President Kennedy died today, again

Loss of naivete, gullibility, artlessness... right, not exactly the same as innocence.
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But is an infusion of cynicism really so bad for the body politic? It is the cynical among us who keep the public thieves and demagogues called politicians -- if not really honest -- at least on their guard. That's good.

Frank, in 45 years, we now know there is much more evidence to rebut the "fact" that Lee Harvey Oswald was "the presidential assassin" than there is to condemn him. If you don't know that, you should research it more.

Full of promise, but truly a near disaster as president. But, apparently that doesn't matter (just look at HObama).

6th Grade, Home Room. The news brought shock, tears, and regretfully, a couple of cheers. I will never forgot that day, that week. What haunts me most is the image of the caisson, the riderless horse, the repetitive drum rhythm--thrum, thrum, thrum, drrrrrrrr, thrum, thrum.... That and the person who cheered at the horrific news, my friend that I thought I knew, a beautiful girl who looked ever so ugly that day.

"But Lee Harvey Oswald, the presidential assassin,"

Frank, the guy was never tried or convicted so it should read "alleged assassin".

Maybe he wasn't the one of the best presidents we ever had, but he was our president and he was murdered. I, like 'dt,' was in elementary school, 5th grade. We were supposed to watch a Spanish lesson on TV, when the teacher next door ran into our room, huddled with our teacher, and we could tell by the looks on their faces that something terrible had happened. I think everyone sat in front of their TV's the next three days, as President Kennedy was flown back to Washington, DC in a casket, our new president was sworn in, Lee Harvey Oswald was killed in front of us on live TV, and the funeral. I, too, will never forget the caisson, the riderless horse, the repetitive drum rhythm, or the faces of Jackie, Caroline, and John-John as they said good-bye. Pick it apart if you will, but, it was a loss of innocence for out nation.

Third grade...went home for lunch...didn't go back for a week

The day that Kennedy died I was 45 miles south of Saigon, near the town of My Tho, with the ARVN 7th Division. We were fighting the war that JFK started.

While I mourn his passing I also mourn the 58,000 Americans that died in this war.

I will never forget the people who served in Congess that let them died in vain!

I do hope that the Democrats do not repeat this mistake in Iraq.

JFK was well on his way to achieving greatness on 11/22/63.

Some of the agenda was picked up by LBJ and delivered upon.

But, as now, a disastrous war drained the Treasury.

But JFK was an electrifying national presence.

People used to hone their impersonation of his Brookline-Hyannis accent, a lot of them. Not just the late night comedians.

Not even Obama has equaled his magnetic and inspiring public persona----yet.

Truthhurts: People USUALLY evaluate a politician's performance AFTER they've AT LEAST been in office for a while!!!! Would you be talking that trash if John -wandering- around- the- stage-during-the-debate- as -if -he -was- lost McCain was the president-elect?????

Kindergarten. That weekend, I still remember my Eisenhower Repub Dad saying, "What?" as he saw the Ruby assasination with ALL those cops standing around.
He turned off the television, shook his head.
Read this/Watch this from a professor in the Naval War College:
http://www.hup.harvard.edu/features/
kaiass/road_to_dallas.html

If Kennedy were alive today and said, "Ask not!--what your
country can do for you--ask what you can do for your country"...the (new) democrat party would smear him as a right wing neo-con nut job.

Rest in Peace, Mr. President.

Paulo

Pat H--we lost vietnam because the soldiers no longer wanted to commit genocide.
Watch the film "Sir, No Sir!" and overcome your revisionist history of the war.
http://sirnosir.com/
How to win a ar in a land of peasants on the side of the landlord? You CAN'T!

It would be 14 years later until little Excellentform would have his first memory. RIP JFK.

Hey Pat H, President Kennedy did not start the Vietnam war. It was a continuation of the civil war that followed the French withdrawal.
What followed was the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV), or North Vietnam, wanted to take South Vietnam by force. In late 1957, with American aid, Diem began to counterattack. That was pretty much the start of the war. As I recall Eisenhower was the President.

