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| Name | Oliver Stone |
|---|---|
| Caption | Stone at the 66th Venice International Film Festival, 2009 |
| Birth date | September 15, 1946 |
| Birth place | New York City, New York, USA |
| Birthname | William Oliver Stone |
| Yearsactive | 1971 - present |
| Occupation | film director, producer and screenwriter |
| Spouse | Najwa Sarkis (1971-1977)Elizabeth Stone (1981-1993)Sun-jung Jung (1996-Present) |
William Oliver Stone (born September 15, 1946) is an American film director and screenwriter. Stone came to prominence in the late 1980s and the early 1990s for directing a series of films about the Vietnam War, in which he had himself participated as an American infantry soldier. His work has earned him three Academy Awards, and continues to focus frequently on contemporary political and cultural issues, often controversially. His first Academy Award was for Best Adapted Screenplay for Midnight Express (1978). He subsequently won Academy Award for Best Director for Platoon (1986) and Born on the Fourth of July (1989), both of which were centered on the Vietnam War. He has been described, by the British newspaper The Guardian as "one of the few committed men of the left working in mainstream American cinema."
A notable feature of Stone's directing style is the use of many different cameras and film formats, from VHS to 8 mm film to 70 mm film. He sometimes uses several formats in a single scene, as in Natural Born Killers (1994) and JFK (1991).
Stone was then admitted into Yale University, but left after one year. Stone had become inspired by Joseph Conrad's novel Lord Jim as well as by Zorba the Greek and George Harrison's music to teach English at the Free Pacific Institute in South Vietnam. Stone taught in Vietnam for six months after which he worked as a wiper on a United States Merchant Marine ship, travelling to Oregon and Mexico, before returning to Yale, where he dropped out a second time (in part due to working on his 1,400 page autobiographical novel A Child's Night Dream). Stone graduated from film school at New York University (where he was mentored by director Martin Scorsese) in 1971.
For Year of the Dragon (1985) he received a Razzie nomination in the category 'Worst Screenplay'. Other films whose screenplays he participated in are Conan the Barbarian (1982), Scarface (1983), 8 Million Ways to Die (1986) and Evita (1996). In addition, he has written or taken part in the writing of every film he has directed, except for U Turn (1997). The very first film that he directed professionally was the obscure horror picture Seizure (1974). |width=75%|align=center}}
After Alexander, Stone went on to direct World Trade Center, which centered on two Port Authority Police Department (PAPD) cops during the September 11, 2001 attacks. The main undercurrent of the film is hope through times of trial. As of December 19, 2006, the worldwide box office for World Trade Center was $161,735,806. He is slated to direct Pinkville, a Vietnam war drama about the infamous killings set to star Bruce Willis and Channing Tatum. The film's plot was to focus on the investigation into the 1968 My Lai Massacre of Vietnamese civilians. It would have been Stone's fourth Vietnam film, after Platoon, Born on the Fourth of July and Heaven & Earth. The film was to have been made for the newly reformed United Artists. However, United Artists halted its December 2007 production start because of the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike. Stone went on to produce and direct the George W. Bush biopic, titled W.. He indicated his film portrays the controversial President's childhood, relationship with his father, struggles with alcoholism, rediscovery of his Christian faith, and his professional life up until the 2003 invasion of Iraq. The film is based on a screenplay by Stone and Stanley Weiser, who had co-written Wall Street (1987). Josh Brolin was cast in the title role, James Cromwell as George Herbert Walker Bush, and Elizabeth Banks as Laura Welch Bush. Filming began on May 12, 2008 in Shreveport, Louisiana and wrapped in June. W. was released on October 17, 2008. He recently promoted his new film South of the Border at the Venice Film Festival; a documentary about Hugo Chavez. Stone directed (2010), the sequel to Wall Street.
Stone was the recipient of the Extraordinary Contribution to Filmmaking Award at the 2007 Austin Film Festival.
Stone's screenplay Midnight Express was criticized by some for its portrayal of Turkish people. The original author, Billy Hayes, around whom the film is set, has spoken out against the film, protesting that he had many Turkish friends while in jail.
Stone's film The Doors received criticism from Ray Manzarek (keyboardist–bass player) during a question and answer session at Indiana University East (in Richmond, Indiana), in 1997. During the discussion, Manzarek stated that he sat down with Stone about The Doors and Jim Morrison for over 12 hours. Patricia Kennealy Morrison - a well known rock critic and author - was a consultant on the movie, in which she also has a cameo appearance, but she writes in her memoir (Dutton, 1992) that Stone ignored everything she told him and proceeded with his own version of events. From the moment the movie was released, she blasted it as untruthful and inaccurate. Surviving members of the band, John Densmore and Robby Krieger, also cooperated with the filming of Doors, but distanced themselves from the work before the film's release.
Also in 1997, Stone was one of 34 celebrities to sign an open letter to then-German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, published as a newspaper advertisement in the International Herald Tribune, which protested against the treatment of Scientologists in Germany and compared it to the Nazis' oppression of Jews in the 1930s. Other signatories included Dustin Hoffman and Goldie Hawn.
During The Observer interview, Stone did not condemn the FARC outright; "I do think that by the standards of Western civilization they go too far; they kidnap innocent people. On the other hand, they're fighting a desperate battle against highly financed, American-supported forces who have been terrorizing the countryside for years and kill most of the people. FARC is fighting back as best it can and grabbing hostages is the fashion in which they can finance themselves and try to achieve their goals, which are difficult. They're a peasant army; I see them as a Zapata-like army. I think they are heroic to fight for what they believe in and die for it, as was Castro in the hills of Cuba."
Stone made the comments shortly after returning from a trip to Colombia, where he was to have filmed footage of the expected release of three FARC hostages, including a young child named Emanuel. In the days before last New Year's Eve [2007], the Venezuelan government had arranged for the release of high-profile hostages held in the Colombian jungle by the FARC guerrilla group. A high-level international team of observers was on hand, including former President Néstor Kirchner of Argentina, Brazil's top presidential foreign policy advisor, and representatives from France, Switzerland, Bolivia, Ecuador, Cuba, the Red Cross, and Oliver Stone. The mission failed, and Stone blamed the Colombian government and the United States for the fiasco.
In an interview with The Times newspaper on July 25, 2010, Stone claimed that America does not know "the full story" on Iran and complained about Jewish influence in parts of the US media and foreign policy. and the American Jewish Committee, as well as from Israel's Diaspora Affairs and Public Diplomacy Minister.
On July 28, 2010, Stone issued a second apology to the ADL, which was accepted. "I believe he now understands the issues and where he was wrong, and this puts an end to the matter," said ADL National Director Abraham Foxman.
In 2008, Stone was named the Artistic Director of New York University's Tisch School of the Arts Asia in Asia.
In 2009, Stone completed a documentary about Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and the rise of progressive, leftist governments in Latin America. Stone, who is a supporter of Chavez and the Bolivarian Revolution, hopes the film will get the Western world to rethink the Venezuelan president and socialist policies. Titled South of the Border, Chavez joined Stone for the premiere of the documentary at the Venice Film Festival in September 2009. The documentary features informal interviews by Stone with Chavez and six allied leftist presidents, from Bolivia's Evo Morales to Cuba's Raul Castro. Stone stated that he hopes the film will help people better understand a leader who is wrongly ridiculed "as a strongman, as a buffoon, as a clown." In May 2010, Stone began a Latin American tour to promote the film, with screenings planned in Ecuador, Brazil, Bolivia, Paraguay and Argentina. The documentary was also being released in some cities in the United States and Europe in the summer.
Category:1946 births Category:American Buddhists Category:American Christians Category:American film directors Category:American military personnel of the Vietnam War Category:American people of French descent Category:American people of Jewish descent Category:American political writers Category:American screenwriters Category:BAFTA winners (people) Category:Best Adapted Screenplay Academy Award winners Category:Best Director Academy Award winners Category:Best Director Golden Globe winners Category:Conspiracy theorists Category:Living people Category:New York University alumni Category:People from New York City Category:Recipients of the Bronze Star Medal Category:Recipients of the Purple Heart medal Category:Researchers of the John F. Kennedy assassination Category:United States Army soldiers Category:Writers Guild of America Award winners
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| Name | Al Pacino |
|---|---|
| Caption | Al Pacino attending the Venice Film Festival in September 2004 |
| Birth name | Alfredo James Pacino |
| Birth date | April 25, 1940 |
| Birth place | New York City, New York, U.S. |
| Death date | |
| Occupation | Actor, director, screenwriter, producer |
| Years active | 1968–present |
Alfredo James "Al" Pacino (born April 25, 1940) is an American film and stage actor and director. He is most famed for playing mobsters including Michael Corleone in The Godfather trilogy and Tony Montana in Scarface, though he has also appeared several times on the other side of the law—as a police officer, detective and a lawyer. His role as Frank Slade in Scent of a Woman won him the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1992 after receiving seven previous Oscar nominations.
He made his feature film debut in the 1969 film Me, Natalie in a minor supporting role, before playing the leading role in the 1971 drama The Panic in Needle Park. Pacino made his major breakthrough when he was given the role of Michael Corleone in The Godfather in 1972, which earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. Other Oscar nominations for Best Supporting Actor were for Dick Tracy and Glengarry Glen Ross. Oscar nominations for Best Actor include The Godfather Part II, Serpico, Dog Day Afternoon, the court room drama ...And Justice for All and Scent of a Woman.
In addition to a career in film, he has also enjoyed a successful career on stage, picking up Tony Awards for Does a Tiger Wear a Necktie? and The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel. His love of Shakespeare caused him to direct his first film with Looking for Richard, a part documentary on the play Richard III. Pacino has received numerous lifetime achievement awards, including one from the American Film Institute. He is a method actor, taught mainly by Lee Strasberg and Charlie Laughton at the Actors Studio in New York.
Although he has never married, Pacino has had several relationships with actresses and has three children.
Pacino is currently co-president, along with Ellen Burstyn and Harvey Keitel, of the Actors Studio.
Pacino made his return to the stage in 2010 as Shylock in The Merchant of Venice. The production continued in October 2010 at the Broadhurst Theatre New York, earning US$1 million at the box office in its first week.
In 1992 Pacino won the Academy Award for Best Actor, for his portrayal of retired U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel Frank Slade in Martin Brest's Scent of a Woman. Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun Times wrote, ‘The satanic character is played by Pacino with relish bordering on glee.’ In Donnie Brasco Pacino played mafia gangster "Lefty", in the true story of undercover FBI agent Donnie Brasco (Johnny Depp) and his work in bringing down the mafia from the inside. Pacino also starred as real life 60 Minutes producer Lowell Bergman in the multi-Oscar nominated The Insider opposite Russell Crowe, before starring in Oliver Stone's Any Given Sunday in 1999.
Pacino has not received another nomination from the Academy since Scent of a Woman, but won two Golden Globes since the year 2000, the first being the Cecil B. DeMille Award in 2001 for lifetime achievement in motion pictures.
Pacino's film festival-screened Chinese Coffee earned good notices. Shot almost exclusively as a one-on-one conversation between the two main characters, it was filmed in 1997 but not released until 2000. Chinese Coffee was included along with Pacino's two other rare films he has been involved in producing, The Local Stigmatic and Looking for Richard, on a special DVD boxset titled Pacino: An Actor's Vision which was released in 2007. Pacino produced prologues and epilogues for the discs containing the films.
Pacino turned down an offer to reprise his role as Michael Corleone in the computer game version of . As a result, Electronic Arts was not permitted to use Pacino's likeness or voice in the game, although his character does appear in it. He did allow his likeness to appear in the game adaptation of the remake of 1983's Scarface, titled .
Director Christopher Nolan worked with Pacino for Insomnia, a remake of the Norwegian film of the same name, co-starring Robin Williams. In this film, Pacino delivered a performance of a burned-out character, like in Donnie Brasco. Newsweek stated that "he [Pacino] can play small as rivetingly as he can play big, that he can implode as well as explode". The film did moderately well at the box office, taking US$113 million dollars worldwide. His next film, S1m0ne, was one that Pacino liked, but which did not gain much critical praise or box office success.
In Two for the Money, Pacino works as a sports gambling agent and mentor for Matthew McConaughey, alongside Renee Russo. The film was released on October 8, 2005 and received mixed reviews. Desson Thomson wrote in The Washington Post, "Al Pacino has played the mentor so many times, he ought to get a kingmaker's award (...) the fight between good and evil feels fixed in favor of Hollywood redemption." Pacino starred as Shylock in Michael Radford's 2004 film adaptation of The Merchant of Venice, choosing to add empathy to a character that had usually been played as a straight villain. On November 22, 2006, the University Philosophical Society of Trinity College, Dublin awarded Pacino the Honorary Patronage of the Society.
Pacino starred in Steven Soderbergh’s Ocean's Thirteen alongside George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Elliott Gould and Andy García as the villain Willy Bank, a casino tycoon targeted out of revenge by Danny Ocean and his crew. The film received generally favorable reviews.
