The highest percentage cuts went to the lowest bracket taxpayers in 2003 and the lowest percentage cuts went to top bracket taxpayers.

The table shows how much smaller the tax cuts for the lowest taxpayers would have been if they had only received the same percentage cuts as the highest bracket payers.

The highest bracket rate cut was only 11.61% (39.6% to 35%).

The lowest bracket rate cut was 33 1/3% (15% to 10%)

Note

By applying the percentage cut received by the top bracket taxpayers-11.61%-to the lowest bracket, the right hand column of the table shows that the lowest group would have cut taxes by only $174, instead of $500, had their tax cut percentage, been the same as the highest bracket.

This means that what is true, is the exact opposite, of what class warfare, big government, liberals, have been brainwashing the public with, for close to 30 years.

%-tax cut-top bracket	%-tax cut-bottom bracket	Taxable Income	Tax before Bush tax cuts	Tax after Bush tax cuts	Saved by bottom bracket	If top % cut-applied To Lowest Bracket-Savings Would Only Be
11.61%	33 1/3%	$10,000	$1500	$1000	$500	$174

%-tax cut-top bracket	Under Construction	Taxable Income	Tax before Bush tax cuts	Tax after Bush tax cuts	Saved in this bracket	If top % cut-applied to this bracket-Savings Would Only Be
11.61%	Between 25% and 33 1/3%	$25,000	$3,750	$3,050	$700	$435

%-tax cut-top bracket	Under Construction	Taxable Income	Tax before Bush tax cuts	Tax after Bush tax cuts	Saved in this bracket	If top % cut-applied to this bracket-Savings Would Only Be
11.61%	Between 25 and 33 1/3%	$50,000	$8,300	$6,800	$1,500	$964

$189,803 represents the purchasing power of $28,000 in 1965, the first year of JFK'S tax cuts. Up to that amount George Bush's tax cuts were more favorable to the lowest tax brackets. At $28,000 each tax cut provided a cut of 16.66%. See tables below.

Below see how much better the rich did on 3 million, 2 million, etc. under JFK, than they did under GWB. Then as now, it was good for all.

__________

$32,000 in 1965 would have the purchasing power of $216,917 in 2008 dollars

__________

315,000=$97,408

2003---35% starts above $311,950=$84,184

$96,201 amount paid on $311,950 at 39.6%$84,184 amount paid on $311,950 at 35%

Taxable Income $3,000,000	Tax Before Cut	Tax After Cut	Tax Payment Reduced by:	% of Cut
JFK Tax Cuts 1963-1965	$2,679,000	$2,140,980	$538,020	25.12%
GWB Tax Cuts 2000-2003	$1,161,168	$1,017,761	$144,007,	12.40%

Taxable Income $2,000,000	Tax Before Cut	Tax After Cut	Tax Payment Reduced by:	% of Cut
JFK Tax Cuts 1963-1965	$1,769,000	$1,440,980	$329,020	18.59%
GWB Tax Cuts 2000-2003	$765,168	$667,761	$97,407	12.73%

Taxable Income $1,000,000	Tax Before Cut	Tax After Cut	Tax Payment Reduced by:	% of Cut
JFK Tax Cuts 1963-1965	$859,000	$740,980	$118,020	13.73%
GWB Tax Cuts 2000-2003	$368,168	$317,761	$50,407	13.69%

When JFK became president in 1961, he went right to work trying to improve the economy.

The young president went before congress in 1962 and asked for a capital gains tax cut and a whopping 15% "investment tax credit" for the purchase of business equipment.

This type of credit is a direct subtraction from the tax.

So if a piece of equipment was purchased for $100,000, a 15% credit would allow a deduction on the tax return for that year of $15,000, in addition to the allowable depreciation for that year.Congress only went along with a 7% credit, but that still acted as a great incentive in improving the economy.

For individual rates, those that eventually passed helped everyone but those at the top, the richest Americans received a whopping reduction in their top rate from 91% to 70%.

Even though tax cuts only reduce taxes in proportion to the amount being paid, before those cuts, Democrats (liberals) who have stolen the party of JFK and turned into today's nanny-state redistribution scheme, today, practice terrible deception with the idea of reducing taxes.

