedia. I fail to see how it's suitable for an America conservative project. [[User:PeterF|PeterF]] 19:49, 3 November 2009 (EST)
::DerekE -- or someone using his account-- has tried to seriously damage CP (look at the edits a few minutes ago on Obama Administration). That destroys his entire credibility from A to Z, in my opinion. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 19:58, 3 November 2009 (EST)
:::That doesn't answer my question. removing a talk page post--in effect trying to make him a "non-person"--has nothing to do with the situation you describe. We've always been at war with East Asia. [[User:PeterF|PeterF]] 20:02, 3 November 2009 (EST)
::::we don't want saboteurs at CP and we remove their work. It's like a team changing the record book when an illegal player is involved. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 20:17, 3 November 2009 (EST)

==Scotland Revert==

Hello, i noticed you reverted an edit by DWiggins on the scotland article, saying in the edit description that "civilized world seems to cover the reaction pretty well". I've undone your edit as it was biased and misleading, if the "civilized world"(could you specify what the civilized world is?) universally thought it was disgusting, why was there so much controversy? perhaps from an american perspective but outside of the states "disgust" doesnt cover it at all, unless you meant to imply that the civilized world is solely the USA, in which case all credibility of claims about conservapedia being fair or trustworthy are lost. also, please dont ban me, i'm just trying to bring some balance and i dont mean to troll, but as im scottish it annoys me when people try and spin the lockerbie story, thanks. [[User:Euaaan|Euaaan]] 09:13, 4 November 2009 (EST)
::there was very high controversy regarding 1) wisdom of releasing a convicted terrorist and 2) role of the London government in trading convict for diplomatic and trade goals. And yes, worldwide disgust was pretty intense. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 09:23, 4 November 2009 (EST)

== John F. Kennedy ==

I responded to your argument on the John F. Kennedy talk page. You should go check it out. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 13:31, 5 November 2009 (EST)

== John F. Kennedy (again) ==

I added a new section re: Medicare to our Kennedy discussion on the JFK talk page.

I would really like for you to respond to the slew of points I raised re: Kennedy's liberal positions and traits. I believe they extend far wider and deeper than the article or your arguments suggest they do. In reading what I wrote and responding to it, I would like for us to work together to re-consider and re-write the parts of the article that discuss John F. Kennedy's ideological bend. Certainly, we can together reshape this article to reflect that he both advocated dramatic liberal measures and made conservative stands on certain issues that no modern-day liberal would ever dream of considering. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 20:02, 8 November 2009 (EST)
::thanks I appreciate the help and i will look at it later tonite. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 20:19, 8 November 2009 (EST)
:::I responded to your arguments. I am still hoping we can re-write this article together, and show that Kennedy was a diverse politician with both liberal and conservative views (and one that is hard to accurately describe as "basically liberal" or "basically conservative"). [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 21:28, 8 November 2009 (EST)

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-11-09T02:27:02Z

ChuckR:

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-11-09T02:26:19Z

ChuckR:

"crisis" should read "Cuban Missile Crisis", please.

== Not Fair ==
It is not entirely fair to lay the blame of the failure of the Bay of Pigs squarely at JFK's feet. There was a lot of urging from the CIA and the military NOT to go ahead with American military itervention on behalf of the insurgents. Considering the atmosphere of the world at that time, I can't say listening to them was a horrible idea. Regrettable that the operation was botched, but the reasons why it was botched are not 100% of JFK's doing.

And it's quite interesting that the hawks in his administration that urged him NOT to intervene in Bay of Pigs are the ones who the author of this article quite cleverly insinuates are the reason why Kennedy kept us safe through the Cuban Missle Crisis, as if without them Kennedy would have been inept. If you're looking for the slightest reasons to praise the hawks in his administration, even if it is to just lessen JFK's abilities as an individual, you could have made mention of the hawks being the driving force behind not intervening in Bay of Pigs, and thus applauded them for it in the process (when keeping in mind that not risking such a blatant and overt challenge to the USSR that would not have been necesary and risked TERRIBLE reprecussions...). But it looks like the author of this article was too concerned with finding anything to blame on Kennedy, and thus missed their opportunity to render more praise unto the conservative hawks. [[User:Jros83|Jros83]] 02:30, 25 June 2007 (EDT)

:To add to the Bay of Pigs discussion, the CIA under Eisenhower actually made the plan, it was recomended to Kennedy once he took office. The way this page reads is as though he is 100% totally at fault for everything. I think he was a do-nothing president that is only popular because he was assasinated, but seriously folks, lets calm down the rhetoric. ALSO: I changed the reference about him being the "youngest president". He was the youngest person ever ELECTED president, but Teddy Roosevelt was actually a year or two younger than Kennedy when he took office. I didn't want to re-write the whole section, but I figured I'd throw in a minor correction. [[User:JamesBenjamin|JamesBenjamin]] 18:54, 29 June 2007 (EDT)

== Sordid personal life ==
Okay, I've tried twice to include something about how Kennedy was a sex fiend and twice they were scrubbed right away. I expect this lionizing nonsense from Wikipedia but I thought the point of this was that conservatives could actually post relevant information about entries of importance without having it waxed by Marxist Wikipedia editors. If I'm missing something, then please tell me why [[User:Billdozer|Billdozer]]
:Show us solid, verifyable evidence from official sources that Kennedy was such a man, and we'll include it. [[User:Karajou|Karajou]] 22:38, 11 March 2008 (EDT)

What's a solid, official source? There isn't an official source that says Bill Clinton was, um, serviced by an intern in the Oval Office, but everyone in the world knows it to be true. Similarly, there were no shortage of witnesses who could attest to JFK's ravenous sexual apptetite. [[User:Billdozer|Billdozer]]
:Witnesses came out within weeks testifying as to Bill and Monica's indiscretions; plus there's past indiscretions all over Arkansas, such as Paula Jone's and others lawsuits. These, at the least, made the newspapers at that time. I want to see similar patterns for Kennedy, reported in the newspapers at the time he was a U.S. senator, as well as when he was a U.S. president. [[User:Karajou|Karajou]] 05:47, 12 March 2008 (EDT)

There are other reliable sources than newspapers. The newspapers wouldn't even have printed Clinton's misdoings if the Drudge Report hadn't forced the case into the open. The press was well aware of what JFK was really like but they protected him, as the press tends to do for left-wing presidents. But good luck finding a JFK biography, even a glowing one, that doesn't at least acknowledge some sort of pattern of sexual misconduct. [[User:Billdozer|Billdozer]]

== new material added ==

::{{template|Part of this article was copied from [[Conservapedia]] but the copied text was originally written by me, RJJensen (under the name Richard Jensen) and does not include alterations made by others on that site.||category=Copied Articles}} [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 19:03, 22 November 2008 (EST)

== JFK a conservative? What? ==

I take issue with the two sentences, "JFK, like his family, was middle-of-the-road on domestic issues and conservative on foreign policy" and "The Kennedy family represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party"

Since when did the Kennedys represent the conservative wing of the Democratic party? All of them are liberal stalwarts. As for his foreign policy, it was his idea to pull out of Vietnam, among other things. As far as domestic policy, he was definitely liberal; his civil rights plank, championing of a Medicare-type program, Peace Corps, etc.

I motion that the first sentence be revised to "JFK, like his family, was liberal on domestic issues and middle-of-the-road on foreign policy" and that the second sentence be dropped entirely. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 19:28, 17 October 2009 (EDT)
::Joe Kennedy was always one of the main leaders and financiers of the conservative wing of the Dem party, and was a main supporter of Joe MvcCarthy; Bobby was an aide and supporter of Joe McCarthy. They were all strongly anti-communist and very critical of labor unions (which were much more powerful in those days). The Peace Corps was the main "liberal" achievement, though conservatives have not opposed it. It was JFK who sent forces INTO Cuba and Vietnam to fight Communism. His civil rights plank in 1960 was just about the same as the GOP plank. He did not champion Medicare. The surviving Kennedys turned left after JFK was killed and the father had a stroke. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 17:18, 2 November 2009 (EST)
:::I know that the Kennedys were staunch anti-communists, but I've never heard JFK--or the Kennedy family--described as conservative. Any citations you could make? Also, as for Cuba and Vietnam, one, Cuba changed his opinion on foreign policy. After the Cuban Missile Crisis, Kennedy's foreign policy went from being center-right to being center-left, and his calls for peace and negotiations replaced hawkish rhetoric. Secondly, Kennedy actually wanted to pull out of Vietnam, and had started the motions to do so before he was assassinated. Johnson reversed it, and escalated it. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 21:55, 2 November 2009 (EST)
::::sending combat forces into both Cuba and Vietnam to stop Communism is pretty dramatic example of a conservative foreign policy, not to mention forcing the Russians out of Cuba. In domestic policy he took many conservative positions: he opposed unions (esp Teamsters), opposed deficit spending, and supported tax cuts. He never supported abortion in any form, or gay rights. And (in 1960) he moved the country to acceptance of Roman Catholicism. Finally, he was opposed by the major liberals of the day (E. Roosevelt, Humphrey, Stevenson); for his VP he picked Johnson, considered a conservative at the time. The Kennedy family was known for leading the support of Joe McCarthy in 1950s. As for what people say, try Googling "jfk" and "conservative" and look at the 2 million hits.[[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 22:54, 2 November 2009 (EST)
:::::
Well, first of all, if you Google "FDR" and "Conservative" you get 9,510,000 hits. I guess this makes Old Man Roosevelt the greatest conservative of all time then, eh?

Anyway, let's take a walk through history, shall we? Here's a list of some of Kennedy's liberal traits.

First of all, JFK supported the withdrawal of troops from Vietnam. Not only is this confirmed by Robert McNamara in his film "The Fog of War," but an audio recording of then-Vice President Lyndon Johnson referring to this plan of Kennedy's is also shown. Also, consult Kennedy's National Security Action Memorandum 263, from October 1963, which called for the removal of 1,000 armed forces personnel to be removed by the end of the year.

Yes, Kennedy was--for a long time--a foreign policy hawk. No question. But by the last year of his life (post-Bay of Pigs), he was moving in a more dovish direction. He negotiated the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, and gave a famous speech about world peace at American University on June 10, 1963. http://www1.media.american.edu/speeches/Kennedy.htm

Secondly, John F. Kennedy's tax cut was a demand-side tax cut, not a supply-side cut; Ronald Reagan he was not. You could argue whether a present-day liberal would institute such a measure (probably not), but no conservative would either. http://www.slate.com/id/2093947/ A good article about this.

Your talk of Kennedy not supporting civil rights seems to neglect the entire last two years of his life. Kennedy deployed federal marshalls in 1962 to allow James Meredith to enroll in his first class at the University of Mississippi. Furthermore, after George Wallace infamously blocked the doorway of University of Alabama, John F. Kennedy gave one of his most famous speeches, his civil rights speech, on June 11, 1963. In it, he proposed what would become the Civil Rights Act of 1964. You can find a transcript here: http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Reference+Desk/Speeches/JFK/003POF03CivilRights06111963.htm It is startling to me that you don't know of this. Also note that John, along with brother Robert, helped secure Martin Luther King's release from prison http://www.lib.lsu.edu/hum/mlk/srs216.html

Your claim in the main article that Kennedy never claimed to be a liberal is false. One of his most famous quotes is this, from September 1960, in accepting the New York Liberal Party nomination: "If by a "Liberal" they mean someone who looks ahead and not behind, someone who welcomes new ideas without rigid reactions, someone who cares about the welfare of the people — their health, their housing, their schools, their jobs, their civil rights, and their civil liberties — someone who believes we can break through the stalemate and suspicions that grip us in our policies abroad, if that is what they mean by a "Liberal," then I'm proud to say I'm a "Liberal."" Also note the mention of civil rights.

By saying that Kennedy never supported abortion or gay rights, you're creating a false strawman. Abortion and gay rights were not issues in the 1960s; by this measure, you could just as easily claim that Nixon and Goldwater were liberals because they didn't (between 1961 and 1963) speak out against those two issues. Fact of the matter is, abortion didn't become a major political issue until Roe v. Wade. Had Kennedy lived, and opposed abortion through the 1970s, you may have had a point. The Democrats didn't introduce a gay rights plank to their party platform until 1976; the Republicans didn't introduce one in opposition until 1992.

But while we're talking about modern issues, here's President Kennedy arguing for '''''universal health care''''' in May of 1962 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14A1zxaHpD8

Kennedy signed Omnibus Housing Bill 1961, which proposed spending $3.19 billion on a massive government housing program for the working poor. It also called for the creation of the Department of Housing and Urban Urban Affairs.

Kennedy opposed the quota system for immigration, saying it had "no basis in either logic or reason." He said to Congress on July 23, 1963: "It neither satisfies a national need nor accomplishes an international purpose. In an age of interdependence among nations, such a system is an anachronism for it discriminates among applicants for admission into the United States on the basis of the accident of birth." (Kennedy, John F., Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., 1964, pp. 594-597.)

Kennedy signed HR5143, which abolished the death penalty for first-degree murder in Washington DC.

As for Kennedy and FDR, read "Ask Not: The Inauguration of John F. Kennedy and the Speech That Changed America." Franklin Roosevelt was one of Kennedy's heroes. His "Ask not..." quote and "New Frontier" were efforts to mimick FDR's "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself" and "New Deal," respectively

It's also funny that you claim that the Kennedy family represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party; Joseph Kennedy Sr. strongly opposed the Lend-Lease Act and indeed, any aid to Great Britain at all. In 1940, he famously proclaimed "Democracy is finished in England. It may be here." He supported Chamberlain's policy of appeasement; read "The Dark Side of Camelot" by Seymour Hersh for more. So yes, the elder Kennedy did oppose FDR, but from his LEFT, not his right.

John F. Kennedy Kennedy established the President’s Commission on the Status of Women to examine issues of women's equality. Who chaired this group? Eleanor Roosevelt, whom you claim he opposed.

It's ashame that you felt the need to lock the page, enshrining your uncited and biased new article as "fact," and stifling what should be a robust debate and exchange of ideas. It also upsets me that you think I should "read more and think more," when clearly you aren't aware of (or simply chose not to mention) a great deal of what Kennedy believed or what policy directives his administration took. You do bring up good points about areas of his conservatism; he was a hawk for a while, he was tough on crime, etc. I don't mean to demean those points at all; you make them eloquently. But as I've clearly shown, he was quite liberal in many areas as well. My guess is, if he were alive today, he would probably be a Democrat in the mold of Joe Lieberman, or perhaps Evan Bayh. Hopefully, we can resolve this, and re-write the passage together to find a better balance, and more accurately show that Kennedy worked in both conservative and liberal directions in his long and illustrious career.
[[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 13:30, 5 November 2009 (EST)

'''Addendum''': In reviewing what I wrote, I realized I left out an important component: Medicare. You claimed that Kennedy "Never championed Medicare." This is incorrect. In fact, he championed it during both his campaign and his presidency, and was one of the individuals who actually popularized the moniker "Medicare." Review these links: 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpMNdYhRq90 President Kennedy explains importance of Medicare bill to Congress 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gu1HyCeEus&feature=related Candidate Kennedy defends Medicare 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFesycofKk4 Madison Square Garden debate with Medicare opponent Dr. Edward Annis 

On December 7, 1961, Kennedy said at the opening of the AFL-CIO Convention: "Those who are "too old to work and too young to die" must be protected through Social Security system against the staggering costs of medical care. The time has come, in this next session of the Congress, to face the fact that our elder citizens need these benefits-that their needs cannot be met in any other way-and that every member of the Congress should have an opportunity to vote this bill up, or vote it down and tell the people why."

In September 1961, he wrote to the Chairman of the Senate Special Committee on Aging: "I consider the proposal to provide health insurance for the aged under Social Security one of the most important measures I have advocated."

The Politics of Medicare is a good read. However, a Google Books search of "John F. Kennedy" and "Medicare" nets many more similar quotes to what I posted, as well as news reports from the 1960 campaign concerning his advocacy for Medicare. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 20:02, 8 November 2009 (EST)

::1) Kennedy sent the troops into Vietnam. He made the commitment. He did rotate units but there is no evidence he planned to end that commitment. That was wishful thinking by liberals who liked him.
 2) the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty had both liberal and conservative elements (esp as a device to control China)
 3) the tax cut was praised by Reagan and many conservatives in urging their own tax cuts in 1981.
 4) the quote "If by a "Liberal" they mean ..." avoids almost all the main liberal positions of the day, re taxes, spending and labor unions, for example. He of course had to say nice things because he needed the Liberal party line in the election.
 5) Kennedy enforced federal court orders but civil rights was low on his agenda and he was never a main supporter from 1948 till his death.
 6) Kennedy did oppose the quota immigration system of 1924--as did most conservatives too.
 7) Kennedy never supported abortion or gay rights, and always voted the conservative Catholic position on such issues.
 8) he signed the death penalty repeal which was on the liberal side
 9) Kennedy did admire FDR's political skills and rhetoric and tried to emulate them. As did Reagan.
 10) the 1940 business is a bit complicated because it's not clear how much JFK agreed with his father. His father represented the conservative opponents of aid to Britain, including for example Taft and Lindbergh. The left (John L Lewis) opposed aid because Russia strongly opposed aid to Britain.
 11) He needed Eleanor Roosevelt's support and appointed her. She was A CONSERVATIVE on women's issues and she strongly opposed the ERA.
 12) Medicare: yest hat was a liberal position Kennedy took. The articles says that he had a mixed record on domestic issues.
 13) "uncited and biased new article." if you call CP administrators names you'll get in trouble. I actually read all the books that are listed and I expect people to be familiar with come of them before they jump in. I you want to propose a paragraph, run it thrugh here first.[[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 20:37, 8 November 2009 (EST)
 
 
 
No one is calling you any names, for one. It is a matter of solid fact that the revision you put into the new article has very few citations and many statements of opinion that wouldn't be found in any reputable encyclopedia, conservative or otherwise. A statement like "Kennedy was basically a conservative, but he had to appeal to a primarily liberal base, so he offered symbols for the liberals while following a conservative course in foreign and domestic policy" that doesn't have a citation has no business being there.
 