88 Minutes was released on April 18, 2008 in the United States, having already been released in various other countries in 2007. The film co-starred Alicia Witt and was critically panned, although critics found the fault to be in the plot instead of Pacino's acting. In Righteous Kill, Pacino and Robert De Niro co-star as New York detectives searching for a serial killer; rapper 50 Cent also stars in it. The film was released to theaters on September 12, 2008. Although it was an anticipated return for the two stars, it was not well received by critics. Lou Luminick of The New York Post gave Righteous Kill one star out of four, saying: "Al Pacino and Robert De Niro collect bloated paychecks with intent to bore in Righteous Kill, a slow-moving, ridiculous police thriller that would have been shipped straight to the remainder bin at Blockbuster if it starred anyone else."
Pacino played Dr. Jack Kevorkian in an HBO Films biopic entitled You Don't Know Jack, which premiered April 2010. The film is about the life and work of the doctor-assisted suicide advocate. The performance earned Pacino his second Emmy Award for lead actor.
Category:1940 births Category:Actors Studio alumni Category:American film actors Category:American film directors Category:BAFTA winners (people) Category:American people of Italian descent Category:Best Actor BAFTA Award winners Category:Best Actor Academy Award winners Category:Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners Category:Best Miniseries or Television Movie Actor Golden Globe winners Category:Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Miniseries or Television Movie Screen Actors Guild Award winners Category:Cecil B. DeMille Award Golden Globe winners Category:Drama Desk Award winners Category:Emmy Award winners Category:Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts alumni Category:Actors from New York Category:People from New York City Category:American people of Sicilian descent Category:Tony Award winners Category:Living people Category:American actors of Italian descent
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| Caption | Michael Douglas, June 2004 |
|---|---|
| Birth name | Michael Kirk Douglas |
| Birth date | September 25, 1944 |
| Birth place | New Brunswick, New Jersey, U.S. |
| Spouse | Diandra Luker (1977–2000)Catherine Zeta-Jones (2000–) |
| Occupation | Actor, producer |
| Years active | 1966– |
| Parents | Kirk DouglasDiana Dill |
| Relatives | Joel (brother)Peter (half-brother)Eric (half-brother, deceased) |
| Children | 3 (including Cameron) |
| Nationality | American |
Douglas has a younger brother, Joel Douglas (born 1947), and two paternal half-brothers, Peter Douglas (born 1955) and Eric Douglas (1958–2004).
Douglas attended the Allen-Stevenson School, the International School of Geneva, and graduated from Eaglebrook School in Deerfield, Massachusetts in 1960 and The Choate School (now Choate Rosemary Hall) in Wallingford, Connecticut in 1963. He received his B.A. from the University of California, Santa Barbara in 1966, where he is also the Honorary President of the UCSB Alumni Association.
In 1975, Douglas received from his father, Kirk Douglas, the rights to the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Michael went on to produce the film of the same name with Saul Zaentz. Douglas considered playing the starring role, but decided against it after considering himself too old. The lead role went to a young Jack Nicholson, who ended up winning the Academy Award for Best Actor. Still, Douglas won the Award for Best Picture for producing it.
After leaving Streets of San Francisco in 1976, Douglas appeared in the medical thriller Coma in 1978 and Running in 1979. In 1979, he both produced and starred in The China Syndrome, a dramatic film co-starring Jane Fonda and Jack Lemmon about a nuclear power plant accident (the Three Mile Island accident took place 12 days after the film's release).
The year 1987 saw Douglas star in the thriller Fatal Attraction with Glenn Close. That same year he played tycoon Gordon Gekko in Oliver Stone's Wall Street for which he received an Academy Award as Best Actor. He reprised his role as Gekko in the sequel in 2010, also directed by Stone.
Douglas again paired with Kathleen Turner for the 1989 film The War of the Roses, which also starred Danny DeVito. In 1989, he starred in Ridley Scott's international police crime drama Black Rain opposite Andy García and Kate Capshaw. The film was shot in Osaka, Japan.
In 1992, Douglas had another successful starring role when he appeared alongside Sharon Stone in the film Basic Instinct. The movie was a box office hit, and sparked controversy over its depictions of bisexuality and lesbianism. In 1994, Douglas and Demi Moore starred in the hit movie Disclosure focusing on the topic of sexual harassment with Douglas playing a man harassed by his new female boss. Other popular films he starred during these decade were Falling Down, The American President, The Ghost and the Darkness, The Game (directed by David Fincher), and a remake of Alfred Hitchcock's classic - Dial M for Murder - titled A Perfect Murder. In 1998, Douglas received the Crystal Globe award for outstanding artistic contribution to world cinema at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival.
in Fatal Attraction (1987)]] In 2000, Douglas starred in Steven Soderbergh's critically acclaimed film Traffic, opposite Benicio del Toro and future wife Catherine Zeta-Jones. That same year, he also received critical acclaim for his role in Wonder Boys as a professor and novelist suffering from writer's block. He was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor in a Drama as well as several other awards from critics.
He has also offered reasons why he has become successful in both acting and producing:
"I think I'm a chameleon. I think it's something that I possibly inherited early on as a child going back and forth between two families. I know that whether it's right or wrong, I have an ability to sort of fit into a lot of different situations and make people feel relatively comfortable in a wide range without giving up all my moral values. I think that same chameleonlike quality can transfer into films. I think if you can remember the reason you got involved with it in the first place and try to keep that impulsive, instinctive feeling even when you're being beaten down or exhausted or waylaid, you'll be successful."
On December 17, 2007 it was announced that Douglas was to be the new voice at the beginning of NBC Nightly News, some two years after Howard Reig, the previous announcer, retired.
Douglas married Diandra Luker, 14 years his junior, on March 20, 1977, after 6 weeks of dating. They had one son, Cameron (born December 13, 1978). In 1980, Douglas was involved in a serious skiing accident which sidelined his acting career for three years. In September 1992, the same year Basic Instinct came out, he underwent treatment for alcoholism and drug addiction at Sierra Tucson Center. In 2000, after 23 years of marriage, Diandra divorced Douglas.
Douglas married Welsh actress Catherine Zeta-Jones on November 18, 2000; they were both born on September 25, though 25 years apart. Zeta-Jones says that when they met in Deauville, France, Douglas used the line "I want to father your children." They have two children, Dylan Michael (born August 8, 2000) and Carys Zeta (born April 20, 2003). They are planning to renew their wedding vows as part of their 10th wedding anniversary. The idea was hers, and came after Douglas was found to have advanced stages of cancer. One report notes that "Michael was in tears when she suggested it to him," and he sees it as a “wonderful expression of love.”
Douglas and Zeta-Jones hosted the annual Nobel Peace Prize concert in Oslo, Norway, on December 11, 2003. They acted as co-masters of ceremony in the concert celebrating the award given to Iranian human rights activist Shirin Ebadi. In 2006, he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Letters (D.Litt.) from the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. Douglas and his family divide their time among their homes in Pacific Palisades, California; New York City; Aspen, Colorado; Bermuda; Majorca, Spain; Swansea, Wales, Ridgewood, New Jersey, and La Conception, Quebec.
Douglas, the son of a Jewish father and an Anglican mother, has no formal religion. He is an advocate of nuclear disarmament, a supporter of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, and sits on the Board of Directors of the anti-war grantmaking foundation Ploughshares Fund. In 1998, he was appointed UN Messenger of Peace by Secretary-General Kofi Annan. He is a notable Democrat and has donated money to Barack Obama, Christopher Dodd, and Al Franken. He has been a major supporter of gun control since John Lennon was murdered in 1980.
In 1997, New York caddy James Parker sued Douglas for $25 million. Parker accused Douglas of hitting him in the groin with an errant golf ball, causing Parker to lose a testicle and his job. The case was later settled out of court.
It was announced on August 16, 2010, that Douglas was suffering from throat cancer and will undergo chemotherapy and radiation treatment. On August 31, 2010 Douglas appeared on Late Show with David Letterman and confirmed that the cancer was at an advanced stage IV. In November 2010, Douglas was put on a special weight gain diet by his doctors due to the excessive weight loss leaving him weak. On January 11, 2011, he said in an interview that his cancer has gone.
Douglas lent his support for the campaign to release Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, the Iranian woman, who after having been convicted of committing adultery, was given a sentence of death by stoning.
Category:1944 births Category:20th-century actors Category:21st-century actors Category:Actors from New Jersey Category:American actors of Russian descent Category:American anti-nuclear weapons activists Category:American film actors Category:American people of Belarusian-Jewish descent Category:American people of Bermudian descent Category:American people of British descent Category:American people of Russian descent Category:American people of Russian-Jewish descent Category:American television actors Category:Best Actor Academy Award winners Category:Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners Category:California Democrats Category:Cancer patients Category:Cecil B. DeMille Award Golden Globe winners Category:Choate Rosemary Hall alumni Category:Living people Category:Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture Screen Actors Guild Award winners Category:People from New Brunswick, New Jersey Category:People self-identifying as alcoholics Category:Producers who won the Best Picture Academy Award Category:United Nations Messengers of Peace Category:University of California, Santa Barbara alumni Category:Cancer survivors
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| Caption | Kermode (front right) playing with The Dodge Brothers at Marylebone station, July 2009 |
|---|---|
| Name | Mark Kermode |
| Birth name | Mark Fairey |
| Birth place | Barnet, North London, England |
| Birth date | July 02, 1963 |
| Residence | Brockenhurst, New Forest, Hampshire, England |
| Nationality | English |
| Citizenship | British |
| Known for | Mark Kermode and Simon Mayo's Film Reviews, The Culture Show, The Dodge Brothers |
| Education | PhD (English) |
| Alma mater | University of Manchester |
| Employer | BBC, The Observer, Sight and Sound |
| Occupation | Film critic, presenter, musician |
Mark Kermode (born 2 July 1963) is an English film critic who contributes to Sight and Sound magazine and The Observer newspaper. He reviews films with Simon Mayo on Friday afternoons on BBC Radio Five Live, and co-presents the BBC Two arts programme The Culture Show. He also discusses other branches of the arts for the BBC Two programme Newsnight Review, and appears regularly on the BBC News channel. He also writes and presents a film-related video blog for the BBC. In The Screen Directory's chart of best ever film critics, Kermode appears at number 10. He won the 2010 Sony Award for Best Specialist Contributor for his work with Simon Mayo at BBC Radio 5 Live. He is 75th on the Guardian's Film Power 100.
Mark Fairey's parents divorced when he was in his early 20s and he subsequently changed his surname to his GP mother's maiden name by deed poll. (Neither of them are related to the literary critic Frank Kermode.)
He earned his PhD in English at the University of Manchester in 1991, writing a thesis on horror fiction.
Kermode now lives in Brockenhurst with his wife, Linda Ruth Williams, a professor who lectures on film at the University of Southampton and has written The Erotic Thriller in Contemporary Cinema and co-edited Contemporary American Cinema. In October to November 2004, they jointly curated a History of the Horror Film season and exhibition at the National Film Theatre in London.
Kermode also co-hosted an early 90s afternoon magazine show on BBC Radio 5 called A Game of Two Halves alongside former Blue Peter presenter Caron Keating.
He currently reviews and debates new film releases each Friday afternoon with Simon Mayo on Mayo's BBC Radio Five Live show, which is also available as a podcast (and previously also as a vodcast).
The programme won Gold in the Speech Award category at the 2009 Sony Radio Academy Awards on 11 May 2009. The judges' citation was:
The winner of the Gold Award made the judges laugh out loud. They found this programme witty and entertaining, cheeky and irreverent, and they admired the sustained passion and energy of its presenters who made listening an effortless and rollercoaster pleasure.
On the Radio Five Live show, Kermode is frequently referred to by nicknames including "The Good Doctor" and listeners also send in names for the double-act of Kermode and Mayo, such as Hinge and Bracket.
Kermode is also a resident film critic and presenter for Film Four and Channel 4 television, presenting the weekly Extreme Cinema strand. He also writes, researches and presents documentaries for Channel 4.
Kermode's autobiography, It's Only A Movie, was published in February 2010 by Random House and was accompanied by a UK tour.
Kermode is sometimes critical of the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC), the censor for film in the UK, calling for horror films from abroad to be shown in their uncut versions. However, in recent years, he has stated on numerous occasions that the BBFC do a good job in an impossible situation, and expressed his approval of their decisions.
Kermode rarely watches television, calling it "trivial" and stating that "I have been doing my best to avoid [TV] for the last 20 years." On being challenged by The Observer to watch TV, he admitted "if there's one thing I've learned from agreeing to take up the Observer's TV challenge this summer, it's that an awareness of what's going on in television is probably helpful to an understanding of movies. Worse, it may even be essential". |- | 2009 | Sony Radio Academy Awards | Speech Award |style="background: #CFB53B"| Gold |}
Category:Alumni of the University of Manchester Category:English Anglicans Category:English film critics Category:English journalists Category:English double-bassists Category:English radio personalities Category:English television personalities Category:English vegetarians Category:Film historians Category:Old Haberdashers Category:People from Barnet Category:People from Brockenhurst Category:1963 births Category:Living people
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| Name | Larry King |
|---|---|
| Caption | King in September 2010 |
| Birth name | Lawrence Harvey Zeiger |
| Birth date | November 19, 1933 |
| Birth place | Brooklyn, New York, U.S. |
| Occupation | Television/Radio personality |
| Years active | 1957–2010| spouse = Freda Miller (1952–1953)Annette Kaye (1961)Alene Akins (1961–1963)Mickey Sutphin (1963–1967)Alene Akins (1967–1972)Sharon Lepore (1976–1983)Julie Alexander (1989–1992)Shawn Southwick (1997–present) |
He is recognized in the United States as one of the premier broadcast interviewers. He has won an Emmy Award, two Peabody Awards, and ten Cable ACE Awards.
