was he? or did the media just create that image?
Undoubtedly that is true. Good point. However, it worked. All my teachers and subsequently my peers bought into. Interesting, part of that image created by the media then was "country first."
Of course the line "ask what you can do for your country", peace corps and his vision to inspire to put man on the moon, accelerating the evolution of technology did not hurt the medias agenda.