Mr. Kemp, thank you for your exemplary life and service to our nation. RIP

a worthy note from an Ace of Spades comment:

Mr. Kemp won his House seat in 1970 because of his celebrity as an all-star quarterback for the Buffalo Bills, twice champions of the American Football League. He often connected his concern for minorities with his respect for his black teammates, especially the linemen who had protected him from pass rushers. Vin Weber, a former congressman from Minnesota and a close friend, said Mr. Kemp would often say, “I can’t help but care about the rights of the people I used to shower with.”
But though Mr. Kemp had not studied a lot at Occidental, he had been making up for it for years. On long team flights, his reading habits — Ayn Rand and William F. Buckley Jr., among others — stood out. The wide receiver Elbert Dubenion recalled in 2009, “He was reading these political books, and we were reading the Katzenjammer Kids.”
While some allies wanted him to seek the Republican nomination himself in 1980, Mr. Kemp supported Mr. Reagan. In 1979 he organized a seminar in Los Angeles to explain the intricacies of his policy (to cut taxes) to Mr. Reagan and his campaign advisers. Mr. Reagan, who thought his own taxes as a movie actor had been too high, seized on the idea as one that would appeal to blue-collar voters.
Mr. Kemp was a founder and president of the A.F.L. Players Association. In January 1965, he supported a boycott of an all-star game in New Orleans by the league’s black players after they had been barred from nightclubs and cabs in the city. Mr. Kemp helped get the game moved to Houston, where the black players participated.
Mr. Kemp’s final turn on the national stage came as Mr. Dole’s vice-presidential candidate in 1996. It was a surprising choice. The two men differed on economic policy: Mr. Dole advocated balanced budgets; Mr. Kemp wanted tax cuts and did not worry about deficits. They also disliked each other. In one exchange, in 1985, Mr. Dole said, “Kemp wants a business deduction for hair spray.” Mr. Kemp retorted: “In a recent fire, Bob Dole’s library burned down. Both books were lost. And he hadn’t even finished coloring one of them.”

An Icon Of America And The Republican Party Has Left The Field.
Godspeed.

Posted by: sickinmass at May 03, 2009 06:27 AM (/i4dU)

maverick muse on May 3, 2009 at 7:50 AM

Through Nov.2008, Jack Kemp was a syndicated columnist. You can read his archive, including a letter to his grandchildren @ Kemp Partners.

maverick muse on May 3, 2009 at 9:11 AM

November 12, 2008

My advice for you all is to understand that unity for our nation doesn’t require uniformity or unanimity; it does require putting the good of our people ahead of what’s good for mere political or personal advantage.

The party of Lincoln, (i.e., the GOP), needs to rethink and revisit its historic roots as a party of emancipation, liberation, civil rights and equality of opportunity for all. On the other hand, the party of Franklin Roosevelt, John Kennedy and now Obama must put forth an agenda that understands that getting American growing again will require both Keynesian and classical incentive-oriented (supply-side) economic ideas. But there’s time for political and economic advice in a later column (or two).

Let me end with an equally great historical irony of this election. Next year, as Obama is sworn in as our 44th president, we will celebrate the 200th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln’s birth. … honoring of Lincoln in many of his speeches reminds us of how vital it is to elevate these ideas and ideals to our nation’s consciousness and inculcate his principles at a time of such great challenges and even greater opportunities. …

President-elect Obama talks of Abraham Lincoln’s view of our nation as an “unfinished work.” Well, isn’t that equally true of all of us? Therefore let all of us strive to help him be a successful president, so as to help make America an even greater nation.

Jack Kemp to his Grandchildren

Absolutely. HOLD OBAMA ACCOUNTABLE for his premise platform on which he won the election. No POTUS is free to dismantle the Constitution, dishonor contractual law, and make America a Marxist nation. Obama swore he wasn’t Marxist and that he wouldn’t take socialist measures if elected. And on his honor, Kemp entrusted a blessing that Obama thugged along with rule of law.

