Joseph P. Kennedy Quotes

Patton always believed that Eisenhower wanted to be President. At the beginning of the war Patton was much senior to Eisenhower, but President Roosevelt promoted Eisenhower above many more senior generals. Eisenhower thought Patton the best fighting general in the army, but a public relations and administrative problem. Several times when he had gone too far, Eisenhower reprimanded him but kept him in his command position. After the fighting was over, Patton became the military governor of part of Germany and was not as successful at peacekeeping and nation building as he was at fighting. Eisenhower was convinced that Patton would destroy himself and get fired by the army command and the President if he continued as governor. Patton confused Eisenhower’s prudent and politic demeanor with the allies as a lack of courage. And Patton could never get over the fact that Eisenhower and never commanded an army fighting in the field. He was jumped to Supreme Allied Commander, in a very bold and brilliant stroke by FDR who passed over many senior generals.

FDR was terribly affable and was at the opposite end of the spectrum from the ideologues. Therefore he never offered specific programs. He was this grossly underestimated by many of the pundits of the day as being shallow with few or no ideas. Actually, he implemented more new ideas and programs than any other President in history but was very pragmatic about them and not really wedded to any of them. If one thing did not work, he tried another. The people and the Congress grew to trust him as no other president in our history although he always had his right wing enemies.

Coughlin was a great admirer of Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini and the Fascists. He was one of the American “heroes” in Nazi Germany, receiving assistance from the Nazi government. Between his anti-Semitism and support for Hitler, Fascism and radical socialism, the Vatican ordered him off the air and shut down his political demagoguery.

Coughlin was a great admirer of Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini and the Fascists. He was one of the American “heroes” in Nazi Germany, receiving assistance from the Nazi government. Between his anti-Semitism and support for Hitler, Fascism and radical socialism, the Vatican ordered him off the air and shut down his political demagoguery.

In an ironic turn of the tables, Frank Kingdon, a staunch Roosevelt supporter wrote a book defending the President and used the phrase as a title, mocking the upper class hatred of FDR.

Bohlen, Harry Hopkins and President Roosevelt were differing as to how to deal with one of the many ego difficulties of French leader Charles De Gaulle. Ever the diplomat, and trying to find common ground, Bohlen said:

Browder, had been prohibited by Court Order from touring the country during the 1940 Presidential Campaign. He personally blamed FDR although the Communist vote was so small that no matter where and how Browder campaigned it would not have made any difference. However, the court order gave Browder the opening leading some to believe that the communist following was larger than it was—why else would the establishment want to keep the campaign limited?

Attacking FDR by pandering to anti-Semites and falsely claiming that a Jewish financier, Bernard Baruch ran the government: The Priest was the right wing demagogic radio host of his day. Virulently anti-Semitic and anti-Black, he was threatened with excommunication by the Catholic Church, which finally ordered him to cease us weekly radio show and stop the political hate.

The justice so hated the President, that he not only made intemperate insulting remarks in private as this one but he even made intemperate insults in Supreme Court proceedings. See {585241}. McReynolds was an extreme racist and detested every thing that FDR and the New Deal stood for. Although an elderly man when FDR came into office, he lived long enough so that Roosevelt was never able to appoint his replacement. McReynolds was one of the reasons that FDR tried to pack the Supreme Court.

This quotation shows American tolerance and freedom of speech even for our head of state.

Roosevelt’s first gubernatorial term was shaken by the Stock Market Crash and the Failure of the Banks 1929 and the passivity of the Herbert Hoover administration in Washington in coping with the economy and the Great Depression. Reform of Tammany Hall and other State problems took a back seat to trying to create jobs and stabilize the state economy. The Republican candidate Tuttle could not argue against FDR’s economic policies as he would then have to defend President Hoover who was becoming exceedingly unpopular. So he went after the corruption of the Tammany Hall Machine and Roosevelt’s relative passivity. The voters were ok with FDR’s priorities.

This quotation illustrates an interesting phenomenon in American Presidential Politics. There have been Democratic Presidents (FDR and Obama are the most glaring examples) for whom there was vituperative hatred and derision from the conservative Republicans who would frequently refer to them as Socialists and would believe that they were trying to lead the country on the path to socialism. The Presidents always stated that they were opposed to socialism, but to little avail with their conservative haters. But the socialists of the times and even the left wing of the Democratic Party not only did not see them as socialists, but were not very supportive or complementary of their skills and capabilities. Roosevelt reveled in the situation and “welcomed: their hate. Obama was more of a public centrist who tried to avoid the president getting involved in the extreme partisanship of the day.

Absurd attacks on a presidential opponent’s character have not only been made in modern times. There is a long history of trying to drive up an opponent’s negatives by making almost paranoid accusations. What was so absurd about this particular effort was that one characteristic of FDR that almost everyone agreed upon was his affability and charm. People loved to be with him and speak with him alone. Many conservatives thought that FDR’s policies and programs were dangerous for the country, but other than Hoover, there appears to be no other prominent person who expressed any personal fear of being alone with Roosevelt.