Below you will see bracket by bracket how much deceit and dishonesty exists in today's Democrat Party.

Before the JFK tax cuts took place the lowest rate on which taxes were paid was 20%. President Kennedy's cuts, cut that to 14%.

Under George Bush the lowest rate had been 15%, Mr. Bush cut that to 10%

Taxable Income $0-$4000	Bracket	Cut To	% of Cut
JFK Tax Cuts 1963-1965	20%	14%	30%
GWB Tax Cuts 2000-2003	15%	10%	33 1/3%

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported recently that since 2000, disposable personal income has risen $3700 plus per person.

That means for a family of four, they now have $15,000 more to spend than they did then.

Since the Mainstream Media and Democrats want Americans more dependent on government, they have reported non-stop how bad the economy is.

Even though up to 80% of Americans say their own finances are fine, they constantly agree that the economy is in bad shape.

This shows the power of Mainstream Media brainwashing.

Because, Democrats want Americans to be dependent on government, bad news for America, or the spin to make things look bad is always good for Democrats, especially if a Republican is in office.

Taxable Income $4000-$8000	Tax on $8000 Before Cut	Tax After Cut	% of Cut
JFK Tax Cuts 1963-1965	$1680	$1380	17.85%
GWB Tax Cuts 2000-2003	$1200	$800	33 1/3%

Taxable Income $8,000-$12,000	Tax on $12,000 Before Cut	Tax After Cut	% of Cut
JFK Tax Cuts 1963-1965	$2720	$2260	16.91
GWB Tax Cuts 2000-2003	$1800	$1200	33 1/3%

We will continue these tables showing comparitive cuts on various rates and amounts of taxable income at intervals up to at least $1,000,000.

After the 1965 cuts there were still 25 brackets. Today there are only 6, so exact comparisons cannot be made but many comparisons can still be made.

It should be noted that these cuts were proposed by JFK but not adopted till 1964 after his untimely assasination. They were phased in over 2 years.

George Bush's cuts were phased in over 3 years.

Today's Tax Tip

Right-click to download Real World Economics: For High School Seniors College Students and New Entrants To The Workforce.

It's Free-It's Instant

You will need Adobe Reader (the latest version is recommended) installed on your computer in order to open and read this ebook. You can get Adobe Reader here (a new window will open so you can download it without leaving this page).

If you want to open the file in your browser window, just click on the link. However, if you want to download the file to view later, then right-click on the link and choose "Save Target As" if you are using Internet Explorer or "Save Link As" if you are using Mozilla. Some Browsers use "Save File as" Then select where you want to save the file on your hard drive.

Once you have saved the file, locate where you saved it, and double click to open.

One of the main features is an outline of a plan for getting 25 to 30 year olds elected to congress.

This is in no way an endorsement of Ron Paul. It is to show that a 25 year old with the same message of bringing the "federal monster" under control could raise enough money for a successful campaign.

JFK is featured quite prominently is this Ebook. His tax cuts gave us one of the best economies in the history of America.

You should find his economic philosophy both informative and illuminating.

Comments are welcome. Disagree as strenuously as you like, but still try to keep it mature and with as supporting data as possible.

When JFK proposed his tax cuts in 1963, the nation was very receptive.

The liberal disease-Class Warfare-was a non factor.

President Kennedy's plan, cut tax rates for all brackets.

Ironically the dollar amounts and the percentage amounts were far more beneficial to the wealthiest taxpayers, than were the cuts of George W. Bush.

In the 1960,s however, when actions were a benefit to the nation, most of the country rallied behind them.

The President's plan emphasized the relationship between rates that were too high and revenues that were sluggish as a result.

He said among many other things, "The final and best means of strengthening demand among consumers and business is to reduce the burden on private investment."

This of course meant lower taxes and other burdens of government.

Today, the Democratic Party cares much more about power than it does about the good of the country.

As a result, it has become radicalized, mean spirited and out of the mainstream of American thinking and values.

