Joseph P. Kennedy

Joseph Patrick Kennedy (September 6, 1888 – November 18, 1969) was a businessman, investor, and politician of the Old United States and American Havana.

A prominent businessman, whose had investments in real estate and film (co-founding RKO among other thing) and Democratic politician before the Second American Civil War, Kennedy became one of the most influential White exiles and one of the closest men in Douglas MacArthur's circle. Starting as Under Secretary of State under Breckinridge Long, after a purge in 1936, he was promoted to Secretary of the Interior for two years. During his reign, he became infamous for his anti-Semitic remarks and sympathies to the regime of Adolf Hitler, as well as his avowed support for isolationism during the Great Revolutionary War.

Those factors, along with the defection of his eldest son, Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr., to Nazi Germany and later involvement of American Havana in the war against the Axis powers, contributed to the decline of Kennedy's political career and his influence on the Americuban political life. In 1938, he was "reassigned" to serve as Ambassador to the United Kingdom. After Cuba's declaration of war, he was let go even of that (likely because of his attempts to stall British involvement in the war). While exiled from the higher echelons of Cuban society, Kennedy still had enough influence to continue to have some power, especially by cultivating relationships with businessmen and gangsters, much as he did during the 1920's.

With two of his children, Sean Cinnéide and Marós Cinnéide, remaining on the mainland, and his one-time favored son being dead and disgraced in Stalingrad, Kennedy soon pinned his hopes to his next son, Bobby. Kennedy was able to get Bobby a job as the assistant to Vice-President Howard W. Smith in 1952. Undeterred by Smith's purge the next year, and replacement by John Foster Dulles, Kennedy managed Bobby's 1954 campaign for the Senate (representing "The State of Massachusetts in exile), though because he was still mistrusted, Kennedy kept out of public view.

Kennedy's efforts paid off in 1960 when MacArthur appointed Robert as Attorney General. Kennedy also arranged for younger son Teddy to become a Congressmen in 1962, before suffering a stroke later that year.

Despite his incapacitation, he lived to see his efforts pay off in 1963, when MacArthur died, and (partly through his efforts), Robert would succeed him as President. However, he was unable to have influence over Kennedy's presidency (which saw Cuba liberalized) nor could prevent Ted's fall from grace in 1967. Eventually, Kennedy would die from a second stroke in 1969.