President John F. Kennedy was born this day in 1917- 96 years ago today. It’s hard to believe but JFK has been dead longer than he had lived. He will be forever 46 years old in peoples minds. The other day on television there was an hour show on Arlington National Cemetery and they had a segment on Kennedy and his funeral and burial at Arlington. I have been at Arlington a few dozen times and after the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, the most visited place is JFK’s grave.  Something struck me while watching that show that I hadn’t thought of before. Every time I’ve been at his grave there has been a good sized crowd. If you go to President Taft’s grave at Arlington you will most likely be by yourself. How much longer will this be the case with JFK’s grave? In 50 years when no one alive has a memory of JFK alive-will this still be the case? I go with my 8th graders every year to DC and we always go to Arlington. These kids who were born a few decades after JFK’s assassination are taken with him. They have heard from parents/grandparents about JFK. They mistakenly think JFK was up there with Washington, Lincoln, Roosevelt as one of the greatest of presidents. I have a feeling in 50 years JFK’s grave is still going to be a busy place. It was the way he died. He will always be forever young.

I am not a huge fan of Kennedy but I certainly would take him over some of our recent presidents. He served less than 3 years of his term. I think he would most likely have won re-election. Of course serving 8 years it could have gone either way. Who knows, he was reckless with his women-maybe with 5 more years in office he would have fallen to a sex scandal? If he had lived would we have gotten as deeply involved in Vietnam as we did? If he had lived would we have made it to the moon by 1969? I think his tragic death was the boost the space program needed. Let’s do it for John. Who knows how history would have been different had he lived.