The video below is a short clip from August 1962. JFK had already passed some business tax cuts that were at the time breathing life and gains into what had been a sluggish economy.

Four months later and coincidentally after the Cuban Missile Crisis, the President would give a much more detailed and well-known speech on the benefits of tax cuts, to all.

Length of video: Two minutes, two seconds

This speech highlights every major aspect of today's benefits from the tax cuts of George W. Bush.

The following quote is part of this speech.

"The billions of dollars this bill will place in the hands of the consumer and our businessmen, will have both immediate and permanent benefits to our economy.

Every dollar that is released from taxation, that is spent or invested will help create a new job and a new salary and these new jobs and new salaries can create other new jobs and other salaries."

Speech To The Economic Club of New York December 14, 1962

I feel tonight somewhat like I felt when I addressed in 1960 the Houston Ministers Conference on the separation of church and state. But I am glad to have a chance to talk to you tonight about the advantages of the free enterprise system.

Less than a month ago this Nation reminded the world that it possessed both the will and the weapons to meet any threat to the security of free men. The gains we have made will not be given up, and the course that we have pursued will not be abandoned.

But in the long run, that security will not be determined by mititary or diplomatic moves alone. It will be affected by the decisions of finance ministers as well as by the decisions of Secretaries of State and Secretaries of Defense; by the deployment of fiscal and monetary wapons as well as by military weapons; and above all by the strength of this Nation's economy as well as by the strength of our defenses.

You will recall that Chairman Khrushchev has said that he beieved that the hinge of world history would begin to move when the Soviet Union outproduced the United States.

Therefore, the subject to which we address ourselves tonight concerns not merely our own well-being, but also very vitally the defense of the free world.

America's rise to world leadership in the century since the Civil War has reflected more than any thing else our unprecedented economic growth.

Interrupted during the decade of the thirties, the vigourous expansion of our economy was resumed in 1940 and continued for more than 15 years thereafter. It demonstrated for all to see the power of freedom and the efficiency of free institutions. The economic health of this Nation has been and is now fundamentally sound.

But a leading nation, a nation upon which all depend not only in this country but around the world, cannot afford to be satisfied, to look back or to pause. On our strength and growth depend the strength of others, the spread of free world trade and unity, and continued confidence in our leadership and our currency.

The under developed countries are dependent upon us for the sale of their primary commodities and for aid to their struggling economies. In short, a prosperous and growing America is important not only to Americans-it is, as the sposkesman for 20 Western nations in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development as he stressed this week, of vital importance to the entire Western World.

In the last 2 years we have made significant strides. Our gross national product has risen 11 percent while inflation has been arrested. Employment has been increased by 1.3 million jobs. Profits, personal income, living standards-all are setting new records.

Most of the economic indicators for this quarter are up and the prospects are for further expansion in the next quarter. But we must look beyond the next quarter, or the last quarter, or even the last 2 years. For we can and must do better, much better than we have been doing for the last 5 1/2 years.

The economy is capable of producing without strain $30 to $40 billion more than we are producing today. Business earnings could be $7 to $8 billion higher than they are today.

Utilization of existing plant and equipment could be much higher; and if it were, investment would rise. We need not accept an unemployment rate of 5 percent or more, such as we have had for 60 out ot the last 61 months. There is no need for us to be satisfied with a rate of growth that keeps good men out of work and good capacity out of use.

The Economic Club of New York is of course familiar with these problems. For in this state the rate of insured unemployment has been persistently higher than than the national average, and the increases in personal income and employment have been slower here than in the Nation as a whole.

You have seen the tragedy of chronically depressed areas upstate, of enemployed young people, and I think this might be one of our most serious problems, unemployed young people, those under 20, one out of four is unemployed, particularly those in the minority groups, roaming the streets of New York and our other great cities, and others on relief at an early age, with the prospect that in this decade we will have betwween 7 and 8 million school dropouts, unskilled, coming into the labor market, at a time when the need for unskilled labor is steadily diminishing.

And I know you share my conviction that, proud as we are of its progress, this Nation's economy can and must do even better than it has done in the last 5 years.

