In 1967, then Gov. Ronald Reagan and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy appeared on a trans-Atlantic broadcast with students/Communist plants called “Town Meeting of the World”.
Reagan was on point and clearly well informed. RFK was equivocating and weak.
After the debate, Kennedy told his aide Frank Mankiewicz “Who the f— got me into this… Never, ever again put me on telefision with him. It was impossible.”
This raised the possibility that if Kennedy had not been assassinated, than Reagan would have been elected President in 1968. Nixon was able to get the nomination on the first ballot because of the powerbrokers could guarantee their state’s delegation for only the first ballot. If Kennedy had not been shot, and had gained the Democrat nomination, would have likely frightened those Republican powerbrokers to not even guarantee their state’s delegations on the first ballot out of fear of Nixon losing to another Kennedy. In such a case, they might have very well gone with the one Republican who had proven himself able to verbally b***h slap RFK.