Re: your list: 
1.) Re-read what I wrote concerning Kennedy and Vietnam, and watch The Fog of War. Kennedy made the commitment, but he also began taking the steps necessary to withdraw. In discussing this issue in the article, we should take steps to show that Kennedy became conflicted as the war dragged on. Take a look at this http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hs2AWQQgQffeC3pmWebC22GqdBGwD9BO80E80 
2.) Any sources for this claim? If you can provide some, I'm willing to concede the point and agree with you. However, in all that I've read, I have never seen such treaties described as being conservative. 
3.) Of course it was praised by Reagan; typically, when a president is trying to get a measure passed that has broad support within their base but little-to-none from the other party, they will invoke the memory of a president from the other party. Bush II did this with Franklin Roosevelt and Social Security. Candidate John Kerry did this with Ronald Reagan in talking about his foreign policy, etc. As I stated before, you're right, no liberal would pass a tax cut like this nowadays. HOWEVER, with it being a demand-side tax cut designed to benefit the working class (rather than a trickle-down tax cut), this is not something that many conservatives would enact either. 
4.) Whether what Kennedy described also applies to today's liberals is irrelevant. My point in bringing it up was to show you that your claim in the article--"Kennedy refused to call himself a liberal"--is patently inaccurate. 
5.) Your response here is simply inaccurate. Yes, Kennedy enforced court orders. And you're right, he was not a prominent supporter of civil rights for MOST of his life. But by 1963, this was changing. Again, I direct you to the speech he gave June 11, 1963. In it, he proposed what would become the Civil Rights Act of 1964. You can find a transcript here: http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Reference+Desk/Speeches/JFK/003POF03CivilRights06111963.htm 
6.) The sponsors of the Immigration and Nationality Act (which reformed the quotas)--Rep. Emanuel Celler and Sens. Phillip Hart and Ted Kennedy--were all Democrats. All opposition either came from Republicans or conservative Southern Democrats. I would describe this as a middle-of-the-road act at best. Kennedy considered this to be a matter of civil rights; http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=60440 
7.) I never disagreed with you here. All I did was state that these were NOT issues during the time Kennedy was active in politics (1948-1963). NO ONE supported gay rights or abortion at that time; neither were political issues. By that measure, FDR and Truman would both be conservatives, as neither of them spoke out in favor of either. You can't hold Kennedy to standards that didn't exist. Furthermore, your claim that he "always voted the conservative Catholic position on such issues" is also incorrect, as 1.) Those issues never came up in the senate, and 2.) There is no public record of John F. Kennedy's position on abortion or gay rights. 
8.) I'm glad we agree 
9.) More than admiring FDR's political skills, he also admired (most of) his policy decisions. Refer to Kennedy's speeches on Medicare, or again to "Ask Not" for more. 
10.) Whether JFK agreed with his dad is irrelevant. My reason in bringing up Joe Sr.'s appeasement beliefs was to refute your claim that the Kennedy family "represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party." That was not true during Joe Sr.'s time, and it wasn't true during JFK, RFK, and Ted's time. 
11.) Your statement here that Eleanor was a "CONSERVATIVE" flies in the face of what you said earlier (that she was one of the liberals that Kennedy opposed). Which is it? 
12.) No disagreements here. This was, however, in response to your claim that Kennedy "never championed Medicare." Clearly, he did. At least you admitted you were wrong. 
 
Have you really read the books I listed? Much less, viewed the speeches or other links I provided? Clearly, you still have some misconceptions about his record.
 
Also, I am not suggesting we revise the article to say that Kennedy was a flaming liberal. Of course he wasn't. But the way it stands now--with Kennedy being described as "basically conservative"--is simply inaccurate. Between Medicare, civil rights, $3.19 billion being spent on government housing, the promotion of the Department of Urban Affairs, the Peace Corps, his move to abolish the death penalty in DC, and reforming the quota system, clearly he was not "basically conservative." This article needs to take a more nuanced view, and reflect the fact that Kennedy held MANY liberal positions in addition to having some strong conservative stances as well.
 
As a final note, I would appreciate it (simply from a perspective of readability) if you could type more accurately and with less typos. As it stands now, your typos are frequent and egregious, and it takes me several moments to figure out what you mean. I don't mean this personally, it's just something that I'm struggling with; as a college professor, I'm sure you understand. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 21:20, 8 November 2009 (EST)
:::'''Addendum''': Also, it's pretty funny that you said "I you want to propose a paragraph, run it thrugh here first." (Translation: '''If you''' want to propose a paragraph, run it '''through''' here first"). Clearly, you did not do this yourself; you abused your administrator privileges by unilaterally inserting your own edits (with NO prior discussion) and then locking the article when others who dared to disagree with you attempted to edit your contributions. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 21:26, 8 November 2009 (EST)

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-11-09T02:24:04Z

ChuckR:

"crisis" should read "Cuban Missile Crisis", please.

== Not Fair ==
It is not entirely fair to lay the blame of the failure of the Bay of Pigs squarely at JFK's feet. There was a lot of urging from the CIA and the military NOT to go ahead with American military itervention on behalf of the insurgents. Considering the atmosphere of the world at that time, I can't say listening to them was a horrible idea. Regrettable that the operation was botched, but the reasons why it was botched are not 100% of JFK's doing.

And it's quite interesting that the hawks in his administration that urged him NOT to intervene in Bay of Pigs are the ones who the author of this article quite cleverly insinuates are the reason why Kennedy kept us safe through the Cuban Missle Crisis, as if without them Kennedy would have been inept. If you're looking for the slightest reasons to praise the hawks in his administration, even if it is to just lessen JFK's abilities as an individual, you could have made mention of the hawks being the driving force behind not intervening in Bay of Pigs, and thus applauded them for it in the process (when keeping in mind that not risking such a blatant and overt challenge to the USSR that would not have been necesary and risked TERRIBLE reprecussions...). But it looks like the author of this article was too concerned with finding anything to blame on Kennedy, and thus missed their opportunity to render more praise unto the conservative hawks. [[User:Jros83|Jros83]] 02:30, 25 June 2007 (EDT)

:To add to the Bay of Pigs discussion, the CIA under Eisenhower actually made the plan, it was recomended to Kennedy once he took office. The way this page reads is as though he is 100% totally at fault for everything. I think he was a do-nothing president that is only popular because he was assasinated, but seriously folks, lets calm down the rhetoric. ALSO: I changed the reference about him being the "youngest president". He was the youngest person ever ELECTED president, but Teddy Roosevelt was actually a year or two younger than Kennedy when he took office. I didn't want to re-write the whole section, but I figured I'd throw in a minor correction. [[User:JamesBenjamin|JamesBenjamin]] 18:54, 29 June 2007 (EDT)

== Sordid personal life ==
Okay, I've tried twice to include something about how Kennedy was a sex fiend and twice they were scrubbed right away. I expect this lionizing nonsense from Wikipedia but I thought the point of this was that conservatives could actually post relevant information about entries of importance without having it waxed by Marxist Wikipedia editors. If I'm missing something, then please tell me why [[User:Billdozer|Billdozer]]
:Show us solid, verifyable evidence from official sources that Kennedy was such a man, and we'll include it. [[User:Karajou|Karajou]] 22:38, 11 March 2008 (EDT)

What's a solid, official source? There isn't an official source that says Bill Clinton was, um, serviced by an intern in the Oval Office, but everyone in the world knows it to be true. Similarly, there were no shortage of witnesses who could attest to JFK's ravenous sexual apptetite. [[User:Billdozer|Billdozer]]
:Witnesses came out within weeks testifying as to Bill and Monica's indiscretions; plus there's past indiscretions all over Arkansas, such as Paula Jone's and others lawsuits. These, at the least, made the newspapers at that time. I want to see similar patterns for Kennedy, reported in the newspapers at the time he was a U.S. senator, as well as when he was a U.S. president. [[User:Karajou|Karajou]] 05:47, 12 March 2008 (EDT)

There are other reliable sources than newspapers. The newspapers wouldn't even have printed Clinton's misdoings if the Drudge Report hadn't forced the case into the open. The press was well aware of what JFK was really like but they protected him, as the press tends to do for left-wing presidents. But good luck finding a JFK biography, even a glowing one, that doesn't at least acknowledge some sort of pattern of sexual misconduct. [[User:Billdozer|Billdozer]]

== new material added ==

::{{template|Part of this article was copied from [[Conservapedia]] but the copied text was originally written by me, RJJensen (under the name Richard Jensen) and does not include alterations made by others on that site.||category=Copied Articles}} [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 19:03, 22 November 2008 (EST)

== JFK a conservative? What? ==

I take issue with the two sentences, "JFK, like his family, was middle-of-the-road on domestic issues and conservative on foreign policy" and "The Kennedy family represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party"

Since when did the Kennedys represent the conservative wing of the Democratic party? All of them are liberal stalwarts. As for his foreign policy, it was his idea to pull out of Vietnam, among other things. As far as domestic policy, he was definitely liberal; his civil rights plank, championing of a Medicare-type program, Peace Corps, etc.

I motion that the first sentence be revised to "JFK, like his family, was liberal on domestic issues and middle-of-the-road on foreign policy" and that the second sentence be dropped entirely. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 19:28, 17 October 2009 (EDT)
::Joe Kennedy was always one of the main leaders and financiers of the conservative wing of the Dem party, and was a main supporter of Joe MvcCarthy; Bobby was an aide and supporter of Joe McCarthy. They were all strongly anti-communist and very critical of labor unions (which were much more powerful in those days). The Peace Corps was the main "liberal" achievement, though conservatives have not opposed it. It was JFK who sent forces INTO Cuba and Vietnam to fight Communism. His civil rights plank in 1960 was just about the same as the GOP plank. He did not champion Medicare. The surviving Kennedys turned left after JFK was killed and the father had a stroke. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 17:18, 2 November 2009 (EST)
:::I know that the Kennedys were staunch anti-communists, but I've never heard JFK--or the Kennedy family--described as conservative. Any citations you could make? Also, as for Cuba and Vietnam, one, Cuba changed his opinion on foreign policy. After the Cuban Missile Crisis, Kennedy's foreign policy went from being center-right to being center-left, and his calls for peace and negotiations replaced hawkish rhetoric. Secondly, Kennedy actually wanted to pull out of Vietnam, and had started the motions to do so before he was assassinated. Johnson reversed it, and escalated it. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 21:55, 2 November 2009 (EST)
::::sending combat forces into both Cuba and Vietnam to stop Communism is pretty dramatic example of a conservative foreign policy, not to mention forcing the Russians out of Cuba. In domestic policy he took many conservative positions: he opposed unions (esp Teamsters), opposed deficit spending, and supported tax cuts. He never supported abortion in any form, or gay rights. And (in 1960) he moved the country to acceptance of Roman Catholicism. Finally, he was opposed by the major liberals of the day (E. Roosevelt, Humphrey, Stevenson); for his VP he picked Johnson, considered a conservative at the time. The Kennedy family was known for leading the support of Joe McCarthy in 1950s. As for what people say, try Googling "jfk" and "conservative" and look at the 2 million hits.[[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 22:54, 2 November 2009 (EST)
:::::
Well, first of all, if you Google "FDR" and "Conservative" you get 9,510,000 hits. I guess this makes Old Man Roosevelt the greatest conservative of all time then, eh?

Anyway, let's take a walk through history, shall we? Here's a list of some of Kennedy's liberal traits.

First of all, JFK supported the withdrawal of troops from Vietnam. Not only is this confirmed by Robert McNamara in his film "The Fog of War," but an audio recording of then-Vice President Lyndon Johnson referring to this plan of Kennedy's is also shown. Also, consult Kennedy's National Security Action Memorandum 263, from October 1963, which called for the removal of 1,000 armed forces personnel to be removed by the end of the year.

Yes, Kennedy was--for a long time--a foreign policy hawk. No question. But by the last year of his life (post-Bay of Pigs), he was moving in a more dovish direction. He negotiated the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, and gave a famous speech about world peace at American University on June 10, 1963. http://www1.media.american.edu/speeches/Kennedy.htm

Secondly, John F. Kennedy's tax cut was a demand-side tax cut, not a supply-side cut; Ronald Reagan he was not. You could argue whether a present-day liberal would institute such a measure (probably not), but no conservative would either. http://www.slate.com/id/2093947/ A good article about this.

Your talk of Kennedy not supporting civil rights seems to neglect the entire last two years of his life. Kennedy deployed federal marshalls in 1962 to allow James Meredith to enroll in his first class at the University of Mississippi. Furthermore, after George Wallace infamously blocked the doorway of University of Alabama, John F. Kennedy gave one of his most famous speeches, his civil rights speech, on June 11, 1963. In it, he proposed what would become the Civil Rights Act of 1964. You can find a transcript here: http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Reference+Desk/Speeches/JFK/003POF03CivilRights06111963.htm It is startling to me that you don't know of this. Also note that John, along with brother Robert, helped secure Martin Luther King's release from prison http://www.lib.lsu.edu/hum/mlk/srs216.html

Your claim in the main article that Kennedy never claimed to be a liberal is false. One of his most famous quotes is this, from September 1960, in accepting the New York Liberal Party nomination: "If by a "Liberal" they mean someone who looks ahead and not behind, someone who welcomes new ideas without rigid reactions, someone who cares about the welfare of the people — their health, their housing, their schools, their jobs, their civil rights, and their civil liberties — someone who believes we can break through the stalemate and suspicions that grip us in our policies abroad, if that is what they mean by a "Liberal," then I'm proud to say I'm a "Liberal."" Also note the mention of civil rights.

By saying that Kennedy never supported abortion or gay rights, you're creating a false strawman. Abortion and gay rights were not issues in the 1960s; by this measure, you could just as easily claim that Nixon and Goldwater were liberals because they didn't (between 1961 and 1963) speak out against those two issues. Fact of the matter is, abortion didn't become a major political issue until Roe v. Wade. Had Kennedy lived, and opposed abortion through the 1970s, you may have had a point. The Democrats didn't introduce a gay rights plank to their party platform until 1976; the Republicans didn't introduce one in opposition until 1992.

But while we're talking about modern issues, here's President Kennedy arguing for '''''universal health care''''' in May of 1962 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14A1zxaHpD8

Kennedy signed Omnibus Housing Bill 1961, which proposed spending $3.19 billion on a massive government housing program for the working poor. It also called for the creation of the Department of Housing and Urban Urban Affairs.

Kennedy opposed the quota system for immigration, saying it had "no basis in either logic or reason." He said to Congress on July 23, 1963: "It neither satisfies a national need nor accomplishes an international purpose. In an age of interdependence among nations, such a system is an anachronism for it discriminates among applicants for admission into the United States on the basis of the accident of birth." (Kennedy, John F., Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., 1964, pp. 594-597.)

Kennedy signed HR5143, which abolished the death penalty for first-degree murder in Washington DC.

As for Kennedy and FDR, read "Ask Not: The Inauguration of John F. Kennedy and the Speech That Changed America." Franklin Roosevelt was one of Kennedy's heroes. His "Ask not..." quote and "New Frontier" were efforts to mimick FDR's "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself" and "New Deal," respectively

It's also funny that you claim that the Kennedy family represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party; Joseph Kennedy Sr. strongly opposed the Lend-Lease Act and indeed, any aid to Great Britain at all. In 1940, he famously proclaimed "Democracy is finished in England. It may be here." He supported Chamberlain's policy of appeasement; read "The Dark Side of Camelot" by Seymour Hersh for more. So yes, the elder Kennedy did oppose FDR, but from his LEFT, not his right.

John F. Kennedy Kennedy established the President’s Commission on the Status of Women to examine issues of women's equality. Who chaired this group? Eleanor Roosevelt, whom you claim he opposed.

It's ashame that you felt the need to lock the page, enshrining your uncited and biased new article as "fact," and stifling what should be a robust debate and exchange of ideas. It also upsets me that you think I should "read more and think more," when clearly you aren't aware of (or simply chose not to mention) a great deal of what Kennedy believed or what policy directives his administration took. You do bring up good points about areas of his conservatism; he was a hawk for a while, he was tough on crime, etc. I don't mean to demean those points at all; you make them eloquently. But as I've clearly shown, he was quite liberal in many areas as well. My guess is, if he were alive today, he would probably be a Democrat in the mold of Joe Lieberman, or perhaps Evan Bayh. Hopefully, we can resolve this, and re-write the passage together to find a better balance, and more accurately show that Kennedy worked in both conservative and liberal directions in his long and illustrious career.
[[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 13:30, 5 November 2009 (EST)

'''Addendum''': In reviewing what I wrote, I realized I left out an important component: Medicare. You claimed that Kennedy "Never championed Medicare." This is incorrect. In fact, he championed it during both his campaign and his presidency, and was one of the individuals who actually popularized the moniker "Medicare." Review these links: 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpMNdYhRq90 President Kennedy explains importance of Medicare bill to Congress 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gu1HyCeEus&feature=related Candidate Kennedy defends Medicare 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFesycofKk4 Madison Square Garden debate with Medicare opponent Dr. Edward Annis 

On December 7, 1961, Kennedy said at the opening of the AFL-CIO Convention: "Those who are "too old to work and too young to die" must be protected through Social Security system against the staggering costs of medical care. The time has come, in this next session of the Congress, to face the fact that our elder citizens need these benefits-that their needs cannot be met in any other way-and that every member of the Congress should have an opportunity to vote this bill up, or vote it down and tell the people why."

In September 1961, he wrote to the Chairman of the Senate Special Committee on Aging: "I consider the proposal to provide health insurance for the aged under Social Security one of the most important measures I have advocated."

The Politics of Medicare is a good read. However, a Google Books search of "John F. Kennedy" and "Medicare" nets many more similar quotes to what I posted, as well as news reports from the 1960 campaign concerning his advocacy for Medicare. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 20:02, 8 November 2009 (EST)

::1) Kennedy sent the troops into Vietnam. He made the commitment. He did rotate units but there is no evidence he planned to end that commitment. That was wishful thinking by liberals who liked him.
 2) the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty had both liberal and conservative elements (esp as a device to control China)
 3) the tax cut was praised by Reagan and many conservatives in urging their own tax cuts in 1981.
 4) the quote "If by a "Liberal" they mean ..." avoids almost all the main liberal positions of the day, re taxes, spending and labor unions, for example. He of course had to say nice things because he needed the Liberal party line in the election.
 5) Kennedy enforced federal court orders but civil rights was low on his agenda and he was never a main supporter from 1948 till his death.
 6) Kennedy did oppose the quota immigration system of 1924--as did most conservatives too.
 7) Kennedy never supported abortion or gay rights, and always voted the conservative Catholic position on such issues.
 8) he signed the death penalty repeal which was on the liberal side
 9) Kennedy did admire FDR's political skills and rhetoric and tried to emulate them. As did Reagan.
 10) the 1940 business is a bit complicated because it's not clear how much JFK agreed with his father. His father represented the conservative opponents of aid to Britain, including for example Taft and Lindbergh. The left (John L Lewis) opposed aid because Russia strongly opposed aid to Britain.
 11) He needed Eleanor Roosevelt's support and appointed her. She was A CONSERVATIVE on women's issues and she strongly opposed the ERA.
 12) Medicare: yest hat was a liberal position Kennedy took. The articles says that he had a mixed record on domestic issues.
 13) "uncited and biased new article." if you call CP administrators names you'll get in trouble. I actually read all the books that are listed and I expect people to be familiar with come of them before they jump in. I you want to propose a paragraph, run it thrugh here first.[[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 20:37, 8 November 2009 (EST)
 
 
 
No one is calling you any names, for one. It is a matter of solid fact that the revision you put into the new article has very few citations and many statements of opinion that wouldn't be found in any reputable encyclopedia, conservative or otherwise. A statement like "Kennedy was basically a conservative, but he had to appeal to a primarily liberal base, so he offered symbols for the liberals while following a conservative course in foreign and domestic policy" that doesn't have a citation has no business being there.
 
