No kidding. The history between Irish and Jews is not very rosy. A combustible mixture of the religious (aka "Christ killer" disowned by Vatican II) and typical minorities jockeying for socioeconomic position.
Exactly. He have to remember that not only were Jews highly suspect during the McCarthy era, but less then 10 years prior you still had Jewish kids having the shit kicked out of them by (predominantly Irish) Catholic children on their way to school. That's actually how Lucky Luciano and Meyer Lansky met, only Luciano was actually defending Lansky from other Catholic bullies.No kidding. The history between Irish and Jews is not very rosy. A combustible mixture of the religious (aka "Christ killer" disowned by Vatican II) and typical minorities jockeying for socioeconomic position.
It's not about Bobby needing McCarthy, it's about McCarthy pressuring Bobby to back him at all times and the fact that most people will still probably see Bobby as one of McCarthy's cronies, especially if he's as prominent in the McCarthy crusades as Roy was.Bobby doesn't need McCarthy after '54, so I don't see how that's especially relevant. The problem with MA is that it is too small a pond, and even the Dynasticrat-friendly Bay State would not have two brothers of the same party in the Senate. Also, NY is his home state, having lived there from the ages of 2-17, which many forgot in 1964.
With regards to battles of wills, LBJ looks like a pussy compared to McCarthy. The difference between McCarthy and...everyone...was that McCarthy had absolutely no idea when to stop fighting, something which ultimately destroyed him. If Bobby resits pressures from McCarthy then that relationship is going to go down in flames. And since there won't be any Army-McCarthy hearings ITTL, McCarthy may very well still have the clout to wreck Bobby. I know that Bobby was basically Iron Man when it came to a lot of things but McCarthy was a force of nature, and a completely chaotic and uncontrollable one at that.Good point about the cronyism perception there, though I doubt the pressure would make any difference. No one ever won a battle of wills with Bobby, as LBJ, no slouch in that field himself, found out by March 1968.![]()
Are we sure Bobby would have won in '68?So let's say he runs for MA AG. Then there are 2 options. Run for governor, which is a dead-end, or run for either Jack's vacated seat or Saltonstall's (Kerry's today) seat in 1960. If he has a full term in the Senate under his belt, there goes the "experience" half of Tricky Dick's "maturity and experience" snark when 1968 rolls around.
If you think I haven't employed this strategy time and time and time and time again...And yes, this might be used for TL purposes down the road.![]()