Need Help Debunking "JFK Was a Conservative" Myth

[liberalpragmatist]

It is true, based on my readings, that Kennedy wasn't a far-left liberal. He campaigned as a cold warrior and as a centrist: center/left.

Even so, I need help debunking the myth that JFK wasn't just a moderate but a CONSERVATIVE.

Can anybody here give me a hand?

[Lefty48197]

1. Nixon and Reagan hated JFK. That's a pretty good start.

I remember Mondale reading something Reagan had written about JFK back in 1960. He said something like, "Underneath that mop top hair doo, and boyish grin, lie the same old ideas of Marx and Lenin".

[liberalpragmatist]

5. Actually Nixon and Kennedy Were Friends Until 1960

They were friends in the House and they were on good terms. But their relations soured in 1960. I don't actually believe that Nixon was always such a bitter, vindicative, suspicious character, but my belief is that he was crushed by his 1960 loss, stung by the press' favorability towards Kennedy and grew more and more paranoid. He eventually grew extremely suspicious of the Kennedies and worked to assassinate their characters.

[partygirl]

14. Actually, I have been to both of

their libraries and there is a LOT of evidence that they were friends until the end. It was a real shocker to me, because before they ran against each other in 1960, each one had separately told several of his friends that the other was his best friend in Washington! There are dozens of sources for this, and I saw the stuff at both libraries.

That is why Nixon did NOT fight even though people considered the Kennedy win controversial. Eisenower offered to pay out of his own pocket $$$ to challenge the election, but Nixon would not do anything to hurt his friend. Kennedy wrote his some very sweet letters between 1960 and the time he died--I cried when I read them at the Nixon library. And when Nixon got in office, one of the first things that he did was have JFK Jr visit the white house--if you get a chance read the sweet thank you note that the young JFK Jr wrote to him.

I think we (just we the people) have built up a hatred, but they did not hate each other ever. Nixon lived longer and at his library, there is written and verbal very very nice things that Nixon said about JFK. Their is evidence that they were very close friends prior to the election and that after the election they remained in contact and that each respected the other until the day they died. I think it is a wonderful story! Neither one was as partisan as we are now and they were able to reach out and be friends with people who disagreed with them so that they could accomplish more.

I am always shocked by the people who are all like "oh my mother is going to vote for Nader, I hate her now". I was not raised to HATE people who disagree. There is a saying that "good men disagree"?

[UTUSN]

24. (to #s 5&14) They Might Well Have Been Friendly, But

I don't buy that Tricky Dick's crossing the Styxx to the Dark Side started in 1960. If he wasn't BORN sick, he was well on his way years before when he smeared the California Dem woman as a "Communist" (name? the one running against him) and his role in the '50s witchhunts.

Yes, I had heard that they were friendly, too. But as for Tricky's choosing NOT to contest the '60 election, a large part of it was from his NOW "old fashioned" (stodgy, old Fart) sense of "history"---like the reason he kept taping everything, for "History". I saw somewhere that he realized quite clearly that contesting it would radically split the country (like 2000).

There's not much "Light" I will credit Tricky for.

I think that the main hook that wingnuts like LIMBOsevic claim that JFK was "Conservative" is something about cutting taxes. Otoh, Papa Joe was no shrinking Lib and the young RFK did his time in the '50s witchhunts, too.

[partygirl]

29. I don't remember any of it

(not alive) but from visiting the libraries and stuff it seems like the main thing (of many) where Kennedy may be considered conservative was that he was EXTREMELY tough on communism. That is one of the things he and Nixon had in common. The docents at Kennedy's library were extrememly proud of how tough on communism Kennedy was.

BTW, it is now known that Kennedy privately supported Nixon in his campaign against the "pink lady" (Helen was her name) Kennedy even contributed to Nixon's campaign and he wrote several supportive letters to Nixon advising him to give her hell! I saw it at the Kennedy library--so I do believe it. It is true he supported behind the scenes, not publically.

We have rewritten history to make these guys enemies. It is actually really really cool to think that two guys so different could be friends. They shared a passion for defeating communism, a love of literature and history, and great interest in the sport of political hardball. They were good friends are respected each other.

