love
dad
© Tom Taylor
Sunday, October 1, 2023
Sunday, September 24, 2023
Sunday, September 17, 2023
Sunday, September 10, 2023
Sunday, September 3, 2023
good morning justin
Honey Fitz, John Kennedy's grandfather, represented
this misshapen 11th Congressional District in Boston
back when the iceman delivered a block of ice to
your door to keep food cold. The neighborhood was
poor, working class, Roman Catholic Irish and Italian.
Running for office here means you better be a
Democrat if you want to win. The real contest
was between the Irish and Italians.
Jim Curley was a loveable rogue. Getting elected
wasn't a problem. Staying out of trouble was.
Late in the '30's Depression Curley was convicted
of fraud and sent to prison. Once he was released
the voters of the 11th District sent him to Congress
in 1942, when war raged in Europe and the Pacific.
He hated being a Congressman, a nobody far
from home. Curley returned to Boston at war's end
and was promptly elected the city's mayor.
The man had a gift for sweet-talking the folks.
John Fitzgerald, champion backslapper.
He's a natural for politics. Persuasive.
Honey Fitz. Back in 1913 he was going
to be mayor of Boston. That's when the
bad blood started. It was loveable Jim Curley
that let the press in on this thing Honey Fitz
was having with a cigarette girl named Toodles.
Turns out he wasn't going to be mayor
of Boston, after all.
John Kennedy's wildly wealthy father, Joe.
His winnings came from shrewd Wall Street
investing but upper crust Brahmin Boston
excluded Irish blokes from their festivities.
Rumor had it Kennedy made his money from
bootlegging. Joe Kennedy's own political
ambitions were headed nowhere.
But he had big plans for his son, Joe Jr.
The man would be president one day.
Except his cherished oldest son was
blown apart during a high risk bombing
run over Nazi occupied France in WW2.
That left Jack.
John Fitzgerald Kennedy - JFK.
Lieutenant Kennedy, Jack, commanded his
torpedo-armed patrol boat in the enemy infested
Solomon Islands - where Guadalcanal was nestled.
From the ink of night a Japanese destroyer appeared,
and quickly sliced Kennedy's PT boat in half. Two of
the crew were killed instantly. Kennedy led the
survivors on a three and a half mile swim to an
uninhabited island. One man, too injured to swim,
was towed the entire way, bound in a strap that
was tightly gripped between Kennedy's teeth.
This action made the pages of Reader's Digest
with an article by John Hersey that would play
a role in Kennedy's first effort in democratic
politics.
It's a commitment, running for office.
Have you the conviction to stand out front
and say what you mean - take it to the people.
Have the voters decide. For keeps.
Even if they wind up going against
your wishes and vote you down,
you wouldn't change your message.
You say what you mean.
That doesn't change.
Can a wealthy Harvard graduate win the trust of the
working class poor? John Kennedy had his doubts.
He was reserved, shy actually - not your
backslapping, baby kissing sort of Dad's kind of
Democrat. Kennedy gave people a cool form
of likeable. He enthused them with ideas.
They understood his meaning and more often
than not they were sold. On the man.
Maybe you should run for something smaller.
You'd be a shoe-in for lieutenant-governor.
Joe Kennedy looked at Jack and concluded his
second son was too frail to run for Congress in 1946.
At times he had a yellow hue from persistent bouts
with malaria. His back injury sustained that
night in the Solomons often required him to
wear a brace. John Kennedy was so skinny
someone remarked he looked like a kid
wearing his father's suit.
Nonetheless, Kennedy won.
He attracted the best of people to him.
In his mind he wouldn't be long for any one
position until he made it to the White House.
Right now it felt like he was on his way.
love
dad
© Tom Taylor
Sunday, August 27, 2023
good morning jacob
Richard Nixon developed a mastery of poker,
with several thousand dollars in winnings,
while serving as a supply officer on a small
Pacific island during the course of World War II.
The money he won went to funding the early
days of his 1946 bid for Congress.
With Japan's surrender in August, 1945 American's
expected a quick return of their loved ones to
home, family and a civilian life. Millions of former
GIs, (Government Issue), flooded the streets
looking for jobs. They got married, they had kids
and they had money saved up to buy into the
good life. But factories needed to retool from
making tanks and planes to cars and washing
machines. By 1946 inflation was 20% as people
bid up the price of popular home goods.
Outrageous! America's greatest generation was
being offered only table scraps by that
nincompoop in the White House - Harry Truman.
So what brought on the Depression? Tariffs,
unrealistic Stock Market investments, oversupply.
Oversupply. We were brilliant at manufacturing
what people wanted but we didn't have the
middle class needed to buy all these goods.
Labor was exploited. Workers provided services
to employers at a fraction of their actual value.
Wage earners would have to unite if they had
any hope of standing up to the corporations.
Unions prospered under Roosevelt but endless
strikes following the war further disrupted an
already fragile economy. People took note.
Maybe unions now held too much power.
Jerry Voorhis was the golden boy of Southern California.
Here was a New Deal Democrat bringing home the
bacon five elections in a row from the swing
12th District located just outside LA. Labor loved
him. His Democrat colleagues in the House
voted Voorhis the hardest working man in
Congress. So when Richard Nixon arrives and
announces his candidacy for the Voorhis seat
even Republican pols think - Lots of Luck.
Nixon burns the candle at both ends. He puts in
20 hour days, 6 days a week - writing pamphlets,
doing research, making speeches before service
organizations. His wife, Pat, administers the
campaign - updating schedules, running the office
and critiquing her husband, the candidate, until
4 days before the birth of their first child, Tricia.
Nixon was relentless in his drive to win.
Murray Chotiner made Earl Warren Supreme Court
Chief Justice by engineering Warren's gubernatorial
victory in California. Certainly Eisenhower took
notice of this. Chotiner picks winners and that's
what he saw in Nixon. The man's got intellect
and the discipline to carry through to achieve
what it is he's trying to do. Also, he shared
Nixon's fierce passion to win. Winning means
more than some Man of the Year trophy.
Victory is power. You are now in position to
make a difference, to change the course of
society in some positive way.
You matter.
Only a hopeless idealist would hold onto the
dream of a post-war kumbaya between the
Soviets and Washington. So why is it difficult
to believe in a mankind, being of singular
purpose, living in harmony? If this is you -
you are probably some harmless eccentric.
Like maybe a college professor. There are
others who will say you are part of some
sinister conspiracy to overthrow our way of
life and replace it with Stalin's vision of
Worker's Paradise.
Crowds. Hoopla. Big Whoop.
That's not Richard Nixon.
He's too shy to look you in the face.
He's a bookworm, a nerd. Studious.
But he has his Dad's argumentative nature.
Richard nurtured and shaped this skill
through debate competition that lasted
through college. He was good, comfortable
at arguing either side of the issue.
Poor Jerry Voorhis. Always playing catchup.
He didn't know what hit him.
This first election victory was the happiest
for Pat and Dick, Congressman Nixon.
There were other victories along the way
to the White House but nothing compared
to the glow they now shared.
Such were the possibilities.
God bless.
love
dad
© Tom Taylor
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