Changes for 2nd Kennedy Administration?

[Mark Knight]

An article in this morning's Louisville, KY Courier-Journal sports section quotes from an interview The Denver Post's Anthony Cotton had with boxing promoter Bob Arum:

"The day [President] Kennedy was shot, my immediate boss was in Washington. He was going to become attorney general, and Bobby [Kennedy] was going to become secretary of state, and I was going to go to Washington to become the head of the tax division for the country. If that had happened...if, if, if, I wouldn't be here now, I'd be in tax court making people pay up."

While Arum's statement is just an aside in his career, it implies that Dean Rusk was out, had there been a second Kennedy administration. Since most of the principals are now dead, I doubt that anyone can--or will--dispute Arum's assertion. But it makes me wonder just what OTHER changes--besides the vice presidency--would a second Kennedy administration have wrought? And, if a cabinet secretary was caught unaware, how much of a surprise would it have been? Would it have been enough to have brought about coalescence, if not outright participation, in a pre-existing murder plot?

Is anyone else on the Forum aware of any other planned cabinet changes?

Edited November 2, 2005 by Mark Knight

[Guest Stephen Turner]

As well as Dean Rusk, how bout, Douglass Dillon, Stewart Udall, WW Wirtz, Luther Hodges and Orville Freeman, all en route to Tokyo at the time of the assassination. (just kidding)

[Mark Knight]

Another article that claims that Rusk was going to be out after the '64 election if JFK won:

JFK's Vietnam Strategy

[John Dolva]

An article in this morning's Louisville, KY Courier-Journal sports section quotes from an interview The Denver Post's Anthony Cotton had with boxing promoter Bob Arum:

"The day [President] Kennedy was shot, my immediate boss was in Washington. He was going to become attorney general, and Bobby [Kennedy] was going to become secretary of state, and I was going to go to Washington to become the head of the tax division for the country. If that had happened...if, if, if, I wouldn't be here now, I'd be in tax court making people pay up."

While Arum's statement is just an aside in his career, it implies that Dean Rusk was out, had there been a second Kennedy administration. Since most of the principals are now dead, I doubt that anyone can--or will--dispute Arum's assertion. But it makes me wonder just what OTHER changes--besides the vice presidency--would a second Kennedy administration have wrought? And, if a cabinet secretary was caught unaware, how much of a surprise would it have been? Would it have been enough to have brought about coalescence, if not outright participation, in a pre-existing murder plot?

Is anyone else on the Forum aware of any other planned cabinet changes?

Mark, while looking at copies of Time from, 61, 62, 63, I noticed quite a number of people jostling for position in the upcoming elections. Nixon was being pushed, he ended up staying out of the race for a number of years. Allegiances shifted, parties changed, Thurmond shifted to Goldwater over Johnsons Civil rights bill. The vaccuum created by the assassination saw a number of shifts.

Prior to the assassination there were shifts in fortunes that I don't think I have seen a follow up on.

I wonder if MacNamara might have felt a bit freed? I know in his Morris fog docu he is painted as an anguished soul, however some commentators see him at heart a nazi.

[Norman T. Field]

While not a cabinet level position, my understanding is that J. E. Hoover was to be long gone. Remember, hell hath no fury like a woman (wanna be) scorned. Apparently Hoover knew what was coming thanks to the ever present wire taps. Motive anyone?