interesting read about jfk and his money and modern politics

He came with promises about more money for the state but above all he was selling an image - the naval war hero, the glamorous wife, the kids, the homespun family with their little sailing boats.

Earlier politicians have had a "back-story" - log-cabins, Welsh cottages, you name it - but Kennedy was the first to sell his lifestyle.

Kennedy's father Joe, the former (and unfriendly) ambassador to Britain, had made his fortune in steel, movies, whisky, stocks and property.

With an obsession about building his family into a great political dynasty, he had squared many of the key newspaper owners for his son, who in turn was a master at flattering their reporters.

He was ruthless and properly understood the rising power of the advertising companies - the world of Mad Men taking shape at the time.

As JFK later said, his father wanted to know the size of the eventual majority because "there was no way he was paying for a landslide".

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11718369

The Kennedy team dealt with their Catholic problem above all by smearing Humphrey as a draft-dodger. They saturated the state with advertising, money and helpers.

By the end, a stunned Humphrey, who had compared his fight to that of a corner store against a supermarket chain, was reduced to using the few hundred dollars he and his wife had saved for their daughter's education to pay for a final campaign ad.