King began as a local Florida journalist and radio interviewer in the 1950s and 1960s. He became prominent as an all-night national radio broadcaster starting in 1978, and then, in 1985, began hosting the nightly interview TV program Larry King Live on CNN.
On June 29, 2010, it was announced that he would step down as host of the show but would continue to host specials for CNN. In early September, CNN confirmed that he would be replaced by Piers Morgan. King's last show aired on December 16, 2010.
His Miami radio show launched him to local stardom. A few years later, in May 1960, he hosted Miami Undercover, airing Sunday nights at 11:30 p.m. on WPST-TV Channel 10 (now WPLG). On the show, he moderated debates on important issues of the time. King credits his success on local TV to the assistance of another showbiz legend, comedian Jackie Gleason, whose national TV variety show was being filmed in Miami Beach during this period. "That show really took off because Gleason came to Miami," King said in a 1996 interview he gave when inducted into the Broadcasters' Hall of Fame. "He did that show and stayed all night with me. We stayed till five in the morning. He didn't like the set, so we broke into the general manager's office and changed the set. Gleason changed the set, he changed the lighting, and he became like a mentor of mine." Jackie Gleason was instrumental in getting Larry a hard-to-get on air interview with Frank Sinatra during this time.
During this period, WIOD gave King further exposure as a color commentator for the Miami Dolphins of the National Football League, during their 1970 season and most of their 1971 season. However, he was dismissed by both WIOD and television station WTVJ as a late-night radio host and sports commentator as of December 20, 1971, when he was arrested after being accused of grand larceny by a former business partner. Other staffers covered the Dolphins' games into their 24–3 loss to Dallas in Super Bowl VI. King also lost his weekly column at the Miami Beach Sun newspaper. The charges were dropped on March 10, 1972, and King spent the next several years in reviving his career, including a stint as the color announcer in Louisiana for the Shreveport Steamer of the World Football League in 1974–75. For several years during the 1970s in South Florida, he hosted a sports talk-show called "Sports-a-la-King" that featured guests and callers.
King managed to get back into radio by becoming the color commentator for broadcasts of the Shreveport Steamer of the World Football League on KWKH. Eventually, King was rehired by WIOD in Miami.
It was broadcast live Monday through Friday from midnight to 5:30 a.m. Eastern Time. King would interview a guest for the first 90 minutes, with callers asking questions that continued the interview for another 90 minutes. At 3 a.m., he would allow callers to discuss any topic they pleased with him, until the end of the program, when he expressed his own political opinions. That segment was called "Open Phone America". Some of the regular callers used the pseudonyms "The Portland Laugher", "The Miami Derelict", "The Todd Cruz Caller", "The Scandal Scooper", "Mr. Radio" and "The Water Is Warm Caller". "Mr. Radio" made over 200 calls to King during Open Phone America. The show was successful, starting with relatively few affiliates and eventually growing to more than 500. It ran until 1994.
For its final year, the show was moved to afternoons, but, because most talk radio stations at the time had an established policy of local origination in the time-slot (3 to 6 p.m. Eastern Time) that Mutual offered the show, a very low percentage of King's overnight affiliates agreed to carry his daytime show and it was unable to generate the same audience size. The afternoon show was eventually given to David Brenner and radio affiliates were given the option of carrying the audio of King's new CNN evening television program. The Westwood One radio simulcast of the CNN show continues.
program at the Pentagon in Arlington, VA in 2006]]
Unlike many interviewers, King has a direct, non-confrontational approach. His reputation for asking easy, open-ended questions has made him attractive to important figures who want to state their position while avoiding being challenged on contentious topics. His interview style is characteristically frank, but with occasional bursts of irreverence and humor. His approach attracts some guests who would not otherwise appear. King, who is known for his general lack of pre-interview preparation, once bragged that he never read the books of authors before making an appearance on his program.
In a show dedicated to the surviving Beatles, King asked George Harrison's widow about the song "Something", which was written about George Harrison's first wife. He seemed surprised when she did not know very much about the song.
Throughout his career King has interviewed many of the leading figures of his time. CNN claimed during his final episode that he had performed 60,000 interviews in his career.
King also wrote a regular newspaper column in USA Today for almost 20 years, from shortly after that newspaper's origin in 1982 until September 2001. The column consisted of short "plugs, superlatives and dropped names" but was dropped when the newspaper redesigned its "Life" section. The column was resurrected in blog form in November 2008 and on Twitter in April 2009.
On September 8, 2010, CNN confirmed that Morgan would occupy King's 9:00 pm timeslot from January 2011 onward.
The final edition of Larry King Live aired on December 16, 2010.
On February 12, 2010, Larry King revealed that he had undergone surgery 5 weeks earlier to place stents in his coronary artery to remove plaque from his heart. During the segment on Larry King Live which discussed Bill Clinton's similar procedure, King said he was "feeling great" and had been in hospital for just one day.
As a result of heart attacks, he established the Larry King Cardiac Foundation, an organization to which David Letterman, through his American Foundation for Courtesy and Grooming, has also contributed. King gave $1 million to George Washington University's School of Media and Public Affairs for scholarships to students from disadvantaged backgrounds.
On September 3, 2005, following the devastation to the Gulf Coast by Hurricane Katrina, King aired "How You Can Help", a three-hour special designed to provide a forum and information clearinghouse for viewers to understand and join nationwide and global relief efforts. Guest Richard Simmons, a native of New Orleans, told him, "Larry, you don't even know how much money you raised tonight. When we rebuild the city of New Orleans, we're going to name something big after you."
On January 18, 2010, in the wake of the devastation caused by the 2010 Haiti earthquake, King aired "Haiti: How You Can Help", a special two-hour edition designed to show viewers how to take action and be a part of the global outreach.
King serves as a member of the Board of Directors on the Police Athletic League of New York City, a nonprofit youth development agency serving inner-city children and teenagers.
On August 30, 2010, King served as the host of Chabad's 30th annual "To Life" telethon, in Los Angeles.
In 1997, King was one of 34 celebrities to sign an open letter to then-German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, published as a newspaper advertisement in the International Herald Tribune, which protested the treatment of Scientologists in Germany, comparing it to the Nazis' oppression of Jews in the 1930s. Other signatories included Dustin Hoffman and Goldie Hawn. He married high-school sweetheart Freda Miller in 1951 at age 18. King was later briefly married to Annette Kaye Larry Jr. and his wife, Shannon, have three children.
King met businesswoman Julie Alexander in summer 1989, and proposed to her on the couple's first date, on August 1, 1989. Alexander became King's sixth wife on October 7, 1989, when the two were married in Washington, D.C. The couple lived in different cities, however, with Alexander in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and King in Washington, D.C., where he worked. The couple separated in 1990 and divorced in 1992.
He married his seventh wife, Shawn Southwick, born in 1959 a former singer and TV host, in King's Los Angeles, California, hospital room three days before King underwent heart surgery to clear a clogged blood vessel. The couple has two children: Chance, born March 1999, and Cannon, born May 2000. He is stepfather to Danny Southwick. On King and Southwick's 10th anniversary in September 2007, Southwick boasted she was "the only [wife] to have lasted into the two digits". but have since stopped the proceedings, claiming "We love our children, we love each other, we love being a family. That is all that matters to us".
Shawn attempted suicide in May 2010 when she overdosed on prescription pills.
In July 2009, King appeared on The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien, where he told host O'Brien about his wishes to be cryogenically preserved upon death, as he had revealed in his book My Remarkable Journey.
In 1989, King was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame, and in 1996 to the Broadcasters' Hall of Fame.
in June 1998, King received an Honorary Degree from Brooklyn College, City University of New York, for his life achievements.
King was given the Golden Mike Award for Lifetime Achievement in January 2009, by the Radio & Television News Association of Southern California.
King is an honorary member of the Rotary Club of Beverly Hills. He is also a recipient of the President's Award honoring his impact on media from the Los Angeles Press Club in 2006.
King is the first recipient of the Arizona State University Hugh Downs Award for Communication Excellence, presented April 11, 2007, via satellite by Downs himself. Downs sported red suspenders for the event and turned the tables on King by asking "very tough questions" about King's best, worst and most influential interviews during King's 50 years in broadcasting.
Category:1933 births Category:Living people Category:American actors Category:American agnostics Category:American Jews Category:American talk radio hosts Category:American television talk show hosts Category:American people of Belarusian-Jewish descent Category:American people of Russian-Jewish descent Category:Jewish actors Category:Jewish agnostics Category:Miami Dolphins broadcasters Category:National Football League announcers Category:People from Brooklyn Category:World Football League announcers
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| Order | 35th |
|---|---|
| Office | President of the United States |
| Term start | January 20, 1961 |
| Term end | November 22, 1963 |
| Vicepresident | Lyndon B. Johnson |
| Predecessor | Dwight D. Eisenhower |
| Successor | Lyndon B. Johnson |
| Jr/sr2 | United States Senator |
| State2 | Massachusetts |
| Term start2 | January 3, 1953 |
| Term end2 | December 22, 1960 |
| Preceded2 | Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. |
| Succeeded2 | Benjamin A. Smith |
| State3 | Massachusetts |
| District3 | 11th |
| Term start3 | January 3, 1947 |
| Term end3 | January 3, 1953 |
| Preceded3 | James Michael Curley |
| Succeeded3 | Thomas P. O'Neill, Jr. |
| Birth date | May 29, 1917 |
| Birth place | Brookline, Massachusetts |
| Birthname | John Fitzgerald Kennedy |
| Death date | November 22, 1963 |
| Death place | Dallas, Texas |
| Father | Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr. |
| Mother | Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy |
| Spouse | Jacqueline Lee Bouvier Kennedy |
| Children | Arabella KennedyCaroline Bouvier KennedyJohn Fitzgerald Kennedy, Jr.Patrick Bouvier Kennedy |
| Alma mater | Harvard College (S.B.) |
| Occupation | PoliticianAuthor |
| Party | Democratic |
| Religion | Roman Catholic |
| Signature | John F Kennedy Signature 2.svg |
| Signature alt | Cursive signature in ink |
| Allegiance | United States of America |
| Branch | United States Navy |
| Serviceyears | 1941–1945 |
| Rank | Lieutenant |
| Unit | Motor Torpedo Boat PT-109 |
| Battles | World War IISolomon Islands campaign |
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy (May 29, 1917 November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963.
After military service as commander of the Motor Torpedo Boat PT-109 and Motor Torpedo Boat PT-59 during World War II in the South Pacific, Kennedy represented Massachusetts's 11th congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1947 to 1953 as a Democrat. Thereafter, he served in the U.S. Senate from 1953 until 1960. Kennedy defeated then Vice President and Republican candidate Richard Nixon in the 1960 U.S. presidential election. He was the second-youngest President (after Theodore Roosevelt), the first President to have been born in the 20th century, and the youngest elected to the office, at the age of 43. Kennedy is the only Catholic, and the first Irish American, president, and is the only president to have won a Pulitzer Prize. Events during his presidency included the Bay of Pigs Invasion, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the building of the Berlin Wall, the Space Race, the African American Civil Rights Movement and early stages of the Vietnam War.
Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963, in Dallas, Texas. Lee Harvey Oswald was charged with the crime but was shot and killed two days later by Jack Ruby before any trial. The FBI, the Warren Commission, and the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) concluded that Oswald was the assassin, with the HSCA allowing for the probability of conspiracy based on disputed acoustic evidence. Today, Kennedy continues to rank highly in public opinion ratings of former U.S. presidents.
In September 1931, Kennedy was sent to The Choate School in Wallingford, Connecticut, for his 9th through 12th grade years. His older brother Joe Jr., was already at Choate, two years ahead of him, a football star and leading student in the school. Jack spent his first years at Choate in his brother's shadow, and compensated for this with rebellious behavior that attracted a coterie. Their most notorious stunt was to explode a toilet seat with a powerful firecracker. In the ensuing chapel assembly, the strict headmaster, George St. John, brandished the toilet seat and spoke of certain "muckers" who would "spit in our sea". The defiant Jack Kennedy took the cue and named his group "The Muckers Club", which included long time friend Kirk LeMoyne "Lem" Billings. While at Choate, Kennedy was beset by health problems, culminating in 1934 with his emergency hospitalization at Yale-New Haven Hospital. In June 1934 he was admitted to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota and diagnosed with colitis. Kennedy graduated from Choate in June 1935. For the school yearbook, of which he had been business manager, Kennedy was voted the "Most likely to Succeed".