Kemp promised one or two more missives. But Obama broke his pledge to Kemp. STRESS advances illness. In the end, though Jack Kemp was a true friend to all Americans, Obama was no friend of Jack Kemp.

Moral:

Hope for the best but expect the worst from your opponents; be prepared.

Jack Kemp, you were not wrong to be a man of honor and integrity. You were blessing America, hoping against all odds for Obama to actually represent MLK instead of Marx. You proved that the GOP gave Obama every initial opportunity to measure up to his own premise platform. Your testimonial cleanses the GOP of any implication that Republicans did not offer Obama our support to be the President of the United States of America for ALL AMERICANS, not just for Socialists. Obama is NOT your fault, not your responsibility, but his own.

RIP

maverick muse on May 3, 2009 at 9:34 AM

Jack Kemp’s bio from Kemp Partners:

Mr. Kemp is Founder and Chairman of Kemp Partners, a strategic consulting firm which seeks to provide clients with strategic counsel, relationship development, and marketing advice, helping them accomplish business and policy objectives.

Mr. Kemp was named co-chair of the Lincoln Bicentennial Cabinet, a group formed by the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission to support the Commission’s public/private efforts, in May 2007 along with former Congressman William H. Gray. The Commission was established by Congress to plan educational, public and legacy events to mark the 16th president’s 200th birthday in 2009.

In March 2005 Mr. Kemp was asked to co-chair the Council on Foreign Relations’ Russia Task Force. He also served on Speaker Hastert’s Saving America’s Cities Working Group since early 2005.

From January 1993 until July 2004 he was co-director of Empower America, a Washington, D.C.-based public policy and advocacy organization he co-founded with William Bennett and Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick.

In September 2001, Mr. Kemp helped form a new non-partisan, non-profit think tank, the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies to counter the terrorist propaganda efforts. He has also been writing a weekly syndicated column for the Copley News Service nationwide since February of 2000.

Mr. Kemp received the Republican Party’s nomination for Vice President in August of 1996 and since then has campaigned nationally for reform of taxation, Social Security and education.

In 1995, he served as chairman of the National Commission on Economic Growth and Tax Reform, which promoted major reform and simplification of our tax code in order to unleash the American entrepreneurial spirit, increase economic growth and expand access to capital for all people.

Prior to founding Empower America, Jack Kemp served for four years as Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. He was the author of the Enterprise Zones legislation to encourage entrepreneurship and job creation in urban America and continues to advocate the expansion of home ownership among the poor through resident management and ownership of public and subsidized housing.

Before his appointment to the Cabinet, Mr. Kemp represented the Buffalo area and western New York for 18 years in the United States House of Representatives, from 1971-1989. He served for seven years in the Republican leadership as Chairman of the House Republican Conference.

Before his election to Congress in 1970, Mr. Kemp played 13 years as a professional football quarterback. He was captain of the San Diego Chargers from 1960-1962. He was also the captain of the Buffalo Bills, the team he quarterbacked to the American Football League Championship in 1964 and 1965, when he was named the league’s Most Valuable Player. He co-founded the American Football League Players Association and was five times elected its president. In 2006 Mr. Kemp was named as one of the NCAA’s “100 Most Influential Student-Athletes.” He was also recognized by Sporting News as one of the Top 50 Quarterbacks of All Time in 2005.

Mr. Kemp was born and raised in Los Angeles and educated in the LA public schools. He is married to the former Joanne Main of Fillmore, CA. Both are graduates of Occidental College located in Los Angeles, CA. They have four children (Jeffrey, Jennifer, Judith and Jimmy) and seventeen grandchildren. The Kemps reside in Bethesda, Maryland, and have a home in Vail, Colorado.

Mr. Kemp has been a director of Oracle since 1995. Additionally, he has been a key strategic advisor to many corporations and serves on the board for Hawk Corp and Six Flags. He is also an advisory board member of Toyota’s Diversity initiative, Thomas Weisel Partners, a merchant banking firm in San Francisco, and Thayer Capital in Washington.

maverick muse on May 3, 2009 at 10:01 AM