John F. Kennedy was sworn in as president 50 years ago this week. Columnist Jeffrey Lord points out an important reminder of how revisionist historians on the Left view someone who tried to actually lower taxes and wasn't afraid to label Communism for the nightmare that it truly is..."..30-year old Joseph Kennedy III -- gave a speech to the Massachusetts legislature celebrating JFK's "City on a Hill" speech delivered days before he left for his swearing-in as president. Mr. Kennedy, a prosecutor on Cape Cod and viewed by some as the next Kennedy in politics, had the courage to take on the American left for its rhetoric while predictably doing the same with the American right. But sadly, like his uncle RFK, Jr., he repeated something that is a flat-out untruth: that John F. Kennedy was killed because, as the Boston Globe pretended, "of President Kennedy's opposition to racial discrimination and violence." To say that JFK was killed "for what he represented" is to gloss over a very hard fact.
John F. Kennedy was murdered. By a Marxist. A leftist. Someone who so admired both the Communist Soviet Union and Communist Cuba -- the nations JFK was calling slave states and had threatened with nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis -- that he tried to defect to both. Failing, he murdered John F. Kennedy. After almost killing the right-wing retired General Edwin Walker with a just-missed shot through Walker's Dallas living room window.
Looking back decades later it is no small point that the unraveling of the modern American Left can be traced to the day JFK's left-wing killer was let off the hook by the aborning liberal media of the day -- which tried instantly to put the blame on the American and Dallas right. Anywhere but where it squarely belonged -- at the feet of a determined Marxist who in fact was acting in the violent traditions of his decidedly leftist political faith.
John F. Kennedy's murder, the third time a president of the United States had been shot to death by a leftist -- and not counting the two leftist attempts to kill FDR and Truman -- was an eye-opening example in the day and right now of what can only be called left-on-left violence. The seating of Democrats and Republicans together at the next State of the Union Address will not -- cannot -- cure this.
In fact, JFK's assassination turned out to be the curtain raiser on a cascade of left-on-left violence through the 1960's and beyond. The once seemingly stable Big Government American left represented by JFK and before him FDR and Harry Truman slid into a cesspool of violence and violent rhetoric typified today by the Matthews remarks on Rush Limbaugh or the Robert Kennedy Jr. smear of Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, Michael Savage and Fox News. And of course, Matthews again, attempting to link Mark Levin to the Tucson violence. A bizarre, scurrilous slur which has drawn a $100,000 challenge from Levin to Matthews to prove it in court."
John F. Kennedy was murdered. By a Marxist. A leftist. Someone who so admired both the Communist Soviet Union and Communist Cuba -- the nations JFK was calling slave states and had threatened with nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis -- that he tried to defect to both. Failing, he murdered John F. Kennedy. After almost killing the right-wing retired General Edwin Walker with a just-missed shot through Walker's Dallas living room window.
Looking back decades later it is no small point that the unraveling of the modern American Left can be traced to the day JFK's left-wing killer was let off the hook by the aborning liberal media of the day -- which tried instantly to put the blame on the American and Dallas right. Anywhere but where it squarely belonged -- at the feet of a determined Marxist who in fact was acting in the violent traditions of his decidedly leftist political faith.
John F. Kennedy's murder, the third time a president of the United States had been shot to death by a leftist -- and not counting the two leftist attempts to kill FDR and Truman -- was an eye-opening example in the day and right now of what can only be called left-on-left violence. The seating of Democrats and Republicans together at the next State of the Union Address will not -- cannot -- cure this.
In fact, JFK's assassination turned out to be the curtain raiser on a cascade of left-on-left violence through the 1960's and beyond. The once seemingly stable Big Government American left represented by JFK and before him FDR and Harry Truman slid into a cesspool of violence and violent rhetoric typified today by the Matthews remarks on Rush Limbaugh or the Robert Kennedy Jr. smear of Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, Michael Savage and Fox News. And of course, Matthews again, attempting to link Mark Levin to the Tucson violence. A bizarre, scurrilous slur which has drawn a $100,000 challenge from Levin to Matthews to prove it in court."
Gabrielle Giffords was not targeted due to Right-wing talking points any more than JFK was. To state that Kennedy was assasinated due to his "opposition to racial discrimination" is especially laughable when any historian worth his weight in sheepskin would tell you that Kennedy himself stated "Can't you get your Goddamned friends off those buses? Stop them" to advisor Harris Wofford in reference to the so-called Freedom Riders who, at the time, were detracting attention from Kennedy's upcoming summit with Kruschev. Jonah Goldberg puts it best when he writes...
"A mere three and a half hours before Kennedy died, he was boasting to the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce that he had increased defense spending on a massive scale, including a 600 percent increase on counterinsurgency special forces in South Vietnam. The previous March, Kennedy had asked Congress to spend fifty cents of every federal dollar on defense.
The Kennedy myth also veers sharply from reality when it comes to the issue of race. The flattering legend is that Kennedy was an un-alloyed champion of civil rights. Supposedly, had he lived, the racial turmoil of the 1960's could have been avoided. The truth is far more prosaic. Yes, Kennedy pushed for civil rights legislation, and he deserves credit for it. But he was hardly breaking with the past. In the supposedly reactionary 1950's, Republicans had carried most of the burden of fulfilling the American promise of equality to blacks. Eisenhower had pushed through two civil rights measures over strong opposition to southern Democrats, and in particular Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson, who fought hard to dilute the legislation. Again Kennedy was on the right side of history, but his efforts were mostly reactive"
6 comments:
Sorry for the short answer but "Southern Strategy"
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Southern_strategy
On Kennedy and taxres, even Democrats used to understand--before they became demagogues--that cutting taxes does not reduce tax revenues. Kennedy's speech to the New York Economic Club should be required reading:
http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/jfkeconomicclubaddress.html
"In short, it is a paradoxical truth that tax rates are too high today and tax revenues are too low and the soundest way to raise the revenues in the long run is to cut the rates now. ... And the reason is that only full employment can balance the budget, and tax reduction can pave the way to that employment. The purpose of cutting taxes now is not to incur a budget deficit, but to achieve the more prosperous, expanding economy which can bring a budget surplus."
When I studied American history at college, it was clear that the Johnson administration did more for civil rights than Kennedy's.
What's your take on the Kennedy assassination? Oswald certainly had a motive to kill him, as the Warren Commission established, but I'm not entirely convinced that he acted alone.
What's your take on the Kennedy assassination?
I really don't know at this point Ross. All I know is the more I examine it, the more Oliver Stone's JFK looks like completely made up bunk.
I believe Oswald did it, however I also feel there was a 2nd gunman involved. Who was it? I guess we'll never know.
I am reminded of a political assasination that occurred in Haiti a couple of years ago. The US was pressuring the Haitian authorities for quick resolution on the matter to which the Haitians relied, "You want us to figure this out in relatively short order while you people haven't figured out who killed Knnedy after 40 + years?"
UPDATE:
Ross, I just came from the barber shop where I put your question to my haitian barber. He said, quote...
'Kennedy was killed by Communists in a deal between Cuba and the Soviet Union.'
So there you have it.
I couldn't resist telling you this. Have you ever heard of former Australian Prime Minister Harold Holt, who went missing, presumed drowned whilst swimming in December 1967? Someone thought it would be a great idea to commemorate him this way:
http://tinyurl.com/6dupjkb
Bill Bryson wrote about this in his book, Bill Bryson Down Under, and saw the funny side of it. I don't think you'd be able to get away with that sort of thing in other parts of the eorld.
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