November 22, 1963 (Updated) 2
I was never a big fan of John F. Kennedy. Where and when I grew up, under Jim Crow in the rural south, he was not popular. There was a fear that he might (gasp!) support the Civil Rights Movement.
After I grew up and my views changed and matured, I realized that, except for the Cuban missile crisis, he was pretty ineffective as a president in getting things done; it was his successor who enacted most of his programs.
Yes, he was an inspiring (and grammatical) speaker: charming, witty, with a sense of humor about events and about himself (things our current crop of politicians could use more of), but his legislative record was spotty, at best, with the exception of inaugurating U. S. efforts to put men on the moon in ten years.
Yet, his death was one of the significant corner-turning events in 20th century United States history.
Attytood points out that the memory is starting to fade:
Addendum, 11/23/2006
Some thoughts on parallels between then and now.
November 23, 2006 at 10:13 pm
Geoffery Perret’s biography of JFK does point out one interesting thing: he was the first man to hold the future of the entire human race in the balance of a single go/no-go decision.
November 26, 2006 at 7:00 pm
One hopes that, as the decider, he made the right decision.