Our choice therefore, boils down to one of doing nothing and therby risking a widening gap between our actual and potential growth in output, profits, and employment-or taking action, at the Federal level, to raise our entire economy to a new and higher level of business activity.

If we do not take action, those who have the most reason to be dissatisfied with our present rate of growth will be tempted to seek shortsighted and narrow solutions-to resist automation, to reduce the work week to 35 hours or even lower, to shut out imports, or to raise the prices in a vain effort to obtain full capacity profits on undercapacity operations.

But these are all self-defeating expedients which can only restrict the economy, not expand it.

There are a number of ways by which the Federal Government can meet its responsibilities to aid economic growth.

We can and must improve American education and technical training. We can and must expand civilian research and technology.

One of the great bottlenecks for this country's economic growth in this decade will be the shortage of doctorates in mathematics, engineering, and physics; a serious shortage with a great demand and an undersupply of highly trained manpower.

We can and must step up the development of our natural resources.

But the most direct and significant kind of federal action aiding economic growth is to make possible an increase in private consumption and investment demand-- to cut the fetters which hold back private spending.

In the past, this could be done in part by the increased use of credit and monetary tools, but our balance of payments situation today places limits on our use of those tools for expansion.

It could also be done by increasing Federal expenditures more rapidly than necessary, but such a course would soon demoralize both the Government and our economy.

If Governmnet is to retain the confidence of the people, it must not spend more than can be justified on grounds of national need or spent with maximum efficiency. I shall say more on this in a moment.

The final and best means of strengthening demand among consumers and business is to reduce the burden on private income and the deterrents to private initiative which are imposed by our present tax system; and this administration pledged itself last summer to an across-the-board, top to bottom cut in personal and corporate income taxes to be enacted and become effective in 1963.

I am not talking about a "quickie" or a temporary tax cut, which would be more appropriate if a recession were imminent.

Nor am I talking about giving the economy a mere shot in the arm, to ease some temporary complaint.

I am talking about the accumulated evidence of the last 5 years that our present tax system, developed as it was, in good part, during World War II to restrain growth, exerts too heavy a drag on growth in peace time; that it siphons out of the private economy too large a share of personal and business purchasing power; that it reduces the financial incentives for personal effort, investment, and risk-taking.

In short, to increase demand and lift the economy, the Federal Government's most useful role is not to rush into a program of excessive increases in public expenditures, but to expand the incentives and opportunities for private expenditures.

Under these circumstances, any new tax legislation--and you can understand that under the comity which exists in the United States Constitution whereby the Ways and Means Committee in the House of Representatives have the responsibility of initiating this legislation, that the details of any proposal should wait on the meeting of the Congress in January.

But you can understand that under these circumstances, in general, that any new tax legislation enacted next year should meet the following three tests.

First, it should reduce net taxes by a sufficiently early date and a sufficiently large amount to do the job required.

Early action could give us extra leverage, added results, and important insurance against recession.

Too large a tax cut, of course, could result in inflation and insufficient future revenues-- but the greatest danger is a tax cut too little or too late to be effective.

Second, the new tax bill must increase private consumption as well as investment.

Consumers are still spending between 92 and 94 percent of their after-tax income, as they have every year since 1950.

But that after tax income could and should be greater, providing stronger markets for the products of American Industry.

When consumers purchase more goods, plants use more of their capacity, men are hired instead of laid off, investment increases and profits are high.

Corporate tax rates must also be cut to incrase incentives and the availability of investment capital.

The Government has already taken major steps this year to reduce business tax liability and to stimulate the modernization, replacement, and expansion of our productive plant and equipment.

We have done this through the 1962 investment tax credit and through the liberalization of depreciation allowances--two essential parts of our first step in tax revision which amounted to a 10 percent reduction to corporate income taxes worth $2.5 billion.

Now we need to increase consumer demand to make these measures fully effective--demand which will make more use of existing capacity and thus increase both profits and the incentive to invest.

In fact, profits after taxes would be at least 15 percent higher today if we were operating at full employment.

For all these reasons, next year's tax bill should reduce personal as well as corporate taxes, for those in the lower brackets, who are certain to spend their additional take home pay, and for those in the middle and upper brackets, who can thereby be encouraged to undertake additional efforts and enabled to invest more capital.

