Don G. Dinsdale Loc: El Cajon, CA (San Diego County)

Comparing JFK with Ronald Reagan


John F. Kennedy

35 President only served 2 years


DOMESTIC POLICY

On the evening of May 3, 1963, Americans watched on television as Martin Luther King Jr.'s campaign to desegregate Birmingham, Alabama collapsed under a wave of officially sanctioned violence. Birmingham police attacked peaceful black demonstrators with clubs, dogs, and high-pressure fire hoses, and for the first time many citizens understood the breadth of America's racial divide. Perhaps no one regarded the events with more anguish than President John Fitzgerald Kennedy. The violence in Birmingham proved that Kennedy's piecemeal approach to civil rights had failed.

Promoted the ambitious "New Frontier" domestic program promising federal funding for education, medical care for the elderly, economic aid to rural regions, and government intervention to halt the recession of the time

Abolished the federal death penalty

Signed executive orders prohibiting racial discrimination and laid the groundwork for the Civil Rights Act of 1964

Initiated Project Apollo as the first manned expedition to the Moon

Foreign Policy

In the fall of 1963 American efforts to build a democratic firewall against Communism in South Vietnam were failing. The country's president, Ngo Dinh Diem, ran the nation like a fiefdom. Many Vietnamese began to gravitate toward the Communist opposition. In the White House, a frustrated John F. Kennedy struggled to get Diem -- and the Communist insurgency -- under control. Kennedy had outlined his plan for stopping the spread of communism in his inauguration speech two years before. America would, he said, "pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and success of liberty." Developing nations could expect America to "help them help themselves."

Continued support to West Berlin after the Soviet Union hastily erected the Berlin Wall, and delivered his famous Ich bin ein Berliner speech in 1963

Signed off on the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion and faced down Soviet Premier Khrushchev during the Cuban Missile Crisis

Began American involvement in Vietnam as a means of staunching communist expansion in Southeast Asia

Signed the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty in order to limit nuclear tests by the nuclear powers

Initiated the creation of security ties with Israel

Sought to contain the perceived threat of communism in Latin America by establishing the Alliance for Progress, which sent aid to some countries and sought greater human rights standards in the region

Asked Congress to create the Peace Corps, in which Americans would volunteer to help underdeveloped nations in areas such as education, farming, health care, and construction



Ronald Reagan

40 President 8 years (2 Terms)


Domestic Policy

In the more than fifty motion pictures that Ronald Reagan appeared in during his acting career, he was cast as the bad guy only once. Reagan felt more comfortable, and was more believable, as the well-intended hero. Yet two years into his first presidential term, as the country endured the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, Reagan found himself increasingly viewed as the black-hatted villain. The recession of 1981-82 resulted in record unemployment, bank failures, and farm foreclosures. Critics charged that such dire circumstances were the result of "Reaganomics" -- substantial reductions in government assistance and services, coupled with tax cuts. For his part, Reagan maintained that the faltering economy was the legacy of excessive government growth and spending on the part of his predecessors. He urged the nation to "stay the course," and promised that better days were just around the corner.


Developed "Reaganomics" (supply-side economic policies) as a means of controlling inflation and spurring economic growth through tax cuts, reduced business regulation, and reduced growth in government spending

Lowered the federal income tax rate significantly with the signing of the bipartisan Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981

Escalated the War on Drugs campaign and specified a mandatory minimum penalty for drug offenses

Increased spending on national defense and diplomacy and ushered in a close to the Cold War

Reauthorized the Voting Rights Act of 1965 for another 25 years

Signed the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, which compensated victims of the Japanese-American internment during World War II

Fired 11,345 striking air traffic controllers who illegally went on strike in 1981

Appointed Sandra Day O'Connor as the first female Supreme Court justice


Foreign Policy

Like many of his contemporaries, Ronald Reagan formed his opinions about America's role in the world based on the experiences and outcome of World War II. As the United States and the Soviet Union emerged as dominant, and opposing, forces, Reagan shared the view that communism posed a legitimate threat to free people everywhere. His anti-Communist outlook had not softened any by the time he was elected president. Less than ten days into his first term, Reagan characterized the Kremlin as being committed to "the promotion of world revolution and a one-world Socialist or Communist state..." He insisted that efforts at détente undertaken by previous administrations had resulted in a "one-way street" favoring the Soviets.


