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The Treatment. Whether with his family, at a casual dinner with friends, or working among his trusted aides, Kennedy has one overwhelming interest that shapes all his actions: politics. By instinct and training, he is a political creature who works 25 hours a day at politics.
Kennedy's front-line political weapon is his own power of political persuasion. He courts Congressmen, inviting them to the White House for intimate social gatherings, calling them on the telephone to hash over old times on the Hill, remembering their birthdays with personal notes, carrying a tiny pad on which to jot down their political problems.
Where Harry Truman delighted in denouncing "special interest" groups, Kennedy tries to win them over. He places great emphasis on the power of the press, and no other U.S. President has granted so many private interviews to journalists of many levels. It goes without saying that organized labor is friendly to Democrat Kennedy, but the President has also gone all-out to relieve big business of its suspicions about his Administration. He has sent his economic advisers all over the country to preach that big business is a respected Administration partner, slipped such business leaders as U.S. Steel Chairman Roger Blough into the White House for long, earnest chats.
Kennedy's persuasive personality has also been turned on foreign dignitaries. The President has received 30 chiefs of state and heads of government since his inauguration, sent most of them away grateful for the treatment they received and impressed by Kennedy's broad knowledge and willingness to listen to their problems. Among his Western Allies, Kennedy gets along splendidly with Britain's Harold Macmillan. Germany's Chancellor Konrad Adenauer recently left the White House declaring: "I've never left this house feeling better." Even France's diffi cult Charles de Gaulle trusts and respects Kennedy — up to a point. From De Gaulle aides after Kennedy's spring trip to Paris came word of a characteristic De Gaulle declaration. In his long lifetime, said De Gaulle, he had met only two real states men: Adenauer and Kennedy. But Adenauer was too old, he said, and Kennedy was too young.
Where persuasion fails, Kennedy is perfectly willing to use power — in his own way. In the early days of his Administration, he realized that he had picked the wrong man for Under Secretary of State. Chester Bowles, who was supposed to be tending to administrative work in the State Department, was instead obsessed with big-think solutions to world problems; beyond that, Bowles committed the ultimate sin of disloyalty by letting it be known, after the fact, that he had been against the Cuba venture all along. Kennedy decided to get Bowles out. He invited Bowles down for a swim in the White House pool. Then the two had lunch while Kennedy explained that he had a new job, outside Washington, in mind for Bowles. Bowles not only refused to bite at Kennedy's bait, but went out and stirred up protests among his cultist liberal following. In the face of a fuss, Jack Kennedy backed away — but anyone