IF KENNEDY LIVED

From a political commentator and bestselling author comes an extraordinary, thought-provoking look at John F. Kennedy’s presidency—both before and after November 22, 1963.

Greenfield presents his most compelling narrative of all about the historical event that has riveted us for fifty years. What if Kennedy were not killed that fateful day in 1963? What would the 1964 campaign have looked like? Would changes have been made to the ticket? How would a Kennedy second term have approached Vietnam, civil rights, the Cold War? With J. Edgar Hoover as an enemy, would Kennedy’s indiscreet private life finally have become public? Would his health issues have become so severe as to literally cripple his presidency? And what small turns of fate in the days and years before Dallas might have kept him from ever reaching the White House in the first place? The answers Greenfield provides and the scenarios he develops are startlingly realistic, rich in detail, and shocking in their projections—but always deeply, remarkably plausible. This is a tour de force of political history. Jeff Greenfield currently hosts the PBS news show Need to Know and is a columnist for Yahoo! News. From 2007 to 2011, Greenfield was the CBS News senior political correspondent and contributed to The CBS Evening News, The Early Show, CBS News Sunday Morning, and other broadcasts. Prior to that, he was the CNN senior analyst (1998-2007) for all political coverage, as well as reporting on media and culture; a political and media analyst for ABC News (1983-1997); and the media commentator for CBS News (1979-1983). A five-time Emmy Award winner, he has twice been named to TV Guide’s All-Star team as best political commentator and was cited by the Washington Journalism Review as “the best in the business” for his media analysis.
His work has also appeared in The New York Times Magazine, Harper’s, Esquire and Time, where he was a regular columnist, and for the Universal Press Syndicate, where he was a syndicated columnist from 1981 to 1996; and he is the author or co-author of twelve books going back to 1971, most recently Then Everything Changed: Stunning Alternate Histories of American Politics: JFK, RFK, Carter, Ford, Reagan (Putnam, March 2011).
Before becoming a commentator and analyst, Greenfield himself worked in politics as a Senate aide and speechwriter for Senator Robert F. Kennedy (1967-1968); chief speechwriter for New York Mayor John V. Lindsay (1968-1970); and a political consultant for Garth Associates (1970-1976). He lives in New York City.