John F Kennedy's five terms in office.

Taken from "A History of American Politics, 1920-present, copyright 1992.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt was the president who reshaped American politics more than any other. His progressive economic and social reforms brought an end to the Laissez-faire policies of the previous generations. His leadership brought about allied victory in the second world war, and turned America into an unprecedented superpower. His unorthodox decision to seek a third, and then fourth term, shook American politics to it's core, and paved the way for the longest serving president in American history, and the dominance of Liberal Democrats, which has continued (with two brief interruptions 1953-1961 and 1985-1989) ever since. After his death in 1945, his vice president, Harry S. Truman came to lead the United states for the rest of the 1940s, and the early 50s. Seen mostly as a "transitional figure", noted mainly for his quixotic support for the proposed "22nd amendment" which would undue the very precedent that his predecessor had set. The first interruption was the 1952 election of republican Dwight "Ike" Eisenhower, who lead for the rest of the 1950s. His main concern as president was Military power, putting high priority on the Space Race, and Nuclear build up. He served two terms (the last president to do so) before being beaten out in 1960 by John F Kennedy. The youngest President in American history at the time he assumed office, and the first Roman Catholic, Kennedy would survive numerous assassination attempts to become the longest serving president in American history. The 20 years he was in office, from 1961-1981 where also a time of great change in America. The greatest single cultural shift since the industrial revolution, and the energetic young president took it in strides...
 
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"The 20 years he was in office, from 1961-1981 where also a time of great change in America. The greatest single cultural shift since the industrial revolution, and the energetic young president took it in strides..."

The longest serving and the worst president ever - if you believe the NY Times poll of 1986 and the Newsweek polls of 1990, 2000 and 2004. With great justification the most corrupt, at least 28 former cabinet members have been sentenced in federal courts for a huge variety of corruption charges.

The NAACP considers the past 20 years to have seen the most significant advances in Civil Rights in the last 40 years. They consider the single term of Kennedy's Vice President Lyndon Johnson to have been the most promising. Kennedy's many extra-martial affairs thru out his twenty years in office were widely known and was the reason of Jackie filing for divorce barely four months after leaving the White House - even tho she and the President hadn't been living together since the mid-1970s.
 

Germaniac

Donor
While I am a huge admirer of Kennedy by election of 1968 he had effectively taken control of the government with a mass majority of democrats in both the house and Senate. With no opposition he was able to push through all kinds of legislation. Universal Healthcare, reforming the American intelligence agencies, landing a man on the moon, sending a mars flyby, landing the first man on an astroid, and laying the ground work for landing a man on mars. Along with many economic and social reforms. However not all his endevors were great though.

His eventual downfall was when the true scale of the Vietnam conflict was discovered in the middle of his fifth term. Quite a sad time for America.

All the corruption charges were dropped. Not a single one held up in court. They were a biased attack by the Republican leadership which came into power after 81'. Thank God Jack jr is back at the helm and won the past election.
 

HJ Tulp

Donor
Given JFK and Jack Jr. vs. GHWB and GWB, I'd say it's a clear utopia, relatively.

It isn't JFK instead of GHWB. Besides, I'd choose the old Bush over JFK any day of the week. JFK is the one who screwed the Cubans at the Bay of Pigs, the Dutch and the Papua's in West Papua and almost screwed the whole world because of the Cuba-Crisis. He's the most overrated American President ever.
 
It isn't JFK instead of GHWB. Besides, I'd choose the old Bush over JFK any day of the week. JFK is the one who screwed the Cubans at the Bay of Pigs, the Dutch and the Papua's in West Papua and almost screwed the whole world because of the Cuba-Crisis. He's the most overrated American President ever.


Bay of Pigs was kinda Eisenhowers baby. A big out going republicans screw you to the incoming democrat. However, the rest is true, he is entirely over rated. Chances are, if he wouldn't have been shot by whomever (and I'm leaning towards the crazy ex-marine on the second floor) he would have been saddled with so much scandal he would have lost the next election or had to resign. As it was, his dallying with the possible East German spy had Hoover doing cart wheels for the dirt he had on ol' Jack. And seriously, Jack jr.? Please get over the whole camelotinitis. It, like the original Camelot, was a fairy tale.
 

HJ Tulp

Donor
Bay of Pigs was kinda Eisenhowers baby. A big out going republicans screw you to the incoming democrat. However, the rest is true, he is entirely over rated. Chances are, if he wouldn't have been shot by whomever (and I'm leaning towards the crazy ex-marine on the second floor) he would have been saddled with so much scandal he would have lost the next election or had to resign. As it was, his dallying with the possible East German spy had Hoover doing cart wheels for the dirt he had on ol' Jack. And seriously, Jack jr.? Please get over the whole camelotinitis. It, like the original Camelot, was a fairy tale.


The Bay of Pigs was indeed Eisenhowers baby. However, just like D-Day the Bay of Pigs was designed as almost impossible to fail. Air supriority, preperational airstrikes, numerical supriority etc. etc. Kennedy instead cancelled the airsupport as well as the 30.000 Marines that were going to reinforce the contra-revolutionaries. Kennedy's Bay of Pigs was designed to fail, it was worse then Dieppe.
 
occ: For his myth to survive his living, Vietnam has to be differant, won or low level troop numbers the whole way.

And although he did screw the pooch on Cuba, both times, he would not always be a unexperianced young president...

And he does come from a time when the dems were still anti-communist...

This might not be so bad.

The implications of having a sex fiend in the Oval Office for generations, quite amusing. Would put quite a diffferant spin on the sexual revolution.
 
well, considering that conservatives are saying Reagan made america great, i do not deny that. But i think he only played a minor role compared to JFK. We could have seen more of the gipper, but sadly, Alzheimer's just had to kick in.:mad:
 
No the Bay of Pigs was totally the responsibilty of JFK. It was he who cut the air support for the Cubans as well as changing the plans. It was he who refused to allow US military support. The result was the Cuban Missile Crisis, The Laos Crisis and finally US involvement in Vietnam.
 
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