I have to say that both the Democrats and the Republicans were entirely different animals from what they are today. When we assume that Kennedy would share the beliefs of todays Democrats--and Nixon would share those of todays Republicans--well history does not support that. Things have changed a lot since then. We are much more polarized. Whatever their beliefs these guys shared a deep mutual respect and they each considered the other a friend. I bet not many people in the same situation today would have the grace and maturity to do the same.

[UTUSN]

39. Sorry, But There Is NO Comfort for Any Dem to Take in Getting Along with N

The items you cite as JFK supporting or agreeing with Tricky Satan would SUPPORT the case for calling JFK a Conservative.

But, contrarily, as for JFK supposedly being "EXTREMELY tough on communism," the way the story is usually told is that when KRUSCHEV first met him, KRUSCHEV thought he was a wimp and took this as the main rationale for moving the missiles into Cuber. Whereas the Trickster had this "tough" reputation for having debated KRUSCHEV in some kitchen.

So if JFK "privately supported" the Trickster and contributed to his campaign against Helen DOUGLAS, that would be on the "Conservative" side---besides being a despicable act, not a virtue.

As for our supposedly "rewritten history to make these guys enemies," if any such rewriting has occurred on that score it could only reflect WELL (in Dem/Lib eyes) for JFK to be portrayed as the Trickster's "enemy," and if he wasn't, which I tend to agree he wasn't, it's to his DETRIMENT. The things you cite as JFK's having in common with Trickster would support Trickster's own theory that JFK's "success" was spun out of pure packaging.

I don't care for anybody who would want to be friends with, respect, or share passions with Tricky Satan.

As for Repukes and Dems being different then and now-------uh, no: The platforms have always divided between Haves and Have-nots in economic issues and along the lines of Power and Powerless in social issues. And the VICIOUSNESS of Repuke thuggery has ALWAYS been there----back from the near-coup against FDR to the '50s witchhunts to Poppy's Nazis to Poppy's Lee ATWATER (the pre-ROVE ROVE), to ROVE/CHEENEE/Shrub and Jeb Crow Srhub.

Sorry, but it's my Old Fart role to bust your young bubble. And the mere THOUGHT of Tricky Dick as a "good man" is totally PUKEWORTHY.

[UTUSN]

40. Here's a Great Quote about the Trickster & Helen DOUGLAS

*******QUOTE*******

http://www.goodreports.net/trimit.htm

.... In his later years, Nixon's reputation was somewhat rehabilitated as he became a kind of elder statesman on foreign affairs. But in these pages we see him in all his glory - a young congressman driven to succeed by any means necessary, including a wide range of "dirty tricks."

That Nixon was ambitious is fine - so was Lincoln - but Nixon's ambition was different in that it was so ruthless in operation and empty of purpose. Years after her defeat, Douglas commented on how Nixon seemed to have no "strong convictions about anything except success." This will to power was fuelled by feelings of resentment against a sinister host of ill-defined "others" (communists, Jews, intellectuals, women). His paranoia would bear bitter fruit in the bunker of the White House. ....

********UNQUOTE*******

[H2O Man]

18. Actually they remained on good terms....

True Kennedy historians know that Nixon and Kennedy remained on good terms after the election. Nixon was furious about JFK's using the Cuban issue in one debate. But the day after the election, JFK called him and they joked about Ohio. Nixon actually could have contested the election -- though it would have proved unsuccessful -- but he ignored those who advised him to contest it. JFK called Nixon on several issues after that. (Nixon, like LBJ, did not feel the same about RFK as John. And Nixon was paranoid about Ted.)

As far as was JFK a conservative or liberal: like many complex characters, President Kennedy had his share of both traits. Nothing wrong with that. But he belongs to us, not to the republicans. If you want a good example on economic policy, look what he did with steel. Oh, they hated him. Or look what he was doing with the defense contracts in late 1963. Yes, they hated him.

[partygirl]

20. Thanks for the back-up.

I think maybe they had some big things in common (they liked to read and often talked about books and stuff) that gave them a friendship.

Both of them truly did have a mix of liberal/conservative elements (I didn't know this until I visited the libraries). Nixon put in a lot of programs for the poor--in fact a lot of the programs that Reagan got rid of in the 1980's were programs that Nixon had been responsible for! I actually see Reagan as the radicalizing of the Republican party--but I really wasn't alive for the Nixon presidency so i am not an expert. I do know that Reagan brought things really really far to the right.