In September 1935, he made his first trip abroad, with his parents and sister Kathleen, to London, with the intent of studying at the London School of Economics (LSE) as his older brother Joe had done. There is uncertainty about what he did at LSE before returning to America in October 1935, when he enrolled late and spent six weeks at Princeton University. He was then hospitalized for two months of observation for possible leukemia at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital in Boston. He convalesced further at the Kennedy winter home in Palm Beach, then spent the spring of 1936 working as a ranch hand on a 40,000-acre (160 km2) cattle ranch outside Benson, Arizona. That summer he raced sailboats at the Kennedy home in Hyannisport.
In September 1936, Kennedy enrolled at Harvard College, where he produced that year's annual "Freshman Smoker", called by a reviewer "an elaborate entertainment, which included in its cast outstanding personalities of the radio, screen and sports world." He tried out for the football, golf, and swim teams and earned a spot on the varsity swim team. In July 1937, Kennedy sailed to France, with his convertible on board, and spent ten weeks driving through Europe with a friend. In June 1938, Kennedy sailed overseas with his father and brother Joe to work with his father, Roosevelt's U.S. Ambassador to the Court of St. James's, at the American embassy in London; in August the family went to a villa near Cannes. In 1939, Kennedy toured Europe, the Soviet Union, the Balkans, and the Middle East in preparation for his Harvard senior honors thesis. He then went to Czechoslovakia and Germany before returning to London on September 1, 1939, the day Germany invaded Poland. On September 3, 1939, the family was in the House of Commons for speeches endorsing the United Kingdom's declaration of war on Germany. Kennedy was sent as his father's representative to help with arrangements for American survivors of the SS Athenia, before flying back to the U.S. from Foynes, Ireland to Port Washington, New York on his first transatlantic flight.
In 1940, Kennedy completed his thesis, "Appeasement in Munich," about British participation in the Munich Agreement. He initially intended his thesis to be private, but his father encouraged him to publish it. He graduated cum laude from Harvard with a degree in international affairs in 1940, and his thesis was published that year as a book entitled Why England Slept, and became a bestseller. Kennedy enrolled and audited classes at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. In early 1941, he helped his father complete the writing of a memoir of his three years as an American ambassador and then traveled throughout South America.
On August 2, 1943, Kennedy's boat, PT-109, along with PT-162 and PT-169, were ordered to continue nighttime patrol near New Georgia in the Solomon Islands, when it was rammed by the Japanese destroyer Amagiri. Kennedy gathered his surviving crew members together in the water around the wreckage, to vote on whether to "fight or surrender". Kennedy stated, "There's nothing in the book about a situation like this. A lot of you men have families and some of you have children. What do you want to do? I have nothing to lose." Shunning surrender, the men swam towards a small island. Kennedy, despite re-injury to his back in the collision, towed a badly burned crewman through the water with a life jacket strap clenched between his teeth. He towed the wounded man to the island and later to a second island from where his crew was subsequently rescued. For these actions, Kennedy received the Navy and Marine Corps Medal with the following citation:
For extremely heroic conduct as Commanding Officer of Motor Torpedo Boat 109 following the collision and sinking of that vessel in the Pacific War Theater on August 1–2, 1943. Unmindful of personal danger, Lieutenant (then Lieutenant, Junior Grade) Kennedy unhesitatingly braved the difficulties and hazards of darkness to direct rescue operations, swimming many hours to secure aid and food after he had succeeded in getting his crew ashore. His outstanding courage, endurance and leadership contributed to the saving of several lives and were in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States Naval Service.
General Douglas MacArthur, however, had quite a different opinion about Kennedy's actions: "Those PT boats carried only one torpedo. They were under orders to fire it and then get out. They were defenseless. Kennedy hung around, however, and let a Japanese destroyer mow him down. When I heard about it, I talked to his superior officer. He should have been court-martialed."
In October 1943, Kennedy took command of a PT boat converted into a gun boat, Motor Torpedo Boat PT-59, which in November took part in a Marine rescue on Choiseul Island. Kennedy was honorably discharged in early 1945, just prior to Japan's surrender. Kennedy's other decorations in World War II included the Purple Heart, American Defense Service Medal, American Campaign Medal, Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal with three bronze service stars, and the World War II Victory Medal.
Kennedy underwent several spinal operations over the following two years, was at times critically ill and received Catholic last rites, and was often absent from the Senate. During his convalescence in 1956, he published Profiles in Courage, a book about U.S. Senators who risked their careers for their personal beliefs, and which received the Pulitzer Prize for Biography in 1957.
At the 1956 Democratic National Convention, Kennedy was nominated for Vice President, for the presidential nominee Adlai Stevenson, but finished second in that balloting to Senator Estes Kefauver of Tennessee. Kennedy received national exposure from that episode; his father thought it just as well that his son lost, due to the political debility of his Catholicism, and the strength of the Eisenhower ticket.
One of the matters demanding Kennedy's attention in the Senate was President Eisenhower's bill for the Civil Rights Act of 1957 Kennedy cast a procedural vote on this which was considered by some as an appeasement of Southern Democratic opponents of the bill. Kennedy also voted for Title IV, termed the "Jury Trial Amendment". Many civil rights advocates at the time criticized that vote as one which would weaken the act. A final compromise bill, which Kennedy supported, was passed in September 1957. In 1958, Kennedy was re-elected to a second term in the Senate, defeating his Republican opponent, Boston lawyer Vincent J. Celeste, by a wide margin.
Senator Joseph McCarthy was a friend of the Kennedy family; Joseph Kennedy, Sr. was a leading McCarthy supporter, Robert F. Kennedy worked for McCarthy's subcommittee, and McCarthy dated Patricia Kennedy. In 1954, when the Senate voted to censure McCarthy, Kennedy had drafted, but not delivered, a speech supporting the censure, but was in the hospital. Though absent, he could have participated procedurally by "pairing" his vote against that of another senator, but did not do so. He never indicated how he would have voted, but the episode damaged Kennedy's support in the liberal community, including Eleanor Roosevelt, in the 1956 and 1960 elections.
, March 1960]] With Humphrey and Morse eliminated, Kennedy's main opponent at the Los Angeles convention was Senator Lyndon B. Johnson of Texas. Kennedy overcame this formal challenge as well as informal ones from Adlai Stevenson, the Democratic nominee in 1952 and 1956, Stuart Symington, as well as several favorite sons, and on July 13 the Democratic convention nominated Kennedy as its candidate. Kennedy asked Johnson to be his Vice Presidential candidate, despite opposition from many liberal delegates and Kennedy's own staff, including brother Robert. He needed Johnson's strength in the South to win what was considered likely to be the closest election since 1916. Major issues included how to get the economy moving again, Kennedy's Roman Catholicism, Cuba, and whether the Soviet space and missile programs had surpassed those of the U.S. To address fears that his being Catholic would impact his decision-making, he famously told the Greater Houston Ministerial Association on September 12, 1960, "I am not the Catholic candidate for President. I am the Democratic Party candidate for President who also happens to be a Catholic. I do not speak for my Church on public matters — and the Church does not speak for me." Kennedy questioned rhetorically whether one-quarter of Americans were relegated to second-class citizenship just because they were Catholic, and once stated that, "No one asked me my religion [serving the Navy] in the South Pacific."
In September and October, Kennedy appeared with Republican candidate Richard Nixon, then Vice President, in the first televised U.S. presidential debates in U.S. history. During these programs, Nixon, with a sore injured leg and his "five o'clock shadow", looked tense, uncomfortable, and perspiring, while Kennedy, choosing to avail himself of makeup services, appeared relaxed, leading the huge television audience to favor Kennedy as the winner. Radio listeners, however, either thought Nixon had won or that the debates were a draw. The debates are now considered a milestone in American political history—the point at which the medium of television began to play a dominant role in politics. After the first debate Kennedy's campaign gained momentum and he pulled slightly ahead of Nixon in most polls. On Tuesday, November 8, Kennedy defeated Nixon in one of the closest presidential elections of the twentieth century. In the national popular vote Kennedy led Nixon by just two-tenths of one percent (49.7% to 49.5%), while in the Electoral College he won 303 votes to Nixon's 219 (269 were needed to win). Another 14 electors from Mississippi and Alabama refused to support Kennedy because of his support for the civil rights movement; they voted for Senator Harry F. Byrd, Sr. of Virginia. He was the youngest man elected president, succeeding Eisenhower who was the oldest.
John F. Kennedy was sworn in as the 35th President at noon on January 20, 1961. In his inaugural address he spoke of the need for all Americans to be active citizens, famously saying, "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country." He also asked the nations of the world to join together to fight what he called the "common enemies of man: tyranny, poverty, disease, and war itself." He added: "All this will not be finished in the first one hundred days. Nor will it be finished in the first one thousand days, nor in the life of this Administration, nor even perhaps in our lifetime on this planet. But let us begin." In closing, he expanded on his desire for greater internationalism: "Finally, whether you are citizens of America or citizens of the world, ask of us here the same high standards of strength and sacrifice which we ask of you."
Kennedy brought to the White House a stark contrast in organization compared to the decision making structure of the former general, Eisenhower; and he wasted no time in dismantling it. Kennedy preferred the organizational structure of a wheel, with all the spokes leading to the president. He was ready and willing to make the increased number of quick decisions required in such an environment, and did a monumental job of selecting his cabinet and other appointments, some experienced and some not. In those cases of inexperience, he stated, "we can learn our jobs together". There were a couple instances where the president got ahead of himself, as when he announced in a cabinet meeting, without prior notice, that Edward Lansdale would be Ambassador to South Vietnam, a decision which Secretary of State Rusk later had Kennedy alter. There was also the rapid appointment of Harris Wofford who was summoned and arrived at the White House for swearing in, without knowing the position he was to assume.
Kennedy further demonstrated his decision making agility with Congress and his staff. Much to the chagrin of his economic advisors who wanted him to reduce taxes, he quickly agreed to a balanced budget pledge when this was needed in exchange for votes to expand the membership of the House Rules Committee in order to give the Democrats a majority in setting the legislative agenda. The president insisted on a focus upon immediate and specific issues facing the administration, and quickly voiced his impatience with ponderings of deeper meanings. Deputy national security advisor, Walt Whitman Rostow, once began a diatribe about the growth of communism and Kennedy abruptly cut him off, asking, "What do you want me to do about that today?"
President Kennedy's foreign policy was dominated by American-Soviet confrontations, manifested by proxy contests in the early stage of the Cold War. In 1961 Kennedy anxiously anticipated a summit with Nikita Khruschev. On the way to the summit was a stop in Paris in June to meet Charles de Gaulle, whose advice to Kennedy was to expect and ignore the abrasive style of Khruschev. The French Prime Minister was nationalistic, and disdainful of the United States' presumed influence in Europe, in his talks with Kennedy. Nevertheless de Gaulle was quite impressed with the young president and family. Kennedy picked up on this in his speech in Paris, saying he would be remembered as "the man who accompanied Jackie Kennedy to Paris."
On June 4, 1961 the president met with Khruschev in Vienna and left the meetings angry and disappointed that he had allowed the Premier to bully him, despite warnings received. Khruschev for his part was impressed with the president's intelligence but thought him weak. Kennedy did succeed in conveying the bottom line to Khruschev on the most sensitive issue before them, a proposed treaty between Moscow and East Berlin. He made it clear that any such treaty which interfered with U.S access rights in West Berlin would be regarded as an act of war. Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, Kennedy and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara in the White House Cabinet Room on April 13, 1962.]] Shortly after the president returned home, the U.S.S.R. announced an intent to treat with East Berlin, regardless of any third party occupation rights in either sector of the city. A depressed and angry president then assumed his obligation was to prepare the country for nuclear war as the only option, and which he then personally thought had a one in five chance of occurring.
In the weeks immediately after the Vienna summit, more than 20 thousand people fled from East Berlin to the western sector in reaction to statements from the U.S.S.R. Kennedy began intensive meetings on the Berlin issue, where Dean Acheson took the lead in recommending a military buildup with NATO allies as the appropriate response. In a July 1961 speech, Kennedy announced his decision to add $3.25 billion to the defense budget, along with over 200 thousand additional troops for the military, saying an attack on West Berlin would be taken as an attack on the U.S. The speech received an 85% approval rating. The following month, the U.S.S.R. and East Berlin officials began blocking any further passage of East Berliners into West Berlin, erecting barbed wire fences across the city, which were quickly upgraded to the Berlin Wall. Kennedy's initial reaction was to ignore this, as long as free access from West to East Berlin continued. This course was altered when it was learned that the West Berliners had lost confidence in the defense of their position by the United States. Kennedy sent V.P. Johnson, along with a host of other military personnel, in convoy through West Germany, including Soviet armed checkpoints, to demonstrate the continued commitment of the U.S. to West Berlin.
John F. Kennedy gave a speech at Saint Anselm College on May 5, 1960, regarding America's conduct in the emerging Cold War. Kennedy's speech detailed how American foreign policy should be conducted towards African nations, noting a hint of support for modern African nationalism by saying that "For we, too, founded a new nation on revolt from colonial rule".