Re: your list: 
1.) Re-read what I wrote concerning Kennedy and Vietnam, and watch The Fog of War. Kennedy made the commitment, but he also began taking the steps necessary to withdraw. In discussing this issue in the article, we should take steps to show that Kennedy became conflicted as the war dragged on. Take a look at this http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hs2AWQQgQffeC3pmWebC22GqdBGwD9BO80E80 
2.) Any sources for this claim? If you can provide some, I'm willing to concede the point and agree with you. However, in all that I've read, I have never seen such treaties described as being conservative. 
3.) Of course it was praised by Reagan; typically, when a president is trying to get a measure passed that has broad support within their base but little-to-none from the other party, they will invoke the memory of a president from the other party. Bush II did this with Franklin Roosevelt and Social Security. Candidate John Kerry did this with Ronald Reagan in talking about his foreign policy, etc. As I stated before, you're right, no liberal would pass a tax cut like this nowadays. HOWEVER, with it being a demand-side tax cut designed to benefit the working class (rather than a trickle-down tax cut), this is not something that many conservatives would enact either. 
4.) Whether what Kennedy described also applies to today's liberals is irrelevant. My point in bringing it up was to show you that your claim in the article--"Kennedy refused to call himself a liberal"--is patently inaccurate. 
5.) Your response here is simply inaccurate. Yes, Kennedy enforced court orders. And you're right, he was not a prominent supporter of civil rights for MOST of his life. But by 1963, this was changing. Again, I direct you to the speech he gave June 11, 1963. In it, he proposed what would become the Civil Rights Act of 1964. You can find a transcript here: http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Reference+Desk/Speeches/JFK/003POF03CivilRights06111963.htm 
6.) The sponsors of the Immigration and Nationality Act (which reformed the quotas)--Rep. Emanuel Celler and Sens. Phillip Hart and Ted Kennedy--were all Democrats. All opposition either came from Republicans or conservative Southern Democrats. I would describe this as a middle-of-the-road act at best. Kennedy considered this to be a matter of civil rights; http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=60440 
7.) I never disagreed with you here. All I did was state that these were NOT issues during the time Kennedy was active in politics (1948-1963). NO ONE supported gay rights or abortion at that time; neither were political issues. By that measure, FDR and Truman would both be conservatives, as neither of them spoke out in favor of either. You can't hold Kennedy to standards that didn't exist. Furthermore, your claim that he "always voted the conservative Catholic position on such issues" is also incorrect, as 1.) Those issues never came up in the senate, and 2.) There is no public record of John F. Kennedy's position on abortion or gay rights. 
8.) I'm glad we agree 
9.) More than admiring FDR's political skills, he also admired (most of) his policy decisions. Refer to Kennedy's speeches on Medicare, or again to "Ask Not" for more. 
10.) Whether JFK agreed with his dad is irrelevant. My reason in bringing up Joe Sr.'s appeasement beliefs was to refute your claim that the Kennedy family "represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party." That was not true during Joe Sr.'s time, and it wasn't true during JFK, RFK, and Ted's time. 
11.) Your statement here that Eleanor was a "CONSERVATIVE" flies in the face of what you said earlier (that she was one of the liberals that Kennedy opposed). Which is it? 
12.) No disagreements here. This was, however, in response to your claim that Kennedy "never championed Medicare." Clearly, he did. At least you admitted you were wrong. 
 
Have you really read the books I listed? Much less, viewed the speeches or other links I provided? Clearly, you still have some misconceptions about his record.
 
Also, I am not suggesting we revise the article to say that Kennedy was a flaming liberal. Of course he wasn't. But the way it stands now--with Kennedy being described as "basically conservative"--is simply inaccurate. Between Medicare, civil rights, $3.19 billion being spent on government housing, the promotion of the Department of Urban Affairs, the Peace Corps, his move to abolish the death penalty in DC, and reforming the quota system, clearly he was not "basically conservative." This article needs to take a more nuanced view, and reflect the fact that Kennedy held MANY liberal positions in addition to having some strong conservative stances as well.
 
As a final note, I would appreciate it (simply from a perspective of readability) if you could type more accurately and with less typos. As it stands now, your typos are frequent and egregious, and it takes me several moments to figure out what you mean. I don't mean this personally, it's just something that I'm struggling with; as a college professor, I'm sure you understand. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 21:20, 8 November 2009 (EST)

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-11-09T02:23:12Z

ChuckR:

"crisis" should read "Cuban Missile Crisis", please.

== Not Fair ==
It is not entirely fair to lay the blame of the failure of the Bay of Pigs squarely at JFK's feet. There was a lot of urging from the CIA and the military NOT to go ahead with American military itervention on behalf of the insurgents. Considering the atmosphere of the world at that time, I can't say listening to them was a horrible idea. Regrettable that the operation was botched, but the reasons why it was botched are not 100% of JFK's doing.

And it's quite interesting that the hawks in his administration that urged him NOT to intervene in Bay of Pigs are the ones who the author of this article quite cleverly insinuates are the reason why Kennedy kept us safe through the Cuban Missle Crisis, as if without them Kennedy would have been inept. If you're looking for the slightest reasons to praise the hawks in his administration, even if it is to just lessen JFK's abilities as an individual, you could have made mention of the hawks being the driving force behind not intervening in Bay of Pigs, and thus applauded them for it in the process (when keeping in mind that not risking such a blatant and overt challenge to the USSR that would not have been necesary and risked TERRIBLE reprecussions...). But it looks like the author of this article was too concerned with finding anything to blame on Kennedy, and thus missed their opportunity to render more praise unto the conservative hawks. [[User:Jros83|Jros83]] 02:30, 25 June 2007 (EDT)

:To add to the Bay of Pigs discussion, the CIA under Eisenhower actually made the plan, it was recomended to Kennedy once he took office. The way this page reads is as though he is 100% totally at fault for everything. I think he was a do-nothing president that is only popular because he was assasinated, but seriously folks, lets calm down the rhetoric. ALSO: I changed the reference about him being the "youngest president". He was the youngest person ever ELECTED president, but Teddy Roosevelt was actually a year or two younger than Kennedy when he took office. I didn't want to re-write the whole section, but I figured I'd throw in a minor correction. [[User:JamesBenjamin|JamesBenjamin]] 18:54, 29 June 2007 (EDT)

== Sordid personal life ==
Okay, I've tried twice to include something about how Kennedy was a sex fiend and twice they were scrubbed right away. I expect this lionizing nonsense from Wikipedia but I thought the point of this was that conservatives could actually post relevant information about entries of importance without having it waxed by Marxist Wikipedia editors. If I'm missing something, then please tell me why [[User:Billdozer|Billdozer]]
:Show us solid, verifyable evidence from official sources that Kennedy was such a man, and we'll include it. [[User:Karajou|Karajou]] 22:38, 11 March 2008 (EDT)

What's a solid, official source? There isn't an official source that says Bill Clinton was, um, serviced by an intern in the Oval Office, but everyone in the world knows it to be true. Similarly, there were no shortage of witnesses who could attest to JFK's ravenous sexual apptetite. [[User:Billdozer|Billdozer]]
:Witnesses came out within weeks testifying as to Bill and Monica's indiscretions; plus there's past indiscretions all over Arkansas, such as Paula Jone's and others lawsuits. These, at the least, made the newspapers at that time. I want to see similar patterns for Kennedy, reported in the newspapers at the time he was a U.S. senator, as well as when he was a U.S. president. [[User:Karajou|Karajou]] 05:47, 12 March 2008 (EDT)

There are other reliable sources than newspapers. The newspapers wouldn't even have printed Clinton's misdoings if the Drudge Report hadn't forced the case into the open. The press was well aware of what JFK was really like but they protected him, as the press tends to do for left-wing presidents. But good luck finding a JFK biography, even a glowing one, that doesn't at least acknowledge some sort of pattern of sexual misconduct. [[User:Billdozer|Billdozer]]

== new material added ==

::{{template|Part of this article was copied from [[Conservapedia]] but the copied text was originally written by me, RJJensen (under the name Richard Jensen) and does not include alterations made by others on that site.||category=Copied Articles}} [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 19:03, 22 November 2008 (EST)

== JFK a conservative? What? ==

I take issue with the two sentences, "JFK, like his family, was middle-of-the-road on domestic issues and conservative on foreign policy" and "The Kennedy family represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party"

Since when did the Kennedys represent the conservative wing of the Democratic party? All of them are liberal stalwarts. As for his foreign policy, it was his idea to pull out of Vietnam, among other things. As far as domestic policy, he was definitely liberal; his civil rights plank, championing of a Medicare-type program, Peace Corps, etc.

I motion that the first sentence be revised to "JFK, like his family, was liberal on domestic issues and middle-of-the-road on foreign policy" and that the second sentence be dropped entirely. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 19:28, 17 October 2009 (EDT)
::Joe Kennedy was always one of the main leaders and financiers of the conservative wing of the Dem party, and was a main supporter of Joe MvcCarthy; Bobby was an aide and supporter of Joe McCarthy. They were all strongly anti-communist and very critical of labor unions (which were much more powerful in those days). The Peace Corps was the main "liberal" achievement, though conservatives have not opposed it. It was JFK who sent forces INTO Cuba and Vietnam to fight Communism. His civil rights plank in 1960 was just about the same as the GOP plank. He did not champion Medicare. The surviving Kennedys turned left after JFK was killed and the father had a stroke. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 17:18, 2 November 2009 (EST)
:::I know that the Kennedys were staunch anti-communists, but I've never heard JFK--or the Kennedy family--described as conservative. Any citations you could make? Also, as for Cuba and Vietnam, one, Cuba changed his opinion on foreign policy. After the Cuban Missile Crisis, Kennedy's foreign policy went from being center-right to being center-left, and his calls for peace and negotiations replaced hawkish rhetoric. Secondly, Kennedy actually wanted to pull out of Vietnam, and had started the motions to do so before he was assassinated. Johnson reversed it, and escalated it. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 21:55, 2 November 2009 (EST)
::::sending combat forces into both Cuba and Vietnam to stop Communism is pretty dramatic example of a conservative foreign policy, not to mention forcing the Russians out of Cuba. In domestic policy he took many conservative positions: he opposed unions (esp Teamsters), opposed deficit spending, and supported tax cuts. He never supported abortion in any form, or gay rights. And (in 1960) he moved the country to acceptance of Roman Catholicism. Finally, he was opposed by the major liberals of the day (E. Roosevelt, Humphrey, Stevenson); for his VP he picked Johnson, considered a conservative at the time. The Kennedy family was known for leading the support of Joe McCarthy in 1950s. As for what people say, try Googling "jfk" and "conservative" and look at the 2 million hits.[[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 22:54, 2 November 2009 (EST)
:::::
Well, first of all, if you Google "FDR" and "Conservative" you get 9,510,000 hits. I guess this makes Old Man Roosevelt the greatest conservative of all time then, eh?

Anyway, let's take a walk through history, shall we? Here's a list of some of Kennedy's liberal traits.

First of all, JFK supported the withdrawal of troops from Vietnam. Not only is this confirmed by Robert McNamara in his film "The Fog of War," but an audio recording of then-Vice President Lyndon Johnson referring to this plan of Kennedy's is also shown. Also, consult Kennedy's National Security Action Memorandum 263, from October 1963, which called for the removal of 1,000 armed forces personnel to be removed by the end of the year.

Yes, Kennedy was--for a long time--a foreign policy hawk. No question. But by the last year of his life (post-Bay of Pigs), he was moving in a more dovish direction. He negotiated the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, and gave a famous speech about world peace at American University on June 10, 1963. http://www1.media.american.edu/speeches/Kennedy.htm

Secondly, John F. Kennedy's tax cut was a demand-side tax cut, not a supply-side cut; Ronald Reagan he was not. You could argue whether a present-day liberal would institute such a measure (probably not), but no conservative would either. http://www.slate.com/id/2093947/ A good article about this.

Your talk of Kennedy not supporting civil rights seems to neglect the entire last two years of his life. Kennedy deployed federal marshalls in 1962 to allow James Meredith to enroll in his first class at the University of Mississippi. Furthermore, after George Wallace infamously blocked the doorway of University of Alabama, John F. Kennedy gave one of his most famous speeches, his civil rights speech, on June 11, 1963. In it, he proposed what would become the Civil Rights Act of 1964. You can find a transcript here: http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Reference+Desk/Speeches/JFK/003POF03CivilRights06111963.htm It is startling to me that you don't know of this. Also note that John, along with brother Robert, helped secure Martin Luther King's release from prison http://www.lib.lsu.edu/hum/mlk/srs216.html

Your claim in the main article that Kennedy never claimed to be a liberal is false. One of his most famous quotes is this, from September 1960, in accepting the New York Liberal Party nomination: "If by a "Liberal" they mean someone who looks ahead and not behind, someone who welcomes new ideas without rigid reactions, someone who cares about the welfare of the people — their health, their housing, their schools, their jobs, their civil rights, and their civil liberties — someone who believes we can break through the stalemate and suspicions that grip us in our policies abroad, if that is what they mean by a "Liberal," then I'm proud to say I'm a "Liberal."" Also note the mention of civil rights.

By saying that Kennedy never supported abortion or gay rights, you're creating a false strawman. Abortion and gay rights were not issues in the 1960s; by this measure, you could just as easily claim that Nixon and Goldwater were liberals because they didn't (between 1961 and 1963) speak out against those two issues. Fact of the matter is, abortion didn't become a major political issue until Roe v. Wade. Had Kennedy lived, and opposed abortion through the 1970s, you may have had a point. The Democrats didn't introduce a gay rights plank to their party platform until 1976; the Republicans didn't introduce one in opposition until 1992.

But while we're talking about modern issues, here's President Kennedy arguing for '''''universal health care''''' in May of 1962 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14A1zxaHpD8

Kennedy signed Omnibus Housing Bill 1961, which proposed spending $3.19 billion on a massive government housing program for the working poor. It also called for the creation of the Department of Housing and Urban Urban Affairs.

Kennedy opposed the quota system for immigration, saying it had "no basis in either logic or reason." He said to Congress on July 23, 1963: "It neither satisfies a national need nor accomplishes an international purpose. In an age of interdependence among nations, such a system is an anachronism for it discriminates among applicants for admission into the United States on the basis of the accident of birth." (Kennedy, John F., Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., 1964, pp. 594-597.)

Kennedy signed HR5143, which abolished the death penalty for first-degree murder in Washington DC.

As for Kennedy and FDR, read "Ask Not: The Inauguration of John F. Kennedy and the Speech That Changed America." Franklin Roosevelt was one of Kennedy's heroes. His "Ask not..." quote and "New Frontier" were efforts to mimick FDR's "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself" and "New Deal," respectively

It's also funny that you claim that the Kennedy family represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party; Joseph Kennedy Sr. strongly opposed the Lend-Lease Act and indeed, any aid to Great Britain at all. In 1940, he famously proclaimed "Democracy is finished in England. It may be here." He supported Chamberlain's policy of appeasement; read "The Dark Side of Camelot" by Seymour Hersh for more. So yes, the elder Kennedy did oppose FDR, but from his LEFT, not his right.

John F. Kennedy Kennedy established the President’s Commission on the Status of Women to examine issues of women's equality. Who chaired this group? Eleanor Roosevelt, whom you claim he opposed.

It's ashame that you felt the need to lock the page, enshrining your uncited and biased new article as "fact," and stifling what should be a robust debate and exchange of ideas. It also upsets me that you think I should "read more and think more," when clearly you aren't aware of (or simply chose not to mention) a great deal of what Kennedy believed or what policy directives his administration took. You do bring up good points about areas of his conservatism; he was a hawk for a while, he was tough on crime, etc. I don't mean to demean those points at all; you make them eloquently. But as I've clearly shown, he was quite liberal in many areas as well. My guess is, if he were alive today, he would probably be a Democrat in the mold of Joe Lieberman, or perhaps Evan Bayh. Hopefully, we can resolve this, and re-write the passage together to find a better balance, and more accurately show that Kennedy worked in both conservative and liberal directions in his long and illustrious career.
[[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 13:30, 5 November 2009 (EST)

'''Addendum''': In reviewing what I wrote, I realized I left out an important component: Medicare. You claimed that Kennedy "Never championed Medicare." This is incorrect. In fact, he championed it during both his campaign and his presidency, and was one of the individuals who actually popularized the moniker "Medicare." Review these links: 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpMNdYhRq90 President Kennedy explains importance of Medicare bill to Congress 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gu1HyCeEus&feature=related Candidate Kennedy defends Medicare 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFesycofKk4 Madison Square Garden debate with Medicare opponent Dr. Edward Annis 

On December 7, 1961, Kennedy said at the opening of the AFL-CIO Convention: "Those who are "too old to work and too young to die" must be protected through Social Security system against the staggering costs of medical care. The time has come, in this next session of the Congress, to face the fact that our elder citizens need these benefits-that their needs cannot be met in any other way-and that every member of the Congress should have an opportunity to vote this bill up, or vote it down and tell the people why."

In September 1961, he wrote to the Chairman of the Senate Special Committee on Aging: "I consider the proposal to provide health insurance for the aged under Social Security one of the most important measures I have advocated."

The Politics of Medicare is a good read. However, a Google Books search of "John F. Kennedy" and "Medicare" nets many more similar quotes to what I posted, as well as news reports from the 1960 campaign concerning his advocacy for Medicare. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 20:02, 8 November 2009 (EST)

::1) Kennedy sent the troops into Vietnam. He made the commitment. He did rotate units but there is no evidence he planned to end that commitment. That was wishful thinking by liberals who liked him.
 2) the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty had both liberal and conservative elements (esp as a device to control China)
 3) the tax cut was praised by Reagan and many conservatives in urging their own tax cuts in 1981.
 4) the quote "If by a "Liberal" they mean ..." avoids almost all the main liberal positions of the day, re taxes, spending and labor unions, for example. He of course had to say nice things because he needed the Liberal party line in the election.
 5) Kennedy enforced federal court orders but civil rights was low on his agenda and he was never a main supporter from 1948 till his death.
 6) Kennedy did oppose the quota immigration system of 1924--as did most conservatives too.
 7) Kennedy never supported abortion or gay rights, and always voted the conservative Catholic position on such issues.
 8) he signed the death penalty repeal which was on the liberal side
 9) Kennedy did admire FDR's political skills and rhetoric and tried to emulate them. As did Reagan.
 10) the 1940 business is a bit complicated because it's not clear how much JFK agreed with his father. His father represented the conservative opponents of aid to Britain, including for example Taft and Lindbergh. The left (John L Lewis) opposed aid because Russia strongly opposed aid to Britain.
 11) He needed Eleanor Roosevelt's support and appointed her. She was A CONSERVATIVE on women's issues and she strongly opposed the ERA.
 12) Medicare: yest hat was a liberal position Kennedy took. The articles says that he had a mixed record on domestic issues.
 13) "uncited and biased new article." if you call CP administrators names you'll get in trouble. I actually read all the books that are listed and I expect people to be familiar with come of them before they jump in. I you want to propose a paragraph, run it thrugh here first.[[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 20:37, 8 November 2009 (EST)
 
No one is calling you any names, for one. It is a matter of solid fact that the revision you put into the new article has very few citations and many statements of opinion that wouldn't be found in any reputable encyclopedia, conservative or otherwise. A statement like "Kennedy was basically a conservative, but he had to appeal to a primarily liberal base, so he offered symbols for the liberals while following a conservative course in foreign and domestic policy" that doesn't have a citation has no business being there.
 