[partygirl]

23. I think that the

original quote was something said by Goldwater and that he was referring to BOBBY Kennedy.

[Dyedinthewoolliberal]

2. Not sure if this helps,

but how about the Peace Corps? It was certainly not a conservative move from the point of view it expended funds not necessary to the health and welfare of Americans........ :shrug:
What I remember most from the election of Kennedy and Nixon is how some of my adult neighbors didn't like him because he was *gasp* RICH!
They didn't care about the Catholic thing.

[amber dog democrat]

3. Civil Rights

Facing down the mobs in Mississippi to admit James Merideth to the Univ of Missisippi. Also stopping a right wing invasion of Cuba, and opposing the Hawks who wanted to go straight to war over the missles in the Cuban Missle Crisis.

Civil rights and other issues.

[21winner]

10. Thats hardly liberal.

Is it? He aproved the invaision of Cuba and tasked his brother to eliminate Castro.

Jfk might be the greatist presidant in the 20th century because we have anothetr one. I lived thru it and there will never be anything like it again. Democrats always get it right.

[VOX]

4. Speech made by JFK on 9/14/60: "What is a liberal?"

"...if by a "Liberal" they mean someone who looks ahead and not behind, someone who welcomes new ideas without rigid reactions, someone who cares about the welfare of the people -- their health, their housing, their schools, their jobs, their civil rights, and their civil liberties -- someone who believes we can break through the stalemate and suspicions that grip us in our policies abroad, if that is what they mean by a "Liberal," then I'm proud to say I'm a "Liberal."
<snip>
"Only liberalism, in short, can repair our national power, restore our national purpose, and liberate our national energies. And the only basic issue in the 1960 campaign is whether our government will fall in a conservative rut and die there, or whether we will move ahead in the liberal spirit of daring, of breaking new ground, of doing in our generation what Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman and Adlai Stevenson did in their time of influence and responsibility."
<snip>

[TexasSissy]

6. Well, that pretty much takes care of that issue, doesn't it?

Thanks for the outstanding quote.

[John BigBootay]

12. Not really-- Actions speak louder than words

Someone saying they're "liberal" means little-- someone who VOTES liberal means a lot.

I don't see too many of what WE might consider liberal votes from Kennedy. Of course, it might merely be the passage of 40 years that changes the spectrum-- what was considered liberal then might be considered moderate today. And I see Kennedy more as a "classic liberal" or moderate.

[TexasSissy]

41. That wasn't the discussion, now, was it? It was whether Kennedy

was "conservative," as claimed currently by Repubs. He was not, of course. Whether he was a liberal or a moderate, under the standards of 1960 or under today's standards, is a different discussion.

But nice try....

[Narraback]

27. Here is the whole speech

http://www.cjnetworks.com/~cubsfan/whatis.html

[Bombtrack]

7. He cut taxes when they were at like 75 percent for the top rate

[Blue Wally]

17. 91%, he cut them to 70%

[Branjor]

8. Sounds like some conservatives want to claim....

JFK for themselves. So what else is new?

[21winner]

9. In those days.

There were just Dems and Repubs. Liberal and conservative were adjectives,that shaded the spread. You have JFK about right. But don't forget we have never elected a "liberal" president.

Democrats ruled from 1932 until 1980 because they did it so well. It went downhill from there.

Forget about lables. Democrats can get things done well. They are just like that,winners.

[TexasSissy]

11. Tax cuts. Repubs think JFK was conservative because

of his belief in tax cuts. He did believe, and get pushed through Congress, tax cuts, but they were very different from the conservative supply-side tax cuts. AND the tax cuts were part of an economic plan that included protection of the unemployed, raising the minimum wage, a growth plan for the depressed Appalachian region, and social programs to help the disadvantaged.

All Bush has done is the tax cut part, and his tax cuts predominantly benefited the top 1%. Kennedy's were across the board. Although he decreased the top bracket significantly, it had reached a whopping 91% income tax rate. Congress cut it to 70% under Kennedy's plan. Compare that to Bush cutting from almost 40% to 35%. 40% is not unreasonable for someone earning over $1 Million dollars, esp. considering all the deductions they could use, if they chose to (and do). We all know that the wealthy have many loopholes to lower their tax bills. The poor do not.