Reversed the US policy of detente with the USSR and developed the Reagan Doctrine in support for anti-communist rebel movements in Afghanistan, Angola, Cambodia, Nicaragua and elsewhere

Provided arms and other support to anti-communist groups such as the Contras and the mujahideen, and sold arms to foreign allies such as Taiwan, Israel, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq

Invaded Grenada after a 1979 coup d'etat established an independent non-aligned Marxist-Leninist government

Launched a series of airstrikes in Libya in 1986 in retaliation for a bomb explosion in a Berlin discotheque that resulted in American casualties

Negotiated with Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev to initiate a substantial reduction in armaments levels worldwide

Negotiated the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) to substantially reduce nuclear arms and initiated negotiations with the Soviet Union for the treaty that would later be known as START I

Presided over the Iran-Contra Affair of selling weapons to Iran and using the proceeds to fund right-wing Contra forces in Nicaragua

~~~~~

John Kennedy & Ronald Reagan's Similarities

By: Matt Towery --

Over the last month or so, America has commemorated the 50th anniversary of John Kennedy's inauguration. Recall that JFK on that day delivered one of the most historically significant inaugural addresses in our history. Also in recent weeks, the nation has recognized the 100th birthday of the Republicans' patron saint, Ronald Reagan.

Let's first consider what the primary aims were of Kennedy and Reagan when each of these men first became president. Both inherited economic slumps. Especially Reagan.

Kennedy had campaigned "vigorously" -- one of his favorite terms -- on the unacceptable economic sluggishness of the latter years of the Dwight Eisenhower administration. And Reagan on the campaign stump had blasted President Jimmy Carter for making worse an inherited economic malaise by appearing to be not aggressive enough in reacting to a series of unfortunate circumstances.

Both men, too, were all but obsessed with the threat of communism. In Kennedy's time, it was growing in far-away places, particularly Southeast Asia, and nearby in Cuba. Kennedy and Reagan were both determined to challenge communism head-on.

Kennedy was bullied into checking off on an ill-conceived invasion of Cuba -- a plan that had been hatched under Eisenhower. The expedition's failure created in Kennedy a passionate mistrust of the so-called "military-industrial complex."

He then turned to the pressing economic issues of his day. At first, he seemed to subscribe to the approach of today's Obama administration: fighting with big business, increasing federal spending, upping the minimum wage and flooding the economy with dollars.

But by 1963, JFK had reached an interesting conclusion. Let me quote directly from Wikipedia, which, tellingly, often gives short shrift to the achievements of conservatives. This is from Kennedy's speech to the Economics Club of New York: "... the paradoxical truth is that tax rates are too high and revenues are too low, and the soundest way to raise revenue in the long run is to lower rates now."

Reagan's first months in office were eerily similar to Kennedy's. There was too much worry about the Soviet Union and not enough visible action on the American economy. So Reagan ultimately passed his own version of Kennedy's tax-rate reduction -- an economic philosophy that Wikipedia describes as nothing less than "classic liberal and laissez-faire."

Also like Kennedy, Reagan determined that the military was to be respected but also reigned in. Both men, especially the war-decorated Kennedy, were shaped by the events of World War II. As presidents, both were cautious about U.S. intervention overseas.

Kennedy fought with his own Joint Chiefs of Staff about America's response to the installation by the Soviets of offensive nuclear weapons in Cuba. And debate still rages about whether Kennedy had planned before he died to start withdrawal of the American troops placed in South Vietnam to keep order there as communist forces from the north stepped up their attacks.

Reagan used a minimum of troops to keep both the peace and America's reputation for strength. He initially deployed troops to Lebanon during its civil war. But he took a different approach following the bombing of the U.S. Marines barracks in Beirut. And after American tourists were killed in a bombing of a German cafe, Reagan declined to invade Libya, which was behind the murders. Instead, he moved swiftly to bomb that nation's strategic resources. That included places where its leader, Muammar Gaddafi, was thought to be sleeping. Gaddafi survived, but no one heard from him for years.

Historians can and do pick through history and to find huge differences between John Kennedy and Ronald Reagan. Kennedy hesitantly, and then more robustly, entered the fray of the civil rights movement. But Reagan was no bigot. A friend once asked the president if he knew how many secretly gay people there were in his administration. Reagan replied, "Why would I care?" After all, he had lived for years in Hollywood. His acceptance of lifestyle freedoms was high.

Perhaps Kennedy would have greatly appreciated that it was under Reagan that Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday became a national holiday, and that it also happened at a time when King's home state of Georgia had just elected its first Republican U.S. senator since Reconstruction, Mack Mattingly.

Kennedy and Reagan. Two "classic liberal" presidents, despite the definition of the term by today's revisionists.

By: Stephen Tuttle --

The two modern ex-presidents with the most mystique both marked milestones recently.

January was the 50th anniversary of President John Kennedy’s inauguration. And February would have been Ronald Reagan’s 100th birthday. Ironically, there were marked similarities between the dashing young liberal from Massachusetts and the dashing old conservative from California.