Third, the new tax bill should improve both the equity and the simplicity of our present tax system.

This means the enactment of long-needed tax reforms, a broadening of the tax base and the elimination or modification of many special tax privileges.

These steps are not only needed to recover lost revenue and thus make possible a larger cut in present rates; they are also tied directly to our goal of greater growth.

For the present patchwork of special provisions and preferences lightens the tax load of some only at the cost of placing a heavier burden on others.

It distorts economic judgment and channels an undue amount of energy into effors to avoid tax liabilities.

It makes certain types of less productive activity more profitable than other more valuable undertakings.

All this inhibits our growth and efficiency, as well as considerably complicating the work of both the taxpayer and the Internal Revenue Service.

These various exclusions and concessions have been justified in part as a means of overcoming oppressively high rates in the upper brackets-and a sharp reduction in those rates, accompanied by base-broadening, loophole-closing measures, would properly make the new rates not only lower but also more widely applicable. Surely this is more equitable on both counts.

Those are the three tests which the right kind of bill must meet and I am confident that the enactment of the right bill next year will in due course increase our gross national product by several times the amount of taxes actually cut.

Profit margins will be improved and both the incentive to invest and the supply of internal funds for investment will be increased.

There will be new interesst in taking risks, in increasing productivity, in creating new jobs and new products for long-term economic growth.

Other national problems, moreover, will be aided by full employment. It will encourage the locattion of new plants in areas of labor surplus and provide new jobs for workers that we are retraining and facilitate the ajustment which will be necessary under our new trade expansion bill and reduce a number of government expenditures.

It will not, I'm confident, revive an inflationary spiral or adversely affect our balance of payments.

If the economy today were operating closer to capacity levels with little unemployment, or if a sudden change in our military requirements should cause a scramble for men and resources, then I would oppose tax reductions as irresponsible and inflationary; and I would not hesitate to recommend a tax increase, if that were necessary.

But our resources and manpower are not being fully utilized; the general level of prices has been remarkably stable; and increased competition, both at home and abroad, along with increased productivity will help keep both prices and wages within appropriate limits.

The same is true of our balance of payments. While rising demand will expand imports, new investment in more efficient productive facilities will aid exports and a new economic climate could both draw capital from abroad and keep capital here at home.

It will also put us in a better position, if necessary, to use monetary tools to help our international accounts.

But, most imprortantly, confidence in the dollar in the long run rests on confidence in America, in our ability to meet our economic commitments and reach our economic goals.

In a world-wide conviction that we are not drifting from recession to recession with no answer, the substantial improvement in our balance of payments position in the last 2 years makes it clear that nothing could be more foolish than to restrict our growth merely to minimize that particular problem rather than diminish it.

On the contrary, European governmental and financial authorities with almost total unanimity, far from threatening to withdraw gold, have urged us to cut taxes in order to expand our economy, attract more capital, and increase confidence in our future.

But what concerns most Americans about a tax cut, I know is not the deficit in our Federal budget.

When I announce in April of 1961 that this kind of comprehensive tax reform would follow the bill enacted this year, I had hoped to present it in an atmosphere of a balanced budget.

But it has necessary to augment sharply our nuclear and conventional forces, to step up our efforts in space, to meet the increased cost of servicing the national debt and meeting our obligations, established by law, to veterans.

These expenditure increases, let me stress, constitute practically all of the increases which have occurred under this administration, the remainder having gone to fight the recession we found in industry-mostly through the supplemental employment bill-and in agriculture.

We shall, therfore, neither postpone our tax cut plans nor cut into essential national security programs.

This administration is determined to protect America's security and survival and we are also determined to step up its economic growth. I think we must do both.

Our true choice is not between tax reduction, on the one hand, and the avoidance of large Federal deficits on the other.

It is increasingly clear that no matter what party is in power, so long as our national security needs keep rising, an economy hampered by restrictive tax rates will never produce enough revenue to balance our budget just as it will never produce enough jobs or enough profits.