Prior to Kennedy's election to the presidency, the Eisenhower Administration created a plan to overthrow the Fidel Castro regime in Cuba. Central to the plan, led by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) with help from the US Military, but with no covert help from the United States, was the arming of a counter-revolutionary insurgency composed of anti-Castro Cuban exiles U.S.-trained Cuban insurgents, led by CIA paramilitary officers were to invade Cuba and instigate an uprising among the Cuban people in hopes of removing Castro from power. On April 17, 1961, Kennedy ordered the previously planned invasion of Cuba to proceed. In what is known as the "Bay of Pigs Invasion", 1,500 U.S.-trained Cubans, called "Brigade 2506," returned to the island in the hope of deposing Castro. However, in keeping with prior plans, no U.S. air support was provided. As CIA director Allen Dulles latter stated, they thought that once the troops were on the ground any action required for success would be authorized by the president to prevent failure. By April 19, 1961, the Cuban government had captured or killed the invading exiles, and Kennedy was forced to negotiate for the release of the 1,189 survivors. After twenty months, Cuba released the captured exiles in exchange for $53 million worth of food and medicine. Furthermore, the incident made Castro wary of the U.S. and led him to believe that another invasion would occur. According to biographer Richard Reeves, Kennedy primarily focused on the political repercussions of the plan rather than the military considerations; when it failed, he was convinced the plan was a set up to make him look bad. Nevertheless, in the end, Kennedy took the blame himself. Afterwards, he opined, "...We got a big kick in the leg and we deserved it. But maybe we'll learn something from it."
Late in 1961 the White House formed the "Special Group (Augmented)", headed by Robert Kennedy and including Edward Lansdale, Sec. McNamara and others. The group's objective, to overthrow Castro via espionage, sabotage and other covert tactics, was never pursued.
in 1961]]
On October 14, 1962, CIA U-2 spy planes took photographs in Cuba of intermediate-range ballistic missile sites under construction by the Soviets in previous months. The deployment of these missiles had come to the attention of the intelligence community when Soviet shipments to Cuba began and a debate had ensued in the National Security Council (NSC) as to whether the intended use of the weapons was offensive or defensive. The photos were shown to Kennedy on October 16, 1962, and a consensus was reached that the missiles were offensive in nature and thus posed an immediate nuclear threat. Kennedy faced a dilemma: if the U.S. attacked the sites, it might lead to nuclear war with the U.S.S.R., but if the U.S. did nothing, it would be faced with the increased threat from close range nuclear weapons. The U.S. would as well appear to the world as less committed to the defense of the hemisphere. On a personal level, Kennedy needed to show resolve in reaction to Khrushchev, especially after the Vienna summit.
More than a third of the members of the NSC favored an unannounced air assault on the missile sites, but for some of them this conjured up an image of "Pearl Harbor in reverse". There was as well some reaction from the international community (asked in confidence) that the assault plan was an overreaction in light of U.S. missiles placed in Turkey by Eisenhower. There also could be no assurance from the Council that the assault would be 100% effective. In concurrence with a majority vote of the NSC, Kennedy decided on a naval quarantine, and on October 22 dispatched a message of this to Khrushchev and announced the decision on T.V.
The U.S. Navy would stop and inspect all Soviet ships arriving off Cuba, beginning October 24. The Organization of American States surprisingly gave unanimous support to the removal of the missiles. The president exchanged two sets of letters with Khrushchev to no avail. U.N. Secretary General U Thant requested both parties reverse their decisions and allow a cooling off period. Khrushchev said yes but Kennedy replied no. After one Soviet-flagged ship was stopped and boarded, on October 28 Khrushchev agreed to dismantle the missile sites subject to U.N. inspections. The U.S. publicly promised never to invade Cuba and privately agreed to remove its Jupiter missiles in Turkey, which were at that time obsolete and had been supplanted by missile-equipped US Navy Polaris subs. This crisis had brought the world closer to nuclear war than at any point known before or since. In the end, "the humanity" of the two men prevailed. The crisis improved the image of American willpower and the president's credibility. His approval rating increased from 66% to 77% immediately thereafter.
Arguing that "those who make peaceful revolution impossible, will make violent revolution inevitable," Kennedy sought to contain communism in Latin America by establishing the Alliance for Progress, which sent foreign aid to troubled countries and sought greater human rights standards in the region. He worked closely with Governor of Puerto Rico Luis Muñoz Marín for the development of the Alliance of Progress, as well as developments in the autonomy of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.
When the president took office the Eisenhower administration, through the CIA, has begun putting into place assassination plots in Cuba against Castro and in the Dominican Republic against Rafael Trujillo. Kennedy instructed the CIA privately that any such planning must include plausible deniability by the U.S. His public position was in opposition. In June 1961 the Dominican Republic's leader was assassinated; in the days following the event, Undersecretary of State Chester Bowles led a cautious reaction by the nation, and Robert Kennedy, substituting for his brother who was in France, and who saw an opportunity for the U.S., called him "a gutless bastard" to his face.
When briefing Kennedy, Eisenhower emphasized the communist threat in Southeast Asia as requiring priority; Eisenhower considered Laos to be "the cork in the bottle" in regards to the regional threat. In March 1961, Kennedy voiced a change in policy from supporting a "free" Laos to a "neutral" Laos, indicating privately that Vietnam, and not Laos, should be deemed America's tripwire for communism's spread in the area. In May 1961 he dispatched Lyndon Johnson to meet with South Vietnam's President Ngo Dinh Diem. Johnson assured Diem of more aid in molding a fighting force that could resist the Communists. Kennedy announced a change of policy from support to partnership with Diem in defeat of communism in South Vietnam.
Kennedy initially followed Eisenhower's lead, by using limited military action to fight the Communist forces led by Ho Chi Minh. Kennedy continued policies providing political, economic, and military support for the South Vietnamese government. Kennedy increased the number of helicopters, military advisors and undeclared U.S. Special Forces in the area, but he was still reluctant to order a full scale deployment of troops. Kennedy formally authorized escalated involvement when he signed the "National Security Action Memorandum - Subversive Insurgency (War of Liberation)" in early 1962. Secretary of State, Dean Rusk voiced strong support for U.S. involvement as illustrated in his emphatic in the Fall of 1962 that, "...neutralism [in South Vietnam] is not neutralism at all; it's tantamount to surrender." "Operation Ranch Hand", a broad scale aerial defoliation effort began on the roadsides in South Vietnam. in the Oval office in 1963.]]
In April 1963, Kennedy expressed his assessment of the situation in Vietnam at the time: "We don't have a prayer of staying in Vietnam. Those people hate us. They are going to throw our asses out of there at any point. But I can't give up that territory to the Communists and get the American people to re-elect me". By July 1963, Kennedy faced a crisis in Vietnam; despite increased U.S. support, the South Vietnamese military was only marginally effective against pro-Communist Viet Cong forces.
On August 21, just as the new U.S. Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge arrived, Ngo Dinh Diem, and his brother Ngo Dinh Nhu ordered South Vietnam forces, funded and trained by the CIA, into the temples to quell buddhist demonstrations. The crackdowns heightened expectations of a coup d'état to remove Diem with (or perhaps by) his brother, Nhu. Lodge was instructed to try to get Diem and Nhu to step-down and out of the country. Diem would not listen to Lodge. Cable 243 (DEPTEL 23) dated August 24 followed, declaring: Washington would no longer tolerate Nhu's actions and Lodge was ordered to pressure Diem to remove his brother. If Diem refused, the Americans would explore alternative leadership. Lodge replied to this contradictory cable, saying that the only workable option was to get the South Vietnam generals to overthrow Diem and Nhu, as originally planned. At week's end, Kennedy learned from Lodge that the Diem government might, due to France's assistance to Nhu, be dealing secretly with the Communists - and might ask the Americans to leave; orders were sent to Saigon and throughout Washington to "destroy all coup cables". This, as the first formal anti Vietnam war sentiment was expressed by U.S. clergy from the Ministers Vietnam Committee.
In September, at a White House meeting, symbolic of very different ongoing appraisals of Vietnam, the president was given updated assessments after personal inspections on the ground by the Dept. of Defense (Gen. Victor Krulak) and the State Dept. (Joseph Mendenhall). Krulak said the military fight against the communists was progressing and being won, while Mendenhall related that the country was civilly being lost to any U.S. influence. Kennedy reacted, saying, "Did you two gentlemen visit the same country?" The president was unaware the two men were at such odds they did not speak on the return flight.
In October 1963, the president appointed Defense Secretary McNamara and Gen. Maxwell D. Taylor to a Vietnam mission in another effort to synchronize the information and formulation of policy. The stated objective of the McNamara Taylor mission "emphasized the importance of getting to the bottom of the differences in reporting from U.S. representatives in Vietnam." In meetings with McNamara, Taylor and Lodge, Diem again refused to agree to governing measures insisted upon by the U.S., helping to dispel McNamara's previous optimism as to Diem. Taylor and McNamara were also enlightened by Vietnam's V.P. Nguyen Ngoc Tho (choice of many to succeed Diem should a coup occur), who in detailed terms obliterated Taylor's information that the military was succeeding in the countryside. The Mission report, after it had been through the NSC, nevertheless retained, at Kennedy's insistence, a recommended schedule for troop withdrawals: 1000 by year's end and complete withdrawal in 1965, something the NSC considered strategical fantasy. The final report also portrayed military progress, an increasingly unpopular Diem-led government, not vulnerable to a coup, albeit possible internal assassination.
In late October, intelligence wires again reported a coup of the Diem government was afoot. The source, Duong Van Minh a/k/a "Big Minh" wanted to know the position of the U.S. Kennedy's instructions to Lodge were to offer covert assistance to the coup, excluding assassination, but to ensure deniability by the U.S. Later that month as the coup became imminent, Kennedy ordered all cables routed through him, and a policy of "control and cut out" was initiated - to insure presidential control of U.S. responses, while cutting him out of the paper trail. On November 1, 1963, South Vietnamese generals, led by "Big Minh", overthrew the Diem government, arresting and then killing Diem and his brother Nhu. Kennedy was shocked by the deaths and to find out afterwards that Minh had asked the CIA field office to secure safe passage out of the country for Diem and Nhu, but was told 24 hours was needed to get a plane. Minh responded that he could not hold them that long and thus handed them a death sentence. Initially after news of the coup, there was renewed confidence in America and in South Vietnam, that now the war might truly be won. McGeorge Bundy drafted a National Security Action Memo to present to Kennedy upon his return from Dallas. It reiterated U.S. resolve to fight communism in Vietnam, with both military and economic aid at a higher level, including operations in Laos and Cambodia. Before leaving for Dallas, Kennedy told Mike Forrestal that "after the first of the year...[he wanted] an in depth study of every possible option, including how to get out of there...to review this whole thing from the bottom to the top". When asked what he thought the president meant, Forrestal said, "it was devil's advocate stuff."
Historians disagree on whether Vietnam would have escalated to the point it did, had Kennedy survived and been re-elected in 1964. Fueling the debate are statements made by Kennedy and Johnson's Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara in the film, "The Fog of War", that Kennedy was strongly considering pulling out of Vietnam after the 1964 election. The film also contains a tape recording of Lyndon Johnson stating that Kennedy was planning to withdraw, a position Johnson states he strongly disapproved. Further, Kennedy had signed National Security Action Memorandum (NSAM) 263, dated October 11, 1963, which ordered the withdrawal of 1,000 military personnel by the end of 1963. Nevertheless, given the reasons stated for the overthrow of the Diem government, such action would have been a policy reversal, but Kennedy was moving in a less hawkish direction since his acclaimed speech about World Peace at American University on June 10, 1963. According to historian Lawrence Freedman, Kennedy's statements about withdrawing from Vietnam, were "...less of a definite decision than a working assumption, based on a hope for stability rather than an expectation of chaos". Some of the details of Kennedy's involvement in Vietnam were classified until the release of the Pentagon Papers in 1971.
U.S. involvement in the region escalated until Lyndon Johnson, his successor, directly deployed regular U.S. military forces for fighting the Vietnam War. After Kennedy's assassination, the new President Lyndon B. Johnson immediately reversed his predecessor's order to withdraw 1,000 military personnel by the end of 1963 with his own NSAM 273 on November 26, 1963.
