The Kennedy Half-Century (133 page)

21
. The numbers for all responses add to more than 100% since respondents were permitted to choose up to two options.

22
. The poll question on this topic was kept simple and structured to prompt respondents to make a basic choice: “There has been significant speculation about the circumstances surrounding the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Which statement do you agree with more?” (1) “There is nothing left to know about the circumstances surrounding the Kennedy assassination. Lee Harvey Oswald acted on his own to assassinate the president, and there was no conspiracy.” (2) “There are still too many questions surrounding Kennedy’s assassination to say that Lee Harvey Oswald acted by himself, or that there is not a larger conspiracy regarding the details of his death.”

23
. Younger voters, perhaps knowing less about the assassination, were not quite as firm in their beliefs. Only 11% strongly agreed that Oswald acted alone, while 41% strongly agreed that there were too many questions to claim there was no conspiracy. Of course, this is still a nearly 4-to-1 ratio in favor of the second statement among those with a strong opinion.

24
. Note that the second statement in our polling query does not force people to conclude that a conspiracy existed, merely that there are “too many questions” lingering about the assassination to rule out the possibility (see note 22). In our view, this was a more realistic way to pose the choice.

25
. Letter to the Author from Peter Hart and Geoff Garin, September 21, 2011, “Key Observations from the Focus Groups,” Hart Research Associates, p. 1.

26
. Ibid., 3.

27
. Ibid., 9.

CONCLUSION: A FLAME ETERNAL?

1
. “The Sound of Silence,” Paul Simon website,
http://www.paulsimon.com/us/music/paul-simon-songbook/sound-silence
 [accessed August 21, 2012].

2
. “John F. Kennedy and the Press,” John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum website,
http://www.jfklibrary.org/JFK/JFK-in-History/John-F-Kennedy-and-the-Press.aspx
 [accessed January 28, 2013].

3
. Only William Henry Harrison, Zachary Taylor, Millard Fillmore, James A. Garfield, Warren Harding, and Gerald Ford served fewer days in the White House than John Kennedy.

4
. In response to a March 21, 1962, press conference question about the unhappiness expressed by some military personnel about their status, Kennedy cited the unfairness of life, the fact that some people are sick and others well, some servicemen were killed in war while others never leave the country, and so on. See John F. Kennedy, “The President’s News Conference,” March 21, 1962, Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley,
The American Presidency Project
,
http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=8564
 [accessed August 8, 2012].

5
. E-mail from Ted Sorensen, October 22, 2010.

6
. It is important to note that Kennedy was by no means the exception in an era when outlandish, dangerous sexual conduct was overlooked because it was categorized as “private life.” The code of the times permitted even the CIA director, Allen Dulles, to have what his sister later described as a hundred or more affairs all over the world, with queens and commoners as he chose. Today’s standards forced out CIA director David Petraeus after just a single affair in 2012. See Eleanor Lansing Dulles,
Chances of a Lifetime: A Memoir
(Engle-wood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1980), and Stephen Kinzer, “When a C.I.A. Director Had Scores of Affairs,”
New York Times
, November 10, 2012,
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/10/opinion/when-a-cia-director-had-scores-of-affairs.html?_r=1&
 [accessed November 12, 2012].

7
. See Bryan Bender, “A Dark Corner of Camelot,”
Boston Globe
, January 23, 2011,
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2011/01/23/kennedy_family_limiting_access_to_rfk_documents/
 [accessed August 21, 2012].

8
. Barack Obama of Illinois is the sole exception, and he was born in the Sunbelt’s Hawaii. Gerald Ford of Michigan was never elected.

A Note on the Author

Dr. Larry J. Sabato is the founder and director of the renowned Center for Politics at the University of Virginia. He is also the University Professor of Politics at the University of Virginia, and has had visiting appointments at Oxford University and Cambridge University in Great Britain. A Rhodes scholar, he received his doctorate from Oxford, and is the author or editor of two dozen books on American politics, including
The Rise of Political Consultants, Feeding Frenzy, A More Perfect Constitution
, and
Barack Obama and the New America
. Dr. Sabato is a well-known election analyst who has appeared on television news shows hundreds of times. In 2013 Dr. Sabato won an Emmy for the documentary
Out of Order
, which he produced to highlight the dysfunctional U.S. Senate. He directs the Crystal Ball website, which has an unparalleled record of accuracy in predicting U.S. elections. Dr. Sabato has taught tens of thousands of students, and has received every major teaching award at the University of Virginia, which has also given him the university’s highest honor, the Thomas Jefferson Award. For more information, go to
www.centerforpolitics.org
.

Ask the Author

The Kennedy Half Century
is accompanied by an innovative website,
TheKennedyHalfCentury.com
. Additional features and updates will be posted on the site frequently, and readers can e-mail questions and comments to the author.

By the Same Author

The Rise of Political Consultants

Goodbye to Good-Time Charlie

Feeding Frenzy

Dirty Little Secrets

Toward the Millennium

Overtime!

Midterm Madness

Divided States of America

The Sixth Year Itch

The Year of Obama

Pendulum Swing

Barack Obama and the New America

A More Perfect Constitution

Copyright © 2013 by Larry J. Sabato

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Photo credits (numbers run sequentially from the first insert, top to bottom): 23 © AP/AP/CORBIS; 30, 31 © Associated Press; 8 courtesy of Barry Webb Battle; s 1, 10, 11, 13, 15, 17, 18, 21, 22, 28, 35, 42 © Bettmann/CORBIS; 63 by Dennis Brack/Bloomberg News © Getty Images; 59 courtesy of the George Bush Presidential Library and Museum; 37 is from the archives of the Chicago Sun- Times, and the author's private collection; 61, 62 courtesy of the William J. Clinton Presidential Library; 2, 3, 16, 34 © CORBIS; 26 courtesy of the Tom Dillard Collection, The Dallas Morning News/The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza; 7 © Randy Faris/CORBIS; 54 courtesy of the Gerald R. Ford Library; 44 © Bob Jackson; 55 courtesy of the Jimmy Carter Library; 12 courtesy of the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston; 47, 48 courtesy of the LBJ Presidential Library; 5 by Dan McElleney and © CORBIS; 4 courtesy of Reni News s, Inc. and © CORBIS; 50 by Yoichi Okamoto. Courtesy of the LBJ Presidential Library; 19 by Jerry Olsen, U.S. Navy and courtesy of the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston; 56, 57, 58 courtesy of the Ronald Reagan Library; 60 © Arnie Sachs/CNP/Corbis; 53 courtesy of Nate D. Sanders; 20 by Len Simon and courtesy of the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston; 32 courtesy of The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza; 45 by Stan Stearns and © Bettmann/CORBIS; 29, 38, 40 by Cecil Stoughton, courtesy of the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston; 41 by Cecil Stoughton, courtesy of the LBJ Presidential Library; 14 by Stanley Tretick and © Bettmann/CORBIS; 6 ©Underwood & Underwood/CORBIS; 64 © Evan Vucci/AP/Corbis; 26, 27 are from the Warren Commission, exhibits #133A and #237, courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Mary land; 46 by Harold Waters and © Associated Press; 33 by Jack A. Weaver; 51 by Frank Wolfe. Courtesy of the LBJ Presidential Library.

Published by Bloomsbury USA, New York

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Sabato, Larry
The Kennedy half-century : the presidency, assassination, and lasting legacy of John
F. Kennedy / Larry J. Sabato.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
eISBN 978-1-62040-281-8
1. Kennedy, John F. (John Fitzgerald), 1917– 1963—Influence. 2. Kennedy, John F.
(John Fitzgerald), 1917– 1963—Assassination. 3. Kennedy, John F. (John Fitzgerald),
1917– 1963—Public opinion. 4. Public opinion— United States. 5. United
States— Politics and government– 1945–1989. 6. United States— Politics and
government—1989- I. Title.
E842.1.S23 2013
973.922092—dc23
2013023969

First U.S. Edition 2013
This electronic edition published in October 2013

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