Bush's economic plan is MAINLY tax cuts for the top earners, and not much else. That's a huge difference.

Even Reagan's tax cuts were not as bad as Bush's. The proof is in the pudding: The gap between the middle class and the wealthy widened significantly under both Reagan and Bush Jr. It did not under or immediately after JFK.

[onecitizen]

13. Are those Repukes trying......

to steal Kennedy again? Shheeeeessshh. Time to move on CONS. HE WAS A DEMOCRAT. Go cry now. Don't you wish you could have him? Someday, you'll be wishing and saying Clinton was a CON!

[Minstrel Boy]

15. Read the American University speech of June 1963.

What a vision. No wonder he had to be killed.


What kind of peace do I mean? What kind of peace do we seek? Not a Pax Americana enforced on the world by American weapons of war. Not the peace of the grave or the security of the slave. I am talking about genuine peace, the kind of peace that makes life on earth worth living, the kind that enables men and nations to grow and to hope and to build a better life for their children, not merely peace for Americans but peace for all men and women, not merely peace in our time but peace for all time.

...

In short, both the United States and its allies, and the Soviet Union and its allies, have a mutually deep interest in a just and genuine peace and in halting the arms race. Agreements to this end are in the interests of the Soviet Union as well as ours, and even the most hostile nations can be relied upon to accept and keep those treaty obligations, and only those treaty obligations, which are in their own interest. So, let us not be blind to our differences, but let us also direct attention to our common interests and to the means by which those differences can be resolved. And if we cannot end now our differences, at least we can help make the world safe for diversity. For, in the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children's future. And we are all mortal.
http://www.edchange.org/multicultural/speeches/jfk_american_u.html

[stavka]

21. That was my father's Law School graduation speech....

He went on to work in Justice for Bobby, and send students to prison for wanting to travel to Cuba.

Don't believe the hype.

[Merlin]

26. Exxxxxcellent!

I can't imagine the thrill now of remembering being in that audience. But then there must have been enormous pain that came with the RFK/Justice experience after JFK was murdered.

[Bush was AWOL]

16. The great society and civil rights were JFK's ideas

which I'd say are hardly conservative policies. Plus, right before he was taken out he was becoming very skeptical of the hardass cold warrior shit. And democrats were more hawkish on military issues up until Vietnam anyway. Republicans thought FDR was a warmonger.

Another thing, Republicans in Congress wouldn't approve of any of JFK's agenda other than tax cuts. Why would they fight him so hard if he was one of them?

The only conservative thing he did was cut taxes.

[H2O Man]

19. I agree in general.....

but "The Great Society" was something LBJ had been developing for decades. Civil rights were certainly something JFK started on before his death. But the idea that JFK was a "Great Society" promoter was something that RFK started; Murray Kempton wrote after RFK's death: "From the need to identify at once with his triumphant brother and with the great company of losers in life to which he had fallen, he invented a John F. Kennedy that never was, the buried spirit of radical discontent." Or, as Thomas Maier notes in his wonderful "The Kennedys: America's Emerald Kings," for Robert "Family history became a parable, if not gospel truth."

[Guava Jelly]

22. check out my sig line

liberal baby

[Merlin]

25. Actions Speak the Loudest. JFK was the gutsiest liberal of our time.

Can there be any doubt about it?

The only thing the other side points to to try to morph JFK into a right winger is his tax cuts and fiscal responsibility.

But Clinton proved that it is LIBERAL to be fiscally responsible. A balanced budget and strong economy keeps interest rates down and brings in tax revenues with which it's possible to make changes.

JFK got up on TV and asked America to consider if our society is truly just and equal, "...then who among us would be content to have the color of his skin changed and become a negro?" He said it was time to stop having two Americas "one black and one white" and eradicate the ancient primitive differences. Then he introduced the Voting Rights Act.

JFK fought tooth and nail to keep combat troops OUT OF VIETNAM, and even issued an order to withdraw our advisors by 1965; an order reversed 2 days after he died.

JFK began a program to eliminate the enormous wealth disparities in Latin America. He sent Peace Corp volunteers to poor areas to help people. He initiated programs to redevelop Appalachia.

JFK launched a program of detente with the Soviet Union, and announced in his extraordinary American University speech in June, 1963, that he would try to end the cold war.

