Debunking the SILLY right wing meme that "Today, Kennedy would be a Republican." [View all]

It is just incredible. The right wing is just SILLY. They are so insanely jealous, I guess, of America's enduring love of Kennedy, as very personally flawed as he was, that they are actually trying to co-opt him. The TeaPublicans are OFF THE RAILS IN EVERY CONCEIVABLE SENSE OF THE WORD.

Here is how you can fire back if you, as I did, run into some modern TeaPublican who tries to say that "Kennedy was 'conservative' and today would be a Republican."

* First, conservative Republicans and DixieCrats of the time did not like Kennedy. The reason he went to Texas was to try to heal rifts with Southern Democrats there with Johnson's help, but it was going to be a very uphill battle. **The remaining old DixieCrats and their offspring are now hardcore Republicans.

* Kennedy used Marshals and the National Guard to integrate the Southern universities. Conservatives HATED this.

* Kennedy was very sympathetic to the civil rights movement in other ways, very progressive for the times which conservatives hated.

* Kennedy was for very robust investment in public education and saw a strong federal role in it, he expanded the space program tremendously, and he was for very robust investment in transportation infrastructure and other major national investments including HEALTHCARE which conservatives opposed and would oppose today. He favored activist government and a strong federal role in society, very unlike today's TeaPublicans and conservatives of his time.

* Yes, he saw tax cuts as ONE part of an economic program, but tax cuts weighted to the middle class just like Clinton and OBAMA.

* While he was strong on defense, he was also measured in his approaches. Remember, it was the height of the Cold War. Of course he was going to be strong on defense at that time. But during the Cuban Missile Crisis, for example, he resisted the conservative militarist push to bomb and invade immediately, going with the measured blockade approach and negotiation, including a pledge to take missiles out of Turkey as part of the deal. Conservatives would have bombed and invaded Cuba.

* Kennedy and his family were STAUNCH and LOYAL DEMOCRATS, and he took the Republicans to task very strongly time and again. The Republican establishment did not like Kennedy at all. They and their base really despised him and his charisma. However, he would have won re-election in a landslide with strong liberal and moderate Democratic support and strong independent support, not with a whole lot of Republican help.