Re: your list: 
1.) Re-read what I wrote concerning Kennedy and Vietnam, and watch The Fog of War. Kennedy made the commitment, but he also began taking the steps necessary to withdraw. In discussing this issue in the article, we should take steps to show that Kennedy became conflicted as the war dragged on. Take a look at this http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hs2AWQQgQffeC3pmWebC22GqdBGwD9BO80E80 
2.) Any sources for this claim? If you can provide some, I'm willing to concede the point and agree with you. However, in all that I've read, I have never seen such treaties described as being conservative. 
3.) Of course it was praised by Reagan; typically, when a president is trying to get a measure passed that has broad support within their base but little-to-none from the other party, they will invoke the memory of a president from the other party. Bush II did this with Franklin Roosevelt and Social Security. Candidate John Kerry did this with Ronald Reagan in talking about his foreign policy, etc. As I stated before, you're right, no liberal would pass a tax cut like this nowadays. HOWEVER, with it being a demand-side tax cut designed to benefit the working class (rather than a trickle-down tax cut), this is not something that many conservatives would enact either. 
4.) Whether what Kennedy described also applies to today's liberals is irrelevant. My point in bringing it up was to show you that your claim in the article--"Kennedy refused to call himself a liberal"--is patently inaccurate. 
5.) Your response here is simply inaccurate. Yes, Kennedy enforced court orders. And you're right, he was not a prominent supporter of civil rights for MOST of his life. But by 1963, this was changing. Again, I direct you to the speech he gave June 11, 1963. In it, he proposed what would become the Civil Rights Act of 1964. You can find a transcript here: http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Reference+Desk/Speeches/JFK/003POF03CivilRights06111963.htm 
6.) The sponsors of the Immigration and Nationality Act (which reformed the quotas)--Rep. Emanuel Celler and Sens. Phillip Hart and Ted Kennedy--were all Democrats. All opposition either came from Republicans or conservative Southern Democrats. I would describe this as a middle-of-the-road act at best. Kennedy considered this to be a matter of civil rights; http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=60440 
7.) I never disagreed with you here. All I did was state that these were NOT issues during the time Kennedy was active in politics (1948-1963). NO ONE supported gay rights or abortion at that time; neither were political issues. By that measure, FDR and Truman would both be conservatives, as neither of them spoke out in favor of either. You can't hold Kennedy to standards that didn't exist. Furthermore, your claim that he "always voted the conservative Catholic position on such issues" is also incorrect, as 1.) Those issues never came up in the senate, and 2.) There is no public record of John F. Kennedy's position on abortion or gay rights. 
8.) I'm glad we agree 
9.) More than admiring FDR's political skills, he also admired (most of) his policy decisions. Refer to Kennedy's speeches on Medicare, or again to "Ask Not" for more. 
10.) Whether JFK agreed with his dad is irrelevant. My reason in bringing up Joe Sr.'s appeasement beliefs was to refute your claim that the Kennedy family "represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party." That was not true during Joe Sr.'s time, and it wasn't true during JFK, RFK, and Ted's time. 
11.) Your statement here that Eleanor was a "CONSERVATIVE" flies in the face of what you said earlier (that she was one of the liberals that Kennedy opposed). Which is it? 
12.) No disagreements here. This was, however, in response to your claim that Kennedy "never championed Medicare." Clearly, he did. At least you admitted you were wrong. 
 
Have you really read the books I listed? Much less, viewed the speeches or other links I provided? Clearly, you still have some misconceptions about his record.
 
Also, I am not suggesting we revise the article to say that Kennedy was a flaming liberal. Of course he wasn't. But the way it stands now--with Kennedy being described as "basically conservative"--is simply inaccurate. Between Medicare, civil rights, $3.19 billion being spent on government housing, the promotion of the Department of Urban Affairs, the Peace Corps, his move to abolish the death penalty in DC, and reforming the quota system, clearly he was not "basically conservative." This article needs to take a more nuanced view, and reflect the fact that Kennedy held MANY liberal positions in addition to having some strong conservative stances as well.
 
As a final note, I would appreciate it (simply from a perspective of readability) if you could type more accurately and with less typos. As it stands now, your typos are frequent and egregious, and it takes me several moments to figure out what you mean. I don't mean this personally, it's just something that I'm struggling with; as a college professor, I'm sure you understand. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 21:20, 8 November 2009 (EST)

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-11-09T02:22:23Z

ChuckR:

"crisis" should read "Cuban Missile Crisis", please.

== Not Fair ==
It is not entirely fair to lay the blame of the failure of the Bay of Pigs squarely at JFK's feet. There was a lot of urging from the CIA and the military NOT to go ahead with American military itervention on behalf of the insurgents. Considering the atmosphere of the world at that time, I can't say listening to them was a horrible idea. Regrettable that the operation was botched, but the reasons why it was botched are not 100% of JFK's doing.

And it's quite interesting that the hawks in his administration that urged him NOT to intervene in Bay of Pigs are the ones who the author of this article quite cleverly insinuates are the reason why Kennedy kept us safe through the Cuban Missle Crisis, as if without them Kennedy would have been inept. If you're looking for the slightest reasons to praise the hawks in his administration, even if it is to just lessen JFK's abilities as an individual, you could have made mention of the hawks being the driving force behind not intervening in Bay of Pigs, and thus applauded them for it in the process (when keeping in mind that not risking such a blatant and overt challenge to the USSR that would not have been necesary and risked TERRIBLE reprecussions...). But it looks like the author of this article was too concerned with finding anything to blame on Kennedy, and thus missed their opportunity to render more praise unto the conservative hawks. [[User:Jros83|Jros83]] 02:30, 25 June 2007 (EDT)

:To add to the Bay of Pigs discussion, the CIA under Eisenhower actually made the plan, it was recomended to Kennedy once he took office. The way this page reads is as though he is 100% totally at fault for everything. I think he was a do-nothing president that is only popular because he was assasinated, but seriously folks, lets calm down the rhetoric. ALSO: I changed the reference about him being the "youngest president". He was the youngest person ever ELECTED president, but Teddy Roosevelt was actually a year or two younger than Kennedy when he took office. I didn't want to re-write the whole section, but I figured I'd throw in a minor correction. [[User:JamesBenjamin|JamesBenjamin]] 18:54, 29 June 2007 (EDT)

== Sordid personal life ==
Okay, I've tried twice to include something about how Kennedy was a sex fiend and twice they were scrubbed right away. I expect this lionizing nonsense from Wikipedia but I thought the point of this was that conservatives could actually post relevant information about entries of importance without having it waxed by Marxist Wikipedia editors. If I'm missing something, then please tell me why [[User:Billdozer|Billdozer]]
:Show us solid, verifyable evidence from official sources that Kennedy was such a man, and we'll include it. [[User:Karajou|Karajou]] 22:38, 11 March 2008 (EDT)

What's a solid, official source? There isn't an official source that says Bill Clinton was, um, serviced by an intern in the Oval Office, but everyone in the world knows it to be true. Similarly, there were no shortage of witnesses who could attest to JFK's ravenous sexual apptetite. [[User:Billdozer|Billdozer]]
:Witnesses came out within weeks testifying as to Bill and Monica's indiscretions; plus there's past indiscretions all over Arkansas, such as Paula Jone's and others lawsuits. These, at the least, made the newspapers at that time. I want to see similar patterns for Kennedy, reported in the newspapers at the time he was a U.S. senator, as well as when he was a U.S. president. [[User:Karajou|Karajou]] 05:47, 12 March 2008 (EDT)

There are other reliable sources than newspapers. The newspapers wouldn't even have printed Clinton's misdoings if the Drudge Report hadn't forced the case into the open. The press was well aware of what JFK was really like but they protected him, as the press tends to do for left-wing presidents. But good luck finding a JFK biography, even a glowing one, that doesn't at least acknowledge some sort of pattern of sexual misconduct. [[User:Billdozer|Billdozer]]

== new material added ==

::{{template|Part of this article was copied from [[Conservapedia]] but the copied text was originally written by me, RJJensen (under the name Richard Jensen) and does not include alterations made by others on that site.||category=Copied Articles}} [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 19:03, 22 November 2008 (EST)

== JFK a conservative? What? ==

I take issue with the two sentences, "JFK, like his family, was middle-of-the-road on domestic issues and conservative on foreign policy" and "The Kennedy family represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party"

Since when did the Kennedys represent the conservative wing of the Democratic party? All of them are liberal stalwarts. As for his foreign policy, it was his idea to pull out of Vietnam, among other things. As far as domestic policy, he was definitely liberal; his civil rights plank, championing of a Medicare-type program, Peace Corps, etc.

I motion that the first sentence be revised to "JFK, like his family, was liberal on domestic issues and middle-of-the-road on foreign policy" and that the second sentence be dropped entirely. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 19:28, 17 October 2009 (EDT)
::Joe Kennedy was always one of the main leaders and financiers of the conservative wing of the Dem party, and was a main supporter of Joe MvcCarthy; Bobby was an aide and supporter of Joe McCarthy. They were all strongly anti-communist and very critical of labor unions (which were much more powerful in those days). The Peace Corps was the main "liberal" achievement, though conservatives have not opposed it. It was JFK who sent forces INTO Cuba and Vietnam to fight Communism. His civil rights plank in 1960 was just about the same as the GOP plank. He did not champion Medicare. The surviving Kennedys turned left after JFK was killed and the father had a stroke. [[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 17:18, 2 November 2009 (EST)
:::I know that the Kennedys were staunch anti-communists, but I've never heard JFK--or the Kennedy family--described as conservative. Any citations you could make? Also, as for Cuba and Vietnam, one, Cuba changed his opinion on foreign policy. After the Cuban Missile Crisis, Kennedy's foreign policy went from being center-right to being center-left, and his calls for peace and negotiations replaced hawkish rhetoric. Secondly, Kennedy actually wanted to pull out of Vietnam, and had started the motions to do so before he was assassinated. Johnson reversed it, and escalated it. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 21:55, 2 November 2009 (EST)
::::sending combat forces into both Cuba and Vietnam to stop Communism is pretty dramatic example of a conservative foreign policy, not to mention forcing the Russians out of Cuba. In domestic policy he took many conservative positions: he opposed unions (esp Teamsters), opposed deficit spending, and supported tax cuts. He never supported abortion in any form, or gay rights. And (in 1960) he moved the country to acceptance of Roman Catholicism. Finally, he was opposed by the major liberals of the day (E. Roosevelt, Humphrey, Stevenson); for his VP he picked Johnson, considered a conservative at the time. The Kennedy family was known for leading the support of Joe McCarthy in 1950s. As for what people say, try Googling "jfk" and "conservative" and look at the 2 million hits.[[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 22:54, 2 November 2009 (EST)
:::::
Well, first of all, if you Google "FDR" and "Conservative" you get 9,510,000 hits. I guess this makes Old Man Roosevelt the greatest conservative of all time then, eh?

Anyway, let's take a walk through history, shall we? Here's a list of some of Kennedy's liberal traits.

First of all, JFK supported the withdrawal of troops from Vietnam. Not only is this confirmed by Robert McNamara in his film "The Fog of War," but an audio recording of then-Vice President Lyndon Johnson referring to this plan of Kennedy's is also shown. Also, consult Kennedy's National Security Action Memorandum 263, from October 1963, which called for the removal of 1,000 armed forces personnel to be removed by the end of the year.

Yes, Kennedy was--for a long time--a foreign policy hawk. No question. But by the last year of his life (post-Bay of Pigs), he was moving in a more dovish direction. He negotiated the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, and gave a famous speech about world peace at American University on June 10, 1963. http://www1.media.american.edu/speeches/Kennedy.htm

Secondly, John F. Kennedy's tax cut was a demand-side tax cut, not a supply-side cut; Ronald Reagan he was not. You could argue whether a present-day liberal would institute such a measure (probably not), but no conservative would either. http://www.slate.com/id/2093947/ A good article about this.

Your talk of Kennedy not supporting civil rights seems to neglect the entire last two years of his life. Kennedy deployed federal marshalls in 1962 to allow James Meredith to enroll in his first class at the University of Mississippi. Furthermore, after George Wallace infamously blocked the doorway of University of Alabama, John F. Kennedy gave one of his most famous speeches, his civil rights speech, on June 11, 1963. In it, he proposed what would become the Civil Rights Act of 1964. You can find a transcript here: http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Reference+Desk/Speeches/JFK/003POF03CivilRights06111963.htm It is startling to me that you don't know of this. Also note that John, along with brother Robert, helped secure Martin Luther King's release from prison http://www.lib.lsu.edu/hum/mlk/srs216.html

Your claim in the main article that Kennedy never claimed to be a liberal is false. One of his most famous quotes is this, from September 1960, in accepting the New York Liberal Party nomination: "If by a "Liberal" they mean someone who looks ahead and not behind, someone who welcomes new ideas without rigid reactions, someone who cares about the welfare of the people — their health, their housing, their schools, their jobs, their civil rights, and their civil liberties — someone who believes we can break through the stalemate and suspicions that grip us in our policies abroad, if that is what they mean by a "Liberal," then I'm proud to say I'm a "Liberal."" Also note the mention of civil rights.

By saying that Kennedy never supported abortion or gay rights, you're creating a false strawman. Abortion and gay rights were not issues in the 1960s; by this measure, you could just as easily claim that Nixon and Goldwater were liberals because they didn't (between 1961 and 1963) speak out against those two issues. Fact of the matter is, abortion didn't become a major political issue until Roe v. Wade. Had Kennedy lived, and opposed abortion through the 1970s, you may have had a point. The Democrats didn't introduce a gay rights plank to their party platform until 1976; the Republicans didn't introduce one in opposition until 1992.

But while we're talking about modern issues, here's President Kennedy arguing for '''''universal health care''''' in May of 1962 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14A1zxaHpD8

Kennedy signed Omnibus Housing Bill 1961, which proposed spending $3.19 billion on a massive government housing program for the working poor. It also called for the creation of the Department of Housing and Urban Urban Affairs.

Kennedy opposed the quota system for immigration, saying it had "no basis in either logic or reason." He said to Congress on July 23, 1963: "It neither satisfies a national need nor accomplishes an international purpose. In an age of interdependence among nations, such a system is an anachronism for it discriminates among applicants for admission into the United States on the basis of the accident of birth." (Kennedy, John F., Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., 1964, pp. 594-597.)

Kennedy signed HR5143, which abolished the death penalty for first-degree murder in Washington DC.

As for Kennedy and FDR, read "Ask Not: The Inauguration of John F. Kennedy and the Speech That Changed America." Franklin Roosevelt was one of Kennedy's heroes. His "Ask not..." quote and "New Frontier" were efforts to mimick FDR's "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself" and "New Deal," respectively

It's also funny that you claim that the Kennedy family represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party; Joseph Kennedy Sr. strongly opposed the Lend-Lease Act and indeed, any aid to Great Britain at all. In 1940, he famously proclaimed "Democracy is finished in England. It may be here." He supported Chamberlain's policy of appeasement; read "The Dark Side of Camelot" by Seymour Hersh for more. So yes, the elder Kennedy did oppose FDR, but from his LEFT, not his right.

John F. Kennedy Kennedy established the President’s Commission on the Status of Women to examine issues of women's equality. Who chaired this group? Eleanor Roosevelt, whom you claim he opposed.

It's ashame that you felt the need to lock the page, enshrining your uncited and biased new article as "fact," and stifling what should be a robust debate and exchange of ideas. It also upsets me that you think I should "read more and think more," when clearly you aren't aware of (or simply chose not to mention) a great deal of what Kennedy believed or what policy directives his administration took. You do bring up good points about areas of his conservatism; he was a hawk for a while, he was tough on crime, etc. I don't mean to demean those points at all; you make them eloquently. But as I've clearly shown, he was quite liberal in many areas as well. My guess is, if he were alive today, he would probably be a Democrat in the mold of Joe Lieberman, or perhaps Evan Bayh. Hopefully, we can resolve this, and re-write the passage together to find a better balance, and more accurately show that Kennedy worked in both conservative and liberal directions in his long and illustrious career.
[[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 13:30, 5 November 2009 (EST)

'''Addendum''': In reviewing what I wrote, I realized I left out an important component: Medicare. You claimed that Kennedy "Never championed Medicare." This is incorrect. In fact, he championed it during both his campaign and his presidency, and was one of the individuals who actually popularized the moniker "Medicare." Review these links: 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpMNdYhRq90 President Kennedy explains importance of Medicare bill to Congress 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gu1HyCeEus&feature=related Candidate Kennedy defends Medicare 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFesycofKk4 Madison Square Garden debate with Medicare opponent Dr. Edward Annis 

On December 7, 1961, Kennedy said at the opening of the AFL-CIO Convention: "Those who are "too old to work and too young to die" must be protected through Social Security system against the staggering costs of medical care. The time has come, in this next session of the Congress, to face the fact that our elder citizens need these benefits-that their needs cannot be met in any other way-and that every member of the Congress should have an opportunity to vote this bill up, or vote it down and tell the people why."

In September 1961, he wrote to the Chairman of the Senate Special Committee on Aging: "I consider the proposal to provide health insurance for the aged under Social Security one of the most important measures I have advocated."

The Politics of Medicare is a good read. However, a Google Books search of "John F. Kennedy" and "Medicare" nets many more similar quotes to what I posted, as well as news reports from the 1960 campaign concerning his advocacy for Medicare. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 20:02, 8 November 2009 (EST)

::1) Kennedy sent the troops into Vietnam. He made the commitment. He did rotate units but there is no evidence he planned to end that commitment. That was wishful thinking by liberals who liked him.
 2) the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty had both liberal and conservative elements (esp as a device to control China)
 3) the tax cut was praised by Reagan and many conservatives in urging their own tax cuts in 1981.
 4) the quote "If by a "Liberal" they mean ..." avoids almost all the main liberal positions of the day, re taxes, spending and labor unions, for example. He of course had to say nice things because he needed the Liberal party line in the election.
 5) Kennedy enforced federal court orders but civil rights was low on his agenda and he was never a main supporter from 1948 till his death.
 6) Kennedy did oppose the quota immigration system of 1924--as did most conservatives too.
 7) Kennedy never supported abortion or gay rights, and always voted the conservative Catholic position on such issues.
 8) he signed the death penalty repeal which was on the liberal side
 9) Kennedy did admire FDR's political skills and rhetoric and tried to emulate them. As did Reagan.
 10) the 1940 business is a bit complicated because it's not clear how much JFK agreed with his father. His father represented the conservative opponents of aid to Britain, including for example Taft and Lindbergh. The left (John L Lewis) opposed aid because Russia strongly opposed aid to Britain.
 11) He needed Eleanor Roosevelt's support and appointed her. She was A CONSERVATIVE on women's issues and she strongly opposed the ERA.
 12) Medicare: yest hat was a liberal position Kennedy took. The articles says that he had a mixed record on domestic issues.
 13) "uncited and biased new article." if you call CP administrators names you'll get in trouble. I actually read all the books that are listed and I expect people to be familiar with come of them before they jump in. I you want to propose a paragraph, run it thrugh here first.[[User:RJJensen|RJJensen]] 20:37, 8 November 2009 (EST)
 
No one is calling you any names, for one. It is a matter of solid fact that the revision you put into the new article has very few citations and many statements of opinion that wouldn't be found in any reputable encyclopedia, conservative or otherwise. A statement like "Kennedy was basically a conservative, but he had to appeal to a primarily liberal base, so he offered symbols for the liberals while following a conservative course in foreign and domestic policy" that doesn't have a citation has no business being there.
 