For which of these liberal initiatives was JFK murdered?

We have yet to find out.

[partygirl]

31. I think we need a thread on

who killed JFK and why. I would love to hear all the theories...

[Merlin]

32. We have had countless over the past years. After the election...

we'll have many more, I'm sure.

[PROGRESSIVE1]

28. JFK ended the Soviet standoff (missles into Cuba) without firing....

a single bullet!

Gee, I'd say JFK's a Liberal. If it were Bushler instead, he would have started World War's 3, 4, and 5!

[Hippo_Tron]

35. So true...

Liberals solve foreign policy problems with intelligent decissions.

[rowire]

30. He had a "D" next to his name

eom

[JSJ]

33. he was killed by a fascist conspiracy- anything else?

[RevCheesehead]

34. name the last Conservative who was assasinated

[Zynx]

37. William McKinley.

[stavka]

42. More importantly, an attempt was made on Reagan...

Attempts are just failed assassinations...

I have HUGE doubts about the Bush/Iraq assassinasion "plot"

[PATRICK]

36. Maybe consider the source

They deflect you with one outrageous mensonge du jour after another, build up by volume and repetition, construct sophistries and statistics in the same bone wearying way- all to the transparent purpose of simply making you feel bad in order to make themselves feel good. This is what passes as creativity and revisionist fantasies in the Gulag Media Dystopia these days.

Granting this cheekish argument the benefit of your time is another way for them to succeed. Simply hand them a bunch of things Kennedy did or said they cannot swallow- and laugh. A lot of the context and facts are missing. Tell them to fill it in. They can argue that the world is flat all they want. We are taking a sea voyage.

Context shows Kennedy was forced to do certain things. The twisted "Keynesian" of the new Conservatives is mainly the result of their having raw power over all our money and nothing else. Bye-bye fiscal responsibility! We get the money not for the common good but for private looting. Kennedy's foreign policy and hawkishness was often a disaster playing into the hands of cons and GOP predecessors. All modern Dem Presidents have waddled into that prepared mire much to the entertainment of their critical Con admires today. Otherwise Kennedy could have had his Alliance for Progress succeed wildly, his other stalled programs, an end to the Cold War. Giving in to Conservative doctrines is what cost FDR and all the rest a lot of wasted effort and
painful experiences.

[mth44sc]

38. Give 'em a copy of this

on edit
oops - I see this was already referenced. Ah - well - its worth repeating!

http://www.turnleft.com/whatis.html

What is a liberal?

Sen. John F. Kennedy, acceptance of the New York Liberal Party Nomination, September 14, 1960.

What do our opponents mean when they apply to us the label "Liberal?" If by "Liberal" they mean, as they want people to believe, someone who is soft in his policies abroad, who is against local government, and who is unconcerned with the taxpayer's dollar, then the record of this party and its members demonstrate that we are not that kind of "Liberal." But if by a "Liberal" they mean someone who looks ahead and not behind, someone who welcomes new ideas without rigid reactions, someone who cares about the welfare of the people -- their health, their housing, their schools, their jobs, their civil rights, and their civil liberties -- someone who believes we can break through the stalemate and suspicions that grip us in our policies abroad, if that is what they mean by a "Liberal," then I'm proud to say I'm a "Liberal."

But first, I would like to say what I understand the word "Liberal" to mean and explain in the process why I consider myself to be a "Liberal," and what it means in the presidential election of 1960.

In short, having set forth my view -- I hope for all time -- two nights ago in Houston, on the proper relationship between church and state, I want to take the opportunity to set forth my views on the proper relationship between the state and the citizen. This is my political credo:

I believe in human dignity as the source of national purpose, in human liberty as the source of national action, in the human heart as the source of national compassion, and in the human mind as the source of our invention and our ideas. It is, I believe, the faith in our fellow citizens as individuals and as people that lies at the heart of the liberal faith. For liberalism is not so much a party creed or set of fixed platform promises as it is an attitude of mind and heart, a faith in man's ability through the experiences of his reason and judgment to increase for himself and his fellow men the amount of justice and freedom and brotherhood which all human life deserves.