On June 10, 1963, Kennedy delivered the commencement address at American University in Washington, D.C., "to discuss a topic on which too often ignorance abounds and the truth is too rarely perceived - yet it is the most important topic on earth: world peace...I speak of peace because of the new face of war...in an age when a singular nuclear weapon contains ten times the explosive force delivered by all the allied forces in the Second World War...an age when the deadly poisons produced by a nuclear exchange would be carried by wind and air and soil and seed to the far corners of the globe and to generations yet unborn...I speak of peace, therefore, as the necessary rational end of rational men...world peace, like community peace, does not require that each man love his neighbor - it requires only that they live together in mutual tolerance...our problems are man-made - therefore they can be solved by man. And man can be as big as he wants." The president also made two announcements - that the Soviets had expressed a desire to negotiate a nuclear test ban treaty and that the U.S had postponed planned atmospheric tests.
governing mayor Willy Brandt, March 1961]]
In 1963, Germany was enduring a time of particular vulnerability, due to Soviet aggression to the east, de Gaulle's French nationalism to the west, and the impending retirement of German Chancellor Adenauer. On June 26, 1963, Kennedy visited West Berlin and gave a public speech reiterating American commitment to Germany and criticizing communism; he was met with an ecstatic response from a massive audience. Kennedy used the construction of the Berlin Wall as an example of the failures of communism: "Freedom has many difficulties and democracy is not perfect, but we have never had to put a wall up to keep our people in." The speech is known for its famous phrase "Ich bin ein Berliner" ("I am a citizen of Berlin"). Nearly five-sixths of the population was on the street for the speech. He remarked to Ted Sorensen afterwards: "We'll never have another day like this one, as long as we live."
In July 1963 the stage was set for negotiations, and Kennedy sent Averell Harriman to Moscow to negotiate a treaty with the Soviets. The introductory sessions began with Khrushchev, who then delegated Soviet representation to Andrei Gromyko. It quickly became clear that the stated objective of a comprehensive test ban would not reach fruition, due largely to the reluctance of the Soviets for inspections to verify compliance. Ultimately, the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union were the initial signatories to a limited treaty, which prohibited atomic testing on the ground, in the atmosphere, or underwater, but not underground; the U.S. Senate ratified this and Kennedy signed it into law in October 1963. France was quick to declare that it was free to further develop and test its nuclear defenses.
The economy turned around and prospered during the Kennedy administration. GDP expanded by an average of 5.5% from early 1961 to late 1963, industrial production rose by 15% and motor vehicle sales leapt by 40%. This rate of growth in GDP and industry continued until around 1966, and has yet to be repeated for such a sustained period of time.
The major steel companies announced in April 1962 a 3.5% price increase (the first in 3 years) within a day of each other. This came just days after the companies had reached a settlement with the steelworkers' union, providing in chief a wage increase of 2.5%. The administration was furious, with Kennedy saying, "Why did they do this? Do they think they can get away with this? God, I hate the bastards." The president took personal charge of a campaign against the industry, assigning to each cabinet member a statement regarding the effects of the price increase on their area. Robert Kennedy, echoing his brother's own sentiments, "We're going for broke...their expense accounts, where they've been and what they've been doing...the FBI is to interview them all...we can't lose this." Robert took the position that the steel executives had illegally colluded in doing this. There was genuine concern about the inflationary effects of the price increase. The administration's actions influenced US Steel not to institute the price increase. The Wall Street Journal wrote that the administration had acted "by naked power, by threats, by agents of the state security police." Yale law professor Charles Reich wrote in The New Republic his opinion that the administration had violated civil liberties by calling a grand jury to indict US Steel for collusion so quickly. Nevertheless, the administration's Bureau of Budget reported the price increase would have resulted in a net gain for GDP as well as a net budget surplus.
Kennedy had little knowledge of the agricultural sector of the economy, and farmers were definitely not on his list of priorities, at least in his 1960 campaign. After giving a speech to a farming community, he rhetorically asked an aide, "Did you understand any of what I just said in there? I sure didn't."
On March 22, 1962, Kennedy signed into law HR5143 (PL87-423), abolishing the mandatory death penalty for first degree murder in the District of Columbia, the only remaining jurisdiction in the United States with a mandatory death sentence for first degree murder, replacing it with life imprisonment with parole if the jury could not decide between life imprisonment and the death penalty, or if the jury chose life imprisonment by a unanimous vote. The death penalty in the District of Columbia has not been applied since 1957, and has now been abolished.
Nevertheless President Kennedy believed the grass roots movement for civil rights would anger many Southern whites and make it more difficult to pass civil rights laws in Congress, which was dominated by conservative Southern Democrats, and he distanced himself from it. He also was more concerned with other issues early in his presidency, e.g. the "Bay of Pigs" fiasco and Southeast Asia. As articulated by brother Robert, the administration's early priority was to "keep the president out of this civil rights mess". As a result, many civil rights leaders viewed Kennedy as lukewarm, especially concerning the Freedom Riders who organized an integrated public transportation effort in the south, and who were repeatedly met with violence by whites, including law enforcement both federal and state. Kennedy assigned federal marshals to protect the Freedom Riders as an alternative to using federal troops or uncooperative FBI agents. Robert Kennedy, speaking for the president, urged the Freedom Riders to "get off the buses and leave the matter to peaceful settlement in the courts."
In September 1962, James Meredith enrolled at the University of Mississippi, but was prevented from entering. Attorney General Robert Kennedy responded by sending some 400 U.S. Marshals, while President Kennedy reluctantly federalized and sent 3,000 troops after the situation on campus turned violent. Campus Riots left two dead and dozens injured, but Meredith did finally enroll in his first class.
In early 1963, Kennedy related to Martin Luther King, Jr., about the prospects for civil rights legislation: "If we get into a long fight over this in Congress, it will bottleneck everything else, and we will still get no bill." However, civil rights clashes were very much on the rise that year. Brother Robert and Ted Sorenson pressed Kennedy to take more initiative on the legislative front. On June 11, 1963, President Kennedy intervened when Alabama Governor George Wallace blocked the doorway to the University of Alabama to stop two African American students, Vivian Malone and James Hood, from attending. Wallace moved aside only after being confronted by Deputy Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach and the Alabama National Guard, which had just been federalized by order of the President, and which had hours earlier been under Wallace's command. That evening Kennedy gave his famous civil rights address on national television and radio, launching his initiative for civil rights legislation - to provide equal access to public schools and other facilities, and greater protection of voting rights. His proposals became part of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The day ended with the murder of a N.A.A.C.P. leader, Medgar Evers, at his home in Mississippi. As the president had predicted, the day after his T.V. speech, and in reaction to it, House Majority leader Carl Albert called to advise him that his two year signature effort in Congress to combat poverty in Appalachia (Area Redevelopment Administration) had been defeated, primarily by the votes of Southern Democrats and Republicans.
Kennedy signed the executive order creating the Presidential Commission on the Status of Women in 1961. Commission statistics revealed that women were also experiencing discrimination; their final report documenting legal and cultural barriers was issued in October 1963. Earlier, on June 10, 1963, Kennedy signed the Equal Pay Act of 1963, a federal law amending the Fair Labor Standards Act, aimed at abolishing wage disparity based on sex.
Over a hundred thousand, predominantly African Americans, gathered in Washington for the civil rights March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28, 1963. Kennedy feared the March would have a negative effect on the prospects for the civil rights bills in Congress, and declined an invitation to speak. He turned over some of the details of the government's involvement to the Dept. of Justice, which channelled hundreds of thousands of dollars to the six sponsors of the March, including the N.A.A.C.P. and Martin Luther King's Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). To ensure a peaceful demonstration, the organizers and the president personally edited speeches which were inflammatory and agreed the March would be held on a Wednesday and would be over at 4:00 P.M. Thousands of troops were placed on standby. Kennedy watched King's speech on T.V. and was very impressed. The March was considered a "triumph of managed protest", and not one arrest relating to the demonstration occurred. Afterwards, the March leaders accepted an invitation to the White House to meet with Kennedy and photos were taken. Kennedy felt the March was a victory for him as well and bolstered the chances for his civil rights bill.
Nevertheless, the struggle was far from over. Three weeks later, a bomb exploded on a Sunday at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham; at the end of the day six children had died in the explosion and aftermath. As a result of this resurgent violence, the civil rights legislation underwent some drastic amendments that critically endangered any prospects for passage of the bill, to the outrage of the president. Kennedy called the congressional leaders to the White House and by the following day the original bill, without the additions, had enough votes to get it out of the House committee.
Kennedy was, however, eager for the U.S. to take the lead in the Space Race for strategic reasons. Kennedy first announced the goal for landing a man on the Moon in the speech to a Joint Session of Congress on May 25, 1961, saying
"First, I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish."Kennedy later made a speech at Rice University on September 12, 1962, in which he said
"No nation which expects to be the leader of other nations can expect to stay behind in this race for space."and
"We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard."On November 21, 1962, however, in a Cabinet Room meeting with NASA Administrator James Webb and other officials, Kennedy said
"This is important for political reasons, international political reasons... Because otherwise we shouldn't be spending this kind of money, because I'm not that interested in space. I think it's good, I think we ought to know about it, we're ready to spend reasonable amounts of money. But...we’ve spent fantastic expenditures, we’ve wrecked our budget on all these other domestic programs, and the only justification for it, in my opinion, to do it in the pell-mell fashion is because we hope to beat them [the Soviets] and demonstrate that starting behind, as we did by a couple of years, by God, we passed them. I think it would be a helluva thing for us."On the second approach to Khrushchev, the Ukrainian was persuaded that cost-sharing was beneficial and that American space technology was forging ahead. The U.S. had launched a geosynchronous satellite in July 1962 and Kennedy had asked Congress to approve more than $25 billion for the Apollo program.
In September 1963, during a speech before the United Nations, Kennedy again proposed a joint lunar program to the Soviet Union. The proposal was not enthusiastically received by Khrushchev. Kennedy's death only a little more than a month later essentially made the proposal irrelevant. On July 20, 1969, almost six years after his death, Apollo's goal was realized when Americans landed on the Moon.
Construction of the Kinzua Dam flooded of Seneca nation land that they occupied under the Treaty of 1794, and forced approximately 600 Seneca to relocate to the northern shores upstream of the dam at Salamanca, New York. Kennedy was asked by the American Civil Liberties Union to intervene and halt the project but he declined citing a critical need for flood control. He did express concern for the plight of the Seneca, and directed government agencies to assist in obtaining more land, damages, and assistance to help mitigate their displacement.
President Johnson created the Warren Commission—chaired by Chief Justice Earl Warren—to investigate the assassination, which concluded that Oswald was the lone assassin. The results of this investigation are disputed by many. The assassination proved to be an important moment in U.S. history because of its impact on the nation and the ensuing political repercussions.
The honor guard at JFK`s graveside was the 37th Cadet Class of the Irish Army. JFK was greatly impressed by the Irish Cadets on his last official visit to the Republic of Ireland, so much so that Jackie Kennedy requested the Irish Army to be the honor guard at the funeral.
Kennedy's wife, Jacqueline and their two deceased minor children were buried with him later. His brother, Senator Robert Kennedy, was buried nearby in June 1968. In August 2009, his brother, Senator Edward M. Kennedy, was also buried near his two brothers. JFK's grave is lit with an "Eternal Flame." Kennedy and William Howard Taft are the only two U.S. Presidents buried at Arlington.
Outside on the White House lawn, the Kennedys established a swimming pool and tree house, while Caroline attended a preschool along with 10 other children inside the home.
The president was closely tied to popular culture, emphasized by songs such as "Twisting at the White House." Vaughn Meader's First Family comedy album—an album parodying the President, First Lady, their family and administration—sold about four million copies. On May 19, 1962, Marilyn Monroe sang "Happy Birthday, Mr. President" at a large party in Madison Square Garden, celebrating Kennedy's upcoming forty-fifth birthday. The charisma of Kennedy and his family led to the figurative designation of "Camelot" for his administration, credited by his wife to his affection for the contemporary Broadway musical of the same name.
Behind the glamorous facade, the Kennedys also experienced many personal tragedies. Jacqueline had a miscarriage in 1955 and a stillbirth in 1956. Their newborn son, Patrick Bouvier Kennedy, died in August 1963. Kennedy had two children who survived infancy. One of the fundamental aspects of the Kennedy family is a tragic strain which has run through the family, as a result of the violent and untimely deaths of many of its members. John's eldest brother, Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr., died in World War II, at the age of 29. It was Joe Jr. who was originally to carry the family's hopes for the Presidency. Then, of course, both John himself, and his brother Robert died as a result of assassinations. Edward had brushes with death, the first in a plane crash and the second as a result of a car accident, known as the Chappaquiddick incident. Edward died at age 77, on August 25, 2009, from the effects of a malignant brain tumor.
Years after Kennedy's death, it was revealed that in September 1947, at age 30, and while in his first term in Congress, he was diagnosed by Sir Daniel Davis at The London Clinic with Addison's disease, a rare endocrine disorder. In 1966, his White House doctor, Janet Travell, revealed that Kennedy also had hypothyroidism. The presence of two endocrine diseases raises the possibility that Kennedy had autoimmune polyendocrine syndrome type 2 (APS 2). He also suffered from chronic and severe back pain, for which he had surgery and was written up in the AMA's Archives of Surgery. Kennedy at one time was regularly seen by no less than three doctors, one of whom was unknown to the other two, as his mode of treatment was for the most severe bouts of pain. There was often disagreement among his doctors, as in late 1961, over the proper balance of medication and exercise, with the president preferring the former as he was short on time and desired immediate relief.
Caroline Bouvier Kennedy was born in 1957 and is the only surviving member of JFK's immediate family. John F. Kennedy, Jr. was born in 1960, just a few weeks after his father was elected. John died in 1999, when the small plane he was piloting crashed en route to Martha's Vineyard, killing him, his wife, Carolyn Bessette, and his sister-in-law.