There is little debate that Kennedy was a different kind of president than what the country had been used to prior to 1960. Young, attractive, vibrant and with an even younger, beautiful wife he made everyone feel a little more optimistic about the future.

We liked him and wanted him to succeed.

He was strong during the Cuban missile crisis, forcing the Soviets to remove offensive missiles with nuclear capabilities from Cuba. It was a time of tension far beyond anything we’re now experiencing – the world’s two atomic super powers in a face-to-face showdown that could have ended in a nuclear holocaust. (It was serious enough that it was the first time I remember our house having television on during dinner. Regrettably, the second time was only a couple years later when we followed, with horror, the news of Kennedy’s murder in Dallas.)

Kennedy also inspired us to reach the moon and provided the impetus that led to the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts.

But he badly bungled the Bay of Pigs invasion, a horribly amateur operation designed to overthrow Fidel Castro.

Our invaders were all either captured or killed and the fiasco set the groundwork for what has become a half-century long policy of foolishness toward Cuba.

Worse, he started the escalations of our role in Vietnam. The early 60s were our best chance to gracefully and honorably bow out of Southeast Asia and save several hundred billion dollars and more than 50,000 lives. Alas, Kennedy bought into the now discredited “domino theory” that held if South Vietnam fell, all of Southeast Asia would become Communist, falling like so many dominoes.

We also learned, after the fact, that Kennedy was a world-class philanderer and, far from being vigorous and active, had a crippling back injury he received in World War II and suffered from a debilitating case of Grave’s disease.

To be fair, Kennedy had only 1,000 days of presidency, not enough time to be either fully successful or a failure. That we still talk of Camelot and the Kennedy presidency is testament to his friends and family and their ability to perpetuate the myth and mystique. And we cling to an unrealistic image because, at least in part, he was taken from us so harshly and suddenly.

Ronald Reagan, of course, had eight full years to enact his vision for America.

As effective as the Kennedy clan and their friends have been in keeping the Kennedy aura alive and well, Reagan’s supporters have been better. They’re still trying to make sure there is some kind of Reagan monument in every county in the country. Some haven’t given up on their notion that Reagan deserves a place on Mount Rushmore. Never mind that there’s no room.

Reagan, much like Kennedy, brought hope and optimism to the country. In Reagan’s case, that was especially important to a country that had been battered for nearly a decade. We’d gone through Watergate, the Iranian hostage mess was still in play, and we had been mired in an economy with double-digit inflation and brutal interest rates. Gas prices skyrocketed and the OPEC nations decided it would be fun to punish us by exporting less so we had long, long lines at the gas pumps and even some gas rationing. Things were not so good.

Then along comes Ronald Reagan, and his exquisite campaign commercials, telling us it was “morning in America”.

This was to be a new brand of conservative leadership that would restore our military, reduce the size of the government, lower taxes and still be tough on the Soviet Union. Some of his supporters still talk as if he actually did all those things.

President Reagan did, in fact, become a very tough adversary for the Soviets. He wasn’t much of a negotiator but his anti-Soviet rhetoric was dynamic. His speech in Berlin, demanding that Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev “tear down this wall” was a classic. And he was willing to spend and spend and spend on the military, including the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), popularly known as the Star Wars missile defense system. Gorbachev has said publicly it was Reagan’s willingness to spend freely on the military that ultimately did them in. They simply could not keep pace given the moribund reality of their perpetually failing Socialist economy.

Aside from that, Reagan wasn’t much of a conservative at all.

Under Reagan, our annual deficits increased, our national debt tripled and the federal government grew even more bloated in both size and cost. Supply side economics was a bust and after an initial tax cut, Reagan raised taxes an astonishing 11 times. That’s an unbelievably bad record for a conservative icon and exactly the kind of big taxes, big spending and big government those who now call themselves conservatives so despise.

Then there was the Iran/Contra mess, an illegal and farcical diversion of funds and weapons to the Nicaraguan contras that did not help us with Iran, did not lead to the immediate defeat of the sandinistas and consumed much of Reagan’s second term.

But never mind their failings and flaws. We liked John Kennedy and Ronald Reagan and it seemed they liked us. They made us feel better about our country and become more optimistic about our future. Their acolytes make sure we remember.

We honor them now for what they symbolized more than for what they actually accomplished, and that’s all right.

Hope, despite what some current politicians think, is a good thing and we fondly remember those leaders who bring it to us.

When comparing Presidents like JFK and Reagan one can't help see and understand the traitorous backstabbing of Barack Hussein Obama, Communist/Muslim, pretender to the presidency of The United States of America.

PoppaGringo Loc: Muslim City, Mexifornia, B.R.

Good post. :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup: