It has been on the news the entire week.

Now it reaches its' peak today.

My questions:

Was JFK really a great president, or did his terrible murder make him a great president because his life was cut short?

What was significant about JFK's 1000 days?

And the big question:

Do you believe there was a consipiracy to murder the President?

Well, he had a few spats with Castro, and he was the first, as far as I know, to get us involved in Vietnam...

He pushed for the Civil Rights Act, and I think I read Johnson once saying that it may have never gone through if it wasn't for his death. He also started the Peace Corps., which was a pretty good idea.

It's hard to judge a lot of presidents from historical perspectives; there will always be some naysayers. You can say that Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence and managed the Louisana Purchase, but someone will say "yeah, but he slept with his slaves." The only two intolerable president I can think of off the top of my head was Nixon, because of his criminal behavior.

Kennedy was a good president. He's no Roosevelt, but he was good. I don't think people think of him as a great president because he died, but I think he died under such notoriety that people can't help but talk about him.

Was it a conspiracy? If you define a conspiracy as a criminal act that involved two or more people, hells yes. The government may or may not have been involved in the actual murder, but they were certainly involved in the cover-up. (The Zapruder film went straight to the FBI, but other films were made that don't quite sync up with Zapruder's. It's been altered.) I think the cover-up was more part of a cold-war-esque hysteria than an attempt to cover up someones involvement, sort of like Stalin having dead people "edited" out of photographs after they were taken care of.

If you have a copy of the Zapruder film, take a look. At the point where Kennedy's car passes and is obscured by the stop sign. Just as the car is passing the stop sign, there is a man on the near side of the road wearing a black overcoat and holding an umberella. As Kennedy passes, he lists the umberella into the air, opens it, and closes it again. This happens right at the point of the first shot. I wonder why he would wear an overcoat on what all accounts say was a clear, warm, sunny day.

There is a pretty good documentary called The Men Who Killed Kennedy that aired on The History Channel. I've seen it on DVD, and it was all very interesting. It doesn't provide a whole lot of answers, but it does seem to ask the right questions.

JFK was pretty good. He had some guts and integrity, in public life if not in private. he as the last Democrat President to understand how the economy works, and cut personal income taxes across the board. He was the last Democratic President to try to appeal to all Americans across the board.

Actually, JFK created the Cuban Missile Crisis by his failure to either:
1)Stop the Bay of Pigs altogether
OR
2)Provide the Cuban invasion with the proper support to overthrow Castro.
The Missiles of October came because of poor decision making.

Actually, LBJ had more to do with the Civil Rights acts then Kennedy. LBJ spent a great deal of time making sure the first of the laws passed in 1960 and that cost LBJ valuable time which some historians believed that cost him the 1960 nomination. The others were passed after Kennedy's death.

You are correct in that Kennedy was the first President to send troops to Vietnam, starting the most divisive period in our lifetime. Many Kennedy admirers believe he would have pulled them out in due course, but that is very debatable.

Also there is the dubious 1960 election, which in recent history can be compared to the 2000 election where chicanery was charged. So the method that JFK came into office is comparable with the current occupant in the Oval Office.

Kennedy was trying to shore up the Democrat support for the 1964 election, where many Democrats did not favor Kennedy's support for Civil Rights in the south which was causing a split that made itself apparent in 1968. I suspect, that what happened in 1968 would have happened in 1964, and Kennedy would not have been re-elected in 1964. 1964 would have been a very close election, and the mood in the country in 1963 did not favor Kennedy in the South. Wallace may have decided to run in 1964 had Kennedy lived and split the Democrat vote giving the election to the Republican candidate as it did in 1968.

There are indeed many unanswered questions about what took place on this day 40 years ago. I have read many books from The Warren Commission to Rush to Judgement to Best Evidence to A Conspiracy of One. I have not seen enough to convince me that there was a conspiracy or that there was not a conspiracy. I just don't know.

I grade JFK a below average President. Poor on foreign policy, but acutally good on domestic policy. The common criticism of JFK is that he was great on style, but short on substance. It is one that is not without foundation.

I would suggest the book to read about the JFK administration:

President Kennedy Profile of Power
By Richard Reeves.

I was nine years old when he got shot. I think Kennedy gave the nation hope. He was fresh, young, handsome, liberal (in the best sense of the word), educated and had good speech writers. I think the hope, which may have been based on very little other than outward appearances, was snuffed out along with him. Johnson and then Nixon fit the old mold and had to deal with all sorts of problems which Kennedy may have had to face had he lived.

I think Kennedy was a very good President. It is, of course, hard to argue things one way or the other because many of the arguments rely on "What if" style questions, but nonetheless I think he was a very strong President with even more potential and promise.
I don't think Kennedy 'caused' the Cuban Missile Crisis (and remember the Bay of Pigs was devised before his inauguration), but he certainly was instrumental in settling it peacefully.
In terms of Vietnam, that's too hard a question to answer conclusively. The troubles there started before Kennedy and he certainly got the U.S. more involved, but how far he would have taken things remains totally up in the air, and depends on a great variety of factors.
I wouldn't compare the 1960 election to the 2000 election except for the fact that they were very close. Regardless, most people argue that Kennedy would have been re-elected by quite a nice margin in 1964; I don't see what happened in 1968 happening in '64 had Kennedy lived.
A conspiracy? I believe so, yes. There are too many questions, inconsistencies and suspicious circumstances to explain the whole thing away as simply as the Warren Commission did.
In terms of the Umbrella Man, I believe he was later interviewed and said his actions were intended to heckle the President. I don't believe the Zapruder film was altered; if it was altered to prove a lone gunman solution, they could've done a much better job.

In today's Cleveland Plain Dealer, they have an article caleed JFK's Slaying--40 years later. As part of the article they have a chart that shows other possible theories. The 4listed suspects are:

1.Nikita Krushchev-Head of the USSR at the time.

Pissy over the Cuban Missle Crisis.

I think he is to obvious.

2. Lyndon Baines Johnson-V.P.

More likely. Too obvious.

3. Joe DiMaggio-Jealous over JFK's relationship

Marilyn Monroe.

Another good choice, but killing the President

over a woman?

4. JFK-President and Victim. Huh?

I don't get this. He killed himself? Couldn't

he have done this is a less public way? Was he

really that with Addison's disease?

He promised a lot of Civil Rights stuff ... and then delivered half-heartedly and foot-draggingly; Johnson did more. He didn't understand the economy (tax cuts are not the panacea the neo-cons would like us to believe); Nixon did more (two words: Bretton Woods). Best thing for his rep is getting shot.

Nixon ended the war in Vietnam, normalized relations with China, achieved detente and SALT, reordered the world economy. He was a paranoid, vile, contemptible bastard, but in terms of accomplishments, he far outdoes Kennedy.

Our involvement in Vietnam begins with Eisenhower, Dulles and the creation of SEATO. The first American troop deaths in Vietnam were in the late 50's, before Kennedy was elected.

Yeah, but Kennedy banged hot chicks. HE WINS