The Young Candidates Find Success in Presidential Elections
The United States as a democratic state has always placed a great amount of importance on the leaders of our nation. Not only are United States presidents elected by the people, they are also the face of the nation. These factors combine to make the Presidential race not only one of the most exciting focuses of history, but also overall increasingly controversial. The presidential campaigns of 1960 and 2008 have been two of the most polarized elections of United States history. Many distinguishing factors have contributed to the intensity of these elections, but the common factor has been the candidates involved. John F. Kennedy and Barack Obama entered the presidential arena in a whirlwind of controversy and anticipation of citizens. The success of both John F. Kennedy and Barack Obama stem from their similar qualities, the state the nation during the election period, and their utilization of framing tactics.
John F. Kennedy and Barack Obama have many similar qualities that were beneficial to their presidential campaign. Although some of these qualities were mostly accepted as a positive aspect, critics exist to balance public opinion. In the 1960 and 2008 elections John F. Kennedy and Barack Obama were successful because public opinion favored their controversial qualities and overwhelmingly disregarded the chirps of critics.
I. Political Affiliation
The most obvious public standstill of a majority of elections falls into the conundrum of political affiliation. This was also the case in John F. Kennedy’s 1960 election and Barack Obama’s 2008 election. Although the focus of both elections was not specific to party policies, it was a present theme as alwa...
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The U.S. president is a person deemed to be the most fitting person to lead this country through thick and thin. It’s been such a successful method that it has led to 43 individual men being put in charge of running this country. However, this doesn’t mean that each one has been good or hasn’t had an issue they couldn’t resolve when in office. But no matter what, each one has left a very unique imprint on the history and evolution of this nation. However when two are compared against one another, some rather surprising similarities may be found. Even better, is what happens when two presidents are compared and they are from the same political party but separated by a large numbers of years between them. In doing this, not only do we see the difference between the two but the interesting evolution of political idea in one party.
Both John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon were elected to Congress in 46, a year in which the New Deal took a serious beating as the Republicans regained control of Congress on the slogan Had Enough? Nixon of course, had campaigned against incumbent Jerry Voorhis on an anti-New Deal platform, but it's often forgotten that when JFK first ran for the House in 1946, he differentiated himself from his Democratic primary opposition by describing himself as a fighting conservative. In private, Kennedy's antipathy to the traditional FDR New Deal was even more extensive. When Kennedy and Nixon were sworn in on the same day, both were already outspoken on the subject of the emerging Cold War. While running for office in 1946, Kennedy proudly told a radio audience of how he had lashed out against a left-wing group of Young Democrats for being naive on the subject of the Soviet Union, and how he had also attacked the emerging radical faction headed by Henry Wallace. Thus, when Kennedy entered the House, he was anything but progressive in his views of either domestic or foreign policy. It didn't take long for these two to form a friendship. Both were Navy men who had served in the South Pacific, and both saw themselves as occupying the vital center of their parties. Just as JFK lashed out against the New Deal and the radical wing of the Democratic party, so too did Richard Nixon distance himself from the right-wing of the Republican party. Nixon's support of Harry Truman's creation of NATO and the aid packages to Greece and Turkey meant rejecting the old guard isolationist bent of the conservative wing that had been embodied in Mr. Republican Senator Robert Taft. Indeed, when it came time for Nixon to back a nominee in 1948, his support went to the more centrist Thomas E. Dewey, and not to the conservative Taft. Kennedy decided to go into politics mainly because of the influence of his father. Joe Kennedy, Jr. had been killed in the European arena of World War II and so the political ambitions of the family got placed on the shoulders of John. Nixon, however, got involved in politics by chance. While celebrating the end of the war in New York, he received a telegram from an old family friend indicating that they needed someone to run against the Democrat Jerry Voorhis.
...a post- WWII, while Kennedy deeply concentrated on social condition and civil rights issues. Perhaps, in the US politics, no other comparative administrations have contrasted so sharply, a temporal division between the past and the future.
President Barack Obama has been a well-known political figure for just over 8 years; he has served two terms as the President of the United States. There has been controversy surrounding the first African American president, after his first term Obama failed to prove to America that he would fix all the things he promised to fix upon election. With his second term he has set in place his views and goals for the country. Obama’s views have been trying to benefit the overall population of American, from the poor all the way to the rich with a few subclasses in-between. During the Inauguration of his second term, won against Mitt Romney. His opponent stood for many things that were conflicting to Obamas platform, while Obama stood for rehabilitating the poor after the recession, Romney wanted to focus on tax breaks for the rich. Throughout the speech given by President Barack Obama, he outlines necessary changes in the system to benefit the people and the need for people to come together as one to have an effective country.
: The 1960’S AMERICA COLD WAR RACISM AFFLUENCE ZENITH PIVOTAL POTENTIAL FOR CONFLICT. AN ELECTION WAS FAST APPROACHING, SEEMED LIKE A PRETTY SET IN STONE CHOICE FOR LEADER. BUT HEY JFK WAS A SUPER BABE, MILLIONAIRE, AND WAS FINNA GET THE PRESIDENT SEAT WHICH WAS UP FOR GRABS. YO HE WAS AN UNDERDOG THOUGH. John F. Kennedy made a remarkable and courageous effort during the campaign of 1960. A Massachusetts-born Democrat, not only was Kennedy the youngest person ever to run for the presidency, but he was a Catholic with new and different political ideas campaigning against Vice President Richard Nixon, who had the upperhand because of his political experience. Thus, Kennedy created a campaign specifically for his time, one that appealed to the
Now that John F. Kennedy started political leadership after the war, Kennedy was elected for House of Representatives. With Kennedy’s younger brother as his campaign manager they worked together fo...
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Abraham Lincoln assumed the office of the President of the United States 153 years ago. Barack Obama did the same 148 years later. Nearly fifteen decades separate these two historical events and astounding men. While one man has gone to great lengths to model himself after the other, there was possibly a connection there all along. The differences between Lincoln and Obama are evident and expected, but the similarities are remarkable and extraordinary.
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After World War II, tensions between the United States, its allies, and the Soviet Union became very apparent. When John F. Kennedy (JFK) was elected in 1960, this “Cold War” between the communist government of the Soviet Union and the democratic government of the United States had strained relationships around the world for over 15 years. After losing their sense of security, the American people elected John F. Kennedy in 1960 as the 35th President of the United States because they believed he could lead the country to peace and prosperity. Although President Kennedy knew these goals of peace and prosperity would not be achieved in the term of his presidency or his lifetime, he also knew the world could eventually accomplish them through
When John F. Kennedy won the 1961 election by just eighty six electoral votes, the world was fascinated. As he stood on the podium in Washington D.C., preparing to give his inauguration speech, everyone tuned in to what he had to say. As he began speaking, everyone was hearing his words and soon, people were calling it one of the best written inaugural speeches ever written. Kennedy was able to connect to our country by using an emotional appeal to pull his message, successfully, off. Whether you were a hawk, a dove, or somewhere in between, John F. Kennedy saw you and seemed to speak directly to you during his inaugural address. For that reason, as he stood up there and spoke, the world listened and started to take note of our new President of the United States. By creating an emotionally persuasive speech, Kennedy went from having barely fifty one percent approval rating to skyrocketing to a seventy six percent approval rating, all with his inaugural speech.