Re: your list: 
1.) Re-read what I wrote concerning Kennedy and Vietnam, and watch The Fog of War. Kennedy made the commitment, but he also began taking the steps necessary to withdraw. In discussing this issue in the article, we should take steps to show that Kennedy became conflicted as the war dragged on. Take a look at this http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hs2AWQQgQffeC3pmWebC22GqdBGwD9BO80E80 
2.) Any sources for this claim? If you can provide some, I'm willing to concede the point and agree with you. However, in all that I've read, I have never seen such treaties described as being conservative. 
3.) Of course it was praised by Reagan; typically, when a president is trying to get a measure passed that has broad support within their base but little-to-none from the other party, they will invoke the memory of a president from the other party. Bush II did this with Franklin Roosevelt and Social Security. Candidate John Kerry did this with Ronald Reagan in talking about his foreign policy, etc. As I stated before, you're right, no liberal would pass a tax cut like this nowadays. HOWEVER, with it being a demand-side tax cut designed to benefit the working class (rather than a trickle-down tax cut), this is not something that many conservatives would enact either. 
4.) Whether what Kennedy described also applies to today's liberals is irrelevant. My point in bringing it up was to show you that your claim in the article--"Kennedy refused to call himself a liberal"--is patently inaccurate. 
5.) Your response here is simply inaccurate. Yes, Kennedy enforced court orders. And you're right, he was not a prominent supporter of civil rights for MOST of his life. But by 1963, this was changing. Again, I direct you to the speech he gave June 11, 1963. In it, he proposed what would become the Civil Rights Act of 1964. You can find a transcript here: http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Reference+Desk/Speeches/JFK/003POF03CivilRights06111963.htm 
6.) The sponsors of the Immigration and Nationality Act (which reformed the quotas)--Rep. Emanuel Celler and Sens. Phillip Hart and Ted Kennedy--were all Democrats. All opposition either came from Republicans or conservative Southern Democrats. I would describe this as a middle-of-the-road act at best. Kennedy considered this to be a matter of civil rights; http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=60440 
7.) I never disagreed with you here. All I did was state that these were NOT issues during the time Kennedy was active in politics (1948-1963). NO ONE supported gay rights or abortion at that time; neither were political issues. By that measure, FDR and Truman would both be conservatives, as neither of them spoke out in favor of either. You can't hold Kennedy to standards that didn't exist. Furthermore, your claim that he "always voted the conservative Catholic position on such issues" is also incorrect, as 1.) Those issues never came up in the senate, and 2.) There is no public record of John F. Kennedy's position on abortion or gay rights. 
8.) I'm glad we agree 
9.) More than admiring FDR's political skills, he also admired (most of) his policy decisions. Refer to Kennedy's speeches on Medicare, or again to "Ask Not" for more. 
10.) Whether JFK agreed with his dad is irrelevant. My reason in bringing up Joe Sr.'s appeasement beliefs was to refute your claim that the Kennedy family "represented the conservative wing of the Democratic party." That was not true during Joe Sr.'s time, and it wasn't true during JFK, RFK, and Ted's time. 
11.) Your statement here that Eleanor was a "CONSERVATIVE" flies in the face of what you said earlier (that she was one of the liberals that Kennedy opposed). Which is it? 
12.) No disagreements here. This was, however, in response to your claim that Kennedy "never championed Medicare." Clearly, he did. At least you admitted you were wrong. 
 
Have you really read the books I listed? Much less, viewed the speeches or other links I provided? Clearly, you still have some misconceptions about his record.
 
Also, I am not suggesting we revise the article to say that Kennedy was a flaming liberal. Of course he wasn't. But the way it stands now--with Kennedy being described as "basically conservative"--is simply inaccurate. Between Medicare, civil rights, $3.19 billion being spent on government housing, the promotion of the Department of Urban Affairs, the Peace Corps, his move to abolish the death penalty in DC, and reforming the quota system, clearly he was not "basically conservative." This article needs to take a more nuanced view, and reflect the fact that Kennedy held MANY liberal positions in addition to having some strong conservative stances as well.
 
As a final note, I would appreciate it (simply from a perspective of readability) if you could type more accurately and with less typos. As it stands now, your typos are frequent and egregious, and it takes me several moments to figure out what you mean. I don't mean this personally, it's just something that I'm struggling with; as a college professor, I'm sure you understand. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 21:20, 8 November 2009 (EST)

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-11-09T02:20:22Z

ChuckR:

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-11-09T01:02:43Z

ChuckR:

User talk:RJJensen

2009-11-09T01:02:22Z

ChuckR: /* John F. Kennedy (again) */ new section

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-11-09T00:54:38Z

ChuckR:

User talk:JLauttamus

2009-11-06T00:15:21Z

ChuckR: /* Sorry */

{{welcome|sig=[[User:Joaquín Martínez]], [[User talk:Joaquín Martínez|talk]] 16:05, 22 May 2008 (EDT)}}

== Creation science ==

I see you have reverted my edit in the second sentence without discussion. You appear to have missed the point. I made that particular change because I understand the the 6000 year figure was not necessarily used by all religions. Do Hindus for example agree on that figure? --[[User:Horace|Horace]] 19:03, 21 September 2008 (EDT)
:I disagree with the point that the entire sentence is making. I don't think that most advocates of creation science believe that the earth is 6,000 years old. I'm not very well-versed on Hindu views. However, as I said in the edit summary, there are other advocates of YEC. I don't think it is correct or fair to single out Christians in that statement. If you're going for specificity, then you should qualify with all 3 Abrahamic religions. [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 19:07, 21 September 2008 (EDT)
::You make a valid point. Perhaps the introduction should first of all make some distinction between the creation science views of various religious groups before going on to nominate the 6000 year period for Christians (and whoever else uses it). --[[User:Horace|Horace]] 19:11, 21 September 2008 (EDT)
:::I don't touch the religious articles. I stick to politics and medicine. Your point is valid and well-taken. It's definitely something you should bring up on the talk page. [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 19:14, 21 September 2008 (EDT)

== Award ==

Thanks for the award, but could you double-check the template? My reply to you seems to be rendering inside the blue box no matter what I do. Thanks again for the recognition :-) -[[User:Foxtrot|Foxtrot]] 16:45, 26 September 2008 (EDT)

==Local==
Hello, I'm from the Pittsburgh area as well. [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 11:55, 16 December 2008 (EST)
:Oh, wow. Good to meet another Burgh Boy! I actually live in Northern WV, but I work in Pittsburgh. I'm about 15 miles west of the city. Which end of the city do you live on? [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 11:57, 16 December 2008 (EST)
::I'm southeast, near Monroeville. [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 11:59, 16 December 2008 (EST)
:::Yeah, I'm kind of foreign to that area. I work up by the zoo in Aspinwall, though a good friend of mine lives on the South Side. The only time I ever really make it into the city is for sports games (Pens, Stillers, Pirates). [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 12:02, 16 December 2008 (EST)
:::And I see you're a Social D fan. Quite the punk scene here in Pittsburgh. I got to see Antiflag when they were here last April up at Mr. Smalls. [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 12:04, 16 December 2008 (EST)
::::Yes, I live for Social D. There is a pretty decent punk scene here. The Misfits were just in town on Friday, also at Mr. Smalls. Monroeville is just a short trip West on the parkway (I-376) to Pittsburgh. Sporting events are usually my only reason for downtown travel as well, because it is one of the toughest cities to navigate. [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 14:21, 16 December 2008 (EST)
==Ted==
Ted didn't make the edit to add User:Human as you stared on his talk page. That edit was made by [http://www.conservapedia.com/index.php?title=Body&diff=prev&oldid=517535 Sideways]. [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 13:45, 12 January 2009 (EST)
:Thanks, Wesley (Wes?). I made sure to strike out the comment. I feel like a real jerk...looks like I need to be more careful! [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 13:51, 12 January 2009 (EST)
::Just happened to catch it. And, yes, Wes is fine. Everyone calls me that! [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 14:04, 12 January 2009 (EST)

==Please don't==
What I have written is accurate despite what you say. Please leave the article on SMON alone. --[[User:RickD|RickD]] 15:50, 12 January 2009 (EST)
:You have yet to provide evidence that every administration of the drug causes SMON. I concede that it is neurotoxic in high doses, and also concede that it was a mistaken diagnosis. However, not every administration of clioquinol resulted in neuro-degeneterive effects, let alone SMON. SOME did, and I concede that point as well. All the evidence I could find supports that high doses of clioquinol cause SMON; I cannot find evidence that every administration has. Please show your sources for your claim and I will not alter the statement. I'm merely after accuracy and trustworthiness. [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 15:57, 12 January 2009 (EST)

==vandal revert==
Thank you , I am monitoring from my mobile phone and it would have time consuming to had reverted all those, thanks again. --jpatt

==I got a feeling...==
..that Pittsburgh is going to get it's sixth Super Bowl win! Go Steelers! [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 22:40, 18 January 2009 (EST)

==Vending machines==
I thought the liberal machine had gotten rid of all the cigarette vending machines, when they started disappearing in the late 80s or early 90s. Nice factoid about there still being some states -- those holdouts die hard, don't they? -[[User:Foxtrot|Foxtrot]] 17:41, 11 March 2009 (EDT)
:There's still cigarette vending machines in Pennsylvania, as well. Of course they charge an arm and a leg (some as high as $8.00 per pack). [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 17:43, 11 March 2009 (EDT)
::(EC) Yeah, I was really suprised to still find one, but then I found another one in Ohio! I think it may be illegal to have them in some public places, but I know of at least 5 bars in the tri-state area (WV, PA, and OH) that still have them! --[[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 17:44, 11 March 2009 (EDT)
:::With those keen skills at finding hidden beasts, you should switch careers and start leading safaris. :-) -[[User:Foxtrot|Foxtrot]] 17:58, 11 March 2009 (EDT)

== Sorry ==

Sorry, I didn't realize you'd made a substantial change to the article. I was reverting what the guy before you did. I remedied it and re-entered your section. I'm really sorry for the mix up. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 19:15, 5 November 2009 (EST)

User talk:JLauttamus

2009-11-06T00:15:05Z

ChuckR: /* Sorry */ new section

{{welcome|sig=[[User:Joaquín Martínez]], [[User talk:Joaquín Martínez|talk]] 16:05, 22 May 2008 (EDT)}}

== Creation science ==

I see you have reverted my edit in the second sentence without discussion. You appear to have missed the point. I made that particular change because I understand the the 6000 year figure was not necessarily used by all religions. Do Hindus for example agree on that figure? --[[User:Horace|Horace]] 19:03, 21 September 2008 (EDT)
:I disagree with the point that the entire sentence is making. I don't think that most advocates of creation science believe that the earth is 6,000 years old. I'm not very well-versed on Hindu views. However, as I said in the edit summary, there are other advocates of YEC. I don't think it is correct or fair to single out Christians in that statement. If you're going for specificity, then you should qualify with all 3 Abrahamic religions. [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 19:07, 21 September 2008 (EDT)
::You make a valid point. Perhaps the introduction should first of all make some distinction between the creation science views of various religious groups before going on to nominate the 6000 year period for Christians (and whoever else uses it). --[[User:Horace|Horace]] 19:11, 21 September 2008 (EDT)
:::I don't touch the religious articles. I stick to politics and medicine. Your point is valid and well-taken. It's definitely something you should bring up on the talk page. [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 19:14, 21 September 2008 (EDT)

== Award ==

Thanks for the award, but could you double-check the template? My reply to you seems to be rendering inside the blue box no matter what I do. Thanks again for the recognition :-) -[[User:Foxtrot|Foxtrot]] 16:45, 26 September 2008 (EDT)

==Local==
Hello, I'm from the Pittsburgh area as well. [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 11:55, 16 December 2008 (EST)
:Oh, wow. Good to meet another Burgh Boy! I actually live in Northern WV, but I work in Pittsburgh. I'm about 15 miles west of the city. Which end of the city do you live on? [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 11:57, 16 December 2008 (EST)
::I'm southeast, near Monroeville. [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 11:59, 16 December 2008 (EST)
:::Yeah, I'm kind of foreign to that area. I work up by the zoo in Aspinwall, though a good friend of mine lives on the South Side. The only time I ever really make it into the city is for sports games (Pens, Stillers, Pirates). [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 12:02, 16 December 2008 (EST)
:::And I see you're a Social D fan. Quite the punk scene here in Pittsburgh. I got to see Antiflag when they were here last April up at Mr. Smalls. [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 12:04, 16 December 2008 (EST)
::::Yes, I live for Social D. There is a pretty decent punk scene here. The Misfits were just in town on Friday, also at Mr. Smalls. Monroeville is just a short trip West on the parkway (I-376) to Pittsburgh. Sporting events are usually my only reason for downtown travel as well, because it is one of the toughest cities to navigate. [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 14:21, 16 December 2008 (EST)
==Ted==
Ted didn't make the edit to add User:Human as you stared on his talk page. That edit was made by [http://www.conservapedia.com/index.php?title=Body&diff=prev&oldid=517535 Sideways]. [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 13:45, 12 January 2009 (EST)
:Thanks, Wesley (Wes?). I made sure to strike out the comment. I feel like a real jerk...looks like I need to be more careful! [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 13:51, 12 January 2009 (EST)
::Just happened to catch it. And, yes, Wes is fine. Everyone calls me that! [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 14:04, 12 January 2009 (EST)

==Please don't==
What I have written is accurate despite what you say. Please leave the article on SMON alone. --[[User:RickD|RickD]] 15:50, 12 January 2009 (EST)
:You have yet to provide evidence that every administration of the drug causes SMON. I concede that it is neurotoxic in high doses, and also concede that it was a mistaken diagnosis. However, not every administration of clioquinol resulted in neuro-degeneterive effects, let alone SMON. SOME did, and I concede that point as well. All the evidence I could find supports that high doses of clioquinol cause SMON; I cannot find evidence that every administration has. Please show your sources for your claim and I will not alter the statement. I'm merely after accuracy and trustworthiness. [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 15:57, 12 January 2009 (EST)

==vandal revert==
Thank you , I am monitoring from my mobile phone and it would have time consuming to had reverted all those, thanks again. --jpatt

==I got a feeling...==
..that Pittsburgh is going to get it's sixth Super Bowl win! Go Steelers! [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 22:40, 18 January 2009 (EST)

==Vending machines==
I thought the liberal machine had gotten rid of all the cigarette vending machines, when they started disappearing in the late 80s or early 90s. Nice factoid about there still being some states -- those holdouts die hard, don't they? -[[User:Foxtrot|Foxtrot]] 17:41, 11 March 2009 (EDT)
:There's still cigarette vending machines in Pennsylvania, as well. Of course they charge an arm and a leg (some as high as $8.00 per pack). [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 17:43, 11 March 2009 (EDT)
::(EC) Yeah, I was really suprised to still find one, but then I found another one in Ohio! I think it may be illegal to have them in some public places, but I know of at least 5 bars in the tri-state area (WV, PA, and OH) that still have them! --[[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 17:44, 11 March 2009 (EDT)
:::With those keen skills at finding hidden beasts, you should switch careers and start leading safaris. :-) -[[User:Foxtrot|Foxtrot]] 17:58, 11 March 2009 (EDT)

== Sorry ==

Sorry, I didn't realize you'd made a substantial change to the article. I was reverting what the guy before you did. I remedied it and re-entered your section. I'm really sorry for the mix-up. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 19:14, 5 November 2009 (EST)

== Sorry ==

Sorry, I didn't realize you'd made a substantial change to the article. I was reverting what the guy before you did. I remedied it and re-entered your section. I'm really sorry for the mix up. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 19:15, 5 November 2009 (EST)

User talk:JLauttamus

2009-11-06T00:14:57Z

ChuckR: /* Sorry */ new section

{{welcome|sig=[[User:Joaquín Martínez]], [[User talk:Joaquín Martínez|talk]] 16:05, 22 May 2008 (EDT)}}

== Creation science ==

I see you have reverted my edit in the second sentence without discussion. You appear to have missed the point. I made that particular change because I understand the the 6000 year figure was not necessarily used by all religions. Do Hindus for example agree on that figure? --[[User:Horace|Horace]] 19:03, 21 September 2008 (EDT)
:I disagree with the point that the entire sentence is making. I don't think that most advocates of creation science believe that the earth is 6,000 years old. I'm not very well-versed on Hindu views. However, as I said in the edit summary, there are other advocates of YEC. I don't think it is correct or fair to single out Christians in that statement. If you're going for specificity, then you should qualify with all 3 Abrahamic religions. [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 19:07, 21 September 2008 (EDT)
::You make a valid point. Perhaps the introduction should first of all make some distinction between the creation science views of various religious groups before going on to nominate the 6000 year period for Christians (and whoever else uses it). --[[User:Horace|Horace]] 19:11, 21 September 2008 (EDT)
:::I don't touch the religious articles. I stick to politics and medicine. Your point is valid and well-taken. It's definitely something you should bring up on the talk page. [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 19:14, 21 September 2008 (EDT)

== Award ==

Thanks for the award, but could you double-check the template? My reply to you seems to be rendering inside the blue box no matter what I do. Thanks again for the recognition :-) -[[User:Foxtrot|Foxtrot]] 16:45, 26 September 2008 (EDT)

==Local==
Hello, I'm from the Pittsburgh area as well. [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 11:55, 16 December 2008 (EST)
:Oh, wow. Good to meet another Burgh Boy! I actually live in Northern WV, but I work in Pittsburgh. I'm about 15 miles west of the city. Which end of the city do you live on? [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 11:57, 16 December 2008 (EST)
::I'm southeast, near Monroeville. [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 11:59, 16 December 2008 (EST)
:::Yeah, I'm kind of foreign to that area. I work up by the zoo in Aspinwall, though a good friend of mine lives on the South Side. The only time I ever really make it into the city is for sports games (Pens, Stillers, Pirates). [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 12:02, 16 December 2008 (EST)
:::And I see you're a Social D fan. Quite the punk scene here in Pittsburgh. I got to see Antiflag when they were here last April up at Mr. Smalls. [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 12:04, 16 December 2008 (EST)
::::Yes, I live for Social D. There is a pretty decent punk scene here. The Misfits were just in town on Friday, also at Mr. Smalls. Monroeville is just a short trip West on the parkway (I-376) to Pittsburgh. Sporting events are usually my only reason for downtown travel as well, because it is one of the toughest cities to navigate. [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 14:21, 16 December 2008 (EST)
==Ted==
Ted didn't make the edit to add User:Human as you stared on his talk page. That edit was made by [http://www.conservapedia.com/index.php?title=Body&diff=prev&oldid=517535 Sideways]. [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 13:45, 12 January 2009 (EST)
:Thanks, Wesley (Wes?). I made sure to strike out the comment. I feel like a real jerk...looks like I need to be more careful! [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 13:51, 12 January 2009 (EST)
::Just happened to catch it. And, yes, Wes is fine. Everyone calls me that! [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 14:04, 12 January 2009 (EST)