In October 1951, during his third term as Massachusetts's 11th district congressman, the then 34-year-old Kennedy embarked on a seven-week Asian trip to India, Japan, Vietnam, and Israel with his then 25-year-old brother Robert (who had just graduated from law school four months earlier) and his then 27-year-old sister Patricia. Because of their eight-year separation in age, the two brothers had previously seen little of each other. This trip was the first extended time they had spent together and resulted in their becoming best friends, in addition to being brothers. Robert was campaign manager for Kennedy's successful 1952 Senate campaign and later, his successful 1960 presidential campaign. The two brothers worked closely together from 1957 to 1959 on the Senate Select Committee on Improper Activities in the Labor and Management Field, when Robert was its chief counsel. During Kennedy's presidency, Robert served in his cabinet as Attorney General and was his closest advisor.
Some corroborated reports allege, but others deny, that Kennedy had affairs with a number of women, including: Marilyn Monroe, Gunilla von Post, Judith Campbell, Mary Pinchot Meyer and Mimi Beardsley Alford. There was some medical opinion that the drugs the president required for Addison's had the side effect of increasing virility. Kennedy inspired affection and loyalty from the members of his team and his supporters. According to author Reeves, this included "the logistics of Kennedy's liaisons...[which] required secrecy and devotion rare in the annals of the energetic service demanded by successful politicians."
Kennedy came in third (behind Martin Luther King, Jr. and Mother Teresa) in Gallup's List of Widely Admired People of the twentieth century.
The assassination had an effect on many people, not only in the U.S. but around the world. Many vividly remember where they were when first learning of the news that Kennedy was assassinated, as with the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 before it and the September 11 attacks after it. U.N. Ambassador Adlai Stevenson said of the assassination: "all of us... will bear the grief of his death until the day of ours." Many people have also spoken of the shocking news, compounded by the pall of uncertainty about the identity of the assassin(s), the possible instigators and the causes of the killing as an end to innocence, and in retrospect it has been coalesced with other changes of the tumultuous decade of the 1960s, especially the Vietnam War.
Special Forces have a special bond with Kennedy. "It was President Kennedy who was responsible for the rebuilding of the Special Forces and giving us back our Green Beret," said Forrest Lindley, a writer for the newspaper Stars and Stripes who served with Special Forces in Vietnam. This bond was shown at JFK's funeral. At the commemoration of the 25th anniversary of JFK's death, Gen. Michael D. Healy, the last commander of Special Forces in Vietnam, spoke at Arlington Cemetery. Later, a wreath in the form of the Green Beret would be placed on the grave, continuing a tradition that began the day of his funeral when a sergeant in charge of a detail of Special Forces men guarding the grave placed his beret on the coffin.
Ultimately, the death of President Kennedy and the ensuing confusion surrounding the facts of his assassination are of political and historical importance insofar as they marked a turning point and decline in the faith of the American people in the political establishment—a point made by commentators from Gore Vidal to Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. and implied by Oliver Stone in several of his films, such as his landmark 1991 JFK.
Kennedy's continuation of Presidents Harry S. Truman and Dwight D. Eisenhower's policies of giving economic and military aid to the Vietnam War preceded President Johnson's escalation of the conflict. This contributed to a decade of national difficulties and disappointment on the political landscape.
Many of Kennedy's speeches (especially his inaugural address) are considered iconic; and despite his relatively short term in office and lack of major legislative changes coming to fruition during his term, Americans regularly vote him as one of the best presidents, in the same league as Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, and Franklin D. Roosevelt. Some excerpts of Kennedy's inaugural address are engraved on a plaque at his grave at Arlington.
He was posthumously awarded the Pacem in Terris Award. It was named after a 1963 encyclical letter by Pope John XXIII that calls upon all people of goodwill to secure peace among all nations. Pacem in Terris is Latin for 'Peace on Earth.'
President Kennedy is the only president to have predeceased both his mother and father. He is also the only president to have predeceased a grandparent. His grandmother, Mary Josephine Hannon Fitzgerald, died in 1964, just over eight months after his assassination.
Throughout the English-speaking world, the given name Kennedy has sometimes been used in honour of President Kennedy, as well his brother Robert.
Kennedy received a signet ring engraved with his arms for his 44th birthday as a gift from his wife, and the arms were incorporated into the seal of the USS John F. Kennedy. Following his assassination, Kennedy was honored by the Canadian government by having a mountain, Mount Kennedy, named for him, which his brother, Robert Kennedy, climbed in 1965 to plant a banner of the arms at the summit.
Kennedy features prominently in popular culture. His assassination was the subject of the Oliver Stone film JFK, and footage of him appears in the Robert Zemeckis film Forrest Gump. Kennedy also features in the video games JFK Reloaded and . During his lifetime Kennedy was the focal point of a Superman comicbook, Superman's Mission for President Kennedy.
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| Name | Jesse Ventura |
|---|---|
| Order | 38th |
| Office | Governor of Minnesota |
| Term start | January 8, 1999 |
| Term end | January 6, 2003 |
| Lieutenant | Mae Schunk |
| Predecessor | Arne Carlson |
| Successor | Tim Pawlenty |
| Office2 | Mayor of Brooklyn Park, Minnesota |
| Term start2 | 1991 |
| Term end2 | 1995 |
| Birthname | James George Janos |
| Birth date | July 15, 1951 |
| Birth place | Minneapolis, Minnesota |
| Spouse | Terry Ventura |
| Children | Tyrel VenturaJade Ventura |
| Profession | US Navy UDTProfessional WrestlerColor commentatorActorTalk Show hostPoliticianAuthor |
| Party | Reform Party (1999–2000)Independence Party of Minnesota (2000–present) |
| Branch | United States Navy |
| Serviceyears | 1969–1975 |
| Rank | Petty Officer |
| Unit | Underwater Demolition Team 12United States Navy |
| Awards | National Defense Service MedalVietnam Service Medal |
Bill Salisbury, an attorney in San Diego and a former Navy SEAL officer, accused Ventura of "pretending" to be a SEAL and wrote that Ventura would be blurring an important distinction by claiming to be a SEAL when he was actually a frogman with the UDT. Compared to SEAL teams, UDTs saw less combat and took fewer casualties. Following that, Governor Ventura's office confirmed that Ventura was never a member of the SEALs. His spokesman stated that Ventura has never tried to convince people otherwise. He was criticized by hunters and conservationists for stating in an interview with the Minneapolis StarTribune in April 2001, "Until you have hunted men, you haven't hunted yet."
In January 2002, Ventura, who had never specifically claimed to have fought in Vietnam, disclosed for the first time that he did not see combat. He did not receive the Combat Action Ribbon, which was awarded to those involved in a firefight or who went on clandestine or special operations where the risk of enemy fire was great or expected.
In the fall of 1974, Ventura left the bike club to return to Minnesota. Shortly after leaving, the Mongols entered into open warfare with their rivals the Hells Angels.
| Name | Jesse Ventura |
|---|---|
| Names | Jesse "The Body" Ventura Years later, as a broadcaster, Ventura made a running joke out of claiming that Graham stole all of his ring attire ideas from him. |
| Show name | Jesse Ventura's America |
| Caption | Ventura on his MSNBC talk show Jesse Ventura's America |
| Starring | Jesse Ventura |
| Location | Saint Paul, Minnesota, |
| Network | MSNBC |
| First aired | October 4, 2003 |
| Last aired | December 26, 2003 |
| Italic title | no |
In 2004, fellow Navy veteran and Harvard graduate student Christopher Mora promoted the idea that the academic establishment had failed to reach out to citizens experienced in public service, but who did not fit the traditional idea of a politician. He successfully lobbied for the selection of Ventura, who started teaching a study group at Harvard University for the Spring 2004 semester as a visiting fellow at the Kennedy School of Government's Institute of Politics (IOP). His 90-minute study group focused on third party politics, campaign finance, the war on drugs, and other relevant political issues. Ventura scheduled multiple famous friends to appear for his seminars including Dean Barkley and Richard Marcinko.
On October 22, 2004, with Ventura by his side, former Maine Governor Angus King endorsed John Kerry for President at the Minnesota state capitol building. Ventura did not speak at the press conference. When prodded for a statement, Governor King responded, "He plans to vote for John Kerry, but he doesn't want to make a statement and subject himself to the tender mercies of the Minnesota press".
In November 2004, an advertisement began airing in California featuring Ventura. In it, Ventura voices his opposition to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's policies regarding Native American casinos. Like Hogan, Schwarzenegger at one point was also a close friend of Ventura as well, but since Schwarzenegger's victory in California, Ventura has not reportedly given him any praise; Schwarzenegger didn't even mention Ventura's name in an interview with Fox News in 2005, where reporter Chris Wallace asked him if he was "the next Jesse Ventura". Ventura is serving as an advisory board member for a new group called Operation Truth, a non-profit organization set up "to give voice to troops who served in Iraq." “The current use of the National Guard is wrong....These are men who did not sign up to go occupy foreign nations”.
In August 2005, Ventura became the spokesperson for BetUS, an online Sportsbook. In 2005, Ventura repeatedly discussed leaving the United States. In September 2005, Ventura announced on The Mike Malloy Show that he was leaving the U.S. and planned to "have an adventure". In late October 2005, he went on The Big Idea with Donny Deutsch and reiterated that he was leaving the U.S. due to, among other things, censorship. He has since moved to Baja California, Mexico.
In September 2006, Ventura endorsed and campaigned with independent Texas gubernatorial candidate Kinky Friedman, and Independence Party of Minnesota's gubernatorial candidate Peter Hutchinson and Team Minnesota. He revealed he now spends much of his time surfing near his home in Mexico.
In April 2008, a book authored by Ventura, titled Don't Start the Revolution Without Me, was released. In it, Ventura describes a hypothetical campaign in which he is a candidate for President of the United States in 2008, running as an independent. In an interview with the Associated Press at the time of the book's release, however, Ventura denied any plans for a presidential bid, stating that the scenario is only imaginary and not indicative of a "secret plan to run". On MinnPost.com, Ventura's agent, Steve Schwartz, describes the book thus: "[Ventura is revealing] why he left politics and discussing the disastrous war in Iraq, why he sees our two-party system as corrupt, and what Fidel Castro told him about who was really behind the assassination of President Kennedy."
However, in an interview on CNN's The Situation Room on April 7, Ventura hinted that he was considering entering the race for the United States Senate seat then held by Norm Coleman, his Republican opponent in the 1998 Gubernatorial race. A poll commissioned by Twin Cities station Fox 9 put him at 24 percent, behind Al Franken at 32 percent and Norm Coleman at 39 percent in a hypothetical three-way race. However, Ventura announced on Larry King Live on July 14, 2008 that he would not run.
He spoke at former Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul's "Rally for the Republic", organized by the Campaign for Liberty, on September 2, 2008. At the event, Ventura implied a possible future run at the U.S. Presidency. Ventura stated before a live audience that "If America proves itself worthy, in 2012 we'll give them a race they'll never forget!"
TV Week is reporting that Ventura is in negotiations with 20th Television to host a half-hour court show that would debut in the fall of 2009.
I'll put it to you this way, you give me a water board, Dick Cheney and one hour, and I'll have him confess to the Sharon Tate murders. ... If it's done wrong, you certainly could drown. You could swallow your tongue. [It] could do a whole bunch of stuff to you. If it's done wrong orit's torture, Larry. It's torture. Ventura also expressed interest in being appointed ambassador to Cuba should U.S. relations with Cuba continue to improve. On a May 18, 2009 appearance on The View, Ventura asked Elisabeth Hasselbeck if waterboarding is acceptable, why were not Oklahoma City bombers, Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols waterboarded. "We only seem to waterboard Muslims." Comparing the waterboarding of detainees to the North Vietnamese torture of American P.O.W.s, Ventura asserted, "We created our own Hanoi Hilton in Guantánamo. That's our Hanoi Hilton."
Ventura was interviewed on the Alex Jones radio show on April 2, 2008 where he said that he felt that many unanswered questions remain, and he believes that World Trade Center Building 7, which was not struck by a plane, collapsed on the afternoon of 9/11 in a manner which resembled a controlled demolition Ventura stated:
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He also states the Twin Towers appeared to be pulverized to dust, that they fell at virtually free-fall speed, and that no other massive steel-framed buildings had ever collapsed in this manner due to fire before.
In August 2009, it was announced that Ventura would host TruTV's new show Conspiracy Theory with Jesse Ventura. "Ventura will hunt down answers, plunging viewers into a world of secret meetings, midnight surveillance, shifty characters and dark forces," truTV said in a statement. On the program, which debuted on December 2, 2009, Ventura travels the country, investigating cases and getting input from believers and skeptics before passing judgment on a theory's validity. According to TruTV, the first episode drew 1.6 million viewers, a record for a new series on the network.
American Conspiracies is a book Ventura wrote with Dick Russell, published by Skyhorse Publishing in 2010 which discusses conspiracy theories related to several notable events in United States history.
