If Robert F. Kennedy became president in 1968, what would be his policies?

Bomster

Banned
So I'm trying to a develop a TL where Bobby Kennedy survives his assassination and with Mayor Daley's help, wins the Democratic nomination and defeats Nixon in the Presidential Election. However I'm not exactly sure what kind of policies and programs he might push. What kind of actions would Kennedy have likely take as president?
 

RousseauX

Donor
He might actually have being Bill Clinton a few decades earlier: popular with minorities, but pretty firmly against welfare but "for work". RFK had the potential of being a Third Way New Democrat a couple of decades ahead of time, I could see something like work requirements ala welfare reform of 1996 being pushed by the RFk white house.

Does it get through a new deal era congress? That's another question.
 

RousseauX

Donor
So I'm trying to a develop a TL where Bobby Kennedy survives his assassination and with Mayor Daley's help, wins the Democratic nomination and defeats Nixon in the Presidential Election. However I'm not exactly sure what kind of policies and programs he might push. What kind of actions would Kennedy have likely take as president?
Also see this:

https://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/01/books/01book.html

Someone wrote a really detailed retail book where RFK survives the assassination and needed another 5 PoDs or so to beat Nixon
 

RousseauX

Donor
Then Everything Changed is great. He was an RFK aide, so that third of the book is probably the strongest. I highly recommend picking up a copy for a light read.
I actually thought the first scenario (LBJ in 1960 after jfk gets assassinated) was the most plausible one
 
We'd probably see a more human rights based foreogn policy along with a continued push for civil rights.

One thing people dont discuss is his temper, so he may be less efficient than some think
 

Bomster

Banned
We'd probably see a more human rights based foreogn policy along with a continued push for civil rights.

One thing people dont discuss is his temper, so he may be less efficient than some think
How would Kennedy pull us out of Vietnam? Also how would he respond to Yom Kippur, oil crisis, etc?
 

Bomster

Banned
Many people assume he would have gotten the US out of Vietnam quickly--but not once in any of his speeches did he call for unilateral withdrawal, as even Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. acknowledges. https://books.google.com/books?id=5L-EeG9djO4C&pg=PA890 ("Whatever they may have thought privately, neither [Kennedy nor McCarthy] came out for unilateral withdrawal.")
What do you think Kennedy would have done then to end the war in Vietnam?
 
I think it could avert the Religious Right as it existed IOTL. Before Roe the pro-life movement consisted largely of Catholics who favored progressive politics and saw opposition to abortion as an extension of the civil rights movement, while evangelicals were ambivalent on the issue and many Republicans (included Reagan) supported legal access to abortion. After Roe and with the rise of second-wave feminism in the 1970s, the anti-abortion movement shifted right as part of a general opposition to feminism and "moral decay". With a pro-life Catholic Democrat as president in 1973 we might see a more culturally conservative Democratic Party (a coalition of minorities, labor, and ethnic Catholics) and a more Rockefeller-esque and North/West-oriented GOP.
 
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