On the afternoon of May 4, 1963, President Kennedy wasn't in a mood to mince words.
As he met in the White House with members of a liberal political group, he fumed when one of them mentioned the Associated Press photo splashed above the fold of that day's New York Times. The now-iconic photograph showed a police dog attacking a black teenager in Birmingham, Ala.
"There's no federal law we could pass to do anything about that picture in today's Times. Well, there isn't," Kennedy snapped. "I mean, what law can you pass to do anything about police power in the community of Birmingham? There is nothing we can do."
"This is the only meeting that I know of where you have much more of a give-and-take, and I think he's being terribly honest about what he would like to accomplish, but the reality is he can't do it at the pace that everyone would like," Porter said.
The tape of his meeting with 20 members of Americans for Democratic Action was released by the John F. Kennedy Library and Museum in Boston to coincide with Martin Luther King Day on Monday.
Apologies for butchering AP reporter Theo Emery's article with the copy and paste option.
What got my attention was the line about The President knowing what he would like to accomplish, but knowing he couldn't do it at the pace everyone would like him to do these things. I can't help but relate, albeit it is a stretch.
People want me to do things that I know I am not ready to do for whatever reasons. They are pressuring me to do this or that at a pace and speed they feel is needed. Unfortunately, I'm no JFK. I'm not a man of action.
I don't know, maybe I'm searching for something that really isn't there, but that line did trigger something with me.
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