During his wrestling days, Ventura used anabolic steroids. He admitted this after retiring from competition, and went on to make public service announcements and appear in printed ads and on posters warning young people about the potential dangers and potential health risks of abusing steroids.
In 2002, Ventura was hospitalized for a severe blood clot in his lungs, the same kind of injury that ended his wrestling career.
Currently, Ventura and his wife live in Mexico, "There are no newspapers down where I live. Where I live, I'm an hour from pavement and an hour from electricity..I'm completely off the grid."
Ventura endorsed equal rights for religious minorities, as well as people who don't believe in God, by declaring July 4, 2002, "Indivisible Day". Ventura proclaimed October 13–19, 2002 as "Christian Heritage Week" in Minnesota.
In 2010, regarding the Ground Zero Mosque controversy, Ventura argued, "Excuse me, the Constitution says they can do it, it ends there! You cannot subject the Constitution to a popularity poll," in reference to the opposition of the mosque. In a separate interview on CNN, when told that the victims' families needed to be respected, Ventura replied, "But what's the problem? I mean, Timothy McVeigh, I assume, was a Christian and he did an act of terrorism. Would they then remove all Christian churches from around Oklahoma City, because it happened to have been a Christian that did it? You know, it's ridiculous."
Category:Actors from Minnesota Category:American actor-politicians Category:American athlete-politicians Category:American film actors Category:American memoirists Category:American military personnel of the Vietnam War Category:American professional wrestlers Category:American talk radio hosts Category:American television sports announcers Category:American actors of German descent Category:American sportspeople of German descent Category:Governors of Minnesota Category:Mayors of places in Minnesota Category:Mongols (motorcycle club) Category:Radio personalities from Minneapolis, Minnesota Category:Professional wrestling announcers Category:Reform Party of the United States of America politicians Category:Minnesota Vikings broadcasters Category:Tampa Bay Buccaneers broadcasters Category:United States Navy sailors Category:WWE Hall of Fame Category:1951 births Category:Living people Category:Independence Party of Minnesota politicians Category:American sportspeople of Slovak descent Category:American politicians of Slovak descent Category:American actors of Slovak descent
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| Name | Bill Maher |
|---|---|
| Caption | Maher at a ceremony to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in September 2010 |
| Birth name | William Maher, Jr. |
| Birth date | January 20, 1956 |
| Birth place | New York, New York, U.S. |
| Alma mater | Cornell University |
| Medium | Stand-Up, Television, Film, Books |
| Nationality | American |
| Active | 1979 – present |
| Genre | Satire/Political satire/News Satire, Observational comedy |
| Subject | American politics, , American culture, pop culture, freedom of speech, environmentalism, religion, human sexuality, recreational drug use, libertarianism, American liberalism, American conservatism |
| Influences | Steve Allen, George Carlin, Johnny Carson, David Frost, Robert Klein, Don Rickles, Gore Vidal, Lenny Bruce |
| Notable work | Elliot on Charlie HooverHost of Politically Incorrect Host of Real Time with Bill Maher |
| Website | www.BillMaher.com |
Maher is known for his political satire and sociopolitical commentary, which targets a wide swath of topics: religion, politics, bureaucracies of many kinds, political correctness, the mass media, greed among people and persons in positions of high political and social power, the lack of intellectual curiosity of the electorate, among many topics. He supports the legalization of marijuana and gay marriage and serves on the board of PETA. He is also a critic of religion and is an advisory board member of Project Reason, a foundation to promote scientific knowledge and secular values within society. Maher currently ranks number 38 on Comedy Central's 100 greatest stand-ups of all time. Bill Maher got a Hollywood Walk of Fame star on September 14, 2010. His is the 2,417th star dedicated on the famous sidewalk.
Maher was raised in River Vale, New Jersey, and graduated from Pascack Hills High School in Montvale. He received his Bachelor of Arts in English and History from Cornell University in 1978.
Since beginning his career as a stand-up comedian and actor, he occasionally acts and tours. He was host of the New York City comedy club Catch a Rising Star in 1979. Thanks to Steve Allen, he began appearing on Johnny Carson's and David Letterman's shows in 1982. He made limited television appearances, including two separate appearances on Murder, She Wrote. He has also appeared in several films, usually in a comic role. His feature film debut was in D.C. Cab (1983), and he also appeared in Ratboy (1986), Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death (1988), and Pizza Man (1991), among others.
Maher assumed the host role Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher, a late-night political talk show that ran from 1993-1997 on Comedy Central and later on ABC, until it was cancelled in June 2002. The show regularly began with a topical monologue by Maher preceding the introduction of four guests, usually a diverse group of individuals from show business, popular culture, political pundits, political consultants, authors, and occasionally news figures. The group would discuss topical issues selected by Maher, who also participated in the discussions. Jerry Seinfeld, a regular guest on the show, stated that Politically Incorrect reminded him of talk shows from the 1950s and 60s "when guests interacted with each other as much as with the host."
Politically Incorrect won an array of awards, including an Emmy Award for Outstanding Technical Direction, two CableACE awards for Best Talk Show Series, and a Genesis Award for Best Television Talk Show. Maher earned numerous award nominations for his producing, writing and hosting of Politically Incorrect, including ten Emmy nominations, two TV Guide nominations, and two Writers Guild nominations. ABC decided against renewing Maher's contract for Politically Incorrect in 2002, after he made a controversial on-air remark shortly after the September 11th attacks. He agreed with his guest, conservative pundit Dinesh D'Souza, that the 9/11 terrorists did not act in a cowardly manner. Maher said, "We have been the cowards. Lobbing cruise missiles from two thousand miles away. That's cowardly. Staying in the airplane when it hits the building. Say what you want about it. Not cowardly. You're right." Maher later clarified that his comment was not anti-military in any way whatsoever, referencing his well-documented longstanding support for the American military.
In the context of the attacks, some corporate advertisers found the comment too insensitive and controversial. Several companies, including FedEx and Sears Roebuck, pulled their advertisements from the show, costing the show more than it returned.
The show was cancelled on June 16, 2002, and the Sinclair Broadcast Group had dropped the show from its ABC-affiliated stations months prior. On June 22, 2002, just six days after the cancellation of Politically Incorrect, Maher received the Los Angeles Press Club president's award (for "championing free speech"). Maher was on the board of judges one year for the PEN/Newman's Own First Amendment Award.
Maher's remarks after 9/11 were not the first time he had sparked controversy on Politically Incorrect. In the same year, Maher was widely criticized for comparing dogs to retarded children. He apologized for his comments.
In 2003, Maher became the host, co-producer and co-writer of Real Time with Bill Maher, a weekly hour-long political comedy talk show on the cable television network HBO. During an interview, Maher told Terry Gross (on NPR's Fresh Air) that he much prefers having serious and well-informed guests on his program, as opposed to the random celebrities that fleshed out his roundtable discussions on Politically Incorrect.
As with his previous show, Politically Incorrect, Maher begins Real Time with a comic opening monologue based upon current events and other topical issues. He proceeds to a one-on-one interview with a guest, either in-studio or via satellite. Following the interview, Maher sits with three panelists, usually consisting of pundits, authors, activists and journalists, for a discussion of the week's events. In the segment "New Rules" at the end of each show, Maher delivers a humorous editorial on popular culture and American politics.
In late May 2005, Alabama Congressman Spencer Bachus sent a letter to Time Warner's board of directors requesting Real Time be cancelled after remarks Maher made after noting the military had missed its recruiting goals by 42 percent. Bachus said he felt the comments were demeaning to the military and treasonous. Maher stated his highest regard and support for the troops and asked why the congressman criticized him instead of doing something about the recruitment problem.
Real Time has earned widespread praise. It has been nominated for more than ten Primetime Emmy Awards and six Writer's Guild awards. In 2007, Maher and his co-producers were awarded the Television Producer of the Year Award in Variety Television.
In early 2006, Real Time was released as an audio CD, along with another CD entitled Bill Maher's New Rules which features clips, segments and teasers from Real Time. Starting with Episode 67 (2-23-06), Real Time became available in the USA on iTunes as a free weekly audio podcast.
Maher holds the record for the most Emmy nominations without a win, having been nominated on 22 occasions and not winning once. Eleven of the nominations were for Politically Incorrect, while nine were for Real Time. The other two were nominations for two of his HBO comedy specials: Bill Maher: I'm Swiss and Bill Maher: The Decider.
Maher hosted the January 13, 2006 edition of Larry King Live, on which he is a frequent guest. Maher appeared as a special guest on the June 29, 2010 edition of the show, on which CNN anchor Larry King announced his retirement. Maher co-emceed the final show of Larry King Live on December 16, 2010 with Ryan Seacrest.
Since May 2005, he has been a contributing blogger at The Huffington Post.
Maher favors a partial privatization of Social Security, ending corporate welfare and federal funding of non-profits, and legalization of gambling, prostitution, and marijuana. Maher is a member of NORML's Advisory Board, an organization which supports regulated legalization of marijuana. He describes himself as an environmentalist, and he frequently alludes to the topic of global warming on his show Real Time. Moreover, he often criticizes figures with close ties to industry.
Maher is a board member of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. He has expressed his distaste for the pharmaceutical and health care industries in general, on the grounds that they make their money out of curing people who are made sick by consuming unhealthy food that corporations urge upon the public. He maintains that mass consumption of high-fructose corn syrup is a contributor to the rise in frequency of obesity in the United States.
Before the 2004 U.S. presidential election, Maher became candid in his stated opposition to the re-election of George W. Bush and in his support for John Kerry.
Known for protesting against the demonization of the word "liberal", during the campaign Maher criticized Kerry for being ashamed of the word. On his show, the comedian has noted the paradox of people claiming they distrusted "elite" politicians while at the same time wanting elite doctors to treat them and elite lawyers to represent them in court. Maher supports the death penalty, the legality of abortion and euthanasia. Since the 9/11 attacks, he has endorsed the use of racial profiling at airports.
He was originally against the Iraq War, and has summarized his opinion by saying that the United States and the world have had to pay too high a price for the war. He is skeptical of Iraq surviving without civil war.
In the 2008 U.S. presidential election, Maher announced his support for Barack Obama. Although Maher welcomed Obama's electoral victory, he has subjected him to criticism once in office.
Maher and director Larry Charles teamed up to make the feature film Religulous (2008), described by trade publication Variety as a documentary "that spoofs religious extremism across the world." It was released on October 3, 2008.
On August 24, 2009, Maher was a guest on The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien and on the topic of getting universal health care legislation passed, Maher stated that Obama should forget about trying to get 60 votes for it, "he only needs 51." "Forget getting the sixty votes or sixty percent — sixty percent of people don't believe in evolution in this country — he just needs to drag them to it, like I said, they're stupid; get health care done, with or without them."
Bill Maher has expressed the view that most illness is generally the result of poor diet and that medicine is often not the best way of addressing illness. In an episode of the show about the 2008 presidential candidates' health plans, Maher stated that poor nutrition is the primary cause of illness, and that "the answer isn't another pill."
In a discussion with Michael Moore about the film Sicko, Maher asks, "The human body is pretty amazing; it doesn't get sick, usually, for no reason. I mean, there's some genetic stuff that can get to you, but, basically, people are sick in this country because they're poisoned. The environment is a poisoning factor, but also, we gotta say, they poison themselves. They eat shit. People eat shit, and that's, to my way of thinking, about 90 percent of why people are sick, is because they eat shit. Would you agree?"
On October 9, 2009, on his HBO show, Maher debated the effectiveness of flu vaccinations with Bill Frist and stated, "Why would you let them be the ones to stick a disease into your arm? I would never get a swine flu vaccine or any vaccine. I don’t trust the government, especially with my health." Maher also expressed skepticism about the seriousness of the swine flu and whether completely healthy people could die from it. His comments have generated criticism, and his remarks have been called unscientific and even harmful.
Maher responded to the criticism, noting, "What I've read about what they think I'm saying is not what I've said. I'm not a germ theory denier. I believe vaccinations can work. Polio is a good example. Do I think in certain situations that inoculating Third World children against malaria or diphtheria, or whatever, is right? Of course. In a situation like that, the benefits outweigh costs. But to me living in Los Angeles? To get a flu shot? No." (see Vaccine controversy)
Maher's filing stated that "When the dating ended, [Johnson] (sic) launched a campaign to embarrass, humiliate, and extort ridiculous sums of money from Bill Maher." Johnsen accused another former boyfriend of rape and kidnapping in 1997, and the charges were later dismissed for lack of evidence. Her lawsuit against Maher was dismissed on May 2, 2005.
Maher enjoys his bachelor status and states that he does not want to get married. On his website, he is quoted as saying, "I'm the last of my guy friends to have never gotten married, and their wives — they don't want them playing with me. I'm like the escaped slave — I bring news of freedom."
In 2005, he began dating New York Times best-selling author Karrine Steffans, an actress, former music video performer and hip-hop model. When commentators suggested there was a pattern to his dating because both his girlfriend and former girlfriend were black, Maher said, "People say I'm into black women. Robert De Niro is into black women. I'm just into women who are real, and they happen to be black."
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This text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
