[Cicero]

Excellent piece of work. Many fascinating connections.

I was an undergraduate during the Army McCarthy hearings, and I naively subscribed to the view that McCarthy was a witch hunter. At the same time, it was clear to me back then, and I think always, that the Soviet Union was our enemy and that Communism was as bad as Nazism, if not worse.

It's been fascinating to learn just how many of our politicians and their aides were, in fact, actual Communists.

I don't really understand what would have led Teddy Kennedy to become a Communist patsy, other than the fact that he seems to be both evil and stupid. Unlike many of those other people, the Kennedy family does not seem to have had a Communist background. Mobsters, yes, but not Communists that I have heard of. I would have suspected Jimmy Carter before Teddy Kennedy.

[Fedora]

I don't really understand what would have led Teddy Kennedy to become a Communist patsy, other than the fact that he seems to be both evil and stupid. Unlike many of those other people, the Kennedy family does not seem to have had a Communist background. Mobsters, yes, but not Communists that I have heard of. I would have suspected Jimmy Carter before Teddy Kennedy.

I'm still trying to figure that out as well. I think it's probably rooted in Robert Kennedy's shift towards the antiwar movement in the mid-60s. This occurred on several fronts. Vietnam was the most public expression of it, but there was also his relationship to Cesar Chavez, and his involvement with the left wing of the anti-Castro movement, which predated the Bay of Pigs. The Kennedys supported a left-wing faction of the anti-Castro exile community against a more conservative faction which was closer to Nixon and to Allen Dulles' faction of the CIA. I think the Kennedys' rivalry with Nixon and LBJ had a lot to do with it. Robert was planning to run against LBJ in '68, and Ted was a candidate to run against Nixon in '72 and remained involved in the campaign even after he dropped out following Chappaquidick, so I think it was partly a case of the Kennedys opportunistically aligning with Nixon's enemies, domestic and foreign. This became easier to do after Nixon initiated detente and Ted could legally travel to Russia; I think Ted was taking advantage of that opportunity.

[popdonnelly]

"I don't really understand what would have led Teddy Kennedy to become a Communist patsy"

He's a dumb, arrogant b_st_rd. Just like his dad, Joe, who was a Nazi patsy.

[Petronski]

I don't really understand what would have led Teddy Kennedy to become a Communist patsy, other than the fact that he seems to be both evil and stupid.

Just like his dear old dad, Teddy loves to felate the totalitarian thug.

[Kenny Bunk]

My vote is Bill Press.

If I were a KGB agent, I'd shy away from Carter, Hayden, and Cranston, because they are jointly and severally weird clymers.

[Iris7]

I was of your opinion until I learned of old Joe's actions in 1940-41. As you said, I believed that the Kennedys were "Mobsters, yes, but not Communists".

Pater Familias Joe Kennedy Sr. was Ambassador to the Court of Saint James, that is, Ambassador to Great Britain, from 1937 to 1940. His correspondence with the State Department and Roosevelt's executive department people shows that he followed the Moscow line closely in 1939-40.

Before the German invasion of the Soviet Union in June of 1941 the Moscow Line (the official Soviet, and therefore Communist, Definition of Reality) followed the Ribbentrop-Molotov "Non-aggression Pact" worldview.

From June 1939 to June 1941 the Soviet Union and Germany, Stalin and Hitler, were allies in Hitler's war. All communists were instructed to make propaganda in America that we should stay out of the European War, which didn't concern us, that England was doomed in any case, etc. When the Soviet Union was invaded in June 1940 the Moscow line changed direction one hundred and eighty degrees and overnight "American" communists became pro-war fire breathers. Old Joe behaved in this pattern.

The switch from an anti-war Party Line into a vehement pro-war Line happened almost overnight. American Communists uniformly followed this reversal of the Moscow Party Line and can be identified thereby.

Examination of the record can only sometimes identify Communists by their behaviour in July of 1941. The mass media is "strangely silent" concerning this mighty reversal and only private documents remain as evidence (as far as I have been able to find out).

America was only "united" behind war when the mass media changed policy in - why, amazing, isn't it, the anti-war elements of the mass media changed to pro-war in July, 1941 (with honorable exceptions like John McCormick's Chicago Tribune).

The Left nowadays is virulently anti-Iraq war, but with the same enthusiasm seen today in those days pursued American involvement in the "war on fascism" (as the Reds put it).

I believe you will find the historical background information in this piece very familiar but I hope other readers may find it useful. The Army-McCarthy hearings era is interesting (I was six years old at the time) in the context of Communist operations in the United States, 1930 to (sadly) the present .

[sageb1]

Joe Kennedy, Sr. was an avowed anti-communist and an anti-semite (I believe he said something to the effect that there were a few good Jews). But, I believe the smell of money was too great. The Kennedys had a legacy that "must survive." I believe they exploited Angola for personal gain.

[PghBaldy]

Spite. It would have harmed Reagan's work. Kennedy knew he could have been President, if not for Chappaquiddick. he has been called the "Shadow President," and for good reason.

[tillacum]

Killer kennedy's dad had a very friendly friendship with adolf hitler amd was against the war with Germany, that's why he was recalled from England, where he was an Ambassador. The nut doesn't fall far from the tree. Anti-Americanism runs in the family.