==Please don't==
What I have written is accurate despite what you say. Please leave the article on SMON alone. --[[User:RickD|RickD]] 15:50, 12 January 2009 (EST)
:You have yet to provide evidence that every administration of the drug causes SMON. I concede that it is neurotoxic in high doses, and also concede that it was a mistaken diagnosis. However, not every administration of clioquinol resulted in neuro-degeneterive effects, let alone SMON. SOME did, and I concede that point as well. All the evidence I could find supports that high doses of clioquinol cause SMON; I cannot find evidence that every administration has. Please show your sources for your claim and I will not alter the statement. I'm merely after accuracy and trustworthiness. [[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 15:57, 12 January 2009 (EST)

==vandal revert==
Thank you , I am monitoring from my mobile phone and it would have time consuming to had reverted all those, thanks again. --jpatt

==I got a feeling...==
..that Pittsburgh is going to get it's sixth Super Bowl win! Go Steelers! [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 22:40, 18 January 2009 (EST)

==Vending machines==
I thought the liberal machine had gotten rid of all the cigarette vending machines, when they started disappearing in the late 80s or early 90s. Nice factoid about there still being some states -- those holdouts die hard, don't they? -[[User:Foxtrot|Foxtrot]] 17:41, 11 March 2009 (EDT)
:There's still cigarette vending machines in Pennsylvania, as well. Of course they charge an arm and a leg (some as high as $8.00 per pack). [[User:WesleyS|WesleyS]][[User Talk:WesleyS|Hello!]] 17:43, 11 March 2009 (EDT)
::(EC) Yeah, I was really suprised to still find one, but then I found another one in Ohio! I think it may be illegal to have them in some public places, but I know of at least 5 bars in the tri-state area (WV, PA, and OH) that still have them! --[[User:JLauttamus|Jeffrey W. Lauttamus]][[User_talk:JLauttamus|Discussion]] 17:44, 11 March 2009 (EDT)
:::With those keen skills at finding hidden beasts, you should switch careers and start leading safaris. :-) -[[User:Foxtrot|Foxtrot]] 17:58, 11 March 2009 (EDT)

== Sorry ==

Sorry, I didn't realize you'd made a substantial change to the article. I was reverting what the guy before you did. I remedied it and re-entered your section. I'm really sorry for the mix-up. [[User:ChuckR|ChuckR]] 19:14, 5 November 2009 (EST)

RINO

2009-11-06T00:14:06Z

ChuckR:

[[File:Kel-rino.jpg|thumb|250px|Sergeant [[Jesse Kelly]] runs for Congress in Arizona in 2009 and attacks the RINOs in the GOP]]
A '''RINO''' ('''R'''epublican '''i'''n '''N'''ame '''O'''nly), describes politicians who claim to be Republican but are in fact [[liberal]], and therefore generally debase the winning conservative coalition base of the Republican Party. The term is used to characterize an officeholder or candidate who is a member of the [[Republican Party]], but holds views outside the mainstream Republican Party such as support for raising taxes, abortion as a right, gay rights and gun control. RINOs and Reform Democrats typically come from [[New England]] or West Coast states. A less-used term is '''cafeteria conservative''', for a person who picks and chooses which [[conservative]] principles to believe, as a person might choose foods in a cafeteria instead of ordering the full-course ''menu'' selected by the chef at high-class restaurants.<ref>[http://www.manp.org/association-spotlight/archives/james-carville-mary-matalin-he-said-she-said James Carville & Mary Matalin: He Said, She Said]</ref> In contrast to RINO's and cafeteria conservatives, [[movement conservative]]s understand that since conservative philosophy is a coherent whole, it is untenable to discard part of it without discarding all of it.

The targets of attack argue they follow middle of the road policies and are not liberals; they claim they get results, and insist that without them the Congress would be totally controlled by liberal Democrats and Republicans would rarely have any success. Conservatives respond that in the heyday of "Rockefeller liberalism" in the GOP the Democrats always controlled Congress, and the GOP only took power when [[Newt Gingrich]] launched a national conservative "Contract with America" in 1994, ending 40 years of Democratic control of the House.

== RINOs ==
*Senator [[Olympia J. Snowe]] of [[Maine]]

*Senator [[Susan Collins]] of [[Maine]]

*Senator [[George Voinovich]] of [[Ohio]]

*Congressman [[Michael Castle]] of [[Delaware]]

*Congressman [[Mark Kirk]] of [[Illinois]]

*Former Congressman [[Christopher Shays]] of [[Connecticut]]

*Former Congressman [[Joe Scarborough]] of Florida

*Former Senator [[Gordon Smith]] of [[Oregon]]

*Governor [[Arnold Schwarzenegger]] of [[California]]

*Governor [[Charlie Crist]] of [[Florida]]

*Former Secretary of State [[Colin Powell]]

*Former Governor [[George Pataki]] of [[New York]]

*Former Governor and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator [[Christine Todd Whitman]] of [[New Jersey]]

*Former [[New York City]] Mayor [[Rudy Giuliani]]

*Former United States Secretary of [[Homeland Security]] [[Tom Ridge]].

*Former Senator [[Charles Mathias]] of [[Maryland]]

==Former RINOs==

*Senator [[Arlen Specter]] of [[Pennsylvania]], who became a Democrat in 2009.

*Former Senator [[Lincoln Chafee]] of [[Rhode Island]], who became an independent in 2007.

*Former Senator [[Lowell Weicker]] of [[Connecticut]], who became an Independent.

*Former Senator Jim Jeffords of [[Vermont]], who left the Party in 2001, giving control of the Senate to the Democrats

*New York Congressional Candidate [[Dede Scozzafava]]

==McCain Speculation==
Some conservatives distrust [[John McCain]] and even call him a RINO but he more resembles a true conservative. Key RINO principles; support for gay rights, support for abortion, support for earmarks- John McCain is against those positions. He has always worked in a bi-partisan fashion, reaching across the aisle. That is where he draws the most ire. His duty to country, his sacrifice to country is second to none. His fiscal conservatism, his support for families and a strong military and national defense are in line with conservatives, Reagan Republicans.

==See Also==
*[[Republican Party]]
*[[Moderate Republican]]
*[[Conservative Democrat]]
*[[Blue Dog Democrat]]
*[[Reagan Democrat]]
*[[Catholic in name only]]
*[[Liberal media conservative]]

==References==
<references/>

[[Category:Conservative]]
[[Category:Republican Party]]

RINO

2009-11-05T23:57:02Z

ChuckR: rvted back

[[File:Kel-rino.jpg|thumb|250px|Sergeant [[Jesse Kelly]] runs for Congress in Arizona in 2009 and attacks the RINOs in the GOP]]
A '''RINO''' ('''R'''epublican '''i'''n '''N'''ame '''O'''nly), describes politicians who claim to be Republican but are in fact [[liberal]], and therefore generally debase the winning conservative coalition base of the Republican Party. The term is used to characterize an officeholder or candidate who is a member of the [[Republican Party]], but holds views outside the mainstream Republican Party such as support for raising taxes, abortion as a right, gay rights and gun control. RINOs and Reform Democrats typically come from [[New England]] or West Coast states. A less-used term is '''cafeteria conservative''', for a person who picks and chooses which [[conservative]] principles to believe, as a person might choose foods in a cafeteria instead of ordering the full-course ''menu'' selected by the chef at high-class restaurants.<ref>[http://www.manp.org/association-spotlight/archives/james-carville-mary-matalin-he-said-she-said James Carville & Mary Matalin: He Said, She Said]</ref> In contrast to RINO's and cafeteria conservatives, [[movement conservative]]s understand that since conservative philosophy is a coherent whole, it is untenable to discard part of it without discarding all of it.

The targets of attack argue they follow middle of the road policies and are not liberals; they claim they get results, and insist that without them the Congress would be totally controlled by liberal Democrats and Republicans would rarely have any success. Conservatives respond that in the heyday of "Rockefeller liberalism" in the GOP the Democrats always controlled Congress, and the GOP only took power when [[Newt Gingrich]] launched a national conservative "Contract with America" in 1994, ending 40 years of Democratic control of the House.

== RINOs ==
*Senator [[Olympia J. Snowe]] of [[Maine]]

*Senator [[Susan Collins]] of [[Maine]]

*Senator [[George Voinovich]] of [[Ohio]]

*Congressman [[Michael Castle]] of [[Delaware]]

*Congressman [[Mark Kirk]] of [[Illinois]]

*Former Congressman [[Christopher Shays]] of [[Connecticut]]

*Former Congressman [[Joe Scarborough]] of Florida

*Senator [[Arlen Specter]] of [[Pennsylvania]], who became a Democrat in 2009.

*Former Senator [[Lincoln Chafee]] of [[Rhode Island]], who became an independent in 2007.

*Former Senator [[Lowell Weicker]] of [[Connecticut]], who became an Independent.

*Former Senator [[Gordon Smith]] of [[Oregon]]

*Governor [[Arnold Schwarzenegger]] of [[California]]

*Governor [[Charlie Crist]] of [[Florida]]

*Former Secretary of State [[Colin Powell]]

*Former Governor [[George Pataki]] of [[New York]]

*Former Governor and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator [[Christine Todd Whitman]] of [[New Jersey]]

*Former [[New York City]] Mayor [[Rudy Giuliani]]

*Former United States Secretary of [[Homeland Security]] [[Tom Ridge]].

*Former Senator [[Charles Mathias]] of [[Maryland]]

*Former Senator Jim Jeffords of [[Vermont]], who left the Party in 2001, giving control of the Senate to the Democrats

*New York Congressional Candidate [[Dede Scozzafava]]

==McCain Speculation==
Some conservatives distrust [[John McCain]] and even call him a RINO but he more resembles a true conservative. Key RINO principles; support for gay rights, support for abortion, support for earmarks- John McCain is against those positions. He has always worked in a bi-partisan fashion, reaching across the aisle. That is where he draws the most ire. His duty to country, his sacrifice to country is second to none. His fiscal conservatism, his support for families and a strong military and national defense are in line with conservatives, Reagan Republicans.

==See Also==
*[[Republican Party]]
*[[Moderate Republican]]
*[[Conservative Democrat]]
*[[Blue Dog Democrat]]
*[[Reagan Democrat]]
*[[Catholic in name only]]
*[[Liberal media conservative]]

==References==
<references/>

[[Category:Conservative]]
[[Category:Republican Party]]

RINO

2009-11-05T19:52:11Z

ChuckR: Graham had a 89.79 rating from the American Conservative Union in 2008; I know he's teaming up with Kerry for climate change legislation, but overall he's pretty conservative

[[File:Kel-rino.jpg|thumb|250px|Sergeant [[Jesse Kelly]] runs for Congress in Arizona in 2009 and attacks the RINOs in the GOP]]
A '''RINO''' ('''R'''epublican '''i'''n '''N'''ame '''O'''nly), describes politicians who claim to be Republican but are in fact [[liberal]], and therefore generally debase the winning conservative coalition base of the Republican Party. The term is used to characterize an officeholder or candidate who is a member of the [[Republican Party]], but holds views outside the mainstream Republican Party such as support for raising taxes, abortion as a right, gay rights and gun control. RINOs and Reform Democrats typically come from [[New England]] or West Coast states. A less-used term is '''cafeteria conservative''', for a person who picks and chooses which [[conservative]] principles to believe, as a person might choose foods in a cafeteria instead of ordering the full-course ''menu'' selected by the chef at high-class restaurants.<ref>[http://www.manp.org/association-spotlight/archives/james-carville-mary-matalin-he-said-she-said James Carville & Mary Matalin: He Said, She Said]</ref> In contrast to RINO's and cafeteria conservatives, [[movement conservative]]s understand that since conservative philosophy is a coherent whole, it is untenable to discard part of it without discarding all of it.

The targets of attack argue they follow middle of the road policies and are not liberals; they claim they get results, and insist that without them the Congress would be totally controlled by liberal Democrats and Republicans would rarely have any success. Conservatives respond that in the heyday of "Rockefeller liberalism" in the GOP the Democrats always controlled Congress, and the GOP only took power when [[Newt Gingrich]] launched a national conservative "Contract with America" in 1994, ending 40 years of Democratic control of the House.

== RINOs ==
*Senator [[Olympia J. Snowe]] of [[Maine]]

*Senator [[Susan Collins]] of [[Maine]]

*Senator [[George Voinovich]] of [[Ohio]]

*Congressman [[Michael Castle]] of [[Delaware]]

*Congressman [[Mark Kirk]] of [[Illinois]]

*Former Congressman [[Christopher Shays]] of [[Connecticut]]

*Former Congressman [[Joe Scarborough]] of Florida

*Senator [[Arlen Specter]] of [[Pennsylvania]], who became a Democrat in 2009.

*Former Senator [[Lincoln Chafee]] of [[Rhode Island]], who became an independent in 2007.

*Former Senator [[Lowell Weicker]] of [[Connecticut]], who became an Independent.

*Former Senator [[Gordon Smith]] of [[Oregon]]

*Governor [[Arnold Schwarzenegger]] of [[California]]

*Governor [[Charlie Crist]] of [[Florida]]

*Former Secretary of State [[Colin Powell]]

*Former Governor [[George Pataki]] of [[New York]]

*Former Governor and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator [[Christine Todd Whitman]] of [[New Jersey]]

*Former [[New York City]] Mayor [[Rudy Giuliani]]

*Former United States Secretary of [[Homeland Security]] [[Tom Ridge]].

*Former Senator [[Charles Mathias]] of [[Maryland]]

*Former Senator Jim Jeffords of [[Vermont]], who left the Party in 2001, giving control of the Senate to the Democrats

*New York Congressional Candidate [[Dede Scozzafava]]

==McCain Speculation==
Some conservatives distrust [[John McCain]] and even call him a RINO but he more resembles a true conservative. Key RINO principles; support for gay rights, support for abortion, support for earmarks- John McCain is against those positions. He has always worked in a bi-partisan fashion, reaching across the aisle. That is where he draws the most ire. His duty to country, his sacrifice to country is second to none. His fiscal conservatism, his support for families and a strong military and national defense are in line with conservatives, Reagan Republicans.

==See Also==
*[[Republican Party]]
*[[Moderate Republican]]
*[[Conservative Democrat]]
*[[Blue Dog Democrat]]
*[[Reagan Democrat]]
*[[Catholic in name only]]
*[[Liberal media conservative]]

==References==
<references/>

[[Category:Conservative]]
[[Category:Republican Party]]

RINO

2009-11-05T19:50:57Z

ChuckR: /* RINOs */ Chuck Hagel had one of the most conservative voting records in the senate; only area he broke with Repubs on was Iraq

[[File:Kel-rino.jpg|thumb|250px|Sergeant [[Jesse Kelly]] runs for Congress in Arizona in 2009 and attacks the RINOs in the GOP]]
A '''RINO''' ('''R'''epublican '''i'''n '''N'''ame '''O'''nly), describes politicians who claim to be Republican but are in fact [[liberal]], and therefore generally debase the winning conservative coalition base of the Republican Party. The term is used to characterize an officeholder or candidate who is a member of the [[Republican Party]], but holds views outside the mainstream Republican Party such as support for raising taxes, abortion as a right, gay rights and gun control. RINOs and Reform Democrats typically come from [[New England]] or West Coast states. A less-used term is '''cafeteria conservative''', for a person who picks and chooses which [[conservative]] principles to believe, as a person might choose foods in a cafeteria instead of ordering the full-course ''menu'' selected by the chef at high-class restaurants.<ref>[http://www.manp.org/association-spotlight/archives/james-carville-mary-matalin-he-said-she-said James Carville & Mary Matalin: He Said, She Said]</ref> In contrast to RINO's and cafeteria conservatives, [[movement conservative]]s understand that since conservative philosophy is a coherent whole, it is untenable to discard part of it without discarding all of it.

The targets of attack argue they follow middle of the road policies and are not liberals; they claim they get results, and insist that without them the Congress would be totally controlled by liberal Democrats and Republicans would rarely have any success. Conservatives respond that in the heyday of "Rockefeller liberalism" in the GOP the Democrats always controlled Congress, and the GOP only took power when [[Newt Gingrich]] launched a national conservative "Contract with America" in 1994, ending 40 years of Democratic control of the House.

== RINOs ==
*Senator [[Olympia J. Snowe]] of [[Maine]]

*Senator [[Susan Collins]] of [[Maine]]

*Senator [[George Voinovich]] of [[Ohio]]

*Congressman [[Michael Castle]] of [[Delaware]]

*Congressman [[Mark Kirk]] of [[Illinois]]

*Former Congressman [[Christopher Shays]] of [[Connecticut]]

*Former Congressman [[Joe Scarborough]] of Florida

*Senator [[Arlen Specter]] of [[Pennsylvania]], who became a Democrat in 2009.

*Senator [[Lindsey Graham]] of [[South Carolina]]

*Former Senator [[Lincoln Chafee]] of [[Rhode Island]], who became an independent in 2007.

*Former Senator [[Lowell Weicker]] of [[Connecticut]], who became an Independent.

*Former Senator [[Gordon Smith]] of [[Oregon]]

*Governor [[Arnold Schwarzenegger]] of [[California]]

*Governor [[Charlie Crist]] of [[Florida]]

*Former Secretary of State [[Colin Powell]]

*Former Governor [[George Pataki]] of [[New York]]

*Former Governor and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator [[Christine Todd Whitman]] of [[New Jersey]]

*Former [[New York City]] Mayor [[Rudy Giuliani]]

*Former United States Secretary of [[Homeland Security]] [[Tom Ridge]].

*Former Senator [[Charles Mathias]] of [[Maryland]]

*Former Senator Jim Jeffords of [[Vermont]], who left the Party in 2001, giving control of the Senate to the Democrats

*New York Congressional Candidate [[Dede Scozzafava]]

==McCain Speculation==
Some conservatives distrust [[John McCain]] and even call him a RINO but he more resembles a true conservative. Key RINO principles; support for gay rights, support for abortion, support for earmarks- John McCain is against those positions. He has always worked in a bi-partisan fashion, reaching across the aisle. That is where he draws the most ire. His duty to country, his sacrifice to country is second to none. His fiscal conservatism, his support for families and a strong military and national defense are in line with conservatives, Reagan Republicans.

==See Also==
*[[Republican Party]]
*[[Moderate Republican]]
*[[Conservative Democrat]]
*[[Blue Dog Democrat]]
*[[Reagan Democrat]]
*[[Catholic in name only]]
*[[Liberal media conservative]]

==References==
<references/>

[[Category:Conservative]]
[[Category:Republican Party]]

User talk:RJJensen

2009-11-05T18:31:36Z

ChuckR: /* John F. Kennedy */ new section

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-11-05T18:30:57Z

ChuckR:

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-11-05T18:30:20Z

ChuckR:

John F. Kennedy

2009-11-03T02:57:27Z

ChuckR: Rvt; Kennedy has never been described as a conservative before. To do so here is intellectually dishonest,.