Surely the lesson of the last decade is that budget deficits are not caused by wild-eyed spenders but by slow economic growth and periodic recessions, and any new recession would break all deficit records.

In short it is a paradoxical truth that tax rates are too high today and tax revenues are too low and the soundest way to raise the revenues in the long run is to cut the rates now.

The experience of a mumber of European countries and Japan have borne this out.

This country's own experience with tax reduction in 1954 has borne this out.

Ant the reason is that only full employment can balance the budget, and tax reduction can pave the way to that employment. The purpose of cutting taxes now is not to incur a budget deficit, but to achieve the more prosperous, expanding economy which can bring a budget surplus.

I repeat; our practical choice is not between a tax cut deficit and a budgetary surplus. It is betwen two kinds of deficits; a chronic deficit of inertia, as the unwanted result of inadequate revenues, and achieve-and I believe this can be done-a budget surplus.

The first type of deficit is a sign of waste and weakness; the second reflects an investment in the future.

Nevertheless, as Chairman Mills of the House Ways and Means Committee pointed out this week, the size of the deficit is to be regarded with concern, and tax reduction must be accompanied, in his words, by "increased control of the rises in expenditures."

This is precisely the course we intend to follow in 1963.

At the same time as our tax program is presented to the Congress in January, the Federal budget for fiscal 1964 will also be presented.

Defense and space expenditures will necessarily rise in order to carry out programs which are demanded and are necessary for our own security, and which have largely been authorized by Members in both parties of the Congress with overwhelming majorities.

Fixed interest charges on the debt also rise slightly.

But I can tell you now that the total of all other expenditures combined will be held at approximately its current level.

This is not an easy task. During the past 9 years, domestic civilian expenditures in the National Government have risen at an average rate of more than 7 1/2 percent.

State and local government expenditures have risen at an annual rate of 9 percent.

Expenditures by the New York State Government, for example have risen in recent years at the rate of roughly 10 percent a year.

At a time when Government pay scales have necessarily risen-and I take New York just as an example-when our population and pressures are growing and the demand for services and State aid is thus increasing, next year's Federal budget, which will hold domestic outlays at their present level, will represent a genuine effort in expenditure control.

This budget will reflect, among other economies, a $750 million reduction in the postal defict.

It will reflect a savings of over $300 million in the storage of costs of wurplus feed grain stocks, and as a result of the feed grain bill of 1961 we will have two-thirds less in storage than we would otherwise have had in January 1963 and a savings of at least $600 million from the cancellation of obsolete or unworkable weapons systems.

Secretary McNamara is undertaking a cost reduction program expected to save at least $3 billion a year in the Department of Defense, cutting down on duplication and closing down nonessential installations. Other agencies must do the same.

In addition, I have directed all heads of Government departments and agencies to hold Federal employment under the levels authorized by congressional appropriations; to absorb through greater efficiency a substantial part of this years Federal pay increase; to achieve an increase in productivity which will enable the same amount of work to be done by fewer people; and to refrain from spending any unnecessary funds that were appropriated by the Congress.

It should also be noted that the Federal debt, as a proprotion of our gross national product, has been steadily reduced in this last year.

Last year the total increase in the Federal debt was 2 percent-compared to an 8 percent increase in the gross debt of State and local governments. Taking a longer view, the Federal debt today is 13 percent higher than it was in 1946, while state and local debt increased over 360 percent and private debt by over 300 percent.

In fact, if it were not for Federal financial assistance to State and local governments, the Federal cash budget would show a surplus.

Federal civilian employment, for example, is actually lower today than it was in 1952, while state and local governments employment over the same period has increased 67 percent.

It is this setting which makes Federal tax reduction both possible and appropriate next year.

I do not underestimate the obstacles which the Congress will face in enacting such legislation.

No one will be satisfied.

Everyone will have his own approach, his own bill, his own reduction.

A high order of restraint and determination will be reqired if the possible is not to wait on the perfect.

But a nation capable of marshaling these qualities in any dramatic threat to its security is surely capable, as a great free society, of meeting a slower and more complex threat to our economic vitality.