I believe also in the United States of America, in the promise that it contains and has contained throughout our history of producing a society so abundant and creative and so free and responsible that it cannot only fulfill the aspirations of its citizens, but serve equally well as a beacon for all mankind. I do not believe in a superstate. I see no magic in tax dollars which are sent to Washington and then returned. I abhor the waste and incompetence of large-scale federal bureaucracies in this administration as well as in others. I do not favor state compulsion when voluntary individual effort can do the job and do it well. But I believe in a government which acts, which exercises its full powers and full responsibilities. Government is an art and a precious obligation; and when it has a job to do, I believe it should do it. And this requires not only great ends but that we propose concrete means of achieving them.

Our responsibility is not discharged by announcement of virtuous ends. Our responsibility is to achieve these objectives with social invention, with political skill, and executive vigor. I believe for these reasons that liberalism is our best and only hope in the world today. For the liberal society is a free society, and it is at the same time and for that reason a strong society. Its strength is drawn from the will of free people committed to great ends and peacefully striving to meet them. Only liberalism, in short, can repair our national power, restore our national purpose, and liberate our national energies. And the only basic issue in the 1960 campaign is whether our government will fall in a conservative rut and die there, or whether we will move ahead in the liberal spirit of daring, of breaking new ground, of doing in our generation what Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman and Adlai Stevenson did in their time of influence and responsibility.

Our liberalism has its roots in our diverse origins. Most of us are descended from that segment of the American population which was once called an immigrant minority. Today, along with our children and grandchildren, we do not feel minor. We feel proud of our origins and we are not second to any group in our sense of national purpose. For many years New York represented the new frontier to all those who came from the ends of the earth to find new opportunity and new freedom, generations of men and women who fled from the despotism of the czars, the horrors of the Nazis, the tyranny of hunger, who came here to the new frontier in the State of New York. These men and women, a living cross section of American history, indeed, a cross section of the entire world's history of pain and hope, made of this city not only a new world of opportunity, but a new world of the spirit as well.

Tonight we salute Governor and Senator Herbert Lehman as a symbol of that spirit, and as a reminder that the fight for full constitutional rights for all Americans is a fight that must be carried on in 1961.

Many of these same immigrant families produced the pioneers and builders of the American labor movement. They are the men who sweated in our shops, who struggled to create a union, and who were driven by longing for education for their children and for the children's development. They went to night schools; they built their own future, their union's future, and their country's future, brick by brick, block by block, neighborhood by neighborhood, and now in their children's time, suburb by suburb.

Tonight we salute George Meany as a symbol of that struggle and as a reminder that the fight to eliminate poverty and human exploitation is a fight that goes on in our day. But in 1960 the cause of liberalism cannot content itself with carrying on the fight for human justice and economic liberalism here at home. For here and around the world the fear of war hangs over us every morning and every night. It lies, expressed or silent, in the minds of every American. We cannot banish it by repeating that we are economically first or that we are militarily first, for saying so doesn't make it so. More will be needed than goodwill missions or talking back to Soviet politicians or increasing the tempo of the arms race. More will be needed than good intentions, for we know where that paving leads.

In Winston Churchill's words, "We cannot escape our dangers by recoiling from them. We dare not pretend such dangers do not exist."

And tonight we salute Adlai Stevenson as an eloquent spokesman for the effort to achieve an intelligent foreign policy. Our opponents would like the people to believe that in a time of danger it would be hazardous to change the administration that has brought us to this time of danger. I think it would be hazardous not to change. I think it would be hazardous to continue four more years of stagnation and indifference here at home and abroad, of starving the underpinnings of our national power, including not only our defense but our image abroad as a friend.

This is an important election -- in many ways as important as any this century -- and I think that the Democratic Party and the Liberal Party here in New York, and those who believe in progress all over the United States, should be associated with us in this great effort.

The reason that Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman and Adlai Stevenson had influence abroad, and the United States in their time had it, was because they moved this country here at home, because they stood for something here in the United States, for expanding the benefits of our society to our own people, and the people around the world looked to us as a symbol of hope.

I think it is our task to re-create the same atmosphere in our own time. Our national elections have often proved to be the turning point in the course of our country. I am proposing that 1960 be another turning point in the history of the great Republic.

Some pundits are saying it's 1928 all over again. I say it's 1932 all over again. I say this is the great opportunity that we will have in our time to move our people and this country and the people of the free world beyond the new frontiers of the 1960s.