{{President
|image=John_kennedy.jpg
|seq=35
|term_start=January 20, 1961
|term_end=November 22, 1963<ref>http://home.comcast.net/~sharonday7/Presidents/AP060301.htm</ref>
|party=Democratic
|vp=Lyndon B. Johnson
|previous=Dwight D. Eisenhower
|next=Lyndon B. Johnson
|birth_date=May 29, 1917
|birth_place=Brookline, Massachusetts
|death_date=November 22, 1963
|death_place=Dallas, Texas
|spouse=[[Jacqueline Kennedy|Jacqueline Lee Bouvier Kennedy]]
|spouse2=
|religion=[[Roman Catholic]]
}}

'''John Fitzgerald Kennedy''', often called '''JFK''', (May 29, 1917 - November 22, 1963) was the 35th [[President of the United States of America]], serving for 1000 days in 1961-63; he was the youngest person elected president. The [[Kennedy Family]] had long been leaders of the Irish Catholic wing of the [[Democratic Party]]; JFK, like his family, like his family, was liberal on domestic issues and middle-of-the-road on foreign policy.

The [[Conservative Coalition]] blocked nearly all of his domestic programs, so there were few changes in domestic policy, even as the civil rights movement gained strength.

The Kennedy style called for youth, dynamism, vigor and an intellectual approach to aggressive new policies in foreign affairs. The downside was his inexperience in foreign affairs, standing in stark contrast to the vast experience of the president he replaced, Republican [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]]. Kennedy's rashness and inexperience caused a national humiliation in 1961 as he sent CIA-trained Cuban exiles into an ill-prepared attack on Castro's Cuba. At the [[Bay of Pigs]], all Kennedy's invaders were killed or captured, and he was forced to ransom them for cash. Kennedy's supporters blamed the fiasco on Eisenhower. Russian boss [[Nikita Khrushchev]], seeing for himself Kennedy's inexperience at a summit conference, threw up the [[Berlin Wall]] as the Soviets escalated the [[Cold War]] regarding the status of Berlin, predicting correctly that Kennedy's response would be weak. Khrushchev went too far in 1962 when he sent nuclear missiles into Cuba aimed at the U.S. For the first time since Pearl harbor -- or indeed since Washington and New Orleans were attacked in the [[War of 1812]]-- the U.S. was vulnerable to a major attack by an enemy power. Kennedy and Khrushchev reached a compromise whereby the Soviets removed their missiles from Cuba publicly (giving Kennedy a public relations triumph), while Kennedy secretly removed American missiles from Turkey aimed at the Soviets, and also promised that America would never invade Cuba—a promise still in effect in 2009. Vietnam proved a trap for Kennedy as he sent in 16,000 military advisors to prop up an ineffective regime in South Vietnam. Historians are uncertain whether or how Kennedy would have avoided the failures of [[Lyndon Johnson]] in Vietnam, for Kennedy himself had no definite plans of what to do.

He was assassinated in November 1963 by a Communist sympathizer, and became a national icon and martyr. His reputation has since been dimmed by news of his repeated philandering. He is best known for his call to civic virtue:
{{cquote|And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country.|4=John Kennedy's [[John F. Kennedy's Inaugural Address|Inaugural Address]]|5=<ref>http://www.famousquotes.me.uk/speeches/John_F_Kennedy/5.htm</ref>}}

==Career==
Educated at private schools and (following numerous relatives) Harvard College, young Kennedy was an indifferent student until the war in Europe focused his attention. Extensive interviews with major British politicians and observers led to an unusually precocious senior thesis that became an influential book Why England Slept (1940). As second son in the powerful [[Kennedy Family]], he was marked for an intellectual career as a writer or journalist, while his older brother Joseph was slated for politics by their hyper-manipulative father, [[Joseph P. Kennedy]]. The brother’s death in combat, combined with JFK’s heroic war record, set the stage for his political debut as a Congressional candidate in 1946.

==Politics==
Although the father had abandoned Boston in frustration, JFK’s return to the city restored the family’s traditional power base among the large and powerful Irish-American community in Massachusetts. Strong family connections with the Chicago Irish political community (led by Mayor [[Richard J. Daley]]) augmented his national Catholic base. JFK always had two sets of advisors, an inner circle of Irish politicians who planned his campaigns, and a Protestant-Jewish coterie of intellectuals (mostly from Harvard) who promoted his stature as the intellectual in politics. That image was solidified by the Pulitzer Prize awarded his ''Profiles in Courage'' (1956). JFK possessed powerful assets: an excellent speaker and glib commentator on major issues, a middle-of-the-road political record that offended no one, strong expertise in foreign policy, articulate anti-Communism, unfailing charm and stage presence, a national network of Irish allies, a Catholic base that comprised a fourth of the electorate, and an immense purse that was ready to fund his ambitions, not to mention innumerable relatives who campaigned endlessly on his behalf.

JFK fought his way into the Senate in 1952 by defeating incumbent Republican [[Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr.]], the archetypal Yankee. With the national Democratic party leaderless, JFK largely ignored the old-boy Senate (controlled by his rival [[Lyndon Johnson]]) to display his talents through newspaper and television interviews, magazine articles, and highly publicized speeches to Democratic party gatherings in every part of the country. Aided by his closest advisor, his brother [[Robert Kennedy]], JFK appealed to conservatives by tolerating [[Joe McCarthy]]<ref>JFK's father Joe Kennedy was a major supporter and close personal friend of McCarthy, and Robert worked for a while for McCarthy. McCarthy dated at least one of JFK's sisters.</ref> and instead launching relentless attacks on corrupt labor leaders, especially [[Jimmy Hoffa]] of the [[Teamsters Union]].

The Kennedy family represented was known for its anti-Communism stance and close ties with Republican Senator [[Joe McCarthy]]. Many liberal Democrats, led by [[Eleanor Roosevelt]], were initially skeptical of JFK, primarily because they could never forget Joseph's break with Franklin Roosevelt or the family’s support for McCarthy. They later warmed to Kennedy, after his senate record and speeches put him firmly within the liberal mainstream of Democratic politics.

==Nomination==
By 1960 JFK was the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination, with the biggest question mark whether his Catholic base of support would be outweighed by anti-Catholicism of the sort that hurt [[Al Smith]] so badly in 1928. Of course prohibition was no longer an issue, and fear of Tammany-like bossism had faded away with the demise of most big city machines. The Kennedy juggernaut defeated rival [[Hubert Humphrey]], a liberal, in the West Virginia primary, a state with so much poverty and so few Catholics that party leaders were convinced they had a winner. Kennedy won over the party’s intellectuals by his effective academic connections, while shaming doubters by a brilliant performance before the Protestant ministers of Houston. There he enunciated the position that he did not speak for the Catholic Church on matters of religion, and it did not speak for him on public affairs. He was able to take that position because there were no high intensity moral issues such as abortion before the public. Although JFK’s religiosity consisted of nominal attendance at Sunday Mass, he excited tens of millions of Catholics who saw his election as president as confirmation of their full recognition as true Americans. With 8 of 10 Catholics voting for Kennedy, he ran up majorities in ethnic strongholds like Chicago that barely provided the margin of victory against Richard Nixon. Apart from a few pockets of antipopery among some Midwestern Lutherans and Southern Baptists, fears of Catholicism had largely disappeared from the voting booth.

==Foreign policy==
President Kennedy was primarily interested in foreign policy. Weeks after his [[John F. Kennedy's Inaugural Address|memorable inaugural address]] sounded the tocsin for vigorous anti-communism, he encountered disaster when his invasion of Cuba failed at the [[Bay of Pigs]] in 1961, and he was forced to ransom thousands of soldiers who were captured by [[Fidel Castro]]'s Communist regime. Soviet leader [[Nikita Khrushchev]], sensing weakness, pushed hard on the Berlin issue, and was able to build the Berlin Wall despite Kennedy’s anguished rhetoric, "Ich bin ein Berliner!" ("I am a Berliner!")

Kennedy also made paid a state visit to [[Ireland]] in 1962 - the first state visit of an American President to the country, which had declared independence from Britain forty years earlier. Kennedy visited his ancestral home in County Wexford, and was greeted by huge crowds in the cities of [[Dublin]], [[Limerick]] and [[Cork]]. He told crowds at Limerick during a speech that once he had completed his term as president, he would like to become US Ambassador to Ireland, and live there. Among the many dignitaries at Kennedy's funeral a year later was [[President of Ireland|Irish President]] [[Eamon de Valera]].

===Cuban Missile Crisis===
Khrushchev and Castro went too far in 1962, secretly setting up medium range missiles in Cuba equipped with nuclear warheads that threatened the southeast as far as Atlanta. In his greatest moment, Kennedy rejected invasion plans but imposed a blockade and demanded the missiles be removed immediately. Khrushchev publicly backed down, but privately got Kennedy to remove American missiles from Turkey, while Castro secured the promise that the United States would never invade his island. The Cuban missile crisis reversed JFK’s image of ineptness in foreign policy, but his quiet, continuous escalation of military involvement in Vietnam set the stage for the whirlwind reaped by his successor.

==Domestic policy==
As senator, JFK had shown limited interest in domestic affairs apart from labor union corruption. As president he ignored that issue. Working with his high-powered economic advisors he proposed a Keynesian program to stimulate the economy, not by higher spending but by tax cuts. No matter: none of his domestic policy initiatives went anywhere. Congress was effectively controlled a conservative coalition of Republicans and southern Democrats; the alignment remained unchanged after the status-quo midterm elections of 1962.

Kennedy authorized the de-segregation of federal housing and proposed the civil rights bill, passed after his assassination. He created the [[Peace Corps]] and also pledged to put a man on the moon before the end of the 1960s, a pledge that was later fulfilled after his death. Likewise he proposed tax cuts, which were approved after his death.

===Civil rights===
A new issue that Kennedy had not anticipated blazed into view as the civil rights movement in the South, led by Martin Luther King, produced dramatic confrontations with segregationist Democrats, especially Governor George Wallace of Alabama, and Ross Barnett of Mississippi. A month before the 1962 election Kennedy sent federal marshals and Army MP’s to enforce a federal court order that African American student James Meredith be admitted to the University of Mississippi. Violent resistance by townspeople left two civilians dead, hundreds injured, and 166 federals injured. The confrontation in Alabama in 1963 was nonviolent, and boosted Wallace’s visibility as a leader of southern Democrats. JFK ignored the risks to his southern base and spoke out in favor of civil rights legislation, but as in so many instances, no legislation was passed.

==Legacy==
[[Image:JFK bust.jpg|thumb|Bust of John F. Kennedy by Robert Berks.]]
Kennedy’s assassination in November, 1963, was a stunning shock to all Americans. Pierson (2007) argues that the liberal media turned Kennedy's death into a martyrdom against racism, ignoring Kennedy's weak interest in race and his strong opposition to Communism. Lee Harvey Oswald's Communist ties were downplayed and instead the conservative city of [[Dallas]] was made the guilty party. Incoming president Lyndon Johnson used the martyrdom theme to rally support for his liberal programs, painting them as memorials to Kennedy until Johnson won reelection in 1964 by a landslide over conservative leader [[Barry Goldwater]].

The Irish Catholic community took it hard, and immediately elevated JFK to a sort of sainthood status, celebrating the miracle that he had liberated them from second class citizenship. Johnson in 1964 successfully retained the Catholic base JFK had fostered, but that was the last hurrah. By 1966 Catholics started showing their disillusionment with Johnson, who never recovered from the wave after wave of urban riots that followed his civil rights bills, nor from the disillusionment of the intellectuals with his [[Vietnam War]] policy. With the assassination of Robert Kennedy in 1968, and the failure of youngest brother [[Ted Kennedy]] to recover his brothers’ national base, the Kennedy legacy increasingly became the romantic memory of Camelot. Disclosures of JFK’s astonishing sexual involvements, and detailed reports of his multiple grave medical problems fascinated the public but failed to break the myth that if only JFK had lived his second term would be a story of political triumphs that would restore the people’s faith in their government.

The assassination was so incomprehensible that hundreds of conspiracy theories sprang up and new ones emerge every year. Over 350 people and organizations have been named as guilty of the assassination.

Kennedy appointed liberal Arthur Goldberg to the [[U.S. Supreme Court]], as well as [[Byron White]]. White's rulings combined both liberal and conservative positions.

Kennedy's image appears on the American half-dollar coin.

==Quotes==

* "The time to repair the roof is when the sun is shining."

* "The men who create power make an indispensable contribution to the Nation’s greatness, but the men who question power make a contribution just as indispensable, especially when that questioning is disinterested, for they determine whether we use power or power uses us." Oct 26, 1963

* "And so, my fellow americans: ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country. My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man." Inaugural address, January 20, 1961

* "The Chinese use two brush strokes to write the word 'crisis.' One brush stroke stands for danger; the other for opportunity. In a crisis, be aware of the danger - but recognize the opportunity." Speech in Indianapolis, April 12, 1959

== See also ==

*[[Gallery of American Heroes]]

== External links ==
*[http://millercenter.org/academic/americanpresident/kennedy John Fitzgerald Kennedy]
*[http://www.jfklibrary.org/ John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum]

==Further reading==
* Robert Dallek, ''An Unfinished Life: John F. Kennedy, 1917-1963'' (2003)
* Michael O'Brien, ''John F. Kennedy: A Biography'' (2005)
* Herbert S. Parmet, ''JFK: The Presidency of John F. Kennedy'' (1983)
* Thomas C. Reeves, ''A Question of Character: A Life of John F. Kennedy.'' (1991) conservative critique [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE7D9143EF931A35755C0A967958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all New York Times Book Review]

===Bibliography===
* Balmer, Randall. ''God in the White House: A History--How Faith Shaped the Presidency from John F. Kennedy to George W. Bush.'' (2008)
* Bryant, Nick. ''The Bystander: John F. Kennedy and the Struggle for Black Equality'' (2006) [http://www.amazon.com/Bystander-Kennedy-Struggle-Black-Equality/dp/0465008267/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218173&sr=8-9 excerpt and text search]
* Bugliosi, Vincent. ''Reclaiming History: The Assassination of President,'' (2007) 1632 pp. Debunks dozens of conspiracy theories and concludes Oswald acted alone. [http://www.amazon.com/Reclaiming-History-Assassination-President-Kennedy/dp/0393045250/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1227416692&sr=1-1 excerpt and text search]
* Burner, David. ''John F. Kennedy and a New Generation'' (1988)
* Clarke, Thurston, ''Ask Not: The Inauguration of John F. Kennedy and the Speech That Changed America'' ISBN 0805072136 [http://www.amazon.com/Ask-Not-Inauguration-Kennedy-Changed/dp/0805072136/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218173&sr=8-5 excerpt and text search]
*Dallek, Robert, ''An Unfinished Life: John F. Kennedy, 1917-1963'' (2003), a standard scholarly biography; strress on medical issues [http://www.amazon.com/Unfinished-Life-John-Kennedy-Dynasty/dp/0316907928/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218173&sr=8-3 excerpt and text search]
* Freedman, Lawrence. ''Kennedy's Wars: Berlin, Cuba, Laos and Vietnam'' (2000) [http://www.amazon.com/Kennedys-Wars-Berlin-Cuba-Vietnam/dp/0195152433/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218513&sr=8-1 excerpt and text search]; [http://www.questia.com/library/book/kennedys-wars-berlin-cuba-laos-and-vietnam-by-lawrence-freedman.jsp full text online]
* Fursenko, Aleksandr and Timothy Naftali. ''One Hell of a Gamble: Khrushchev, Castro and Kennedy, 1958–1964'' (1997) [http://www.amazon.com/One-Hell-Gamble-Khrushchev-1958-1964/dp/0393317900/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218554&sr=8-2 excerpt and text search] adds information from Russian sources
* Giglio, James. ''The Presidency of John F. Kennedy'' (1991), standard scholarly overview of policies
* Harper, Paul, and Joann P. Krieg eds. ''John F. Kennedy: The Promise Revisited'' (1988), scholarly articles on presidency [http://www.questiaschool.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=15070503 online edition]
* Hersh, Seymour. ''The Dark Side of Camelot'' (1997), highly negative assessment focused on scandals
* Kunz, Diane B. ''The Diplomacy of the Crucial Decade: American Foreign Relations during the 1960s'' (1994)
* O'Brien, Michael. ''John F. Kennedy: A Biography'' (2005), the most detailed scholarly biography [http://www.amazon.com/John-Kennedy-Biography-Michael-OBrien/dp/0312281293/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218173&sr=8-4 excerpt and text search]
* Parmet, Herbert. ''Jack: The Struggles of John F. Kennedy'' (1980); ''JFK: The Presidency of John F. Kennedy'' (1983), scholarly biography
* Paterson, Thomas G. ''Kennedy's Quest for Victory: American Foreign Policy, 1961-1963'' (1989) [http://www.amazon.com/Kennedys-Quest-Victory-American-1961-1963/dp/019504584X/ref=sr_1_11?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218173&sr=8-11 excerpt and text search], Leftists approach disparages anti-Communism
* Piereson, James. ''Camelot and the Cultural Revolution: How the Assassination of John F. Kennedy Shattered American Liberalism'' (2007) [http://www.amazon.com/Camelot-Cultural-Revolution-Assassination-Liberalism/dp/1594031886/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1227415678&sr=8-2 excerpt and text search], conservative interpetation
* Preble, Christopher A. ''John F. Kennedy and the Missile Gap'' (2004)
* Reeves, Richard. ''President Kennedy: Profile of Power'' (1993), balanced assessment of policies
* Reeves, Thomas. ''A Question of Character: A Life of John F. Kennedy'' (1991) detailed assessment of his character flaws by conservative historian [http://www.amazon.com/Question-Character-Life-John-Kennedy/dp/076151287X/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218173&sr=8-10 excerpt and text search]
* Schlesinger, Arthur, Jr. ''A Thousand Days: John F. Kennedy in the White House'' (1965), major memoir by a close advisor [http://www.amazon.com/Thousand-Days-Kennedy-White-House/dp/1579124496/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218430&sr=8-1 excerpt and text search]
* Schlesinger, Arthur, Jr. ''Robert Kennedy And His Times'' (2002)
* Smith, Jean Edward. "Kennedy and Defense: The Formative Years". ''Air University Review'' (March–April 1967) [http://www.airpower.maxwell.af.mil/airchronicles/aureview/1967/mar-apr/smith.html online]

===Primary sources===
* [http://fraser.stlouisfed.org/publications/ERP/ Council of Economic Advisors, ''Economic Report of the President'' (annual 1947- )], complete series online; important analysis of current trends and policies, plus statistcial tables
* Sorensen, Theodore. ''Kennedy'' (1966), major memoir by a close advisor

====Notes====
{{reflist}}

{{USPresidents}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kennedy, John F.}}
[[Category:Democratic Party]]
[[Category:Irish-Americans]]
[[Category:American war heroes]]
[[Category:United States History]]
[[Category:Cold War]]
[[Category:1950s]]
[[Category:1960s]]
[[Category:Catholic Politicians]]
[[Category: Kennedy Family]]
[[Category:Religion and Politics]]

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-11-03T02:55:57Z

ChuckR: /* JFK a conservative? What? */

John F. Kennedy

2009-11-02T21:57:43Z

ChuckR: Rvt back POV edits; to say he was "one of the most glamourous" and "most beloved" etc, are POV and have no place in an encyclo unless you can cite them.

