Kennedy's Peace Speech and Today

[Kirk Gallaway]

On 8/7/2023 at 4:16 AM, Michael Griffith said:

Anyway, as I have mentioned, there are several hawkish statements in the American University speech (the peace speech), and JFK delivered the very hawkish Berlin and Fort Worth speeches after the peace speech. 

I don't think I'd go that far to compare the speeches. But people here might read the entire text of the American University speech instead of just watching the snippets "Pax Americana" and  "After all, we all breathe the same air." But it was a great speech and those will always be great  aspirational snippets for generations to come as well. 

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 But I was also very surprised at the time when I first saw JFK's speech in Fort Worth about how hawkish the last speech of JFK's life was. And Michael has shown quotes of this here as well . As I said earlier and some here threw a conniption fit, politicians play to the audiences they're addressing and JFK wasn't exempt. Notice how in his final line  when JFK talks about the U.S.  keeping the peace and promoting it's interest, he says, "To that great cause, Texas and the United States is committed". The body of the speech is between 3:10 and 13:10.

 

https://youtu.be/nTFqG64Oqac

 

 

 

On 8/7/2023 at 4:16 AM, Michael Griffith said:

One gets the feeling that certain ultra-liberals here would stop caring about the JFK assassination if they were forced to face the fact that JFK was not a peacenik liberal but a right-leaning centrist who favored massive across-the-board tax cuts, fiscal restraint, a balanced approach toward labor issues, a strong national defense, and the containment of communism. 

 

On 8/7/2023 at 4:16 AM, Michael Griffith said:

if they were forced to face the fact that JFK was not a peacenik liberal but a right-leaning centrist

I  might disagree with that but maybe a tad  left leaning of the center. And being left of center was the right place to be during the Civil Rights movement, as the nation was polarizing but middle class whites could now see the virulent American style of racism being played out on their tv's and watch the progress of MLK and the Civil Rights marches. And when confronted, JFK took the lead.

On 8/7/2023 at 4:16 AM, Michael Griffith said:

who favored massive across-the-board tax cuts, fiscal restraint,

without a doubt and massive tax cuts for the wealthy, but not near what it is now.

 

On 8/7/2023 at 4:16 AM, Michael Griffith said:

, a balanced approach toward labor issues,

A lot of times here when we hear about JFK concerning the unions, it's about the steel crisis which was really more JFK railing against the steel magnates for raising the price of steel 6 more dollars per ton, than it was really pro labor. But earlier as a Senator JFK did sponsor a labor act to clean up the unions. He was no Hubert Humphrey, but  I'd say he's just a tad left leaning of center there.

On 8/7/2023 at 4:16 AM, Michael Griffith said:

a strong national defense, and the containment of communism. 

Yes, but he almost didn't have a choice on that. But after going to the brink of an abyss with the Cuban Missile Crisis, he was going to seize the unique opportunity for peace as he was in the rare position of being a foreign policy liberal who had shown his mettle in dealing with the Soviets.

 

I'm no expert. But I've never believed JFK was going to be completely out of Vietnam by the end of 1965. But I know he would never have made near the commitment to Vietnam LBJ made. I think probably in the first year of his new term, he would have started disengaging, just like Joe Biden did, but more gradually to mitigate his political embarrassment. The only factor that could have modified  that slightly would be how the war went in the 18 months following his assassination.  IMO

[Pamela Brown]

If we add into the mix JFK's To the Moon speech, it becomes even more evident how much of a threat he represented...

https://www.jfklibrary.org/learn/about-jfk/historic-speeches/address-at-rice-university-on-the-nations-space-effort