This nation can afford to reduce taxes, we can afford a temporary deficit, but we cannot afford to do nothing.

For on the strength of our free economy rests the hope of all free nations.

We shall not fail that hope, for free men and free nations must prosper and they must prevail. Thank you.

JFK entered the U.S. Navy as an Ensign in September of 1941. Back troubles had caused him to be rejected by the U.S. Army, several months earlier.

In August of 1943, while on patrol in the Solomon Islands his craft was rammed by a Japanese destroyer. This tossed John Kennedy several feet across the boat injuring his back; his back had been the reason for his prior rejection in the Army.

JFK wound up towing a wounded man several miles in the ocean, to a nearby island. He and his crew were rescued there.

It is understood that he at times blacked out while helping the other man to safety.

He was later the recipient of the Marine Corps Medal and Navy Medal.

JFK received the following citation:

"For heroism; the rescue of three men following the ramming and sinking of his motor torpedo boat while attempting a torpedo attack on a Japanese destroyer in the Solomon Islands area on the night of Aug 1–2, 1943. Lt. KENNEDY, Capt. of the boat, directed the rescue of the crew and personally rescued three men, one of whom was seriously injured. During the following six days, he succeeded in getting his crew ashore, and after swimming many hours attempting to secure aid and food, finally effected the rescue of the men. His courage, endurance and excellent leadership contributed to the saving of several lives and was in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States Naval Service."

Before entering politics, JFK was considering journalism for a career.

It seems as though politics was not on his mind at all.

It seemed to be a given that his older brother Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. was destined to be the top political figure in the family if there was to be a top political figure.

Unfortunately Joseph was killed in the war, leaving John to be the one to satisfy the senior Joseph Kennedy's lifelong ambition to put a Kennedy in the White House.

In 1946 a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives opened up in a district with a large Democratic majority. JFK ran for that seat and coasted to an easy victory.

JFL served three terms in the House of Representatives, before deciding to run for the U.S. Senate.

In 1952, he ran against and defeated the incumbent, Henry Cabot Lodge Jr.

At the 1956 Democratic Convention, Adlai Stevenson, the Democratic nominee for the Democrats chose to leave it to a vote of the delegates rather than selecting his own vice-president.

The young John Kennedy finished second to the well-known and seasoned Estes Kefauver of Tennessee.

Kefauver had become well known through his investigations of mob related activities.

During that time, that committee, The Kefauver Committee, was well known to millions of Americans.

Wikipedia gives this following partial account of the activities of that committee;

The Kefauver Committee

In 1950, Kefauver headed a U.S. Senate committee investigating organized crime. The committee, officially known as the Senate Special Committee to Investigate Crime in Interstate Commerce, was popularly known as the Kefauver Committee or the Kefauver hearings.

The Committee held hearings in fourteen cities and heard testimony from over 600 witnesses. Many of the witnesses were high-profile crime bosses, including such well-known names as Willie Moretti, Joe Adonis, and Frank Costello, the latter making himself famous by refusing to allow his face to be filmed during his questioning and then staging a much-publicized walkout.

A number of politicians also appeared before the Committee and saw their careers ruined. Among them were former Governor Harold G. Hoffman of New Jersey and Mayor William O'Dwyer of New York City.

The Committee's hearings, which were televised live just as many Americans were buying televisions, made Kefauver nationally famous and introduced many Americans to the concept of a criminal organization known as the Mafia for the first time ever.

Although the hearings boosted Kefauver's political prospects, they helped to end the twelve-year Senate career of Democratic Majority Leader Scott Lucas.

In a tight 1950 reelection race against former Illinois Representative Everett Dirksen, Lucas urged Kefauver to keep his investigation away from an emerging Chicago police scandal until after election day, but Kefauver refused.

Election-eve publication of stolen secret committee documents hurt the Democratic party in Cook County, cost Lucas the election, and gave Dirksen national prominence as the man who defeated the Senate majority leader.

As to JFK to make a respectable showing against this well known figure, turned about to be an important event in his future political career.

JFK won a second term in the U.S. Senate. He handily defeated a Boston attorney named Vincent J. Celeste.