OK, I'll play the I-Remember-When game too.
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5th Grade in a Catholic school on the south side of Chicago. We stayed home for the next few days, until he was in the ground. It was a tragedy for us and the nuns first and foremost because Kennedy was a Catholic. Catholics could be that way, especially 40 years ago.
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Now I'm grown up. Now I know that Kennedy was not a hero, a saint or a great president. His legacy (other than having been murdered) is Vietnam and the Bay of Pigs. Now I know that he was angry that Martin Luther King had the nerve to organize a march on Washington.
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Forget the storybook nonsense, the twaddle about Camelot. The real tragedy was that a young man -- a husband and father -- was murdered... something that happens countless times, every day, all over the world.
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But just as in the wake of the assassinations of Lincoln, Garfield and McKinnley, the republic carried on without skipping a beat.

"From what we knew at the time about JFK, he reflected our best selves as we saw it -- courageous, dashing, vigorous, smart, curious."

Funny how the opinion polls at the time didn't reflect Frank James's 2008 gush about "what we knew at the time". Nor did the results of the 1962 mid-term elections.

JFK deserves better than this sentimental, laughable mush.

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Posted by: Scot S. Blakeley | November 23, 2008 10:29 AM
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Scot,
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Before Kennedy took office, we had about 800 military advisors in Vietnam. It was Kennedy who first bumped the number of military advisors up to more than 1,000 and then added 16,000 ground troops at the insistence of Robert McNamara. Before then, the fighting between North and South Vietnam was largely and intramural affair, as our presence was largely covert and advisory. Thus, it is fairly ludicrous to suggest, as you have, that the war was started on Eisenhower's watch or that he started it.
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Posted by: Ask I.F. Stone about the Gulf of Tonkin Lies | November 23, 2008 9:21 AM
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We left Vietnam because the American People were tired of it. Nixon got elected largely on his promise to get us out of the war. He did so through a negotiated agreement by which our troops departed in the early part of 1973. We were never defeated in any major battle, and we were never forced from the field. Quite the opposite was true. Thus, to say that we "lost" the war in any conventional sense of the word is quite inaccurate. If one insists that we"lost" the Vietnam War because we did not achieve our stated goals, then one can say with equal plausibility that we "lost" the Korean war too.

So John W, those 800 military advisors were sent by who? Eisenhower. End of story.

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Posted by: Scot S. Blakeley | November 24, 2008 9:15 AM
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So, Scot, those 800 advisors started the war? No? End of story.

Ok John W, what part of MILITARY ADVISORS do you not understand?
Lets see, Military Advisors advise others on how to fight a war right?
Here's what is laid out in all hostory books (not th eones Palin wants to burn by the way)

The American-Vietnamese War-- 1956-1975--The Communist North Vietnamese and the southern Viet Cong engaged in a long war to overthrow the pro-American government of South Vietnam. The U.S. and other allied nations sent troops to aid the Saigon regime. The last U.S. combat troops left in 1973 and Saigon fell to the North Vietnamese on April 30, 1975. Known in the U.S. and much of the world as "The Vietnam War." Known in Vietnam as "The American War."

Anti-Diem Coup Attempt-- Nov. 11-Nov. 13, 1960--Bloody coup attempt against South Vietnam's leader, Diem. Over 300 killed or wounded. Diem would later be overthrown and murdered in late 1963.

Laotian Civil War-- 1959-1975--North Vietnam sent large numbers of troops into Laos to aid the Communist Pathet Lao against the U.S.-backed Royal Laotian government.

Seems to me Eisenhower was President from 1956-1960.

Thats the end of the true story not your interpretation.

Scot,
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I totally understand what military ADVISORS are and what they do, Scot. They ADVISE. Advisors are generally not COMBATANTS. We did not enter the war as combatant until the Gulf of Tonkin resolution, and that wasn't until 1964. By my recollection, Lyndon B. Johnson was the President at the time. If the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution hadn't come about, we could have left without ever having been in a war in any real sense. Game Over.

Oh John, whatever you say. You're always right. This attitude lost you the election because the majority of Americans know now not to believe you and your kind of rhetoric.
Military advisors advise on how to fight a war. They were American military advisors. Therefore Americans were involved in the begining of the war which started in 1956. This is the history of scholars not the revisionist history of lame duck politics.