John F. Kennedy

2009-11-02T16:49:31Z

ChuckR:

{{President
|image=John_kennedy.jpg
|seq=35
|term_start=January 20, 1961
|term_end=November 22, 1963<ref>http://home.comcast.net/~sharonday7/Presidents/AP060301.htm</ref>
|party=Democratic
|vp=Lyndon B. Johnson
|previous=Dwight D. Eisenhower
|next=Lyndon B. Johnson
|birth_date=May 29, 1917
|birth_place=Brookline, Massachusetts
|death_date=November 22, 1963
|death_place=Dallas, Texas
|spouse=[[Jacqueline Kennedy|Jacqueline Lee Bouvier Kennedy]]
|spouse2=
|religion=[[Roman Catholic]]
}}

'''John Fitzgerald Kennedy''', often called '''JFK''', (May 29, 1917 - November 22, 1963) was the 35th [[President of the United States of America]], serving for 1000 days in 1961-63; he was the youngest person elected president. The [[Kennedy Family]] had long been leaders of the Irish Catholic wing of the [[Democratic Party]]; JFK, like his family, was JFK, like his family, was liberal on domestic issues and middle-of-the-road on foreign policy.

The [[Conservative Coalition]] blocked nearly all of his domestic programs, so there were few changes in domestic policy, even as the civil rights movement gained strength.

The Kennedy style called for youth, dynamism, vigor and an intellectual approach to aggressive new policies in foreign affairs. The downside was his inexperience in foreign affairs, standing in stark contrast to the vast experience of the president he replaced, Republican [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]]. Kennedy's rashness and inexperience caused a national humiliation in 1961 as he sent CIA-trained Cuban exiles into an ill-prepared attack on Castro's Cuba. At the [[Bay of Pigs]], all Kennedy's invaders were killed or captured, and he was forced to ransom them for cash. Kennedy's supporters blamed the fiasco on Eisenhower. Russian boss [[Nikita Khrushchev]], seeing for himself Kennedy's inexperience at a summit conference, threw up the [[Berlin Wall]] as the Soviets escalated the [[Cold War]] regarding the status of Berlin, predicting correctly that Kennedy's response would be weak. Khrushchev went too far in 1962 when he sent nuclear missiles into Cuba aimed at the U.S. For the first time since Pearl harbor -- or indeed since Washington and New Orleans were attacked in the [[War of 1812]]-- the U.S. was vulnerable to a major attack by an enemy power. Kennedy and Khrushchev reached a compromise whereby the Soviets removed their missiles from Cuba publicly (giving Kennedy a public relations triumph), while Kennedy secretly removed American missiles from Turkey aimed at the Soviets, and also promised that America would never invade Cuba—a promise still in effect in 2009. Vietnam proved a trap for Kennedy as he sent in 16,000 military advisors to prop up an ineffective regime in South Vietnam. Historians are uncertain whether or how Kennedy would have avoided the failures of [[Lyndon Johnson]] in Vietnam, for Kennedy himself had no definite plans of what to do.

He was assassinated in November 1963 by a Communist sympathizer, and became a national icon and martyr. His reputation has since been dimmed by news of his repeated philandering. He is best known for his call to civic virtue:
{{cquote|And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country.|4=John Kennedy's [[John F. Kennedy's Inaugural Address|Inaugural Address]]|5=<ref>http://www.famousquotes.me.uk/speeches/John_F_Kennedy/5.htm</ref>}}

==Career==
Educated at private schools and (following numerous relatives) Harvard College, young Kennedy was an indifferent student until the war in Europe focused his attention. Extensive interviews with major British politicians and observers led to an unusually precocious senior thesis that became an influential book Why England Slept (1940). As second son in the powerful [[Kennedy Family]], he was marked for an intellectual career as a writer or journalist, while his older brother Joseph was slated for politics by their hyper-manipulative father, [[Joseph P. Kennedy]]. The brother’s death in combat, combined with JFK’s heroic war record, set the stage for his political debut as a Congressional candidate in 1946.

==Politics==
Although the father had abandoned Boston in frustration, JFK’s return to the city restored the family’s traditional power base among the large and powerful Irish-American community in Massachusetts. Strong family connections with the Chicago Irish political community (led by Mayor [[Richard J. Daley]]) augmented his national Catholic base. JFK always had two sets of advisors, an inner circle of Irish politicians who planned his campaigns, and a Protestant-Jewish coterie of intellectuals (mostly from Harvard) who promoted his stature as the intellectual in politics. That image was solidified by the Pulitzer Prize awarded his ''Profiles in Courage'' (1956). JFK possessed powerful assets: an excellent speaker and glib commentator on major issues, a middle-of-the-road political record that offended no one, strong expertise in foreign policy, articulate anti-Communism, unfailing charm and stage presence, a national network of Irish allies, a Catholic base that comprised a fourth of the electorate, and an immense purse that was ready to fund his ambitions, not to mention innumerable relatives who campaigned endlessly on his behalf.

JFK fought his way into the Senate in 1952 by defeating incumbent Republican [[Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr.]], the archetypal Yankee. With the national Democratic party leaderless, JFK largely ignored the old-boy Senate (controlled by his rival [[Lyndon Johnson]]) to display his talents through newspaper and television interviews, magazine articles, and highly publicized speeches to Democratic party gatherings in every part of the country. Aided by his closest advisor, his brother [[Robert Kennedy]], JFK appealed to conservatives by tolerating [[Joe McCarthy]]<ref>JFK's father Joe Kennedy was a major supporter and close personal friend of McCarthy, and Robert worked for a while for McCarthy. McCarthy dated at least one of JFK's sisters.</ref> and instead launching relentless attacks on corrupt labor leaders, especially [[Jimmy Hoffa]] of the [[Teamsters Union]].

The Kennedy family represented was known for its anti-Communism stance and close ties with Republican Senator [[Joe McCarthy]]. Many liberal Democrats, led by [[Eleanor Roosevelt]], were initially skeptical of JFK, primarily because they could never forget Joseph's break with Franklin Roosevelt or the family’s support for McCarthy. They later warmed to Kennedy, after his senate record and speeches put him firmly within the liberal mainstream of Democratic politics.

==Nomination==
By 1960 JFK was the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination, with the biggest question mark whether his Catholic base of support would be outweighed by anti-Catholicism of the sort that hurt [[Al Smith]] so badly in 1928. Of course prohibition was no longer an issue, and fear of Tammany-like bossism had faded away with the demise of most big city machines. The Kennedy juggernaut defeated rival [[Hubert Humphrey]], a liberal, in the West Virginia primary, a state with so much poverty and so few Catholics that party leaders were convinced they had a winner. Kennedy won over the party’s intellectuals by his effective academic connections, while shaming doubters by a brilliant performance before the Protestant ministers of Houston. There he enunciated the position that he did not speak for the Catholic Church on matters of religion, and it did not speak for him on public affairs. He was able to take that position because there were no high intensity moral issues such as abortion before the public. Although JFK’s religiosity consisted of nominal attendance at Sunday Mass, he excited tens of millions of Catholics who saw his election as president as confirmation of their full recognition as true Americans. With 8 of 10 Catholics voting for Kennedy, he ran up majorities in ethnic strongholds like Chicago that barely provided the margin of victory against Richard Nixon. Apart from a few pockets of antipopery among some Midwestern Lutherans and Southern Baptists, fears of Catholicism had largely disappeared from the voting booth.

==Foreign policy==
President Kennedy was primarily interested in foreign policy. Weeks after his [[John F. Kennedy's Inaugural Address|memorable inaugural address]] sounded the tocsin for vigorous anti-communism, he encountered disaster when his invasion of Cuba failed at the [[Bay of Pigs]] in 1961, and he was forced to ransom thousands of soldiers who were captured by [[Fidel Castro]]'s Communist regime. Soviet leader [[Nikita Khrushchev]], sensing weakness, pushed hard on the Berlin issue, and was able to build the Berlin Wall despite Kennedy’s anguished rhetoric, "Ich bin ein Berliner!" ("I am a Berliner!")

Kennedy also made paid a state visit to [[Ireland]] in 1962 - the first state visit of an American President to the country, which had declared independence from Britain forty years earlier. Kennedy visited his ancestral home in County Wexford, and was greeted by huge crowds in the cities of [[Dublin]], [[Limerick]] and [[Cork]]. He told crowds at Limerick during a speech that once he had completed his term as president, he would like to become US Ambassador to Ireland, and live there. Among the many dignitaries at Kennedy's funeral a year later was [[President of Ireland|Irish President]] [[Eamon de Valera]].

===Cuban Missile Crisis===
Khrushchev and Castro went too far in 1962, secretly setting up medium range missiles in Cuba equipped with nuclear warheads that threatened the southeast as far as Atlanta. In his greatest moment, Kennedy rejected invasion plans but imposed a blockade and demanded the missiles be removed immediately. Khrushchev publicly backed down, but privately got Kennedy to remove American missiles from Turkey, while Castro secured the promise that the United States would never invade his island. The Cuban missile crisis reversed JFK’s image of ineptness in foreign policy, but his quiet, continuous escalation of military involvement in Vietnam set the stage for the whirlwind reaped by his successor.

==Domestic policy==
As senator, JFK had shown limited interest in domestic affairs apart from labor union corruption. As president he ignored that issue. Working with his high-powered economic advisors he proposed a Keynesian program to stimulate the economy, not by higher spending but by tax cuts. No matter: none of his domestic policy initiatives went anywhere. Congress was effectively controlled a conservative coalition of Republicans and southern Democrats; the alignment remained unchanged after the status-quo midterm elections of 1962.

Kennedy authorized the de-segregation of federal housing and proposed the civil rights bill, passed after his assassination. He created the [[Peace Corps]] and also pledged to put a man on the moon before the end of the 1960s, a pledge that was later fulfilled after his death. Likewise he proposed tax cuts, which were approved after his death.

===Civil rights===
A new issue that Kennedy had not anticipated blazed into view as the civil rights movement in the South, led by Martin Luther King, produced dramatic confrontations with segregationist Democrats, especially Governor George Wallace of Alabama, and Ross Barnett of Mississippi. A month before the 1962 election Kennedy sent federal marshals and Army MP’s to enforce a federal court order that African American student James Meredith be admitted to the University of Mississippi. Violent resistance by townspeople left two civilians dead, hundreds injured, and 166 federals injured. The confrontation in Alabama in 1963 was nonviolent, and boosted Wallace’s visibility as a leader of southern Democrats. JFK ignored the risks to his southern base and spoke out in favor of civil rights legislation, but as in so many instances, no legislation was passed.

==Legacy==
[[Image:JFK bust.jpg|thumb|Bust of John F. Kennedy by Robert Berks.]]
Kennedy’s assassination in November, 1963, was a stunning shock to all Americans. Pierson (2007) argues that the liberal media turned Kennedy's death into a martyrdom against racism, ignoring Kennedy's weak interest in race and his strong opposition to Communism. Lee Harvey Oswald's Communist ties were downplayed and instead the conservative city of [[Dallas]] was made the guilty party. Incoming president Lyndon Johnson used the martyrdom theme to rally support for his liberal programs, painting them as memorials to Kennedy until Johnson won reelection in 1964 by a landslide over conservative leader [[Barry Goldwater]].

The Irish Catholic community took it hard, and immediately elevated JFK to a sort of sainthood status, celebrating the miracle that he had liberated them from second class citizenship. Johnson in 1964 successfully retained the Catholic base JFK had fostered, but that was the last hurrah. By 1966 Catholics started showing their disillusionment with Johnson, who never recovered from the wave after wave of urban riots that followed his civil rights bills, nor from the disillusionment of the intellectuals with his [[Vietnam War]] policy. With the assassination of Robert Kennedy in 1968, and the failure of youngest brother [[Ted Kennedy]] to recover his brothers’ national base, the Kennedy legacy increasingly became the romantic memory of Camelot. Disclosures of JFK’s astonishing sexual involvements, and detailed reports of his multiple grave medical problems fascinated the public but failed to break the myth that if only JFK had lived his second term would be a story of political triumphs that would restore the people’s faith in their government.

The assassination was so incomprehensible that hundreds of conspiracy theories sprang up and new ones emerge every year. Over 350 people and organizations have been named as guilty of the assassination.

Kennedy appointed liberal Arthur Goldberg to the [[U.S. Supreme Court]], as well as [[Byron White]]. White's rulings combined both liberal and conservative positions.

Kennedy's image appears on the American half-dollar coin.

==Quotes==

* "The time to repair the roof is when the sun is shining."

* "The men who create power make an indispensable contribution to the Nation’s greatness, but the men who question power make a contribution just as indispensable, especially when that questioning is disinterested, for they determine whether we use power or power uses us." Oct 26, 1963

* "And so, my fellow americans: ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country. My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man." Inaugural address, January 20, 1961

* "The Chinese use two brush strokes to write the word 'crisis.' One brush stroke stands for danger; the other for opportunity. In a crisis, be aware of the danger - but recognize the opportunity." Speech in Indianapolis, April 12, 1959

== See also ==

*[[Gallery of American Heroes]]

== External links ==
*[http://millercenter.org/academic/americanpresident/kennedy John Fitzgerald Kennedy]
*[http://www.jfklibrary.org/ John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum]

==Further reading==
* Robert Dallek, ''An Unfinished Life: John F. Kennedy, 1917-1963'' (2003)
* Michael O'Brien, ''John F. Kennedy: A Biography'' (2005)
* Herbert S. Parmet, ''JFK: The Presidency of John F. Kennedy'' (1983)
* Thomas C. Reeves, ''A Question of Character: A Life of John F. Kennedy.'' (1991) conservative critique [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE7D9143EF931A35755C0A967958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all New York Times Book Review]

===Bibliography===
* Balmer, Randall. ''God in the White House: A History--How Faith Shaped the Presidency from John F. Kennedy to George W. Bush.'' (2008)
* Bryant, Nick. ''The Bystander: John F. Kennedy and the Struggle for Black Equality'' (2006) [http://www.amazon.com/Bystander-Kennedy-Struggle-Black-Equality/dp/0465008267/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218173&sr=8-9 excerpt and text search]
* Bugliosi, Vincent. ''Reclaiming History: The Assassination of President,'' (2007) 1632 pp. Debunks dozens of conspiracy theories and concludes Oswald acted alone. [http://www.amazon.com/Reclaiming-History-Assassination-President-Kennedy/dp/0393045250/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1227416692&sr=1-1 excerpt and text search]
* Burner, David. ''John F. Kennedy and a New Generation'' (1988)
* Clarke, Thurston, ''Ask Not: The Inauguration of John F. Kennedy and the Speech That Changed America'' ISBN 0805072136 [http://www.amazon.com/Ask-Not-Inauguration-Kennedy-Changed/dp/0805072136/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218173&sr=8-5 excerpt and text search]
*Dallek, Robert, ''An Unfinished Life: John F. Kennedy, 1917-1963'' (2003), a standard scholarly biography; strress on medical issues [http://www.amazon.com/Unfinished-Life-John-Kennedy-Dynasty/dp/0316907928/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218173&sr=8-3 excerpt and text search]
* Freedman, Lawrence. ''Kennedy's Wars: Berlin, Cuba, Laos and Vietnam'' (2000) [http://www.amazon.com/Kennedys-Wars-Berlin-Cuba-Vietnam/dp/0195152433/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218513&sr=8-1 excerpt and text search]; [http://www.questia.com/library/book/kennedys-wars-berlin-cuba-laos-and-vietnam-by-lawrence-freedman.jsp full text online]
* Fursenko, Aleksandr and Timothy Naftali. ''One Hell of a Gamble: Khrushchev, Castro and Kennedy, 1958–1964'' (1997) [http://www.amazon.com/One-Hell-Gamble-Khrushchev-1958-1964/dp/0393317900/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218554&sr=8-2 excerpt and text search] adds information from Russian sources
* Giglio, James. ''The Presidency of John F. Kennedy'' (1991), standard scholarly overview of policies
* Harper, Paul, and Joann P. Krieg eds. ''John F. Kennedy: The Promise Revisited'' (1988), scholarly articles on presidency [http://www.questiaschool.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=15070503 online edition]
* Hersh, Seymour. ''The Dark Side of Camelot'' (1997), highly negative assessment focused on scandals
* Kunz, Diane B. ''The Diplomacy of the Crucial Decade: American Foreign Relations during the 1960s'' (1994)
* O'Brien, Michael. ''John F. Kennedy: A Biography'' (2005), the most detailed scholarly biography [http://www.amazon.com/John-Kennedy-Biography-Michael-OBrien/dp/0312281293/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218173&sr=8-4 excerpt and text search]
* Parmet, Herbert. ''Jack: The Struggles of John F. Kennedy'' (1980); ''JFK: The Presidency of John F. Kennedy'' (1983), scholarly biography
* Paterson, Thomas G. ''Kennedy's Quest for Victory: American Foreign Policy, 1961-1963'' (1989) [http://www.amazon.com/Kennedys-Quest-Victory-American-1961-1963/dp/019504584X/ref=sr_1_11?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218173&sr=8-11 excerpt and text search], Leftists approach disparages anti-Communism
* Piereson, James. ''Camelot and the Cultural Revolution: How the Assassination of John F. Kennedy Shattered American Liberalism'' (2007) [http://www.amazon.com/Camelot-Cultural-Revolution-Assassination-Liberalism/dp/1594031886/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1227415678&sr=8-2 excerpt and text search], conservative interpetation
* Preble, Christopher A. ''John F. Kennedy and the Missile Gap'' (2004)
* Reeves, Richard. ''President Kennedy: Profile of Power'' (1993), balanced assessment of policies
* Reeves, Thomas. ''A Question of Character: A Life of John F. Kennedy'' (1991) detailed assessment of his character flaws by conservative historian [http://www.amazon.com/Question-Character-Life-John-Kennedy/dp/076151287X/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218173&sr=8-10 excerpt and text search]
* Schlesinger, Arthur, Jr. ''A Thousand Days: John F. Kennedy in the White House'' (1965), major memoir by a close advisor [http://www.amazon.com/Thousand-Days-Kennedy-White-House/dp/1579124496/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195218430&sr=8-1 excerpt and text search]
* Schlesinger, Arthur, Jr. ''Robert Kennedy And His Times'' (2002)
* Smith, Jean Edward. "Kennedy and Defense: The Formative Years". ''Air University Review'' (March–April 1967) [http://www.airpower.maxwell.af.mil/airchronicles/aureview/1967/mar-apr/smith.html online]

===Primary sources===
* [http://fraser.stlouisfed.org/publications/ERP/ Council of Economic Advisors, ''Economic Report of the President'' (annual 1947- )], complete series online; important analysis of current trends and policies, plus statistcial tables
* Sorensen, Theodore. ''Kennedy'' (1966), major memoir by a close advisor

====Notes====
{{reflist}}

{{USPresidents}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kennedy, John F.}}
[[Category:Democratic Party]]
[[Category:Irish-Americans]]
[[Category:American war heroes]]
[[Category:United States History]]
[[Category:Cold War]]
[[Category:1950s]]
[[Category:1960s]]
[[Category:Catholic Politicians]]
[[Category: Kennedy Family]]
[[Category:Religion and Politics]]

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-10-17T23:29:12Z

ChuckR:

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-10-17T23:28:45Z

ChuckR: /* JFK a conservative? What? */ new section

Talk:John F. Kennedy

2009-10-17T23:28:43Z

ChuckR: /* JFK a conservative? What? */ new section