It's All In The Family

The Kennedy family business is public life, but it's not just politics anymore

Joseph P. Kennedy, founder of the Kennedy clan, wanted badly for his sons to conquer Washington. But he didn't much like the term politics, a word that opened too easily onto whole vistas of abandoned ideals and fishy dealings, something he was sensitive about as a businessman accused of bootlegging and stock manipulations. What Joe preferred was the more sanitary phrase public service. All the same, Joe's main notion of public service was the kind that gets you a seat in Congress and then a desk in the Oval Office. So when it came to choosing their lifework, Kennedy's sons had...

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